Phantine Skyborne: Another Command squad done!

"Green Light! Go Go GO!" -  Major Erwan Grec    44th Phantine Skyborne

Its been a while since I posted and for that I do apologize.  At the current moment Ive gotten a new job that has taken a lot of my time away from painting. This new job however, was my dream job and so Im happy for it.

These models were done over the summer in July. This Phantine Command squad is most likely the last Infantry im going to buy for the Phantine for a while. This is mostly do to running out of room in my case for more Phantine Infantry and also being happy with the amount I have.

This squad was done up just like the others. I needed them to complete my case of Phantine Skyborne and had planned to add them back in 7th as the final steps into my army. With 8th, my plans for the Phantine changed with the breaking apart of the command squad and Company Commanders. I have since played with these models and the nearly won me a tournament a while back. My plan is to add some grav chutes for them one day to make them look like they just dropped out of the Valkyrie.

Now for a look into the future. With this new job, I highly doubt I'll have a lot of time to update in the immediate future. My time for miniatures and painting has dropped to zero. So is this blog going to die? NO WAY! My plan is now to drop the articles so that I get one post per month until I can get caught up with my work. I also plan to add on guest writers to show off their armies and pictures. That way even If i cant post something, somebody else will be contributing to the blog.

Thats the plan for the moment anyway. As always please leave feedback or comments. Let us know you were here. Follow us as well to get updates!

Until Next time....

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Phantine: Marauder Bomber project "G for Greta" Part 1

"Strong men have conquered the land, bold men have conquered the void, between land and void lies the sky, and only the bravest men ever conquer that."

- Dedication to the Hessenville Aviator scholam on Phantine



As per tradition, on the 4th of July I usually release a blog post about something in relation to my Phantine. With that holiday coming up here in the United States that means its now time for me to get this article out of the way. I have had it in my backlog since at least Winter 2016. So today I present to you my biggest (literally) project yet. I am going to assemble, paint and play a Marauder Bomber for my Phantine Air Corp.

At first I was unsure if I wanted to do this as a single blog post or a series. Now having put off this article for a long while, I have decided to release it as a series of post. The model has been bought, washed, and primed for all of its pieces.

I decided that this model will be "G for Greta", which belonged to Commander Oskar Viltry during the Enothis campaign (772-774 M41). This aircraft first appeared in Double Eagle by Dan Abnett and so I have been looking back through that book for details about the aircraft. This will be my first super heavy of any type so I am excited to see what  I can do with it. Since I am a huge flyboy, the Marauder spoke to me as a Flying Fortress stand in that you would have seen in World War II. Having the connection to the books will only make it better when it is out on the table.

Phantine as I have noted before has no ground to muster a PDF on. So pilots and aviators are rounded up for the Guard. Long time readers of my blog will also note that Ive made a small Phantine Skyborne Force too to go with my Air Corp. In the pipeline I also have 5 more Phantine I need to do in order to complete the ground forces of my Skyborne forces. In the future I might expand upon them but for the moment Im going to be long term working on Greta and the Phantine. July is looking to be a busy month for me, so I hope that I am able to keep the 2 blog post a month mantra going. June saw me fall behind with my new job but Im not complaining.


As we celebrate this day, let us remember that in our own world, there are people fighting for us to remain free and risking there life for us. Even though we war game and have fun, we have to remember the real sacrifice that is asked of all who serve.

Happy 4th Everybody!
Till next time!

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Horus Heresy Imperial Fist: 1st Captain Sigismund

I've now written this post three times and gone through countless drafts trying to figure out where this little segment would go. Today I think I'm going to release it as a stand alone and see how it does. There wont be much to this post but in the future there might be more to say about it. For now I have been given a First Captain Sigismund (Siggy) from my friend Bandogora01.

Sigismund is one of my favorite 40k characters of all time. From the Horus Heresy series he is my favorite character. The loyalty not only to the Emperor but to duty and his father makes Sigismund a character that is easy to root for.His ability in dueling and fighting other marines also makes him pretty good on the table top too.

 From my earliest days playing 40k I use to face a lot of Black Templar since they were my first opponent.




40k lorest will know that Sigismund went off with the Templar to fight on a never ending crusade once the legions split into chapters. It was from this early venture into 40k that my enjoyment of the Black Templar and Sigismund began. With the release of the Horus heresy series I hoped that they would write a few stories about him and they have plenty of times. It does make for some of the most enjoyable reading when your favorite characters show up in the story, doesn't it?

 Anyway enough rambling. As I said earlier this segment is going to be pretty short today. Hopefully sometime soon I will be able to get us all back on track with something new. This early part of March has gotten very busy so i apologize for the lack of updates. While I normally try to get two post out per month, March might only see one post this month due to time constraints. I'll keep you all informed as best I can.

Till next time. Keep checking back, say hi or just leave a comment below. Every little bit helps to see that people are reading and enjoying this blog.

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Tau Sept: Shas'O R'alai

Long time viewers of my blog might notice that the banner has changed for Tau. That's because Im trying to make it so each army from here on out has a unique banner or some form of it. We'll see how well it goes. Today I present a new addition to my growing Sept. Shas'O R'alai!

At the store ( I bought the forge world broadside too!)

This model was purchased for me by Bandogora01 at his local game store. Old armies are traded in for store credit and I happened to be there over Christmas break when I spotted Shas'O R'alai and a Forge world Broadside. Both very hard pieces to come by (without paying Forge world prices here in the states). As such I wanted to pick them up and had my friend who worked there hold them for me until I got paid. Bandogora was nice enough to ship them to me once I paid for them and they arrived in good time. The initial model weren't much to look at. Black primer and a weird brown color base coat. This was removed easily enough with LA's Totally Awesome and then the true fun began.

Cleaned up and ready (Spoilers for future post)

I primed the model and then set about painting it in the color scheme of my Sept. Long time viewers know that the color scheme usually takes about a week from start to finish. Shas'O R'alai took two weeks of off and on painting. This was because as a HQ unit I wanted to make sure extra attention was paid to the model in the process. Once the model was finished I set about making a few fixes on the model before calling it done.

That same weekend, I took Shas'O R'alai out to the game store with my brother. We played a 1500 point game. Tau vs Guard. Crisis Wing (Farsight) vs Armored Company with a mission from the Monk'ta Book. Needless to say, I lost. However Shas'O R'alai proved his worth killing many guardsmen, a chimera, and a sentinel before dying to massive lasgun fire. His warlord trait: The Assassin really did make him a terror for independent characters. 1d4chan claims hes the tau version of Abbadon, Yarrick, and other heros who can "tank" their way through the enemy. I didnt see that as much as I saw a long ranged killing machine who could bring a lot of hurt for very little cost. Shas'O R'alai's markerdrones hitting on a 3+ really did make it easy for markerlights to be used for his squad. In the future I think Shas'O R'alai might become a more permanent addition to my forces. My brother on the other hand reverted back to the normal "Tank-Mander" build stating he felt that Shas'O R'alai wasnt within his play style. To each their own.

Back View

Marker drones

Tell me your thoughts on Shas'O R'alai, is he truly a terror like Dante or Yarrick or is he more akin to our regular Tau commander. Share your thoughts below.

Till next time!

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Krieg: The Status of the Bloody 18th

*A note about the photo quality. Bandogora doesn't have the best camera but we make do with the shots he can give us.

Welcome to the first official post of the New Year! Today we bring to you something from Bandogora01's desk. His 18th Krieg Assault Regiment and his Warmachine Khador.

Trying to organize the men

Parade Formation

Long time readers will remember that Bandogora01 sent me his first squad of Krieg back in 2015 in order to start his army. Over the course of two years, that army has grown into a nice battle group you see before you. Bandogora has started to prime his models and get down the base color scheme of the Bloody 18th on to his miniatures. He has also acquired some armored support in the form of my old Leman Russ "Lady"as well as my old Storm Chimera and a custom Thunderer I made for him out of the Leman Russ kit. Together his army is coming in nicely about 1400 points before upgrades. Not pictured are two more heavy stubber teams as well as some heavy bolter teams.  The second picture below shows the models a little bit more clearly then the first picture. As the bloody 18th rises, their story is sure to be told throughout countless 40k battles.

Speaking of which I got to teach Bandogora how to play 40k over the winter holidays. We played a small Kill Team game using the official 40k rules. We modified some of the individual movement actions so that Bandogora could see how squads work in 40k as well as get a feel for how a larger point game might go. Out of the three objectives Bandogora was able to shoot me off two of them and won! It was fun seeing his army that he has been working on forever get some table time.

Khador

Seen here is Bandogora's Khador for warmachine. This army is based around the warcaster Scorcha and has actually gotten a lot more table time then my own Menoth. Bandogora wants to do his Khador in a grey and black scheme that will be sure to put the fear of Khador into those who oppose the Empire.

As a Menoth player, I know that Khador is not a easy opponent having been assassinated last time I played against a Khador player.

As the New Year continues to unfold we hope you keep checking back! Give us a comment, let us know you were here and follow us if you want to be kept updated. A lot of really awesome and special projects are in the works for this year.

Till next time

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2016: A Year in Review

Rolling for Happy New Year!

Still Secret Im Afraid 

Well here we are again! Seems like only yesterday we were starting another New Year. This year has seen a lot of changes in both myself and this blog. Every day brought something new this year and the world has kept on spinning. We here at Behind the Lines Gaming would like to wish you a Happy New Year. At the beginning of the year were had promised to promote big news to you all. That big news is still happening, even if things have been quiet, but we will tell you more in 2017. As always keep checking back for updates on that.


The Tanith and Allied guard have gotten a lot of attention this year. I can safely safe that most of those units have been painted. 2017 should see some additions to the armies.  The Tau as noted earlier will be getting reinforcements with the Riptide battlesuit and hopefully a few more surprises. The Adeptus Mechanicus army is growing with the additional purchase of a skitarii army pending at the moment. More news on that soon! Finally with MK III of warmachine out now, I have gotten into full swing of painting those miniatures. Hopefully i'll be able to take them out for a few games.

As always we plan to do a Top Three projects we have done this year. Located here, the Gallery is a page dedicated to the top work on completed models we've done each year.Give it a look and let us know what you think!

Tiger Tank of the Imperium

#1 this year turned out to be a product review of the Gideon Tank done by MadRobot Miniatures! This review came in with nearly 1137 views! A huge thank you to Steve at MadRobot for putting up with me while I made the order. These models were a joy to put together and a joy to paint. The fact that I got 2 more waiting to be painted is only extra exciting to me! Once warmer weather hits Im going to break out my airbrush and start on its two siblings ASAP! In the future I hope to order potentially two more to add to the armored group. We'll have to see though.

12 Crisis Suits Plus 1 more

#2 this year was the Tau [Crisis Suit] Story. At 764 views this post was the second most viewed post of the year.  Once I had decided on a scheme for my Sept I set about painting it.This scheme was exteremly popular with the folks down at my LFGS and the models have seen a ton of play. I think the post was popular because of the amount of Tau crisis suits? Maybe it was just the amount of painted Tau? Whatever the case It has been a fun journey to show them off to you all and play with them on the table and against them. Trust me, Its not fun to face down 24 plasma rifles as guard. Still the modification to the models to make the XV-46 was one of my favorite changes to these stock models. Leave no model unconverted!

#3 this year was a twist. Pulling from our Dark Heresy game, Sister Hana and Krieger 18D became the third most popular post with 682 views. This project was being completed by my friend Bandogora and he has progressed well on both Hana and 18D. In the future he hopes to finish Hana and add in the rest of the party including our Tech Priest Magnus Nicodemus of Metallica and Interrogator Bo Terran. Time will tell if he can do it.  This project was a joy to watch come to completion. As our Dark Heresy season has ended for the year, I can fully say the party did not come away unscathed. Truths were revealed that injured the party and caused many angry emotions. Next season will show if the party and time has healed the wounds left by one party members betrayal.

As the year comes to a close I wish to thank my loyal readers and those who follow me. It makes writing these post easier knowing that some people read them and enjoy the content of them.If you like what you see please become a follower of the blog or leave a comment below! Every little bit helps

With that I wish you the best in this ending to 2016 and a happy start to 2017! Keep rolling those dice and stay tuned for many new exciting things to come in 2017! 

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[Forge World] Metallica: Breachers Squad and Magos

"As the Emperor protects the faithful, so must we protect the flock" - Tech Priest Magnus Nicodemus

Breacher Squad #2

So what do I have for you all today? Well after a painful three weeks of work on these models I think im calling them done. Followers of this blog will remember that I posted my first Breacher team a while ago. Now today I have my second breacher team ready. Slowly my Adeptus Mech forces are growing.

This squad (like its other squad) is an all female breacher squad. The magos of this army is a female that believes that males are not good enough to serve the Omessiah in any leadership capacity. She carries with her task force an all female breachers squads. Both males and females accompany her in the Skitarii forces.

Her mission is to seek out lost artifacts of the Omessiah and advance her own standing within the Adeptus Mechanicus. This Magos was fun to paint up due to all the unique items that had been added on to her person. The paint job was a lot of work but once finished turned out to be some of my favorite models done up so far.

Yet Un named Female Magos

This project has helped me to become better at working with layering whites. When i started, white was a problem color for me. Since then, I have gotten a lot of practice with white and how to layer it. Sharp eyed viewers might notice that i've added some vallejo cream colors in there to contrast against the white. This was so that I could have varying degrees of white colors on the model.

In the future I hope to be able to use my airbrush in order to get a smoother white transition on the models. Due to school and lack of time, I have been unable to get my air brush out. The cooler weather of winter has also kicked in and made it hard to find a place to air brush. Once spring rolls back around though i plan to start using it again.

In the future I have two big projects planned that I am looking forward to. One will be a Tau Riptide! This will be my Jar'Kia septs first Riptide but hopefully not my last. I also have ordered a Forge World Maruader Bomber that I will be adding to my Phantine Air Force. These two projects will be taking a lot of my modeling time come the new year. As always we soon will be entering the holiday season. At this blog, it is tradition to do a yearly end of the year post and a New Years day post. Rest assured both of those will be prepared for the year. Also be sure to check out the Gallery at the top of this blog. Every year has been recorded with the favorite models of the year added in for good measure.

Till next time! Keep checking back, say hi or just leave a comment. Every little bit helps

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By Order of the Inquisition: Tech Priest and Arbite Gregory Alexie

Dog and Master

So today is another day for a blog post! This time we bring to you two Forge World goodies. The Adeptus Arbite enforcer from Games Day with his cyber mastiff and a titan Tech Priest!

These are two models that I have had my eyes on for a while. Each one would serve perfectly for our INQ28 games or Dark Heresy and so I went a head and purchased them.

Each of the models were done concurrently while the other was drying. Special attention was paid to the cyber mastiff since its going to be a pet for my Inquisitor in game or a bodyguard for my D-44 Detachment while playing Guard.

Another view

 The Arbite enforcer is going to be be Arbite Gregory Alexie. A Arbite from a Hive world. He was played by my friend Saltybelt back in 2009 and became a part of our warband. Alexie has a tough my way or the highway attitude and served with Inquisitor Umarus during the Ventra Majorus Campaign in 2012. This character has gone through a lot of variations before I decided upon this model for him. The other model I used for Gregory has now become another Arbite for my second warband under Inquisitor Ardastia (from DOW II) which I hope to cover in another post sometime soon.

Titan Tech Priest

Next up is the Titan Tech Priest. This Priest of Mars was done up in the traditional martian colors since I wanted it to be no one character in particular. This model was a lot of work to get right and in some ways I am still not happy with it. I had thought to make it a character from our current Dark Heresy Game but it isn't close enough to the characters description to be so, nor was it close enough to be my own Tech Priest from Dark Heresy. In the end I decided it would just be a genre priest for my guard army or Inquisitor.

This model was a lot of fun to paint and I hope to get another one sometime soon in order to paint one up again for our Dark Heresy Group. As our current game is coming to the end of its currents season, many secrets have been revealed and the party is on edge. Whether or not these secrets will destroy the party or bring them closer to each other remains to be seen. They have already made many enemies, enemies that don't want to be found out by the greater imperium at large.

Back view

Since it is November, I hope to partake in Tanks-giving and get a few Gideon Tanks worked on. I am also putting together a few models for Bandogora01 to give as a gift to him for his 18th Krieg Assault Regiment. We'll see how that all turns out.

Till next time, keep checking back!

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Dramatis personae: Krieger 18D and Sister of Battle Hana

18D and Sister Hana Dressed up as a Commissar

This one has been sitting in my drafts queue for a while and I haven't been able to work on it or share it. These pictures come from my friend Bandogora who is putting together our Dark Heresy party into model format. Today we cover two of the of the most prominent figures in the warband, Krieger 18D and Sister of Battle Hana.

18D needs no introduction having been shown here before. As a former member of the 18th Krieg Assault Regiment, 18D was recruited by Inquisitor Ackermaan and brought into the war band to be the sniper / assassin due to his marksmanship. This he has done with remarkable accuracy having survived having his arm blown off by a auto cannon manned by heretics and cultist. Although the loss of his arm was a blow to his morale, the squad sniper quickly recovered and set on killing heretics.Last game saw him come face to face with a Tyranid Lictor, which he promply stabbed and fired into the creatures gullet. However, there are secrets in the backstory of 18D and some of them could destory the man, should the wrong parties find out. As always the dark gods are watching and playing the long game....

Sister Hana

Next up is Sister of Battle Hana, seen here dressed up as a commissar by 18D after their work with the 18th Krieg Assault regiment. Hana is a young woman coming from a feral water world on the edge of the Imperium. Her order of sisters focuses on relics of the past and Hana is learning what it means to be one of the Adepta Sororitas as her loyalty to the party grows with each encounter. Yet for all the goodness in her, there is a fear that she might not be able to do what is expected of her. With the disappearance of the parties NPC sister, Hana has been forced to come forward as the religious figure of faith for the party, a job she was not yet ready for. Should the secrets that 18D has be exposed, would she still see her comrades in the same light?


Hopefully soon we will have the other members of the party included in a group shot. Each model is being done by Bandogora to the closest extent that he can for the respective backgrounds. Will the party be destroyed by 18D secret or will they be able to handle the terrible truth that lies in wait?

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Phantine Skyborne! Ready to Jump!

Command Squad with Scanner

 For the men and women of Phantine, everyday is a fight for survival. Growing up living on mountain tops in closed off cities, the people of Phantine live above the polluted clouds of their world. Called "The scald" these clouds can kill a man in minutes should anyone fall into them. Therefore when the Imperial Guard came for a tithe on Phantine, there was no ground to muster the troops.

Two types of soldiers are pulled from this world: Airmen for the Air Corps and Drop Troopers from the Skyborne. Today we cover the men and woman of the Skyborne. First appearing in Dan Abnettt's Guns of Tanith, the Phantine Skyborne played a vital role not only in reclaiming their world but in the Sabbat Crusade.

A Phantine Sargent

"They were all big, powerful young men wearing cream-coloured quilted jackets and baggy, pale canvas pants bloused into the tops of high jump-boots. The sides of their heads were brutally shaved, leaving just a strip on their crowns. Not as a result of lice treatment, Varl thought. These men kept their hair that way. They were Phantine troopers. Skyborne specialists."  - Guns of Tanith

This description didnt do enough for me so I decided to email the man himself about how the Phantine would look. Dan Abnett was kind enough to respond (for which I am very grateful!):

"I think they would look very much like WW2 aircrew crossed with paratroopers, with the jump-packs being "jet-pack" type units about the size and shape (and appearance) of an un-deployed parachute
Any help?
Dan 

With this information in hand ive set about painting them based off the images I could of World War II aircrews and paratroopers. It is my hope that these are the best representation of the Phantine that I can do.

Scald Squad

My own Only War Character (Captain Jonus Remaus) is a modeled in this army as well with his power sword "Liberus". As a member of the 44th Phantine He is the leader of "Scald" Squad seen here.

Full army shot with Holm Squad on the far right

 The second squad seen here (Far left) is Holm squad. This squad is led by Sergeant "Cowboy". Cowboy was originally nicknamed Cupcake after a superior called him a "cupcake solider",In response, Cowboy bettered himself and during the Ventra Majoris crusade fought against Chaos to protect the world of Sigma Majorus. He is current serving under Captain Remaus and someday hopes to get command of Scald Squad.

My yet un named squad

Seen here is the newest squad of the 44th. This is my last unnamed squad. They are the newest recruits after the Ventra Majoris campaign. Currently they are on patrol with the 44th fighting against Necrons and Orks. Whether or not they can stand against the horrors of the galaxy remain to be seen.

After taking these pictures I realized that I forgot to add in the 2 lascannon sentry guns conversions I had done for this army as well.

The Drop Sentinel in the back is a converted regular sentinel that has been heavily modified to fit the drop role. Its been a big part of this army since the beginning and earned me a few kills of enemy armor during the campaign I ran with my brother against his (read: my) tau forces. It is now a constant part of my drop army.

In the mail I have 2 more surprises coming for this army.  While these are just the ground elements of the army, I hope to be able to show the air elements soon.

Write a comment, say hi or just let me know you were here! Every little bit helps.

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A Tau Crisis [Suit] Story

Panoramic Shot of the Crisis Suits

 So once again, its time for another update! This time from the far eastern fringes. In what is a first for me, I have finally painted all 12! of my Tau Battlesuits. For the advanced Tau player this might not be much but for a Cadre that started out in mid 4th Edition, its been a hassle just getting to this point.

Top down view of the teams

Every time Ive painted them I have never liked a scheme enough to stick with it. This time however I have found one that really spoke to me. I started with a few of my regular suits to get to scheme down and then proceeded to continue on with a new suit each week. Overtime, the suits started to get better looking which helped me feel as if they were getting done. All of the Crisis suits have been converted to some extent since my cadre is using the XV-46 Crisis suit, a variant found in the DeathWatch RPG series. Of course since there is no official pictures of the suit, I went with what i felt best could be achieved closest to the writing of the material. The XV-46 is used a close range suit, designed to work in hostile, close quarters combat such as ship boarding and Zone Mortalis type games. My Cadre however, has requisitioned a few for field testing against their common foes of Necrons and Orks.

Another view of Commander MirrorWater

All the Crisis Suits line up by teams

So whats next? Well im not sure if I want to return to do some more for my Imperium armies or stay working on the Tau. I thought out moving on to the Stealth suits but they get so little game time it wouldnt be worth it (although it would be fun to paint!). Other considerations are the (old style) broadsides which have been converted or maybe a vehicle or two to transport my Fire Warriors. Im going to have to see how time allows me to do these. Im hesitant to work on the vehicles without a airbrush due having always burned myself out on them,  Readers, what would be a good airbrush for a beginner?  Let me know in the comment below! As always leave a comment, say hi! or just let me know you were here. Every little bit helps.

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