It has been a very long time since I posted anything new here, mostly since it has been years since I last played 40K. That may soon be changing.
I am still in China, but Shenzhen has a single gaming shop, about two hours on public transport from where I am working. When I came back to China this time I brought a bunch of fantasy miniatures with me to paint, as something to do. I had not been able to find my marines and my guard army was too big to pack, so I hadn’t brought any 40K models with me.
However, the recent “start collecting” boxed sets changed all that. I think that these boxes are the best thing to happen to 40K in a very long time. Finally, something to encourage people to start the hobby. A boxed set that costs less than the sum of its parts. In fact, some of these boxes cost half as much as their respective parts.
For quite a while I have liked the look of Tau for a long time. I know some players don’t like the anime look, but I like Japanese anime and so the anime look appeals to me. I also like the technology and that the models are not overly adorned with pointless decoration. In recent years the focus of a lot of GW staff was on modelling first and gaming second, producing impressive looking, but expensive and impractical models. The new AoS lines all seem to be along those lines. They are interesting models, but to me they just look silly. new Wulfen are just such models. They look great, but £35 for a 5 man squad in broken armour is a lot for a fairly vulnerable looking squad. They also left me wondering how a bunch of beserker werewolves stuck in the warp found someone to redesign their armour and weapon systems to be so different from the rest of the Space Wolves. The model designers don’t care about why or how. They only care about the “rule of cool”.
The Tau are an army that make sense. Space communists with advanced technology. Drones, guns, battlesuits and alien allies. I was also tempted to convert some of my fantasy lizard men (or should that be Seraphon now) to be alien allies.
The local gaming store, Fat Mantis Games, in the Shekou region of Shenzhen had posted a challenge on a discussion group for the Chinese New Year holiday. The idea was initially to paint one of the new “start collecting…” boxed sets in 24 hours, but due to postal disruptions it instead became, paint a 10 man squad, a HQ and a vehicle in 24 hours.
I had just bought the Tau box a few days earlier and decided that this was the ideal motivation to get started.
The box had a Fire Warrior squad and an Ethereal, but I had three crisis suits, which didn’t really count as a vehicle. I decided to buy a Broadside battlesuit, as it was the only other Tau thing left in the store.
Rather than 24 hours non stop, the challenge was spread over two days, 12 hours a day, from 10.00 until 10.00. Being quite far from the store, I arrived a bit late and the others had already arrived.
There were two Australian friends who had come over from Hong Kong, a Frenchman, a Welshman and the store owner.
The Australians were painting Eldar. One had Eldar and the other had Dark Eldar. Phil, the store owner, was painting some chaos marines. The other two had marines. Salamanders and Blood Angels.
We had to start with everything on sprue, so most of the first day was spent assembling the models. I didn’t bother with the drones, as it was not needed for the challenge, and just put together my infantry and my commander.
The Eldar player has really challenging himself, as his troops and commander were all on jet bikes, which gave him a lot more work to do.
The Salamander player had also given himself a lot to do, by assembling thirty marines and two dreadnoughts. However, he was racing through them, without worrying about mould lines, or adding grenades or any other detail to the figures.They were just very basic marines.
I wanted a Vior’la colour scheme, as the red sun on the white looks very Japanese and fits the anime style of the models. I added sand to the bases before spraying. I sprayed my miniatures black and then sprayed white over the top, leaving a bit of shadow on the bottom, but a nice crisp white on top. I then painted the cloth parts of the uniform black. Already the models were taking shape.
It was then that I realised I had forgotten to add the shoulder pads. I sprayed those while on the sprue and added them. I should have taken more care to smooth the cut mark, where they were separated from the sprue. Once I highlighted the black with grey and added the red markings, they already looked good enough to play.
The models still needed to be pin washed in all the armour cracks and also needed the lenses and painted and more detail on the guns, but I was really happy with the way they were taking shape. To have a break from painting I then started to assemble the Broadside. As Phil had promised to show me how to magnetize the weapons, I didn’t glue the limbs and tried to assemble all the separate pieces before doing any spraying.
During the day a young Chinese boy of 12 was left in the store with us. He had bought another Tau started box and began to assemble them. He stayed there from 12.00 until 9.00, but was the only customer for the whole day other than us.
Phil had been doing some very fancy bases with rivers of blood, that he had prepared beforehand, and so the guys had decided that bases did not need to be done as part of the challenge. I was the only person basing the models with any texture within the 24 hours.
Phil had also offered to use his air brush to base coat spray the models for other players, in return for which he did not have to build a HQ. He was doing a lot of red and green spraying, but I was spraying my models myself.
By the end of the first day most of the miniatures were assembled, although the riders were not on the jet bikes and the Blood Angels player had only put together his infantry.
On the second day I was one of the first to arrive. The Dark Eldar player had decided not to join us, as his asthma was playing up.
With Phils help I was able to drill some holes for magnets and stick the broadside together. The rail gun arm wouldn’t fit well on magnets, although the rocket pod arms did. This is a shame, as I much prefer the look of the rail gun. I had also painted my commander and was also making a start on the pin washing.
Phil sprayed this model for me, starting with grey then spraying white from the top down, to create shadows underneath. I think the effect was quite good. It didn’t really need that much painting after being sprayed.
I decided not to add as much black as the ‘eavy metal images of the Broadside, but added a few metallic bits and some washes. Then added a few grey or black panels and the Broadside was pretty much done. The rest of the day was spent trying to finish things off with as much detail as I could.
It is not very clear in the picture, but the writing on the Ethereal’s robes is meant to say “Colin” in the Tau alphabet.
By the end of 24 hours we had mostly managed to complete the challenge to one extent or other. The Salamanders 10 painted infantry, an officer and two dreadnoughts. They weren’t well painted, but it was still an impressive force.
They were more impressive when the rest of them got sprayed, the following morning.
The Eldar bikes were beautifully painted and had their decals added. The riders still needed more detail to finish them off, but they were certainly at a playable standard and the bikes had given the player a lot more to do.
I didn’t get photos of the finished Chaos force, or of the Blood Angels. The Blood Angels didn’t get a HQ done in time, but the rest were completed to a good standard. My own Tau force were probably the most complete, although not the best painted.
Thus, in 24 hours, I began my new 40K army. The army is already growing, as I have since assembled and painted the drones. I have no doubt that there will be some 40K battles coming in the near future and I will make sure to tell you all about my first experiences of the new rules and the Tau codex when they happen.
Cadian 501st 