That seems to be the general consensus! Gonna work on magnetizing the base here in a moment, but I figured I'd do a little self-promotion: I've started my own blog so that I can start contributing to Bell of Lost Souls! Come check out Southern Fried Gaming sometime if you all feel so inclined!

One of the noted traits of the Iron Suns is their hgih number of Malcador battle tanks. Though not as powerful, they can be produced, fielded, and maintained in far higher numbers than platforms such as the Macharius and the Baneblade hulls. The narrower frames also allow the Malcadors to more easily slip into breaches, and the Iron Suns will often park them side-by-side to block key points, or simply roll as an armored wall. One their current homeworld-known as "Bastion" to the humans whom believe the Iron Suns to be Imperial Marines-Mortius oversees a facility dedicated almost solely to enhancing and producing Malcadors. Two of the unique patterns encountered on the field are a Chaos equivalent to the Executioner-pattern Leman Russ-albeit much tougher, and able to overcharge it's executioner cannon for a massive blast (in one recorded incident, said cannon suffered a failure and the entire turret "tower" exploded. THe marine crew mostly survived though, and pushed the tank to it's limits until a Vendetta put the crippled machine out of it's misery) and a version that is akin to a Land Raider Redeemer and the Malcador Infernus, opting for three seperate Inferno cannons and a hull-mounted multi-melta as opposed to a single Infernus cannon. Rumors have also surfaced of a Defender which has had it's Heavy Bolters replaced with autocannons, another with no turret weapon but a small capacity for Havocs, a "dual demolisher", an Earthshaker-equipped platform, and a Butcher cannon-turreted variant. Even with this myriad of tank designs which can (and often do) take Imperial defenders by surprise, the "classic" trio of Malcador variants still flourishes in the ranks of the Iron Suns for it's proven durability and reliability.

Base hull, no sponsons, turret, or hull weapon (all of which have been magnetized):


Currently magnetized weapon options:


Plasma variant (Needs a name! Any suggestions?):


Infenro variant (Also in need of a title):


Battle Cannon:

Finally starting to get the hang of my airbrush; LOVING how the Malcador's coming along!

Outstanding work as always Orpheus, I can't wait to see these puppies fully painted!

Regarding names, perhaps you could use a system of a type designation (i.e. Type XY), followed by an Imperial reporting name (to keep with the Imperial Japan theme you're going for)? For reporting names I went with the names of Demons, to come up with;

-Type-62 'Azazel'

-Type-75 'Mammon'

-Type-81 'Belial'

-Type-39 'Beelzebub'

-Type-46 'Leviathan'

-Type-53 'Behemoth'

Pick and choose which ones you think would work (if any), or use the system to invent your own!

After working most of the evening and a ways into the morning, here's where the Malcador and it's Plasma-variant armaments currently stand. I'de decided I'm going to stop doing all my rivets in copper/brass, because otherwise the trim looks flat and lazy. I'm planning on doing the treads in black, dryrbush of dark grey, and then again in gunmetal, and when the painting itself is done, I'm going to add snow to it after seeing the results I pulled off on my friend's Space Wolves Contemptor, so there will be some snow accumulation on the hull and the backs of the tracks, but not on the angine nor the weapons (they're plasma weapons and a lascannon after all!); what do you guys think of that idea?

Okay, so I finished the trim up a bit more and painted all the rivets on the hull silver (THAT was excrutiating!), then I slapped some sealer on it and loaded up my airbrush with some Devlan Mud (with a drop ro two of alcohol added, but MOSTLY wash) and covered the whole model until it started to really pool. I let it sit for a while, then loaded the airbrush with rubbing alcohol and justed hosed it down, and once that was dry I took some cotton swabs dipped in rubbing alcohol and went all over the model, removing most of the wash from unwanted areas. I've also begun basecoating the treads in black, going to give them a good drybrush of dark grey, followed by a random drybrush of gunmetal (as well as painting the "rivets" for the links gunmetal) before giving them a wash in Devland Mud and then Badab Black. Once that's all said and done, I'll start adding details, slap on some snow, and add green glow to the viewports.

Wow, sure has been a while since I've posted anything here...or worked on anything important to my Army List! So, with the almost-certain releases of Tau and/or Chaos around the corner, I've decided to pick my most intact army (Chaos) and enact Operation "Finish That Fething Army"! In all honestly...I've been playing 40k sing right before 5th Edition came out, and the closest thing I ever had to a finished army was my original Purple & Brown Tau army. Well, I'm going to do everything in my power to finish the Iron Suns BEFORE the codex comes out! Though, that may take longer than I'd like now that Warsmith Miniatures put up their "Space Crusader" (AKA True-scale) conversion sets on Pre-order...I'd like to gear up my entire army with those, but that'll take a while concerning the costs! So, for now, I'll settle on the weedy default legs and Chaos Warrior ones when I can afford them.

The first step in Operations FTFA was to finally complete my only incomplete troops choice and my only 25mm-based Heavy Support choices-which, respectively, are a squad of Chaos marines w/ champion, icon, plasmagun, lascannon and a squad of havocs w/ champ, icon, and 4 missile launchers. (Please note that the fellow in grey primer in the Havoc squad photo is a placeholder; the Icon bearer has really bad whit eprimer fuzz and is taking a bath in purple power.)


As you can see, the Chaos Marine squad is far more aggressively posed, the front line ready to take on and repel enemy advances (As they have in the past, and certainly will again in the future!) so that the icon bearer can guide in Obliterator support, the lascannon-wielder providing cover fire against vehicles, large creatures, or any poor sap stupid enough to leave himself exposed.


On the other hand, the Havoc team is more stoicly-posed, firmly-footed warriors ready to crack enemy armor or rain shrapnel upon exposed infantry while their bolter-wielding allies provide cover fire, a small team operating an remote-controlled missile system, allowing them to take cover from any retribution the enemy wishes to try dealing upon them, their Champion brandishing his chainaxe proudly. (If you haven't noticed, Chainaxes are sort of becoming a theme for my champions as status symbols.)


And-...wait a minute, what could THIS be?

Nothing ground-breaking or award-winning, but pretty damned good for a first try if ya ask me!




May mess with them a little more later, but I won't fuss with them too much or I'll lose interest in painting again! Tin Bitz trim coming up, possibly gold as well. Should the rivets be the copper/brass color or silver from now on? I think it may look silly if I alternate between them.

Looking good! I have had a hard time getting a straight line when I try to paint a stripe on my Marine shoulder pads. Any tips?

Foundation paints and a clean brush. but yes, I did the pads in Iyanden Darksun, then the chaos black stripes, then again with Iyanden and Chaos black again to tidy it up. if oyu want them to look straight like...directly looking at them, the lines can curve a bit to fit the shoulderpad's curve better. And someone on papanurgle said to stick with the brass/copper trim, said that the gold might be "eh" since there's already yellow. Should the rivets be brass/copper or silver?

I think making the rivets another color other than silver would make them look a little weird, since they would pop out a lot more than they need to.

Well, now we can see for sure! If they look "meh", I can just go over 'em again in Boltgun or chainmail, depending on where they are.

Here's the Misisle Launcher guy, the one closest to being completed! More basing work and OSL will be done soon no that I found my drybrush (and better pics will come afterwards!).





And when I saw the image of the Stormeagle, I realized something: my conversion I was making was only one gun off! So I swapped the autocannons for multimeltas, and forced myself to finish the lascannons (pending liquid GS work):

"What in the hell's going on, Lieutenant; where's the damned Field Commander?!"

"I don't know, m'lord; all communication's down, we've been hit hard!"

The commissar clenched his teeth, gritting them in frustration. "Orks. HAS to be the damned Orks..." He grumbles under his breath before turning his grizzled stare tot he Lieutenant once more. "If communications are down, then for your sake you had best get them back up!"

"Sir! By your orders!" The Lieutenant salutes with an impossibly straight pose, grabbing his lasgun and helmet as he made a dash outside to see the damage. What he saw though wasn't the work of Orks; it was far too thorough and precise, no vast swathes of craters where the other volleys would've hit. Those engines...those roaring engines...it couldn't be the Eldar. No, there was only someone else it could be-and it was the worst of the evils. The Lieutenant's suspicions were confirmed when he heard another set of four engines coming from the West, and what he saw was something even the greatest Imperial aces would've shuddered at the thought of doing: a Marauder Destroyer, rushing ahead at full throttle, not even six feet off of the ground! "INCOMING!" He barely had time to shout, the deafening sound of autocannons and turbofan engines drowning out all other sound. At the last moment the Marauder noses up hard, seeming to be in slow motion as the Lieutenant saw the open bomb bays. However, the sight of the falling bombs and the whirring of Assault Cannons were the last he heard, the aforementioned guns cutting him down, inadvertently saving him from the carnage of the bombing run. The Marauder was not alone, the droning echo of dozens of the massive engines coming from the West...

Not the best, but a little story for those whom enjoy that kinda thing. After a long drought of inspiration and motivation, the pictures of the Dark Vengeance models came out, and once again the Chaos bug decided to take a good chomp out of me! Making Power Axes and Combi-plamsaguns is all well and good, but I decided it was high-time to get my Marauder Destroyer up to snuff! Now that I have Imperial Armour Aeronautica on my laptop, I need to start re-working the cost of my up-gunned variant here...

'nother bit of fluff from Shiron's early attempts at creating a zombie-like retrovirus using plans found on an ancient xeno artifact. Anyone who knows me knows that I'm a huge fan of Dead Space, and after learning of Dead Space 3 coming out in February and playing 2 again recently, I've decided to try making some new Necromorph conversions! Thanks to my buddy Cody, I have a box of Hormagaunts to pull bits from, so I grabbed a couple of my old attempts and tweaked them a bit:

Well, my order for Dark Vengeance (FINALLY) arrived yesterday, and I nearly tore the box open in excitement; however, the Warp seems to have had it's way with my order! When I opened the box, the sprue with all the unique DA sculpts was missing; in it's place, though, was a second sprue of the unique Chaos sculpts! Nearly twice the Chosen, another Kranon, extras of the Cultist leaders, and another complete Helbrute (minus the base)! A quick call to GW about the missing sprue (I forgot to mention the extra one now that I think about it... ) and it's headed my way; if anyone is interested in the Dark Angels half, shoot me a PM and we can work something out. I play Iron Warriors after all; I have no use for Emo Marines!

Anyways, I assembled the first Helbrute (saving the other for when I get conversion ideas), and I gotta say that the guys who did the Chaos sculpts and how they're cut up are -geniuses-. Finally, a starter set mini that wasn't an insult to my intelligence or skills! If it isn't clear by now, these guys are fun to put together, and go together beautifully-still got mold lines to deal with (though many are hidden by the way the parts are casted) and some liquid green stuff love might be needed here and there, but overall I am -very- impressed! I based and primed the Helbrute as soon as I deemed the liquid GS work "good enough", then loaded some of the new metallic paints (Leadbelcher and ironbreaker) into my airbrush, having the silver coats down in record time. The new paints are MUCH more airbrush-friendly, so I may actually get around to painting that Marauder Destroyer sometime!

Anyways, enough rambling; here's the pretty pictures!

Too tired to think, so I'll let the pictures do the talking.

Your hazard stripes look great. I do think the horns and toe nails would benefit from being a different colour though.

Well, every horn that broke through skin or metal is going to be painted bone, and -possibly- bloodied. What would you recommend for the toenails?

Also, I already received the replacement for my missing sprue; if anyone's still up for the trade or whatever, it's all still available!

I think the bone colour would be cool even on the spines on the front which appear to be extruding through the armour too. I wouldn't go too overboard on the blood. Less is more and what you have now looks good. I even think the spine is a bit overdone. The gore looks better focused on the fist in my opinion. If the whole thing looks like it was dipped in a carcass it just won't look that cool on the table from 3 feet away.

Right, I think I'll give the spine a drybrush or highlight on the parts that stick the furthest out of the blood; trying to make it look like it just ripped open/erupted. And that's my plan for the horns! My only issue I've found is that my latest washes have sort of 'uncovered' a few issues (rings from the purple wash, a couple of small (but hidden) spots I missed), so I'll need to figure out how to sort out those issues. I think a quick dab with rubbing alcohol to bust it up a bit will do the trick...