Pretty Pictures: The first five for Waaagh! Orkzenhower!

After about a week of mucking around and experimenting, I've completed the first five models for Waaagh! Orkzenhower. The first thing I had to work out what skin colour - my usual Ork skin is a more 'natural' look, starting out with an olive green which would be far too close to the colour of WW2 GI uniforms. The solution was to go with a more traditional, brighter green Ork skin look, but it took a little while to work one out that was distinct from the uniforms. Then I had to work out how to paint the military green of the uniforms... Now that I've worked that out, I should be able to get the next lot out much faster...
Of course, getting decent pics is another problem, and I'm really not completely happy with what I have got.
Anyway, here they are.

I did try to get close ups on all of them, but they all came out rather blurry apart from the two above. I think I'll borrow the school's photo studio and lights next week and try for better.

Modelling For Hppos Ishoo Firty: Orkified Sherman Gunwagon.

No doubt some of you recall Waaagh! Orkzenhower, part of Mad Juzzy the Flutist's Bounty, and my third Ork Army alongside Waaagh Snaggatoof and Waaagh Gruntblasta. It's the Maxmini Green Alliance WW2 US Army Orks one. In the current hobby climate I decided it was probably time to star doing something with them, so I crunched the numbers and realised that I really did not have enough of them. No problem, all they really need is a Battlewagon I thought, I'll just ork-up a Sherman. So one Tamiya M4 Early Production sherman order from Metro Hobbies later (which arrived at 0800 on Sunday - bless AusPost!) I had all I needed. Since Tamiya kits basically fall together and the modifications were not extensive, the project went very quickly and easily. How quickly and easily? Let us consult with certain experts...

You can just about see the texture of the clapboard siding in the top-left corner of the radiator...

This is how far I had gotten by the end of Sunday. You could actually fit the tracks and call it done at this point, but I wanted an open engine compartment, so onwards I plunged.

And there you have it Hippo Fans! This took three days - Sunday, and then a bit of Monday and Tuesday evenings. It's a quick and easy little project and quite effective. The key to making a 1/35 real world tank like this look right for 40K is to replace anything which is not exagerated - the gun was far too small, you'll notice I have not used any of the hand-grips from the kit as they are also too small and spindly. Ultimately, I would like the tank to be a little taller to look a bit more orky - I'm not sure if it's the Tamiya kit's fault, but it does not look as tall as I thought Shermans were... Might just be to do with viewing angles.

Anyway, I should paint up some figs to go with this beast. Until next time!

Mad Juzzy The Flutist's Bounty

Okay, so my year just keeps getting orkier...
Yesterday my esteemed flute-riddled opponent rang me up to say he'd decided he was never going to finish painting his orks, that the idea of painting filled him with no joy, and that his time would be better spent in board gaming with his tiny offspring. Not wishing to see his Orkz go to waste, he said he would give them to me. A few hours later, this lot arrived.

It's not all Orkz. His paints are in there too, as well as a small Basilean army for Kings of War and a small collection of Reaper Bones figures painted by his 8 and 4 year old children. I'll give those back - I don't think they were meant to be in there. Also there's some sort of giant Matrix exo-suit action figure.

Anyway, I went through it and found a few things. Three trukks, a bunch of part painted boyz, most of a stompa, his MaxMini Green Alliance ww2 style orks, and a whole 1st edition army.

Yes.

Really.

I didn't even know he had one - I knew he'd found a 1st ed plastic battlewagon somewhere, but I did not know about the rest of it.

I'm still sorting things out, but I have reached a vital conclussion. I no longer have an ork army. I have three.

Regular readers will know Waaagh! Snaggatoof, the army I have been working on since 8th ed came out. Mad Juzzy's modern plastic stuff will be integrated into this army.

Waaagh! Gruntblasta will be made from the 1st ed stuff from Mad Juzzy, bolstered with some of my own second edition stuff.

Still in their individual zip-lock bags, behold Waaagh! Gruntblasta! There are some things in here I always wanted back when I was playing 2nd ed, some things I have never seen before, and some things which are goofy as heck. It's 1st ed. after all...

Meganobz! They used to be sorta tiny... A few things in this army are on square bases - until 3rd ed the only round bases were the 25mm ones, and the 1st ed. rules didn't care about shape so you saw round, square and even hex bases used.

The rather silly looking old buggy (this was still current when I started 2nd ed, but the current plastic kit came out soon after. One day, GW will release a new one...), a Wartrakk (these were out of production when I was playing, so I never knew what they even looked like back in the day) and warbikes, one of which is in parts. All of these are much smaller than their modern counterparts - they would happily fit on a 40mm round base, although the buggy might just need a 50mm.

Ah, the old Snakebite warlord on cyboar. I desperately wanted this model when I was thirteen... The rest of the army is not overtly snakebite, and cyboars have long since dropped out of existance in the rules, so I'll use him as a warlord on bike.

Another thing I had never seen before - these are multipart 1st edition plastic ork boyz. It's funny, but those boring single pose plastics from 2nd ed were a step backwards, and the excitement generated by 3rd ed with it multi-pose plastics must've seemed odd to older players. These guys are all assembled, some are painted, and a lot are missing arms, but there are plenty of spares. IN fact, 2nd ed metal orks used the same arms and weapons, so I have some spare. There are about 30 of these guys.

All up, the box also contained:

• 1st ed. Dreadnaught
• A kannon
• A bag full of snots - I have not counted them.
• 5 grots
• A shokk attack gun
• A painboy
• A weird boy
• 4 orkz with heavy weapons - lootas or flashgits in modern terms
• 5 Blood bowl gobbos

I ran this through Battlescribe, and got about 1000 points. I will be bolstering this with some of my own stuff from back in the day.

Stormboyz! Ah, the old dayz when Stormboyz were young Orkz who rebelled against Orky norms by becoming very disciplined and polite. And wearing jetpacks,

Bloodaxe Commandoes - Orkz understood the letter 'c' in 2nd ed. My army was a Bloodaxe army, so I also had some blood axed characters like the chap on the left. He was not my general - I think I sold him.

This is my conversion for Kaptain Badrukk. It's a freebooter figure which has had a scratch built power klaw added among other things. 

Mad Juzzy backed the MaxMini Green Alliance kickstarter, and as a result eventually recieved a box full of interesting resin from Poland. These are ww2 US army style orkz, and very cool, but they do not fit the look of my Waaagh! Snaggatoof, so I've decided the logical thing is to paint them up in their own style and make a Bloodaxe army. I will not be painting them in US army olive drab. Bloodaxes know about camoflage, and they understand the shapes used, but they don't get why the stoopid oomies use boring colours. I'm currently thinking of going heavily into blue or purple. I'll have to think about it - I'm not intending to paint these guys for a while.

The contents of the box.

This is a Meganob I think - I wasn't paying too much attention to the kickstarter. Anyway, he'll give you an idea of the quality of these pieces, which is excellent. Everything else is in numerous pieces and I can't really be bothered to blutac anything together. Go check out MaxMini's website.

This is the big thing in the collection - an awesome Vaught F4U Corsair style dakka jet.

 Well, that lot should keep me busy for some time to come. I will also be molding and casting some of my scratch built war trakks soon, along with some bits for making more grot tanks.
And running NAZORK at Coal Creek on Easter Sunday and again at Little Wars.
Anyway, I'm all excited about painting Waaagh! Gruntblasta, so I must away!
So long hippo fans!