2020/2021 Hobby Season Kick Off And To-Do List

 The Big Leagues

As I began to read more and more hobby blogs in the last few years I spotted these badges on a few of my favorite blogs.  They were an enticingly cool way to keep track of hobby progress through the year, but I didn't want to go the typical internet route to steal the badges and start using them with out understanding more about ''hobby season".  Fortunately I had my ear to the proverbial hobby blog street at the right time this year, and the excellent Confessions Of A 40k Addict blog revealed the secrets of inclusion in hobby season I had been seeking.  Read the preceding link for more information on hobby season and follow along after the jump for my personal hobby goals of the 2020-2021 hobby season...

Epic Proportions Seventh Unit Completed

Ultramarines 4th Company Support, 2nd Land Speeder Squadron,  "The Iron Fingertips"

One of my happiest achievements with these tiny speeders was the Roman numeral transfers from one to five to denote each speeder's place in the squadron.

Progress on the Epic Proportions project seems to have slowed down for all participants, and there are rumblings from Dr TV that he may restart/reboot the challenge.  However since I have a massive amount of Epic miniatures left to paint, I have been slowly churning out at least one unit a month as a breather in between other painting projects.  These Land Speeders were a ton of fun to paint and I found myself getting sucked into the tiny details on the models wanting to bring the most out of the classic characterful sculpts.  Plus they are my only Land Speeder squadron in two huge Epic Space Marine armies so I wanted to take my time to make sure I really liked the finished models.  Follow along after the jump to see them from all angles in their tiny resplendent glory ...

Epic Proportions Sixth Unit Completed

Imperial Robot Cohort 

Sadly these four robots were my only completed miniatures for the Epic Proportions challenge in August.  Between the Inquisitional Conclave and the 2nd Edition Army challenge kicking off I did not get much time to work on my Epic forces.  However enough excuses let's talk about tiny war robots...

Finished ... For Real This Time

 The Iron Gauntlet Advances... In A Rearward Direction?

 

I wanted to show off all the squadron markings plus the newly completed command tank but it does look like he ordered an advance and doesn't know the rest of the company decided otherwise.

Epic Proportions Fifth Unit Completed

Ultramarines 4th Land Raider Company "The Iron Gauntlet"

The beauty of massed formations of vehicles I think is one of the strongest hooks for my love of Epic.

To be fair, this unit is 95% completed but since we were leaving on vacation and the month is coming to a close, I'm rushing this post to publishing.  I don't want to miss Dr The Viking's end of month round up for the Epic Proportions challenge since I spent so much time the last three weeks painting all these tiny tanks.  The nine Land Raiders of the the three squadrons that make up the company are fully completed but unfortunately the command Land Raider still needs some highlights and detail work.  There are many more pictures and painting details after the jump...

Look the crafty command tank is intentionally blurring itself to hide the lack of highlights, stealth mode activated :-)

Epic Proportions Fourth Unit Completed

3rd Land Raider Squadron, 3rd Company Support "The Flame's Heat"

This Unit was finished before the end of June but blog posts have been coming slowly as of late now that summer is here and occupying my children all day long is back to being a full time job.  These Land Raiders were painted similar to the first squad I completed with a few minor alterations for head canon narrative reasons.  

Epic Proportions End of June Update

Tank Shock!

Sliding in under the wire this month with two slightly different pictures of the same thing to sum up this month's progress.  I am happy with the two Land Raider Squadrons I completed this month but since I'm painting two armies for this project I did hope to finish more.  There was a need to rush paint a unit for WH40K that took my painting time for half the month so while I started painting the Land Raider company for the Ultramarines I wasn't far enough along to include them here.  Well with the Nova 2020 convention being canceled for the same reasons everything else is being canceled, I should have plenty of time to paint more Epic minis in July since I won't be finishing off an army for the 40K narrative.  Be sure to follow along with all the Epic fun at Dr The Viking's Cowabunga Slice and Dice.

I think I need to watch a few Bob Ross episodes to perfect my fluffy clouds.

Epic Proportions Third Unit Completed

2nd Land Raider Squadron, 1st Company Support "The Drake's Teeth"

The first unit I finished in June was some tank support for the veteran infantry company.

Epic Proportions Second Unit Completed

Salamanders 1st Company "The Firedrakes"

There is something magical about a fully painted Epic company that lets you envision legions of Space Marines going into action.

This unit was technically finished before the end of May, but Real LifeTM has kept me too busy to post the full pictures of the finished product.  As I discussed in the WIP post about the origins of my first painted army, this unit needed some restoration due to their age (28 years old!) and I also added a few details but tried to keep the spirit of the original painter's work. 

Epic Proportions End of May Update

Salamanders Strike Force Assembling...

The Firedrakes with a Vindicator squadron in support.

Not being sure when Dr The Viking will post a monthly round up so I'm putting up a few pictures of what I finished this month.  There will be a more detailed post on the first company when I can take some more pictures to showcase the veteran company in more detail. I was inspired by Dr The Viking's pictures of his in progress Ork army so I deviated from my normal picture approach and tried to highlight the finished units on a painted scenery background.  Future photos of this type need a little more staging so you only see the models and the scenery as background once they're cropped.  There are more pictures after the jump along with a army progress report...

Epic Proportions WIP

Salamanders Slither Forth

If they could muster an entire veteran company, my Salamanders must be a pre-Istvaan V army...

As May marches on, I'm making some progress in my goal to paint/restore somewhere between 500-1000 points each month as part of the Epic Proportions challenge.  I'm going for the low hanging fruit this month and restoring the first GW army of any kind that I ever owned and played games with.  Additionally this story will explain why I have a green space marine army that's not the first legion.

My first exposure to the 40K universe was when I started picking up White Dwarf issues in 8th grade way back in 1990.  However for the first year I was interested in the hobby, it was a solo adventure.  Coming from a small rural town in Pennsylvania I didn't know any one who was even familiar with Games Workshop or Warhammer.   While I had gotten Rogue Trader, RTB01, and other box sets for Christmas that year, other than trying to convince my younger brother to play an overly complicated game that neither one of us could totally understand, my experiences with actual gameplay were only in issues of WD or my imagination.  All that changed one fateful day in 9th grade Geometry class...

Epic Proportions First Unit Completed

4th Vindicator Squadron, Salamanders 1st Company Support 

I can't tell if I lose some resolution when I crop and enlarge the photos, or if the closer view emphasizes how much work I still need to do in controlling my edge highlight lines. It's probably the latter...

My first unit for the Epic Proportions challenge is finished and I'm pretty pleased with the results.  It was also very satisfying to set out to complete a unit and pull it off in just a few hours of painting.  Epic was always the scale where you could feasibly have the units you could never afford in full size when you were a money poor teenager, and now as a more organized adult painter it seems like a quick route to the great feeling you get when a unit is completed. This challenge may be more fun than I originally imagined. There are many more pictures after the jump...

Epic Proportions Army Pitch Update

Mustering for War

This is why I love Epic, outside of a giant game of Armageddon you could never field this many marines and tanks in a game of WH40K.

This blog had 240 hits the other day and considering my daily pageviews are normally measured in the low teens I must assume this has something to do with Dr The Viking posting his project updates on Facebook.  Which leads people to his blog, then to the Epic Proportions page which will lead them ... here.  It's like how the stormtroopers finding the Jawas leads them to murdering Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru, but with 100% less charred step-family bodies posed dramatically outside their farm house.

Epic Proportions Army Pitch

Assembling The Legions...

Not bad for having ridden unused in some boxes through twenty-five years and several moves through a few states...

I am dropping some quick WIP pictures of my Epic sorting and repair work in anticipation of Dr The Viking posting an update on the Epic Army Challenge for month's end.  For the last two weeks I have been sorting tiny miniatures and studying NetEpicGold army cards in order to figure out the best disposition of my forces.  In an ideal world I would be pooling all my space marine epic miniatures into one giant Legion.  However since I'm jumping headfirst into a long discontinued game and planning to play with fan generated rules I have to be pragmatic about how many opponents I am initially going to be able to find.  Especially since we haven't left our house in six weeks and who knows when I'll be back to playing games in person.  For now, I am very fortunate to have a gaming apprentice in my son so I am shaping up this prospective army to be two separate army groups from two different chapters.

Epic Proportions

A Get Back Into The Epic 40,000 Universe Army Challenge

Tiny Space Marines, Attack!!

Hello hallucinatory chums!  Since painting my Dark Angels, plus some scenery, the game board itself, and mechs for our ongoing Battletech campaign were apparently not enough for my hobby butterfly, I have joined in on an Epic Army Painting challenge.  This friendly challenge is being coordinated by the excellent blog, Dr The Vikings Miniatures Games Hell (try saying that five times fast).  If you love Epic 40K in any of it's many incarnations or if you just love tiny miniatures you should head over to his blog and check it out.  There are more pictures after the jump but I will save the long story about my excitement for this project, my long time love of epic, and why these tiny space marines are Salamanders and not Dark Angels for future posts ...