From PeterB: An Iron Snakes Space Marine [Istvaan V] (75 points)

Greetings all from Istvaan V. For those of you not familiar with this planet, I believe it was the site of one of the early battles in the betrayal of the Warmaster Horus when he betrayed his father the Emperor and turned to Chaos. If you would like to know more, I believe there are a large number of education volumes available from your local Games Workshop under the umbrella title, The Horus Heresy.

For Christmas Mrs B was kind enough to buy me a paint your own, articulated, Primaris Space Marine, from McFarlane Toys. Obviously this wasn't part of my original plan for the painting challenge, but as she gave me the gift Mrs B did wonder how many points it would be worth, due to the fact it is 180mm tall!

Not being a 40K player anymore (I still do own a company of Space Marines, but they just slumber peacefully in their foam trays in storage) I am however a big fan of one Black Library author, Mr Dan Abnett. For those who don't know his work, most of his GW titles are about a chap called Gaunt (think Sharpe in space) or an Inquisitor called Eisenhorn. He has also written Dr Who, 2000AD and even Mr Men, but I digress. Mr Abnett does have one title about an Ultramarine successor chapter called the Iron Snakes, so it was really the only choice for colour scheme. Therefore being another chapter from the Black Library, I believe that qualifies me for the points for visiting this planet.

Ultramarine shown for scale

He is armed with a Hellblaster gun and is technically known as an "artist proof" so is fully articulated and therefore also comes apart to make painting easier.

The undercoating stage

The only issue I really had painting it, was there isn't really any option for a model grip, you just have to hold it to paint it and then wait for parts to dry!

As it did come apart, the shoulder pads were the one part I painted fully before putting back together, which definitely helped with the detail.

The Hellblaster is technically loose, but as his trigger hand isn't really flexible (he isn't Action Man, or GI Joe to those across the Atlantic!) once he has hold of the gun, unless you want paint to start coming off, it is not going anywhere.

It comes with a stand that plugs into either of the feet, but to be honest, it can stand by itself as well.

Finally here it is with a ruler to show scale.

So to the points. Well, I don't know. I am sure of 20 points for the planet. Then 20 points for the Space Marine? I'll leave it to Millsy to decide.

From Millsy:

Crikey, he's massive! I hope you didn't need a second mortgage for the paint Peter. Seriously though, what an absolutely cracking model and what a wonderful job you've done too. The shoulder pads are just spectacular and the smooth finish on his armour can't have been easy with a metallic on something this size either. Well done mate!

As to points? I can't score by height or weight unfortunately or you'd break the Miles' spreadsheet and we can't have him in tears this early in the Challenge. Let's call him 50 points for scale and another 5 for the shoulder pads. Plus the quarant bonus that's 75 points all up.

Amazing. I'm gobsmacked.