Brother Silas - Heavenblade Standard Bearer

Brother Silas is the standard bearer of the First Sword of the Blade Saints Chapter: the Heavenblade. The men of this Sword (as companies are known in the Chapter) are grouped into 5 man teams called “Scythes”, and each one strides onto the battlefield clad in revered suits of Terminator Armor. The brothers of the Heavenblade represent the veterans, the heroes, and the legend of the Company. But of these heroes, Silas and his fellow Brothers of the Heavenblade Command Scythe represent their highest aspirations; beside their Lord Malthius they are Sovereigns of Combat, the Archons of Battle.



The Heavenblade banner depicts an unnamed Angel in a moment of exhaustion from the eternal battle for humanity’s salvation. The sword presented by the Angel is said to be the spiritual weapon taken up by the brothers of the Heavenblade as they fight when all others would rest. The words “Acies Caelum” comes from the Old Earth Latin; Caelum to mean ‘sky’ or ‘heaven’ and Acies holding many meanings such as ‘keenness’, ‘edge’, ‘sharpness’, ‘battle-line’ or ‘battlefield’. Every word appropriate to the intent.

Hope that bit of fluff was not too over-the-top.. but now I just want to ensure that proper.. well, props... I guess, is given to the source of the inspiration for the Banner. The general aesthetic I took from Ron's Banner Tutorial over at From the Warp. A great resource, make sure you check it out. I really liked that Ron's Banners were stylized and graphically strong designs rather than attempts to do real life portraits. You'll see his Helbrecht banner influencing the overall feel of my own. For the Angel, I took my starting point from an awesome collection at this site http://art.thehomeofjon.net/ specifically this one from his collection of Battle Angel pieces. Fantastic work, really! Make sure to check it out.

Anyways, this wasn't the how-to-do banners post. Not sure if there's any merit on going deep into it; I took the templates from Ron's Tutorial, freehanded the initial design and then scanned it, colored, cleaned it on Paint. and printed onto DIY Decal paper as per BOLS' Custom Decal Tutorial. As you can see I am a master at taking other's hard work and making it pay off for me :) but at least I try to give credit where it's due. :D

As always, thanks for stopping by, and hope you enjoyed the visit.

Blade Saint Color Scheme on Test Marine

This is the final color scheme on the Blade Saints chapter. As I mentioned in my first post, they are a Dark Angels successor chapter and, being that, I wanted them to line up more closely with the pre-heresy all black armor rather than the green of post heresy Dark Angels.



This is actually my second pass at this color scheme. In fact, I was almost done (80%) through a 1500pt army before I made the hard decision to change it. In the end it was because I was satisfied but not 100% happy with my first cut. Below is an example of the first scheme.



My method of painting is all about multiple washes and I had original used Badab Black to work up the shadows and in the end I felt it made them a little too muddy. Let me explain… Most shadows are never completely made up of blacks and grays, it contains tints and hints of the color that the object actually is. That being said, what color are the shadows and highlights on black objects? Well I don’t know the scientific color theory answer to that (so you science and art majors leave me alone :) but for my tastes, it depends on whether you’re trying for warm or cold feel to the piece. In the end I found a shade of wash that pleased me and gave me the results I wanted and not just making the model darker. That blend ended up being a 3:1 mix of Thraka Green and Leviathan Purple. And that’s how black armor ended up looking like it’s built up with highlighted blue rather than gray. The next pic just shows the 2 side-by-side.



So I’m moving forward with re-painting my Blade Saints army, wish me luck.

Keep coming by to see if I end up changing my mind again in the late period of getting it done. I already have a bad feeling about this… I used to tinker with airbrush art in high school and the citadel spray gun is giving me bad ideas. But maybe I’ll be able to control my compulsions until I’m working on my son’s Fallen army. Thanks for looking in. Come back soon for a more detailed outline of my “cheater” way of painting armor.

FtW November Challenge Plug

I’ve recently linked up with the FtW Blogger Group and I’m REALLY looking forward to being a part of the community and (hopefully) making a contribution to it. The FtW Blogger Group will not only like each participating blog together but will also initiate activities that members will participate in:

“A weekly Round Table discussion where you can throw your 2 cents in with the thoughts of the FtW bloggers on a different 40k topic each week. Each weekend, a new topic will be put up for everyone to comment on and see what others are thinking. From tactics to tips and everything in between, each week will be something new.

In addition to the weekly Round Table discussions, each month the FtW bloggers will be given a challenge. As a reader, you'll be able to follow along here and on their individual blogs and then see the results when it's all done. From contests, to downloads to step by step articles, you'll benefit from all of it and seeing what the guys come up with.”

So this month’s Challenge and this week’s round table feel to me fairly over my head as a newly returning player; the round table is to discuss any pre-game routines. The Challenge is to create your own 40k scenario. As previously mentioned, I am definitely out of depth on the scenario creation as I haven’t played any of the 3 x 3 combinations more than 3 times each.

That said I am very much looking forward to the output of this group because – from the inside looking out – it is a great collection of collaborative minds. I’ll put in my two cents into the Round Table though, but I know it’s a function of my lack of familiarity with the rules... That said I’ve committed myself to doing my best to contribute to the group and not just be dead weight.

So, thanks for dropping by, come back soon for my description of my own brand of pre-game strangeness.

Malthius to Lead Them

A quick follow-up to my intro of the Blade Saints Chapter.

My son, after a few weeks on me collecting up sets for my DA's, naturally wanted to get in on the act. We've played a few games by then, and we've thrown ideas around about the DA's Fallen background to when he says he wants to start a Chaos Space Marine army of Fallen I have only one response. Cool!

Cause let's face it, I'm building my force with the eye towards being able to play both sides of the fence. They're Fallen, they're not, they're schizophrenic :)

So now my son wants an actual Chaos Force, and so conveniently wants the paint scheme to be very close to my own. Once again I say... Cool.

This a whole lot of preamble to me saying that the first model we built for his force is a Termi Lord and WOW!! The plastic model is pure badness!! And seeing it spawned my current Belial stand-in using bits from the Termi Lord, the standard Termi sprue, the DA veterans Sprue and the Ravenwing Bikers sprue.

This is Malthius, Master of the Blade Saints 1st Company, the Heavenblade. In the years that I've been in and out of the hobby I've never seriously tried my hand at the conversion and Painting. So this is my second real attempt at making a Belial-equivalent character.

(Click on each image for a larger pic)







Comments are welcome, thanks for dropping by.

Saints and Swords

First Post!

A bit about me: I'm in my 30's and have a 10 year-old son that, 2 years ago, first got interested in 40k. I've had my hand in 40k since the first Rogue Trader edition (while in high school) but I dropped the hobby due to not having a consistent pool of gamers. So 2 years ago, Battle for Macragge came out and my son pushed (didn't have to push much) to try it. We bought the set and he promptly lost interest :)

Fast forward a couple more years and 5th Ed is out, I make my regular visit to the GW shop in the local mall - I've never stopped picking up the occasional White Dwarf - and my son gets roped into another intro game. Aside from (IMO) the improved rules, I was really impressed by the quality of the Blackreach set so... I decided to get back into the hobby for myself. Starting with the Blackreach set but quickly getting pulled in neck-deep.

So, I've always been about the coolness of a thing... the wickedness, the sickne.. that doesn't work.

Lets apply that to this hobby, I'm more about the coolness of the army rather than the winningness (made that word up) of it. Which brings me to my army selection. Dark Angels of course. The sinister, brooding, perpetually grumpy group in robes. yep, cool to begin with but again I need to be a little bit different. From the start, I've had it in my head that these guys will be just a bit more baddass than DA.. except I haven't yet decided how that'll manifest. I'm happy for now to start with a DA as a successor that stuck more to the pre-heresy black for its paint scheme. And they would use swords/edged weapons as a big influence in their iconography and culture (i know, THAT is not very original, but still cool).

Kensei is a japanese term denoting legendary skill in swordsmanship (but also sometimes in empty hand). Translated, it tracks roughly to "Sword Saint" A very cool concept, and one that I wanted to carry over to my chapter. And so as a start the chapter name "Blade Saints". So coming up, I'll post my follow through on what I hope is a kick-butt chapter.

Thanks for dropping by, hope you enjoy what comes next.