Omnissiah's Skunkworks

 It's been a while since I painted a war engine, the last being a (yet to be named) Fureans Reaver, which I really need to pull my finger out and get weathered and added to the blog. Bad princeps! As this is going to be my twentieth Titan for Titanicus/Legions Imperialis, I want this to be a particularly special one.  I've selected number twenty to be a Warmaster Heavy Battle Titan for Legio Metallica. It's the biggest engine I can include, at time of writing, and a kit I haven't painted before believe it or not. Just not gotten around to doing a Warmaster yet. So, with that in mind, last weekend I retrieved one I built a few weeks back, primed it up and started work on the metal skeleton. I will not be rushing through this one. I mean, it's not like I do anyway as they always involve a significant time investment to paint purely down to size, amount of detail and all that trim! But this one I think I'm going to take my time on and just enjoy the process. There...

A weekend painting tiny tanks and tiny walkers makes for a happy me. And those are exactly my plans. Goal is to get the mandatory units for the Solar armoured formation complete, along with a couple of upgrade detachments. Namely some heavy sentinels and a pair of Valdor tank hunters.  Both of the latter are already on the workbench early doors while I wait for the varnish on the Russ' to dry. I know it's an appropriately blurry 'potato cam' image, but all I wanted to show is the base stage is nothing more than a pre-shade of greys and some blocked in contrast paints for the markings. Oh, and the tracks and exhausts picked out in Model Air armour brown (Thinned Games Workshop Rhinox Hide would be an equally great substitute). Next stage for these is to add some of the metal details, banding, pistons, frames and weapons. For that I have Scale series Victorian Brass and Metal series Exhaust Manifold in mind. Two of my favourite paints for legions. After a couple more stag...

 Exciting surprise reveal from Warhammer Community, not only some of the Dark Mechanicum rules and campaign, but two more Mechanicum tanks. The Krios and Karacnos spotted hiding in plain sight. That was sneaky of them. The Karacnos Assault tank looks an absolute beast! If one looks carefully past the Karacnos, there's another sneaky Krios behind it! Can't tell if it's a different variation, but wouldn't be surprised. The photo gives a good impression how large the Mechanicum tanks are, especially that Karacnos, which looks similar in bulk to that of a legion Spartan. I think my assessment of the base of the Serperos heavy walkers being 60mm making it approximately Knight Porphyrion in scale turned out fairly accurate. Happy days. You can read all the details on Warhammer Community .  The Mechanicum and Dark Mechanicum reveals so far have really got me excited, can't wait to get these on the workbench and into some games. I might be tempted to even paint one of the N...

 As I spent the weekend moving something like ninety post pages from the lostexodite domain to here, I didn't get an awful lot of hobby done, to be fair. That being said, I DID finally settle (I think) on a loyalist Solar Auxilia palette. One that I'm embarrassed to say is kind of inspired by the 'Lord Marshall's Own' grey and green after all. I have tweaked it a little to suit my own tastes. I've also come up with a tank and unit marking scheme I like, having tested it out on a Leman Russ squadron and Baneblade. The general gist is the full coloured turret and numeral identifies the squadron and command tank. The half turret marking and turret numerals indicate 2IC and the other two tanks in the squadron (troop). I've also used the hull marking position to signify command, tank-hunter and infantry support roles. This scheme works especially well with the Leman Russ squadrons. I'm excited to see how I can evolve it for the Malcadors and 'specialist...

  A new home? Yes. End of the old blog? Unfortunately. Why? The honest and simple answer is the slow and steady decline of readership, engagement and the cost for me to keep it going. For the past several years I have personally been funding the hosting, domain registration, software and other costs for 'lost exodite' out of my own pocket to provide a blog that was ad free for readers and responsibly hosted. Those costs have sadly increased to a point where, I'm sorry to say, I cannot justify them given the decline in readership of blogs in general. It's time and money I could spent elsewhere. I've made this the last year for 'The Lost Exodite' domain and hosting. It was a fun distraction messing with code, but it is time to switch back to a free platform like 'Blogspot'.  I will be leaving lost exodite online until the current hosting renews in 2025, at which point it will lapse, along with the domain name. Any content worth saving, or re-posting I...

This week, I have been thinking about the Solar Auxilia. Colours, themes and what list to build. Ironically, coming up with a scheme I like for the Solar Auxilia has been really challenging for me. I really like the Cthonia Headhunters and Lord Marshal's Own schemes, but they are pretty much done to death. So I have been heading down a different road, something that will thematically compliment the Emperor's Children colour wise. That means pairs with, or incorporates purple. As horrifying as that may sound. I like the idea. Hear me out. Up to now, my foray into Legions Imperialis has followed the events of the Siege of Terra. More accurately the 'loyalists' side of the conflict. I've painted Blood Angels, Imperial Fists and more recently White Scars. All forces I'm really happy with and they give me a great base to create lists for games from. I chose the Emperor's Children to be my traitor legion for two reasons; firstly they were on Terra, so it fits the ...

 Similar to the Land Raiders and Rhinos, Spartans are classed as a 'transport' rather than a battle tank or heavy tank. Despite its size as an assault transport, the Spartan can only be selected as either dedicated transport, or form its own transport pool filling one of the formations optional transport slots. With a capacity of (5) per Spartan, 2-3 of them can pretty much carry a maxxed out tactical detachment into battle. Had a lot of fun painting these two, they are a chunky kit with the pair of quad las-cannons or laser destroyers. Decals on the front assault ramps are form the old Forgeworld legion decal sheets. As are the door markings on the lead Spartan. The rest are from the standard sheet that comes with the tank and aircraft kits. I just select the sizes that best fits the miniature. You get four to a box, so I have a few more to add to either other legions. As the Blood Angels I have assembled to date are well supplied with transports, the next set will probably go...

Back when I first started collecting and playing epic, Land Raiders were a chunky white metal kit. I still have a handful in the bits box somewhere, but sadly being woefully out of scale with the new game I shan't be adding any soon to the Imperial Fists. The new plastic kit however is another matter. An absolute gem of a kit that is literally the full scale kit personified at one quarter of the size. At transport(2), same as a Rhino they can only be taken as either dedicated transports, or as an optional transport pool slot. The main benefit over a Rhino being they can transport 'bulky' units, albeit just one. This makes them an expensive transport choice. But, they are Land Raiders, and nothing is more iconic in epic than the Land Raider. So, here we are with an initial four Raiders to draw from during army selection. I've painted these ones for the Imperial Fists as they fit in with the narrative I'm working to, which is Fafnir Rann's Assault Cadre. But could...

 I feel most of the Astartes Vanguard detachments need to be upgraded from their base two units to look effective. The Proteus pattern Land Speeders I painted for the Imperial Fists have been reinforced with the maximum four additional speeders to take the detachment to six. It feels much more like something you would see on the battlefield at this scale. Whereas talons of Dreadnoughts still feels a little weird (hey, it's just me), squadrons of recon speeders, especially the Javelins and Sky Hunters feels right for epic. Basing The main feature of this detachment is the basing. To create some visual interest in the detachment, I included some of the scatter terrain parts from the Civitas Imperialis kit(s). The Speeders were then in turn pinned onto the terrain piece to create the illusion of them skimming across and around battlefield obstacles. Not sure I need to add more to the Imperial Fists, however I don't think these will be the last Land Speeders I do in this scale. I q...

The Predator squadron is a 'detachment' I can use either as part of a larger armoured company, or as an optional detachment in a legion demi-company. Like other detachments, that actually makes it quite a flexible detachment to have in my list. The kit comes with both turret options in full, which is fantastic! They don't need to be magnetised to swap out options, the turrets sit snugly within the turret ring using just compression fitting. I did however add a magnet into the base of each turret purely for storage so I can also magnetise the spare turrets to the transport plate for going to club games and events. I did the same to the Leman Russ, even though those don't come with both turret options in 'full'. Thinking about future possibilities for turret swaps. These were my favourite tank unit I've painted to date for Legions Imperialis. Maybe because I also did this exact same scheme in regular heresy scale, but possibly because they just look incredible...

I decided for the first of two Dire Wolves to return to my original legio and paint it in the colours of the legio Gryphonicus, cognomen "War Griffons". This one is from the new all plastic Dire Wolf kit released for both Titanicus and Legions Imperialis. The base is one of the thinner legions ones, but I have bulked up the terrain using the Civitas Ruins kit, to give the engine something to conceal itself behind. The narrative I want to create is of an 'ambush predator' stalking larger battle class engines with it's titan killing main weapon. All of the main guns are magnetised so I can use the full range of options in games. 3mm x 2mm magnets are situated inside the bottom of the gun elevation pistons, so I can swap out weapons by simply lifting one out and dropping a new one in with a neat click! My approach for the metallics and skeleton sub-frame this time was to dry brush a variety of steels over the black. It really does not matter what paint range you use,...

Drop Pods have been a game changer for my Blood Angels demi-company. But not on their own. After getting a few games under my belt I decided the demi-company was too fragile in its current form and relied far too much on the tanks of the armoured company doing the heavy lifting. Bottom line was by the time the line units got close to any objectives, they were already broken and combat ineffective. My solution was to double the size of both core detachments, assign all the dedicated Rhino transports to the first detachment and equip the second with Drop Pods. As Drop Pods are not a dedicated transport for a demi-company formation, I needed to purchase them in their own transport support detachment. Well, it's not like I had anything else I was planning to use that optional transport support slot on, so it's all good. Assembly and painting The Drop Pod is a straight forward kit to build, 'but' it is fiddly to paint if you plan on having all the doors function as per the d...

The core legion demi-company on its own is a fragile formation with a low break point. Filling the optional detachment slots with reinforcements is by far the best way to give the formation resiliency under fire. My initial add-ons include a Rapier battery and Tarantula sentries. They are an often overlooked selection, but have some really nasty tricks up their sleeve. The Hyperios launchers are infantry (1) and not bulky. This means they can be deployed by Drop Pod or transported in Rhinos. Yes, you heard that right. Deep Striking a battery of automated sentry anti-air can give your opponents flyers an unexpected headache. Even in Rhino's they can be deployed in reserve then 'disembark' at the end of an 18" march order placing the battery well forward of your deployment line. They won't be able to move without the assistance of the transports, but that's not really the point. The Rapiers 'are' bulky, but that still means you could sneakily drop a coupl...

The Legion Tactical Detachment is the only 'Core' detachment currently listed in Legions Imperialis (at the time of writing). So it's a safe bet I'm going to need a few given at least one is mandatory in the demi-company, garrison and aerial formations, two in the case of the former. This should not be a surprise as tactical marines make up the bulk of Astartes forces in the legions. As I already have two detachments in my Blood Angels demi-company, I felt it was time to branch out and start creating them for the Imperial Fists; the second loyalist legion on Terra during the siege of the Emperor's Palace. A legion Tactical Detachment consists of four bases of tactical marines. That's all you need. It's basically the equivalent of a full twenty man tactical blob in 28mm Horus Heresy: Age of Darkness. Led by a command HQ, two of these, plus a single support detachment are required to form into a demi-company. The good news is, all of that is included in the ...