Painbringer

I have finished painting a unit of Bloodcrushers:

I want to paint unit of 5 Flesh Hounds this month - I've already almost finished two of them. Here are some pics:

Almost 9 months after I opened this topic, I wanted to provide a hobby update. My goal for this year was to have fully painted Khorne Daemons army that I can use for both AoS and WH40K, Here are the models that I have painted since the beginning of the year: I've painted this using the approach I've described in the opening post - painting in small sessions few times a week (usually 30 - 60 minutes, with occasional longer sessions). Currently, I am painting unit of Flesh Hounds. After that, I need to paint 10 more Bloodletters, and that's it! However, not all of the things I've painted are shown on the picture. Besides Khorne models, I have also painted: - Chaos Knight Rampager - Daemon Prince (for Warhammer 40K) - Several Stormcast Eternals models (Bastian Carthalos, Lord-Imperatant, Knight Vexillor with Banner of Apotheosis) - Kairos Fateweaver (almost done) My main reason for posting this was to try to motivate people who might be struggling with painting their armies and models. As I already described at the beginning of this topic, I've struggled with this for years (and left many armies for several different games unfinished). However, now, despite work and family taking most of my time, I am (paradoxically) able to paint more models than ever. It's a slow process, but the results just keep piling up - and it's great when you take a look at what you have accomplished after some time

Hell, I don't even play Ironjaws (my friend does) - and I think this type of battletome supplement is great! This is the way to go!

This month, I want to finish painting my Daemon Prince for 40K and paint one unit of Bloodcrushers. The Daemon Prince is mostly done, but there’s a lot of missing/undefined details - here’s the current state: I like the new Daemon Prince model so much that I have three of them Two are WH40K-specific, but the third one has been built with AoS in mind.

These were my first two minis that I bought and painted: There's also a story about these two minis, so here it goes in case that you want to read. I bought these minis (and a few other ones) from a man who was visiting illustration & comic book workshop that I was attending at the time (I think it was 2000 or 2001). That workshop was a magical place where (besides learning how to draw comics), I met a lot of interesting people and learned about many cool games (including Warhammer). So, this person was selling recasts and he mentioned that these miniatures are used in a game called Warhammer (and basically, that's how I found out about the game). He also agreed to show us how the game is played. So, next week he brought a fully painted 6th edition starter set (the one with empire and Orcs) and a bunch of us played a battle on one of the tables in the studio, with artbooks and comics used as hills and obstacles I really liked the game, but at that time, it was very hard to find Warhammer miniatures in Serbia and they were really expensive (and the country was recovering from economic sanctions and bombing campaign, so the whole economic situation was not very good). So, I bought a dozen of recasts - I understood they were not the "real" miniatures, but they were cheap and it was a first step, anyway. At that time I also learned that there was a set of fan-made rules in Serbian, called "Sword & sorcery". These rules were used for playing small skirmish games with just a handful of miniatures (much like Age of Sigmar Skirmish or Warcry rulesets). I managed to find copy of those rules as well and played a few battles with my brother using these miniatures. Some time later, I learned about the "White Dwarf" magazine - also from a guy that visited the studio from time to time. As far as I remember, he was not collecting Warhammer miniatures, but he liked the miniatures in general and he liked the magazine as well. So, I borrowed a few issues from him - one issue every week. I would look at the pictures of miniatures and battlefields for hours and I started reading lore articles, rules articles and painting articles. I carried the WD to school as well, and read it with a firend of mine during the breaks between the classes. By reading painting articles in the magazine, I actually learned the basics of miniature painting. I found a bunch of oil paints that my mother used while she was painting and decided to paint a few miniatures using them. Both of these miniatures on the picture above were painted with oil paints, using some god-awful brushes (and I did not wash the brushes properly, so I destroyed a few of them while painting these Orcs :D). I remember that I tried to make my own washes by diluting paint with water and applying it in the same way as wash (actually, it somewhat worked) and I also used tea and sand as a flock for the base.

Here's another Khorne model I have finished in the past couple of weeks - Skull Cannon:

I have finished my Skull Cannon! I also started painting unit of 3 Bloodcrushers, but I don't think I'll finish them by the end of July.

After reading the core rules and some Indexes, I do not think that AoS should borrow a lot of stuff from 40K10E. Basically, the only things that would be interesting to see are (as many already pointed out) Battleshock and OC stat. Below you can read why I don't think that AoS should look at all at 40K. When it comes to changes, they way Psychic powers are handled now is probably the change I dislike the most. Stripping them away completely and turning them to some kind of weapon or abilities (that just happen, btw) completely killed the identity of all Psykers in the game. For example, Kairos Fateweaver and Lord of Change are not very different from the Bloodthirster now - they all have melee attack, ranged attack, one or two special abilities... And that's it. I'm not saying this won't work, but I really wanted my Kairos to be represented in a different way. The way things turned out - he became some kind of daemonic artillery I really enjoyed picking psychic powers. I believe that there were other ways of simplifying - like reducing the number of powers or not allowing Psykers to choose more than 1, etc. I enjoy spellcasting in AoS as well and would not want to see it turned into what it became in 40K. A lot of the rules changes just look like the changes for the sake of changes. I thought that 9th Edition had a pretty good core rules - the problem started with the amount of rules that armies had in their codices. However, a lot of rules for targeting and cover were logical in 9th - but now, they became very abstract for some unknown reason. Lone operative looks like a completely random rule, as well as strange limitation regarding cover, AP 0 weapons and saves of 3+ or better. Cover rules are also poorly written in my opinion. I really do not understand if different terrain effects, caused by the different terrain types would produce such cognitive load that new players would end up confused. 9th edition handled that pretty good, with terrain traits. Also, I would really like if GW switched to cover imposing a penalty to hit, instead of improving armour save. AoS could benefit from more complex LOS and terrain rules as well - I really think it suffers in that area from the beginning. However, I don't think that importing changes from 40K would fix anything. When it comes to faction rules, Marks of Chaos for CSM are... Horrendous (again, this is just my opinion). This is one more type of change that puts streamlining in front of any unique or interesting ability the model might have. Everything now improves critical hit chance and provides an additional ability - which is nice, but does not work for every model. This was the list of main reasons why I think that AoS doesn't have much to "borrow" from WH40K. Similar set of changes in AoS could potentially result in many armies loosing thier identity and much of the flavour removed. Of course, rules and fluff are not the same, but I believe that there is some middle ground.

I have finished my Bloodthirster of Insensate Rage. This was fun and easy model to paint - you can make it look really good using mainly drybrushing. There's also a pin that goes from the larger pillar to the right leg, because I was afraid that the "flame" that the model stands on will break too easily.

I have finished my Bloodthirster!

I did a lot of work on my Bloodthirster. The base is finished - but there's still work to do on the model (wings, weapon and metallic parts):

And finally, I've finished my Chaos Knight - I know it's not AoS model, but it was one of the models I planned finishing this month.

More pictures of Stormcast models I’ve painted in the last few months:

I started painting my Bloodthirster of Insensate Rage:

I finished painting Skulltaker last night - very cool model, that is fun to paint.

I have finished my Skulltaker last night:

I want to finish my Kairos Fateweaver this month, as well as my Knight Rampager. The Knight is mostly done (there's only base left and a few more details), but there's still a lot work that needs to be done on Kairos. Here are some pics of Kairos' base hat I've done recently:

Annihilator are done, as well as Knight-Vexillor!

Besides working on Knight Rampager and Stormcast Annihilators, I am also doing a partial re-paint of my Skarbrand that I painted back in 2018. I am still satisfied with the paintjob, but I wanted to add more details to the base, add more highlights and touch up axes and armour a bit. There's a few more things I want to address, but I think the model looks much better now: And here it is next to my Bloodletters (I am building Khorne Daemons army):

Wait, what if the picture of the spearman that @Whitefang attached is not related to the Cities of Sigmar, but to "The Old World"? It fits the theme 100%!

My plan for March is to paint Knight Rampager for my Chaos Knights WH40K army and also a unit of Annihilators with Meteoric Grandhammers for AoS. So far, the Knight Rampager takes most of the time (and it's crazy fun to paint):

I have managed to finish first 10 Bloodletters (out of 20). The bases for some of them still need to be done, but I'll finish them during the week.

@Gitzdee thank you! I hoped that people who had similar experience would share their story. As you wrote, making progress in this way raises the level of enjoyment in hobby. The added benefit is improving your painting skills! Also, it’s great that you have colleague that shares your passion for hobby. I am working in a hybrid evironment right now, so I visit office occasionally - but there’s no one interested in Warhammer among my colleagues. They are great people and wouldn’t mind me doing some hobby stuff during breaks (lots of them are gamers), it’s just they have different interests.

Hi everyone, I wanted to start this topic because I think it's something that a lot of hobbyists are struggling with and in the same time I wanted to share my experience as well. I play miniature games for almost 15 years (and some other games as well) - and during that time, I've painted a decent number of miniatures, but I have almost never managed to fully paint a single army. I always got carried away with the "next project", or painted models from different armies in the same time or I bought models much faster than I could paint them. I also was not consistent when it comes to approach to painting. When I started collecting Age of Sigmar in 2016, I changed my approach to painting and collecting - so I finally managed to fully paint my Sylvaneth army (and I am very proud of that). However, as the time passed by, somewhere along the way I ended up - again - with several armies (for both AoS and WH40K) and a lot of models that waited to be built (at least for me it was a lot). However, this time situation was different because my career progressed and my job became more demanding and I also became a father - so when I had some free time, I prioritized something else, not painting. However, all these unpainted and unassembled models really bothered me - because I really like this hobby and I wanted to carry on with it for years to come, but in the same time, all these unfinished models felt like some kind of "mental burden". Sure, over the years I played a lot of games with unpainted models (and that's fine), but I really hated the fact that I was unable to finish what I started. It was also during this period that I realized that I probably have a lot more stuff than I really need. And so, during the last year, I decided to do something about it, because it was really affecting my enjoyment in this hobby. First, I reduced the number of models/armies that I have by selling or giving away some of them. Since I usually play once or twice a month (if I'm lucky) now, there was simply no sense in keeping some of my models. Instead, I focused on armies that I really enjoyed playing and that look cool (and that are also fun to paint). It was not an easy decision to choose armies and models to part with, but in the end I feel much better because of that (and it feels great to have less stuff around). When it comes to assembling models. during 2022 I have managed to accomplish quite a lot working in small batches. I have assembled over 180 models - from small ones like Tzaangors, to large ones like Chaos Knights, Be'Lakor and Kairos Fateweaver. At this point, I have no models left to build - for the first time in a few years. My "pile of shame/potential" (however you want to call it) ceased to exist. I can use these models in my games now. Sometimes, I spent only 15-20 minutes per day assembling the miniatures (for example, a couple of Tzaangors or Bloodletters), and sometimes I had more. But, I was consistent doing this and after a few months, there was no more models to build! I am also very satisfied with my progress when it comes to painting. I have managed to paint full 1000-point Stormcast Eternals army (with some extra models on top of it, totaling over 1500 points of painted Stormcast models). Besides that, I have managed to paint Be'lakor, Lord of Change and C'tan Shard of the Void Dragon and Illuminor Szeras as well. All of this has been accomplished by doing the work in small batches - 30 minutes here, an hour there. I painted usually early in the morning (before work), during my lunch breaks or in the evening, when my child is asleep. During the week, I was able to get 3 - 5 of these small painting sessions (sometimes more, sometimes less). Occasionally, I was able to paint for a few hours, but that was more exception than a rule. And, same as with building models, things just kept going and I was happy because I was able to see the progress. Also, painting miniatures this way forced me to look for different painting techniques (because I wanted to be as effective as possible in a short time interval), so my painting skills also improved! Also, I have greatly reduced the amount of money that I spend on miniatures, by simply delaying the purchases. A lot of purchases that I made in previous years were impulsive; the usual motivation was either hype (after an interesting game or seeing a preview) or stress. Turns out that after a couple of weeks, buying some model or unit did not seem that much interesting. After six months of delaying any new purchases, my wish list was reduced from 10 items to two - and those were the only ones I bought (because after six months, I still felt like those models would be a great addition to my armies). Also, I chose not to expand most of my armies until I actually play some games with the stuff I already have. So, why did I write this? Because I remember topics about people struggling to keep up with their hobby from this forum and from various other websites. Ultimately, this may lead to people just being unhappy about the hobby in general, or deciding to sell/trade/give away everything and do something else. I did not want to do any of these. I know that a lot of hobbyists have families, jobs and other interests - and that is also why I think it was important to share my experience. A lot can be accomplished by being consistent and doing work in small batches. I know this might not work for everyone, but it may help someone who feels the same.