From DavidB: Merry (belated) Christmas! (38 Points)

It is a grand thing to be back at the table for this AHPC IX! Don't mind the picture above, I had the Crimson Fists above and more on my desk till very recent. All the finished models are now back in the Sabol case. I had an October order from shapeway for Marine shoulder insignia which rejuvenated my desire to complete the iconic Crimson Fists. I began them in 2009-2010 and came back from Afghanistan with full intention of completing them. Unfortunately, the decals had peeled or fallen off most of the troops. Thanks to shapeway and modern computer science, I was able to fix all the above models and in my excitement, I repainted them in my new style. They were a nightshade blue dry brushed with hawk turquoise, but now they sport a multilayer blue with edge highlights blended with a dark blue wash. I looked for inspiration for another technique, but my google foo only found aqua metallic fists, and pages by our own GregB from the painting challenge and my own!....Greg, we apparently are the only fans of dark blue marines with a heavy scout presence.

The shapeway icons glued easily over the shoulder pads(even ones painted or with remnant decals)

I would include the 11 marines painted since last Friday, but I honestly don't know which assault marines with those striking yellow and black chainswords were the ones that were unpainted till now. The blue formula I use with every P3 blue paint works equally well over white or black undercoats. 

I'll just focus on the Lamenter Marine standing next to the other copy of Veteran exclusive and my used to be favourite all time marine model.

That is a hand painted insignia, and the wrinkled decal of the old favourite Chaplin just wrecks that paint job.

The lamenter was primed black and has a head swap from a deathwatch sprue. I used Iyanden darksun yellow as a base and used P3 cygnar yellow and rucksack tan to lighten it up. a watered down wash of Agrax earthshade shaded the crevices and a final highlight of cygnar yellow mixed with white finished the yellow armor.

lamenters use black and white checker board for heraldry and I included that on a knee pad. the other pad was painted red.

He is a one man army with the bolt gun, bolt pistol and thunder hammer. He will be an ally for an Inquisitor in Inquisi-mundia. I have no plans to paint a yellow army and also 60 odd icons!

The Iron Snakes benefited from shapeway icons also. They are from the basic(BASIC) box of $40 which gave me a small booklet of 8th edition 40k. These fellows are the new true scale marines which seem to be replacing the old Astartes forces. The marines not including Primaris marines seem to be getting weaker in the new rules. Terminators just don't have the same staying power and the rest just struggle.

I was going to paint them as Crimson Fists, but I like my Company of blue bloods filled with scouts. I thought maybe Raven guard or Doom Eagles, but I already have deathwatch for black marines. White scars were an option, but Id rather have an army of bikers for white scars.

Dan Abnett wrote about the Iron snakes and they are a mix of Inuit and Greek for background. Plain unpainted armor except for the white shoulder pads trimmed red with blue used for the chapter insignia and squad designators.

That appealed to me, so all future Primaris marines will be Iron Snakes for me

I used every grey available from the P3 line and used a wash of Nuln oil to tie them together. This was an important step as I used the cold greys to paint the darker shaded areas and used the warm greys to color the places that would be hit by light.

The Reviers are the new assault marines and have skull masks

I used green for the optics and helmet lenses

So here are my first seven models for the challenge. There will be a few more groups like this as I have always liked skirmish games and GW has really nailed it with Kill-team. The Primaris marines are my first official kill team squad. I could always use the 40k models iI have painted already, but what fun is that?! my wife would think I'm absolutely sick if I don't have a wish list for new models as well as piles of plastic and metal lying about.

I have just finished drooling over the AD-Mech forces I just got for Christmas. The codex, the starter box and a box of Sicarian Rust stalkers. They won't feature this year, but I'll have plenty of time to figure out a kill team and colors for another time!

I have to see if this fellow is wanting back inside now. His coat only holds two gallons of December rain, he might be ready to get dried off now! ;)

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Welcome back to the fold David! It's great to see that your passion for 40K has not diminished a bit since last spring, awesome.

Terrific work here, sir. These guys look as hard as nails and I especially like that Imperial Fist dude with the warhammer. That is an awesome figure and paintjob. I like the Shapeways 3D modificationss you've done as well - they really make the models a bit more bespoke.

We've been enjoying Kill Team with our group as well, with me running a Grey Knight contingent which has miraculously not lost a model in around eight games. We play in 4 player teams which allows me to use other players' forces as ablative armour. ;P (Which of course can only mean that my boyz will be wiped out to a man in the next match.)

I look forward to seeing what else you come up with for this edition of the Challenge, David. 

Finally, I love the last pic of your hound! It could just be me, but I think he looks ready to come in...

38 point for you, sir, with a few extra added for the mods and hand-panted livery. Awesome!