Weekly hobby update

I haven't posted anything here for a while. I'd like to change that — but rather than trying to write big hobby articles regularly, I want to start with something much smaller.

So, here's the first post in a new series: weekly hobby updates.

The idea is simple: each week, I'll post a picture or a short article about whatever hobby-related thing I managed to do. It might be Warhammer, but it could just as easily be a board game, card game, RPG, or something else.

I really believe in small actions accumulating over time. I've seen it work for myself, not only with hobbies but with other things as well. And when you have a family, a demanding job and a dozen other things competing for your attention, I think there's something valuable in simply doing something each week rather than waiting for the perfect opportunity to devote an entire weekend to a hobby. Sometimes you assemble a few minis, sometimes a few units and sometimes you paint something. And you just keep doing it. And hour here, 30 minutes there... in a few months, you might be surprised with what could be achieved. 

This week, I finally decided to start assembling models for my Thousand Sons army.

I love Tzeentch daemons, and I've had a few Thousand Sons units sitting around for quite some time. The funny thing is that none of them had actually been assembled yet.

Well, that's finally changing. I've decided it's time to build the army, starting with the unit of Scarab Occult Terminators. I will probably use this army mostly for Incursion, Combat Patrol and smaller WH40K games in general. I have absolutely no desire to get involved in 2,000-point affairs. 

It might not be much, but that's kind of the point. One small hobby project started (among several others already in progress :D). Let's see where it goes.

Pink Horrors

Over the past few weeks, I have focused on painting my Disciples of Tzeentch models - primarily the daemons, since I can use them both in AoS and TOW games. My plan is to have fully painted Tzeentch army by the end of the year (or be very close to that). I made some pretty good progress and this week I have also managed to finish a unit of Pink Horrors. I was able to find colour scheme that I could replicate quickly, with just the right amount of details. On the pictures below, you can see them on the movement tray I painted as well. 

Brimstone Horrors

Today I have painted a unit of Brimstone Horrors for "Warhammer: The Old World". These little guys were fun and quick paintjob, done within an hour. I just need to buy another pot of Yiriel Yellow, because I did not manage to do the highlights I wanted. I wanted to represent the "Swarm" rule, so I placed two models on each 40x40mm base. With 6 wounds and ward save, thes guys should be pretty annoying on the battlefield. I am also finishing the unit of Pink Horrors, so expect more photos soon! 

Painting Tzaangor Skyfires

Over the weekend, I painted the first of six Tzaangor Skyfires. I consider Tzaangors among my favourite AoS models and together with Kairos Fateweaver and Lord of Change, they are one of the main reasons why I am playing Disciples of Tzeentch. However, they are really tricky to paint. I think GW went a bit too far when it comes to amount of details and different materials/textures on these models. You have skin, cloth, metal, horns, tentacles, feathers, flames... At the same time, while they technically are Beastmen, you really cannot go "quick & dirty" with Tzaangors, like you can with their cousins - that approach won't work here due to model design. This was the main reason why I had my 20 Tzaangors comission painted - I simply didn't want to spend so much time painting all those models. However, I wanted to paint Skyfires and the Shaman myself. 

I tried to strike a balance between doing too much and doing too little. I wanted to paint the model reasonably quick, but I also wanted it to look good and not deviate too much from what I usually do. I have manged to finish it in a few hours (between 4 and 5) and I expect other models to be done in less time (because now I have the colour scheme and approach figured out). I really enjoyed painting this guy and I am very satisfied with the end result. 

Some new models and lots of Daemon Princes

Last week I got some new models - a box of Chaos Warriors and a Daemon Prince. Of course, I assembled the Daemon Prince as soon as I got home :)

I love my Chaos armies - not only because of the way they look, but also because I can easily use them in different games. I can use all of my Khorne and Tzeentch Daemons in any GW system: Age of Sigmar, WH40K, The Old World (not to mention old Warhammer editions as well). I can also use almost all my Slaves to Darkness models when playing AoS, ToW and WHFB. Not only this can save you a lot of money (because you use the same miniatures all the time), but once you paint the models, they are ready for battle regardless of the system you're going to use.

That being said, I think that the best chaos model that GW released in the last few years is the new Daemon Prince. It looks great and can be customized however you want. I love it so much that the one I bought is actually my 4th Daemon Prince! I already have 3 of them (Tzeentch, Khorne and Undivided), but I wanted to make another Tzeentch DP, which will be more suited to fantasy environment (because the one I have is built specifically for 40K). Here you can see the new guy on the pictures below:   

And here are the other princes. First, the Chaos Undivided one, because he is almost fully painted (I still have a few things to finish): 

Now, here's the Khorne Daemon Prince. It is about halfway done (maybe even bit less than that). I wanted it to have blood-red armour with gold trim, but then you have to be careful when painting skin, because you need to differentiate different surfaces that are all painted in different shades of red. This made painting a bit tricky, but I think I've made a good progress so far.

And here's the second Tzeentch Prince, this time built specifically for WH40K. I hope the picture is clear enough; this one is only primed, but the painting will have to wait because I need finish the models I am currently working on first.  

Of course, I will post the pictures of each of these Daemon Princes once finish them. I believe that all of them will be painted by the end of this year. My priority for 2025 is finishing my Disciples of Tzeentch and Chaos Knights armies, so these guys will have to be painted somewhere between lots of  Tzaangor Skyfires and Pink/Blue/Brimstone Horrors. 

Abraxia and some other things

This week, I finally managed to find "Abraxia's Varanspear" set that contains Abraxia and 3 Varanguard. This set was very hard to find - none of the stores where I buy Warhammer miniatures had any in stock (it was out of stock with GW as well). Finally, I found one in a local WH shop. I assembled it yesterday and will assemble the Varanguard in the next few days. Abraxia's model is really beautiful:

Ever since the 2nd edition of "Age of Sigmar", I wanted to play Archaon's elite army - but aside from Archaon and one unit of Varanguard, I have never fully assembled it (main reason is that I've prioritized finishig some other armies over that one). However, it stayed on my "to-do list" all this time and I have never abandoned the idea. As soon as I've seen Abraxia, I knew it's time to finally finish "Swords of Chaos" army. Oh, and let's not forget the fact that in the new edition of Age of Sigmar, "Swords of Chaos" is army of renown, composed only of Archaon. Abraxia and Varanguard (with some awesome rules as well). I really can't wait to finally bring that army to the table - even unpainted (there's already a lot of stuff in the pipeline right now). 

Oh, and here are also some pictures of one of the endless spells for Disciples of Tzeentch (Daemonic Simulacrum):

Kairos Fateweaver

Recently, I have finished painting my Kairos Fateweaver. This paintjob took a while - I was working on this model in many sessions over the course of 6 months (maybe even a bit more than that). I had a very clear idea of what I wanted to achieve and wanted to work slowly and methodically, to get the desired effect. You can see the final result on the pictures below: 

In case that you are wondering about the symbols on his book - that is an actual word written in the runes of the Dark Tongue of Chaos (it translates to "Knowledge"). I have many old rulebooks lying around and I use them often for references. Hordes of Chaos and Beasts of Chaos army books from WHFB 6th edition have a cool section describing the Dark Tongue and Chaos Runes. This was a great opportunity to use those runes on a model. I am very happy about the end result and the model looks absolutely great on the battlefield (especially if you pair it with a Lord of Change). 

Painting Lord of Change - update #3

 Two weeks ago, I have finished painting my Lord of Change. If you read my previous updates, this one took a really long time: I spent around six months working on this model. I really struggled to find some time to paint. First, the problems at work escalated in a way that I did not expect, so I left the company and applied for the new position (because the work started to affecting my physical and mental health, as well as family life in a very negative way). If that wasn't enough, I started the year suffering from one health issue after another (and my family members were affected by some health issues as well) - so all this left me physically exhausted. In the same time, I avoided painting anything else in order to stay focused on Lord of Change, because I really wanted to make this model one of the centrepieces of my army (as you can imagine, this created a bit of a frustration as well :D ).

However, this model is now finished and I am very satisfied with the final results - this is exactly the "look" that I was aiming for. There are some things that (in retrospect) I could probably do a bit different - but I don't see the value in spending even more time only to focus on few details. All in all - I've finally painted it and I since I have more time for painting lately, there are several things I am working on (and finishing!) at the moment, so expect multiple painting-related posts very soon! 

Painting Lord of Change - WIP update #2

I have painted most of my Lord of Change during December and January, but I did not make any progress during the past month or so (mostly due to family obligations and focusing on a new job). However, recently I was able to set aside some time for painting, so I immediately continued working on Lord of Change. I really enjoy working on this model and I am very satisfied with the results so far. 

The picture above shows the last thing I worked on - the Staff of Tzeentch. I wanted to achieve the effect of the staff being materialized from the raw magical power and in the same time, tie the central part of the staff visually to the "flame" that was already painted on top of the staff. Originally, I wanted the staff to be just simple gold with green gems, but soon I realized that it does not look exciting enough if I leave it like that (and it would be a shame, especially on a model like this one). I am glad that I decided to do something different, because this looks way better. 

Here's how the model looks at the moment. It is mostly done, but as you can see, there are still some details I need to work on: claws, hands, gems and ornaments on the wings. I will probably change the Tzeentch sigil on top of the staff a bit. However, these are all fairly small things, so I should be able to finish everything very soon. I am also thinking about adding a few more details to the base - ruins with Brimstone horrors dancing around.

Hopefully, next update will have the pictures of a fully painted model!  

Painting Lord of Change - WIP update

For the past few months, I have been slowly working on my Lord of Change. The progress was very slow: I struggled to find free time, because my job became particularly demanding in the second half of the year (and this severely affected my work-life balance as well). And when I had some free time, I usually had to choose between painting and some other activities (because sometimes you were just too tired for painting, or wanted to spend that time on something else). Anyway, now I am very close to finishing the model and I want to share some pictures: 

 

As you an see, there is still some work left to do - but it mostly comes down to details (dagger and scabbard, claws, gems, etc.). I was a bit worried about some colour combinations, but I am very satisfied with the final result. This guy will be one of the centerpiece models for my Disciples of Tzeentch army, so spending a bit more time working on those models is definitely worth it. I think I'll probably play Guild of Summoners just to see him hit the table more ofetn :D As soon as the model is completely finished, I'll post another update with better pictures. 

Custom hero for the narrative campaign

One of the options that Age of Sigmar 2.0 rules provided, and that I think was really good, was The Anvil of Apotheosis. I really liked the idea of building heroes for narrative games, and since I started collecting Disciples of Tzeentch this year, I decided to build my first custom hero - the loyal servant of the changer of Ways.  

I knew what I wanted - a warrior-mage, armed with a warhammer, riding a steed of Chaos (or some kind of daemonic mount). Since I really like Varanguard models, I used one of them as a base for the conversion. As you can see on the pictures below, the conversion is pretty basic and requires just a small amount of work - all you need to do is to swap the Varanguard head with Tzaangor (or Tzaangor Enlightened) one, and that's it. You might have to do a bit of work in order to make the Tzaangor head fit properly on the rider's torso, but that should be fairly easy.  

 

 

And here's a warscroll I created for this guy - the hero is 200 points (DP), with mount and all additional abilities/upgrades:

 

The good thing is that I can always use this model as a regular Chaos hero on Daemonic Mount and it also fits nicely with my Tzeentch WHFB army (I know, it's not on square base, but rebasing is something that I just don't want to do at this point).

Trying out new colour scheme

Finally, after almost six months, my Tzeentch models arrived! I wanted to start Tzeentch army this year, and purchased several kits back in January, but for some strange reason the order was going back and forth until it finally arrived last week. And I immediately assembled the miniature I was very excited about - Lord of Change:

Since I wanted this army to be my new "pet project" (because Sylvaneth are almost 100% done) I was thinking about the backstory and the characters during the past few months. I will write a blog post about that as well, but for now it is sufficient to say that I wanted them to be the main enemies of my Sylvaneth force in Ghyran. I also wanted the colour scheme to be very bright and vibrant, so I experimented a bit this morning. Here's the result (I used one of the extra parts from Lord of Change set for testing):

 

Here is the paint scheme that I used:

• GW Ahriman Blue as undercoat
• All-over wash of Vallejo Game Colour Blue Wash
• Drybrush with GW Calgar Blue
• Drybrush/edge highlight with GW Blue Horror
• Paint feathers with Vallejo Game Colour Squid Pink
• Apply wash of GW Druchii Violet to feathers
• Highlight with Vallejo Game Colour Squid Pink
• Highlight with GW White Scar
  

I am very satisfied wih this test turned out - and I can't wait to start painting the big guy :)