From StuartL - No Squirrels were harmed in the making of this movie - Director's Chair - 270 Points

Hi everyone,

Last week I cleared the last stage of the studio, so it is time for my Director's Chair challenge. I emailed our most esteemed Show Lord about my goal for this area and got this response:

 "Now, what do you have in your collection that you’ve been avoiding, or have had all the intentions to getting done, but have not yet grappled with? Let’s see if we can get something like this off your to-do list."

I replied that I had a bunch of Space Marines that I had been meaning to work on, but got distracted chasing Squirrels, so I hadn't touched them. I got no reply back after that, so I am taking the silence as tacit approval of my plan.

For various reasons I have a gajillion* Space Marine for Warhammer 40,000 and Warhammer 30,000, and there is always something that I need to paint. Last summer I rebased a bunch of figures and started sorting and organising them with the plan to get them painted. Ages ago, I bought the Badab War books from Forge World and so I decided to start working on some armies for that conflict, as it mainly involves Space Marines Vs. Space Marines. 

*I counted. 

One of the factions in the Badab War is the Mantis Warriors chapter of Space Marines. Technically they are one of the 'bad guys' in the war, looking to secede from the Imperium, but their story is a little deeper than that. They were goaded into the secession by the real antagonist of the story, Lufgt Huron, Chapter Master of the Astral Claws and a bit of a tyrant. It didn't help that one of the protagonist factions picked a fight with them and forced them into the conflict on Huron's side. But enough waffling about the lore, let's look at some minis.

First up we have a captain to lead the army. I switched out the original head with a Mk.III helmet, obviously a relic of the chapter due to its age.

To take and hold ground, two full tactical squads equipped with a multi-melta and a flamer.

When you need to take the fight to the enemy, you need some assault marines, so here we have ten equipped with jump packs and ten without.

And to help deal with enemy armour, we have a devastator demi-squad with three las-cannons.

As I didn't much fancy hand painting the chapter logo on these models, I managed to find some transfers from a company called The Mighty Brush. Both the chapter logo and the squad markings are from there and they were really, really good. They took a while to come off the backing paper, but were very durable when I messed up sticking them in place, they conformed to the shape of the shoulder pads well and had almost no visible marks when they were done. Top quality decals. Sadly the web-store no longer sells chapter specific transfers, but they do have the squad icons and some other cool looking bits and pieces. I thoroughly recommend them.

All of the models are from Games Workshop, but they are of many different vintages. The model on the left below is from 2004, the one on the right is from 2022. Quality and design has come a long way. Of course, the prices have come a long way too.

And here is a shot of the force in its entirety. 

At some point I am going to have to get some vehicles for these fellows. 

Speaking of vehicles, I have also painted up a Damocles Command Rhino for my Warhammer 30K Ultramarines Legion. It is kind of a pre-requisite for the Ultramarines unique formation in the game, so I will probably need it sooner rather than later. I bought the kit from Forge World years ago and it has sat at the bottom of my box for well over a decade. When the new version of 30K was released, I dusted it off, cleaned it up a bit and stuck on a few 30K specific guns.

Between them, these models have 125 skulls on them, a welcome addition to my total.

The rhino only has one skull (on the side of the radar), how can the Ultramarines live with this shame?

Sadly, I have already scored a Squirrel point for Space Marines, so I get zero Squirrels here, hence the post title.

So for the scoreboard:

46x 28mm minis @5 points = 230 Points.

1x 28mm vehicle @20 points = 20 Points.

Director's Chair @20 points = 20 Points.

Total = 270 Points.

And that means that I have finished all of the different sets, stages and areas in the studio and cleared my points goal for the challenge with a week to spare. Just a few bits and pieces to clear off my painting desk now.

My Side Duels.

Squirrels - 40

Anglo-Saxons, Vikings, Dwarves, Fire Giants, WW2 Polish, Daemons, Viridians, Vasa, Junkers, Turnips, Necrons, Tau, Genestealers, WW2 Japanese, Teutonics, Lizardmen, Gnolls, Arabs, Space Marines, Kung Fu Chinese, Wolf's Dragoons, Merfolk, Fishmen, Fish, Mummies, Greek Myth, Peasants, Desert Terrain, Guild, WW2 Africans, WW2 French, WW2 Germans, WW2 Russians, DKoK, Sengoku Fantasy, Fantasy Zombies, Undead Pirates, Blood Bowl Orcs, AWI British, Modern Zombies

Skullz +126 = 359

Turnips - 115 Points

Lovely submission, sure the Director will be happy. Love the Rhino