Wave two rolls and crashes on the beach starting with an awesome homage to Dr. The Viking in the form of a Ogryn with a pizza banner! You can file this under things I never thought I’d say!

Ogryns: The chonkiest of the chonks. I’ve wanted to paint these guys for a long time. Rarely do I prefer 2nd edition 40k models over Rogue Trader models, but these sculpts fit perfectly with RT orks. I wish I had more of them. They were a joy to paint, primarily because of their faces and fun details, and because they’re quite large and more forgiving on my eyesight.

When I assembled them, I mixed the heads and bodies around to make sure I didn’t have 2 of the exact same poses. I stuck to colors found in other parts of my Ork force, and wanted to keep them less uniform in style, so that gave me a chance to mix and match with some bright colors along the lines of my nobs from the previous challenge. I also tried to vary the skin tones amongst them for variety. When they stand next to mega-armour orks, they don’t look as imposing, but next to my older orks they’re as impressive as ever.

From early on in the planning stages of the challenge, I knew that I wanted to add a banner to this ogryn unit. The upraised fist would make the pose holding the flag look more natural and require no difficult converting. I wanted it to be something specifically meant as a “Thank You” to Dr.TheViking for reinvigorating my painting hobby, and I knew it had to be something cowabunga-ish. What could be more TMNT/Cowabunga Challenge than a slice of pizza? My intention was for the pizza slice to look somewhat realistic, since it’s fairly over-the-top anyway, and I figured it would be fun to make it appear as though the toppings were sloughing off the slice if held sideways.

The banner is plasticard, and I cut the edges to make it look like the pepperoni and cheese were sliding down. I drilled a hole in the ogryn’s fist, cut some brass rod to length, then used a lighter to melt the plasticard a little and fold it over the flag’s pole. I used a plastic skull from GW’s box of skulls to cap the end. Painting was pretty straightforward, and I tried to make it look like it had some real depth. Maybe not as good as a real trompe-l’œil, but from a distance it’s pretty cool. When viewed from an angle it looks a bit freaky as the illusion falls apart. I might post additional photos in the Discord or on my blog, because it’s pretty fun to see the brushstrokes up close. So Dr.TV, this one’s for you.

It was good to take a rest from painting last month, it really helped re-invigorate my interest in being creative. I only have 7 models left to paint for the challenge, so hopefully I can get a few fun extras done next month.

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Models and Points:

Ogryns (5) – 235

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More photos of my miniatures can be found on Instagram @pygmyhippo and on my blog https://giantpygmy.com

Wachtmeister: PygmyHippo certainly succeeded in his attempt at making the banner look like a slice of pizza with the peperoni sliding off.  As soon as I opened the file with the picture I thought “hey, that banner looks like a slice of pizza with the pepperoni sliding off!”  I enlarged the picture and read the entry and realized that is exactly what it was.  What an awesome homage to our fearless leader!

For my slice this month I have painted the last of my Armorcast figures, a Tyranid Malefactor. Malefactors act like Tyranid transport vehicles, with the added bonus that they can attack things in close combat and pound them into dust. Of course, models transported by a Malefactor run the risk of dying gruesome deaths, if their transport is destroyed around them. Unlike other vehicles, Tyranid big slugs don’t get access to vehicle cards to try and mitigate this. 

The model itself is a real corker; a fantastic sculpt. To begin with I was unsure of how a Tyranid could be carried by such a creature. Sure they could just cling to the outside, but there are some really nicely detailed gills behind the armour which I imagine could open up to allow bugs to crawl in and out. I had a lot of fun painting all the hidden details, but the shading on the armour itself took so much time, it drove me slightly nuts.

I have only one model left from my original pledge, a Lictor, which I will finish for the final month. I am hoping to paint a couple of bonus miniatures as well, including a special homage to the challenge itself.

Wachtmeister: The Tyranid players continue to roll out the big Armorcast pieces.  Like the rest of the crew M4cr0Dutch pulled out all the stops on this big gribbly.  The colors he selected really pop on a model of this size.  I’m really impressed with the great results he got with such bold colors!   

Total Points: 80

Fifth month is already over and I almost didn’t make it! But here we are. This time I went with a unit of five Seraphim. The colour scheme is basically the same as the squad last month, as well as the profusion of purity seals. The tombstone on the Veteran actually came with the models when I bought them and I liked the idea, so the thing stayed. I had to rush the whole thing, so I fear my paintwork has been sloppier than usual. Again, no bonus because I got distracted by Real Life and several Nurgle daemons. I barely have time to even write!

So, five Seraphim, three with bolt pistols, one with hand flamers and a Veteran superior with Energy sword and plasma pistol: 195 points.

Wachtmeister:  I love the use of the tombstone on the jump pack, it takes the over the top energy of the early artwork and combines it with the 2^nd ed models we know and love.  While Viden said his work was “sloppy” this month I think his minis look terrific, and this challenge is about getting things done, not perfect.  I think perfection is why so many of us have so many unpainted minis, I’m glad he pushed through to get to finished! 

The penultimate month of the challenge brings a veritable horde of Grots following in the wake of the mighty Snakebite warboss Gortslob, Hero of 2nd War for Armageddon (depending on your point of view).  Month 5 has helped me set a personal record for the most models painted in one month of the challenge and that includes all the previous four challenges I participated in as well.  Way back during the first 2nd edition army challenge I only painted 22 models for my Dark Angels over the whole six months of the challenge!  This month, I split all the grots I have accumulated while building the army into two mobs, a 12 strong Goff  mob and a 13 member grot mob.  When combined with Warboss Gortslob on his super cyboar, that is 25 models painted in month five.

This month’s painting was less about a new learned technique and more about accepting a tabletop paint job for the grot mobs.  Although they’re small, the gretchin still had plenty of detail and there was no way to paint them all to the standard I normally would strive for when only painting 5-6 models in a month of the challenge.  Besides just the time management consideration, there is also the sanity of not killing oneself to paint figures that in a game are going to die as soon as someone even points a projectile weapon at them.  However these tiny green apes don’t have to lie forever, they just need to live long enough to catch incoming fire while Ghaz and his Goff boyz move into charge range of the enemy.  

Meanwhile Gortslob will be leading the charge of the boarboyz which I have found to be pretty devastating when I can pull it off.  The boarboyz have a bad save and can easily get shot to pieces, but if you can screen them from enemy fire while getting into position they can trample a unit in close combat when charging.  This month’s grots could be used to screen the boarboyz from fire, but now that I have a hefty Kult of speed I want to experiment with the boarboyz following the charge of the speed kult to lay a sledgehammer of ork and pig destruction on units disrupted by the all the red vehicles and dakka dakka. 

The final month of painting will be for all the marbles, I need to assemble and paint the mighty Goff dread along with a mob of Evil sunz boyz.

Even though the looming end of the challenge means he is in store for an encounter with my mighty Waaaggghh, the steadfast Wachtmeister deserves many thanks for keeping this circus rolling for the 5th (but his first) time.  Good fortune to all the participants, an exciting mix of skarboyz and young unz.  Follow my painting adventures at 1stlegionchronicles.blogspot.com

Warboss Gortslob – Snakebites Warboss mounted on a Cyboar, Flak Armor, Kustom Shoota, Kustom Force Field, Steel Skull         122 points

Wildspittah’s Mob – 12 Goff Gretchin w/ Autoguns              60 points 

Krookslashah’s Mob – 13 Snakebite Gretchin w/ Auto Pistols and Knives                65 points

Wachtmeister:  If I’m going to beat Jon in this challenges battle royale I better hope I can continue my amazing strategy of getting intervening terrain to screen Jon’s screening units so I can shoot at what I really want to.  Although it turns out I’ll want to shoot at everything, so there is that….  Jon did a great job grinding through this months Gretchin!

I was supposed to complete a combat squad this month but I had a hard time sourcing arms and weapons without stripping a bunch.  That proved to be a job to far so I decided to finish the Techmarine and my Predator.  I’ve owned these models for over 25 years so I’m glad to finally have them finished!  The Predator is missing headlights and vents, I’m hoping I can have my buddy print up some replacements to really finish them off, but even if I can’t get them added I’m very happy with getting it finished.  I’m shocked I still have most of the pieces after so much time, and so many trips!

Space Marine Predator with lascannon sponsons 180 points

Techmarine with Servo Arm – 33 points

Mulligans

I hardly find the time or motivation to paint at the moment. It’s a mulligan for me this month.

Cheers,
Hans

I am a bit disappointed in myself that I have to use my mulligan this month, especially since this was supposed to be the easiest entry and I was pretty close to finishing. I only had 3 (!) models in total to paint! I have just been struggling with motivation for the last couple of weeks and time simply got away from me.

I will for sure finish my pledge next month and I thank past me for not eagerly overcommitting with the original promise. Until then!

Vectis’ communication was lost in the warp.  I know he finished a renegade sorcerer but he wasn’t able to get the picture submitted in time.  I look forward to seeing it on this blog next month, along with the rest of his entries!

Sanction Redactus

Apologies, but I’m going to have to withdraw from this iteration of the challenge. I’ve ended up with too many things competing for my time both in and out of work which has just killed my desire to sit down and paint. I’m really sorry about this, but I thought it best to let you know rather than just dropping off the map. I’m looking forward to seeing what all the other entrants have been up to and hopefully when things are a bit more stable for me later in the year I can open this project up again and get some paint on minis. Thanks for taking the time to set this up, I’m just sorry I haven’t been able to do it justice.

Wachtmeister: I enjoyed all of Ratlords work, I hope he finishes this army and shares it with us! 

Month 5 proved to be a high casualty rate with us losing one member to Sanction Redactus and two taking mulligans.  Challenge fatigue has definitely set in, I had to ask for missing data from more people this month than I did the last four combined.  I’m not exception, I ended up only finishing miniatures I had previously started.  I’m hoping those of us still in the fight finish strong, I look forward to seeing you all next month!

-Wachtmeister