miniature painting – Grimmleigh's Lab

The Salt Mines: 40k Space Wolves

Anyone who has followed this blog for a longer period of time knows that I’ve been struggling with Warhammer 40,000 for a while. I’ve been playing off and on since 1989, and I honestly can’t stand the business model. If that game needs to be updated every three years after being in print for close to four decades? You’re doing a shit job.

*He’s mean! He’s beardy! He’s not a dwarf! But he should have a hammer anyway!*

Sadly, most of my friends have a bad case of 40k Fever. It’s pretty much all they want to play, so I can either NOT play games with them and happily plug away on my other projects, or I can put together something that I do like in the lore and grumble about it a lot.

Yeah, I’m a bundle of fun. People line up around the block to play games with me.

Space Wolves have always had a special place in my heart. They don’t care about the Codex Astartes, they look like they can pilot a longboat, and beards are cool. Plus, they have wolves. Wolves are cool.

I’m going to put together a total of 2,000 points for this army, for a game I really don’t like, just because the people I play with are a lot of fun and I don’t want to NOT play games with them!

Still not sure how to keep engaged enough to learn the janky ass rules without lighting it all on fire, though. Sure, One Page Rules has a good alternative, but good luck getting anyone with 40k Fever to break from the GeeDubs greed train. Grumble grumble.

I’ll have some Terminators up soon, and probably a Rhino or two. And some Bloodclaws and a Dreadnaught. That’s still not 2,000 points, but that’s what I own already, so it’ll have to do for now, hahaha!

Miniatures

Konflikt ’47: Axis and US Command

I have to confess an undying love of Weird War X settings, throw some werewolves into the trenches and I’m pretty much hooked. So, surprise to no one anywhere who knows me, I feel in love with Konflikt ’47.

This game is screaming for kitbashing, so the Fireflies, Stahltruppen, and mechs from the starter set might be the only official K47 minis I end up using. Plus, I want a sneering vampire leader for the Axis troops, and that figure does not exist… yet.

The Axis leader is in heavy armor and packing quite a sneer. I painted him up in an urban camo scheme, and will follow that up with his honor guard and additional Stahltruppen units.

For the US commander, I painted him up with the standard color scheme I was planning on using for the rest of the fireflies. These guys are fun, but he’ll probably be the only one I put out with a tactical rock.

What’s next? Axis zombies, some rank and file troops, and more enhanced US troopers. I’ll be using Isaiah Bradley as the leader of the enhanced, because why not? Cap is cool.

Marvel Crisis Protocol

Marvel Crisis Protocol: Medusa

I started reading comics for real when I was about 10 years old, so indulge me as I take you on a trip in the Way Back Machine to my public library in 1980. I would spend hours there every week, since we didn’t have a television, and I would often find the big compendium books of comics and lose myself on a couch for a few hours. One of those books was a big Silver Surfer collection, and there were some cross-overs with The Inhumans, who seem kinda silly to me now, but 10-year-old me loved them. Especially the Jack Kirby stuff.

Why Kirby? By today’s standards, he looks to be a bit of a hack. But if you really look at his work, especially in the ’60s, he was a master of speed and efficiency. Kirby famously had no idea how many circles Thor had on his chest, he just drew what worked for the panel. He also drew over 100 issues of various Marvel titles in 1964… which is insane.

Plus, the dude drew this, and as we all know, everyone wins when a Nazi gets punched…

Kirby’s other big strength was an understanding of what works with four colors. We can learn a ton from the dude as miniature painters! Hulk doesn’t wear purple pants because they were the rage in 1963. He wears them because purple complements green on the color wheel, and we want our subjects to pop. Half the time I pull a blank on a color scheme for a miniature, I’ll just look at old four color comics and find something that works… and it always works.

*Decades after her debut, artists are paying tribute to Kirby by keeping what works, working. Art by the incomparable Terry and Rachel Dodson.*

For the Marvel Crisis Protocol Medusa miniature, I wanted to make sure to honor the original color scheme. Luckily, most everyone since Kirby has stuck to the purple costume. It looks great with the red hair, and really draws the eye straight to the miniature!

I have to give huge props to Atomic Mass Games for this Medusa sculpt. My wife hardly ever comments on the minis on my workbench, but the second she saw Medusa, she was suddenly paying a lot of attention. In thirty years together, she’s patiently endured my hobby, but actual interest in a figure has been rare!

Looking back at the Dodson art, though, I’m debating going back in and doing the mask, gloves and boots in black. Regardless, this is a fantastic take on a classic character from Atomic Mass Games!

Workbench

Paint What You Got Challenge

While perusing through some posts from Argent Badger’s inspiring blog I stumbled across Dave’s excellent Wargamesculptor’s blog, and his annual “Paint What You Got Challenge“. It runs from the end of December through the end of February each year, and it’s exactly what it says on the tin; a challenge to paint what you have started or just sitting in your collection.

*Rasputina crew for Malifaux, painted in 2021*

I’m not going to even try to hide my enthusiasm. I have WAY too much stuff, and every time I look at the news I somehow end up feeling bad and buying MORE stuff. So, I probably need to cut back on the news and hide my debit card while I’m at it.

I’ve decided to take Dave’s idea and just run with it. So, from this post forward, I’m painting what I’ve got. I won’t be buying anything new, and barring gifts or something out of my control like that, everything you see posted from here on out will be stuff that’s just been sitting and waiting for some love.

Big thanks to Dave for the inspiration, and to Argent Badger and Kuribo for the great blogs!

Star Wars Shatterpoint, Workbench

Star Wars: Shatterpoint- Lord Maul

I have such a love/hate/love relationship with Atomic Mass Games‘ Star Wars miniature offerings. Legion hit in the mid two-thousand-teens and I loved the idea, but couldn’t stand the soft plastic miniatures. Then, Shatterpoint took the lead in the early 2020’s with some really dynamic sculpts and a fun game system.

But damn, buying the same characters again wasn’t something I wanted to do. Those soft plastics for Legion made my initial plunge into Shatterpoint an easy one, but then Legion ended up with some pretty good hard plastic sculpts as well.

Now it’s coming down to scale preference. At 35mm, Legion is already pushing the envelope of how big I want to get with a miniature. The 40mm figures for Shatterpoint look amazing, but with bases even bigger than Marvel Crisis Protocol, they get challenging to store, let alone display.

So, once again, I find myself debating going to one game at the exclusion of the other. Sure, I could keep both, but again, space is an issue. And Shatterpoint doesn’t have vehicles! AGH!

Still, Lord Maul for Shatterpoint was a blast to paint. He’s got those freaky spider mech legs from Clone Wars, and the larger minis really are fun to slap paint on.

Decisions, decisions.

Marvel Crisis Protocol, Workbench

MCP: Shadowcat

My introduction to The Uncanny X-Men was Rom Spaceknight #18, a cover with the coolest looking characters I had ever seen, teamed up with a FREAKING SPACE KNIGHT, not yet knowing that the cover had been drawn by the legendary Frank Miller. I was eleven years old, and doomed to love the X-Men from that point forward.

One of the coolest aspects of comics browsing in the early ’80s was that just about every grocery store had a spinner rack or some shelves with their comics on display, and that meant whatever hadn’t sold was pretty much still there. So, even thought the issue was a couple of months older, I was able to pick X-Men 139 up with a fortunate donation of half a buck from my mom.

This was also my introduction to John Byrne, an absolute legend in his own right. But right there, front and center, was Kitty Pryde, freshly minted X-Men rookie. She wasn’t Bucky or Robin, mere sidekicks (at the time) to title characters. She was the real deal, just training to get there. She was also about my age (sure, 13, but what’s a few years?). She was my favorite character, and pretty soon, Fifty cents a month was being saved up to follow along.

Fast forward some decades, and I’m still an X-Men fan. I don’t pick up the first-run titles, since $5 a pop is just more that I can afford, especially with an already expensive miniature hobby and Marvel cranking out half a dozen X Books a month. But I still pick up the trades where I can, and I’m still hooked.

Marvel Crisis Protocol released Kitty a bit back, and the miniature is fantastic. I wasn’t a fan of the phasing effect always being “on” with the sculpt, but these little figs are a work of art and it just works for me now that she’s painted up.

I’m hoping against hope that her “Captain Kitty” costume makes an appearance, I loved the Krakoa storyline and would really like to see new costumes! Still, this is a home run from Atomic Mass Games.

Star Wars Shatterpoint, Workbench

Star Wars: Shatterpoint- Zeb Orrelios

I’m a pretty content Star Wars fan. I think I grew up with enough hit-or-miss Star Trek that I can allow myself to enjoy a less than perfect visit to that Galaxy far, far, away, and I’ve only really loathed one of the movies. So I found myself pretty excited to get my hands on the Ghost Crew for Star Wars: Shatterpoint!

I’ve already painted Hera, who was a bit challenging because her leu pattern is pretty distinct. Still, she turned out pretty well and I’m happy with the paint job.

Zeb is a lot more straight forward, with a little bit of striping on his legs and arms. I had some fun using fluorescent yellow for his eyes.

It’s also a bit of fun painting this crew because you can either go more muted to match a live action feel, or vibrant for a cartoony look. I went somewhere in between, but that’s what I’ve been aiming for with my Shatterpoint minis from the beginning!

I should be taking on Sabine next, I hope Atomic Mass Games revisits some of these characters with the older versions from Ahsoka!

Marvel Crisis Protocol, Miniatures, monsters, Workbench

MCP: The Abomination!

As I continue to mend, my stamina is picking up a little and I’m able to paint a little more! Just finished up Emil Blonsky, AKA The Abomination! He’s a delicious figure for sure!

He’s also positively huge, easily twice the size of the Hulk and close to Hulkbuster in stature. Very cool!

I’m still trying to figure out if I want to put him in a Hydra group or a Criminal Syndicate group, the big factor here being which group I’m going to get rid of. The syndicate has some cool models, but the Hydra group has a ton of Jack Kirby coolness that I love. On the other hand, Nazis. I hate those guys.

After assessing my overall storage capacity and several near death experiences over the last few years, I’m leaning heavily towards narrowing the collection down to one or two affiliations. The collector in me is shrieking like a gibbon at the moment, but I really don’t want to leave a ton of minis behind if something does actually catch up to me! That might sound a little morbid, but we all go sometime, and I would like to leave as little of my hobby behind to clean up as possible!

Enough of the maudlin, I’m hankering for some 15mm action!

Marvel Crisis Protocol, Miniatures, Workbench

MCP Proxy: Rogue

Here’s another proxy job for my 40mm miniature collection, it’s funny how much energy I spend trying to find that “goldilocks” scale! Rogue in classic MCP suffers from Jim Lee design syndrome, and again… I’m not knocking Jim Lee’s design, I would just like to acknowledge that she’s had other, really cool costumes!

Luckily, I had extra bases from other MCP figs, so I swiped an engine piece from a Necromunda model for her to perch on, and she looks pretty cool!

This is probably my favorite Rogue costume ever, so kudos to the folks who put in the work on it!

I am currently working out some fantasy prints in this scale, as I’m realizing that there are some benefits to working large like this. I love the challenge of painting 15mm scale minis, and you can’t beat the storage options, but 40mm has it’s charms as well! I’ll explore them more in depth in an upcoming post!

Marvel Crisis Protocol, Miniatures

MCP: Captain America (Earth’s Mightiest Box Set Edition)

This was the first mini I popped out of the Earth’s Mightiest Box Set from Marvel Crisis Protocol, and I managed to get him painted up in less than 24 hours, so I’ll be crossing off another box on my hobby bingo card today…

I really, unabashedly love what Captain America stands for, even if that sometimes doesn’t pair up with what the country is actually doing at the moment. I’m trying to look past the nationalism and at the actual symbolism of what the character can stand for: Our better angels, doing what is right for everyone. Protecting everyone, not just the people that like you. Not being distracted or divided. That’s kinda cool, even if I don’t see that much of anywhere anymore.

The sculpt on the figure is really good, probably the second best Cap model in the line. Definitely the best Steve Rogers Cap. I’ll be posting the best Cap sculpt when a certain movie comes out next month!

Let’s take a look at that bingo card!