Speed painting Nids before the codex drops - WIP & pic hvy

[theHman]

I don't know about you, but I am really excited about the new Nid Codex.

In preparation, I've decided to get my butt in gear and paint my Nid army before the new Codex drops in (mid?) January.

Since I've had them for over a year and they still aren't painted, I thought that maybe some social pressure would help to keep me motivated to complete the army.

When successful, this will be the first army in my collection to be fully painted (I've got over 2000pts of Eldar and over 2500pts of Dark Elves primed/base coated but unfinished).

What follows is my army in various stages of assembled, primed and based coated, but before I show you everything, here are some pics of my paint scheme for my Hive Fleet - which I've affectionately named "Hive Fleet Medusa."

Sadly, the pics don't do the paint job justice, but as you can see, the 'skin' is a nice purple with the Chitinous armor in blue.



Here's what's painted:
15 Termagaunts and a whopping 12 stealers (2 of which need stripping and repainting) ...

Yeah, not much done, but that's gonna change over the next two months!

Here's what will get painted in the next 60 days - I'm working with a Codex deadline drop of January 16th - which actually gives me 63 days (as of this post) to get 'er all done.

'Barry' the Broodlord.

10 Stealers.

3 Zoe's - LOVE these giant brain bug minis!
Here's one next to a gaunt for size comparison:



3 Carnies - meet Spike, Ike and Rhinox.

30ish Gaunts.

30ish Hormagaunts - I rarely use Hormies b/c I have the worst luck in CC with them.

They literally kill nothing and end up dying in droves. I'd rather buy 1.5 times more gaunts and shoot the hell outa my opponent. So these guys are probably going to get painted last.

4 shooty Warriors.

3 Ravenors.



As you can see, I used warriors as the basis of the minis and tried modeling them up to look like they are bursting from the ground - hopefully, once painted, this will look really awesome. If not, well, that'll suck and I don't know what I'll do at that point. Ebay maybe?

Larry the Lictor - Also based on a warrior. I've always loved the coolness that is the Lictor.
Here's hoping to Marbo-esque DS rules!

10 Ripper bases - great for giving my stealers and warriors cover saves. As well as tying up most enemy units forever. One of the bases has them jumping straight into a minefield and I've used green stuff for an exploded ripper (that's what you get for jumping on mines ...)

As you can see from reading the post, the vast majority of my army needs to be based and then primed before painting can even begin. =(

Fortunately for me, I've used the awesome and vaste power of the Hive Mind to mind control my girlfriend to help me with basing everything.

Hopefully we can get them all done in an evening so I can prime them the next day and really start cranking.

Wish me luck!

Comments and ideas welcomed.

Harun
Minis to paint: Aprox 90ish
Days left: 63

[theHman]

Here's another pic of the brain bugs just 'cuz I love the mini so much.

[VinceBlack]

That "Brain Bug" that you are using for your Zoe's what is that exactly? Where did you find thoes because they are pretty sweet.

[theHman]

I think they're from Reaper minis.
But not sure.
Stumbled across 'em at my LGS one day while browsing the non-gw mini's rack.

And I can't find them on the Reaper site -- but their site sucks for navigation.
I'd start there, or maybe try a google image search.

I'm gaming tomorrow and I'll check and see if they have any more. If so, I'll write down the code for you.

[Lord Anubis]

I really like your idea of using warriors as "erupting" Ravenors. I like it a lot.

And imitation is the sincerest form of flattery...

[Asymmetrical Xeno]

wow, i love those brain-bugs, they'd be perfect for my enslavers - if you can find out for sure where you got them from, please do tell me.

[Gotthammer]

It's a Reaper mini:

[url]http://www.reapermini.com/OnlineStore/monster/sku-down/14076[/url]


Those Ravenors look like they should turn out good - I'm liking the colours you're using.

[SandWyrm]

The minis look nice, but I'd wait for the codex myself.

I did a lot of work on my foot guard last year prior to the IG codex coming out. Only to find that I had to totally revamp my army afterwards. Wasting a lot of the effort I had put in. It hurts looking at all those lovely models that I've had to leave on the shelf since March.

[pgarfunkle]

Good luck with them, my Nids are store away somewhere in the attic and with the combination of that, the fact that I've just started to paint my Catachans and Steel Legion troops and the probable Blood Angel Codex in the new year means that my Nids won't likely be getting any love for a while.

[theHman]

So I came down with a cold bug and have been laid up for the last 4 days!
I did manage to base and prime everything except the 60+ gaunts - working on those right now.

@Lord Anubis: Steal away my friend! That's what this is all about.

@GothHammer: Thanks and nice find! My LGS was out so I had no idea and after spending 15 minutes of fruitless searching on Reapers site, I gave up.

@SandWyrm: That really sucks. Sorry to hear that. The good news is I'm not too worried about the minis not being WYSIWIG as it will never be a tournament army and we don't play 100% full WYSIWIG. As long as the warrior with twin devourers is a warrior mini, we're cool with that.

@pgarfunkle: Thanks! You can enjoy the glory of the Nids vicariously through this thread! =) I hope I get you excited again though!

Harun
Minis to paint: 90ish
Days left: 57 ...