You can have any colour as long as it's silver

Another bunch of really old school Necrons off the production line.

Not really much to say about these other than I went with drybrushing the Leadbelcher over a black undercoat rather than trusting to silver spray, which never really seems to work out for me, not sure why.

Following that, an Agrax Earthshade wash, Brass Scorpion trim and then White Scar with Hexwraith Flame for the glory bits.

You might be beginning to see the somewhat limited number of sculpts in the old Necron 'range'. Some minor variations but fundamentally two poses.

I suppose it's somewhat appropriate for an ancient race of faceless automata.

I'm nowhere near having anything approaching an army yet, not least because I've not got hold of a Necron Lord yet.

However, I think I may have enough for the original Necron scenario that was published in White Dwarf, so I might try to bend someone's arm into giving that a go.

Acquired: 83
Painted: 227
Lead Mountain: 458

The Ancient Menace

Our adventures in 2nd Edition 40k have already taken me down some unexpected routes, not least starting an Ork army to add to my Daemons and Blood Angels. However, when you already have three armies for an obscure game you rarely play, what's a fourth between friends?

Enter the Necrons...

These six models are part of the original range of metal Necrons that were released in 1998 alongside some accompanying White Dwarf articles detailing an army list that included a grand total of four units: the Necron Lord, Necron Warriors, Necron Destroyers and Scarabs. There was also a Necron Immortal model released around the same time but I suspect that it didn't get rules as 3rd edition came along shortly afterwards. 

The Necron Warriors cam in six sculpts, of which I currently have three. However, they do give you a pretty good feel for the range as it appears that the other sculpts were basically these guys with their heads in different positions.

I approached painting them in the same way I did the single modern Necron a couple of months back: Leadbelcher base, wash with Agrax Earthshade and pick out details with Brass Scorpion. The green pits were picked out in white and washed liberally in Hexwraith Flame.

I quite like mixing the original models with a more modern aesthetic for the Necrons.

These tiny models are Scarabs and actually fight as individuals rather than as a swarm. This has the potential to hand an awful lot of points to the opponent in certain missions, however, at Toughness 8 with the ability to leap 16" over terrain, they might prove difficult to hunt down effectively.

In game they latch on to enemy vehicles and reduce their armour values, making the vehicles more susceptible to the Gauss rifles of the Necron Warriors. Against some opponents I can imagine they'll be really annoying. Against others, such as the Tyranids, they'll be best left at home.

The Destroyer is my favourite model of the bunch, partly due to the casually reclined Necron piloting it, who for some reason reminds me of the 80s cult sci-fi classic 'Battle Beyond the Stars'.

Destroyers provide the speed, manoeuvrability and punch of the army, but will still need help from the Scarabs to be able to effectively deal with enemy vehicles.

It's quite a heavy chunk of metal an balancing it on an old-style flight stand was no easy feat. I only have one more of those bases, so unless I can lay my hands on some more, I may well transfer it to something more stable at some point.

Added to my existing not-Necrons that I painted a while back, I have a fair sized force developing. I need to work out what the other models will count as. The smaller walkers can probably work as proxy Necron Warriors, and I think I'll see if I can use either Eldar War Walkers or Space Marine Dreadnoughts as a basis on which to convert a profile for the larger walkers to be 2nd edition Tomb Spiders.

I received another five Necron Warriors in the post last week that are currently siting in a Dettol bath, and so the army should start to grow fairly soon. I'm keeping a close eye on eBay for affordable lots to try to snap up and add to the army. There seem to be plenty of old Necron available, just not always at a price I'm will to pay.

The trickiest model to get hold of will be the Necron Lord and I may need to splash out for that one when an undamaged version shows up.

Acquired: 81

Painted: 199

Lead Mountain: 483

Opposites Attract

Did I mention I was running out of 40k things to paint?

Well these aren't even mine...technically.

Over the years I have made a number of overture towards Mrs Cheaphammer to try to engage her in this hobby of mine. She has played the occasional game or two but ultimately wargaming just doesn't really float her boat.

The most recent of my failed initiatives was Christmas 2021 when I bought her Getting Started With Warhammer 40,000 as a joke present. Needless to say, she didn't get started with 40k, but the booklet came with two miniatures that she'd built and I'd undercoated for her which I asked recently if I could paint, seeing as she clearly didn't want to.

She agreed, and I asked what colour she'd like the Primaris Marine to be...

It's not like she even particularly likes pink. I suspect the decision was more a comment about how keen she is on the grim darkness of the 41st millennium.

Anyway, I had my mission parameters and I set about accomplishing the task with gusto. A base coat of Emperor's Children was hit with a wash of Baal Red (I still have some left) and dry brushed back up. Most of the rest of the details were done with various contrast painst over Grey Seer, with the shoulder pads being done with Caledor Sky after the Talassar Blue contrast I'd used on the chest plate ending up patchy on a flat surface.

I've not done any transfers as I want to discuss this with Mrs Cheaphammer, as this model is ultimately for her. I'm not planning an army of pink marines...although it is rather striking.

This is actually the first Primaris Marine I've painted and the scale shift (along with the open pose) does make painting it feel easier than the firstborn I've been doing recently.

When it came to the Necron, Mrs Cheaphammer couldn;t care less what I did with it. As I've mentioned, grim darkness is not her thing, so reanimated metallic corpses was never going to work, however, throw in the fact that she has severe arachnophobia and the multi-legged scarab theme was not met with much enthusiasm, as you can probably imagine. 

I used the same approach to painting as the robot spiders (which are officially the least popular miniatures in the house...at leas until I get round to Shelob for LotR) from the last post and it worked well. Whether I could stomach painting an army all exactly the same is a question I need to ponder. However, it was simple to do.

This is probably the first time I've painted miniatures 'just because', with no real intent to use either for anything. They just fitted my mood and were simple enough to do, which made it enjoyable.

It's all progress.

Acquired: -7
Painted: 72
Lead Mountain: 502

Spiders From...Mars?

As you may have noticed, I'm in a little of a 40k phase, but I'm running out of models to paint. Therefore, as I'd just painted up a Tech-Priest and some Mechanicus terrain I figured I could satisfy my cravings by painting up some robots I've had knocking around for a long time and somehow argue them into themed games with the Tech-Priest.

However, something happened...

Basically, as I started painting the larger spider bots, I noticed the shaped of the plates on their legs sort of resembled coffins, and this stirred my imagination towards another 40k race where spidery robots and coffin (or sarcophagus) themed iconography were perhaps more appropriate.

The spider bots were painted really simply with a Leadbelcher base and an Agrax Earthshade wash. I then picked out the trim in Brass Scorpion (is it still called that?), did some glowy bits with Hexwraith Flame over White Scar, threw Black Templar contrast paint over the pipes and then finished off with a bit of highlighting of the spiky bits with Chainmail (that's definitely not its name these days).

These are chunky metal models with more than a bit of heft to them. As such I expect to be constantly sticking the legs back on, and so I might end up putting them on bases.

In terms of how I'll use them, the could still work as Mechanicus constructs, or as generic sci-fi/pulp villains. However, although Tomb Spiders (sorry, 'Canoptek Spyders' tm) don't appear in second edition 40k, these guys match the more chunky aesthetic of the original Necrons, so should I acquire some I might play with the vehicle design rules to make something that seems appropriate (possibly using a dreadnought as a base).

I'm less keen on the sentry turrets, but they were painted the same way and fit a similar aesthetic. In theory there's nothing stopping me using them with the Necron Warrior stat line (scarabs don't have ranged weapons) apart from the fun police. I'll have to see whether this concept develops into anything as the old Necrons are more than a little expensive.

So, I've sort of dipped my toes into Necrons, at least aesthetically. However, even if nothing comes of that idea, I really like the spiders and might need to find an alternate use for them.

Acquired: -7
Painted: 70
Lead Mountain: 504