Slocombe's Warbots - Part 3 - Sprinter

++ GREETINGS FLESHY MASTERS ++

This is my third and final post on the TSF15 Slocombe's Warbot's concluding the project with the MKII 'Sprinter' Assault Droid, released on the Citadel Miniatures October 1987 Flyer and again sculpted by Tony Slocombe who I think now works for Northstar Figures sculpting, casting and has his own miniature range.

TSF15 Warbots

This rare Oldhammer miniature has been residing on my paint station for about 1.5+ years, due to the assembly and sculpting of this Warbot I have been met with disaster after disaster, I managed a base coat then it was all downhill from there, it fell apart even after pinning twice and after my final attempt to fix the pose it just didn't work so I cried as I pulled it apart again and did some even deeper and stronger pinning with steel pins, happy with the final pose I moved back to painting.

MKII 'Sprinter' Assault Droid - side

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Like the other Warbots it's a difficult miniature to paint due to the shallow details and rough casting, I started with black undercoat and then stippled on Vallejo 'Dark Seagreen' which is actually a nice grey to me then some simple highlights, decals/fix, mig weathering powders, and finishing with some more lighter stipple.  Post varnishing I added Citadel 'Ardcoat to all the light sources which I do a lot now.

MKII 'Sprinter' Assault Droid - side

I like to post lots of WIP (Work in Progress) photos my twitter feed along with disaster photos like the one below so get following for all sorts of #Oldhammer related tweets.

‘Mk II Sprinter Assault Droid - disaster

Originally I was going to put a Imperial Army casualty on the base

My first post on the Slocombes Warbots features 'Sam' Type Light Wardroid and my second post features 'Deathblow' Class Heavy Droid, follow links below

'Sam' Type Light Wardroid

'Deathblow' Class Heavy Droid

Before new readers start screaming they are Battletech copies, I am aware of this and have speculated on reasons in previous posts.  Their counterparts are as follows:

• 'Deathblow' Class Heavy Droid - Battletech Archer
• 'Sam' Type Light Wardroid - Battletech Vindicator
• MKII 'Sprinter' Assault Droid - Battletech Catapult

BattleTech Archer

BattleTech Vindicator

BattleTech Catapult

Special thanks goes out to @Leaky_cheese over on twitter for his support of this project and this lovely image he did for me of the Warbots before I laboured for hours to produce my own, I am so rubbish at photo manipulation.

Hope you enjoyed this post, another project completed, plenty more on the go.

 J

New-Oldhammer - First Encounters of a 40K kind

Hello, something a bit different from me today as you are well aware Games Workshop products are going through a bit of a renaissance that harks back to the golden Oldhammer age of gaming, big box games, familiar titles, etc, well I thought I would give some of this NewOldhammer, Newhammer, Nu-hammer, Neohammer or whatever you want to call it a go.

Now I considered the last 20 years of Games Workshop products as unworthy of my attention and was a bit snobbish about it all and very blinkered but the last two years or so of released products have excited me very much I had to have a word with myself 😆, the new products scream to me of days of old so what did I do only went and purchased each new game release when it came out, Warhammer Quest: Silver Tower, Necromunda, Kill team: Rogue Trader, etc while yearning for the day my 5 year old and I can play together. These boxed games are mostly still sitting on top of a wardrobe in their shrink wrap except Gorechosen and Warhammer Quest: Blackstone Fortress which I have been doing some work on in my spare time.

Here are some of my efforts on miniatures from this new exciting era.

My fruits of a new age

UR-025 from Warhammer Quest: Blackstone Fortress, a robot (Men of Iron) who secretly possesses AI and is on a secret mission of his own.  It's been a bit of a struggle to get used to snap fix plastic miniatures but I got there in the end with this one, when painting this one I tried to get as close to the box art as possible as not to confuse my boy when we get around to playing the game, the green white effect was achieved with a 50/50 mix of Lahmian Medium and Nihilakh Oxide using modern Citadel Colour paints is totally new to me being a Vallejo paints fan but I liked the results so will be adding others when I need to. I did my usual basing style also adding a skull from the Citadel skulls set as I want to use this miniature more than just in Blackstone Fortress.


I have to apologise for the number of photos of UR-025 but I felt that there are so many little neat details I wanted to show from higher and lower angles plus if you know me my photography stinks, I am really impressed with the design.

UR-025 - front

UR-025 - side

UR-025 - side

UR-025 - back

UR-025 - gun side

UR-025 - front

UR-025 - front

UR-025 - Flamer side

UR-025 - back

Next up is 'Fexgor the Flayer' a Khornate Slaughterpriest with Hackblade and Wrath-hammer (what a mouthful), he came free with White Dwarf and the brilliant price of Gorechosen lead to my purchase for the game.  I went for typical Khorne colours and jazzed the base up a bit.

Fexgor the Flayer - front

Fexgor the Flayer - side

Fexgor the Flayer - back

Fexgor the Flayer - side

Fexgor the Flayer

The final miniature of today post is ForgeWorld's Necromunda 'Belladonna' the Noble Bounty Huntress, when I saw this I just had to have it as I have great love for John Blanche's work. This miniature is a homage to the Amazon Gothique painting and Chaos Amazon (LE15), I did a blog post discussing this miniature and it's influences here.  My paint job is my attempt to copy the image on the blister and that was a mistake as this miniature is bloody difficult to paint, the level of details is immense I don't think I touched a brush bigger than 5/0, my head hurts when thinking about how the Forgeworld painters achieved their final painted version.

Belladonna - front

Belladonna - side

Belladonna - side

Belladonna - back

Belladonna - side

Well I hope you have enjoy the start of my journey into the modern age, I am currently working on Thaddeus the Purifier for Blackstone Fortress so you will be seeing him soon along with many posts of the usual stuff.

thanks
J

Slocombe's Warbots - Part 2 - Deathblow

Hello again, this is my second post on Slocombe's Warbot's today featuring the 'Deathblow' Class Heavy Droid, the warbot's were released on the Citadel Miniatures October 1987 Flyer and sculpted by Tony Slocombe.  I have completed two miniatures so far from this range with only the last one to complete.

This rare Oldhammer miniature has been sitting on my paint station for about 6 months occasionally getting a lick of paint here and there, I have never been pleased with it's progress and found it a difficult miniature to paint due to the lack flat surfaces, I mean everything is uneven with roughly sculpted grooves, rises, knobs, holes, all sorts, it's just a massive lump of porous lead but I kept going and here are the results.

My first post features Slocombe's Warbot's was 'Sam' Type Light Wardroid which can be enjoyed here.


I started off by spraying him in Citadel Mechanicus Grey which was a disaster as it was a hot day and the paint was drying before it hit miniature leaving a powdery coating that had to be sanded off but helped weather it a bit,  some highlight, decals/fix, mig weathering powders, and finishing with some stipple and detail.  Post varnishing I added Citadel 'Ardcoat to all the light sources which works well for me.

Many of my twitter followers have pointed out his likeness to the original Battletech mech 'Archer' and I have speculated on this in my first post.


All 3 of Slocombes Warbot's have an obvious Battletech influence:

• 'Deathblow' Class Heavy Droid - Archer
• 'Sam' Type Light Wardroid - Vindicator
• MKII 'Sprinter' Assault Droid - Catapult

Deathblow - front

Deathblow - side

Deathblow - back

Deathblow - side

Deathblow squishing Space Orks - Warhammer 40,000 Rogue Trader Rulebook Page 118 

Deathblow miniature featured on page 12 of the Rogue Trader rulebook

A couple of WIP (Work in Progress) photos that I posted on my twitter feed get following for all sorts of #Oldhammer tweets.

Deathblow - Line work

Deathblow - decals/transfers added

I am half way through the last one ‘Mk II Sprinter Assault Droid' but it's being going slow due to numerous disasters and I have since pinned him back together since but I am not too sure about the new pose so I may disassemble and start again.

‘Mk II Sprinter Assault Droid - disaster

Hope you enjoyed this post another draft complete another one coming soon

J

SFD Giant Robots - Scavenger

Hello,
For today's post another classic Citadel Miniature, one of the SFD Giant Robots this time called 'Scavenger'.  Sculpted by Bob Naismith in 1984, the SFD Giant Robots had a limited release in 1987 via the Spring 1987 mail order flyer for use as Warbots in Warhammer 40,000 Rogue Trader, see page 42 in the  rulebook.

This is my third robot finished from this range, I went for a different approach and painted it very difference compared to the other two I have painted previously which were sharp and bright.  I went for a really waethered, dirty, damaged appearance to reflect it's name Scavenger, started off with the colours of a JCB or CAT plant vehicle and then distressed the paint job with washes and weathering powders to extreme levels, luckily here in Birmingham UK it's been like a building site for years so I have had plenty of reference material and everytime I made it dirty it just wasn't dirty enough compared to what I was seeing on a daily basis.

You can read my previous post on the first two I painted a couple of years ago here and you can read some of my ramblings and own theories on these Robots here.

SFD Giant Robots - Scavenger - front

SFD Giant Robots - Scavenger - back

SFD Giant Robots - Scavenger - front

SFD Giant Robots - Scavenger - back

I hope you like my latest work please come back and enjoy my take on more classic Citadel Miniatures and get following lots and lots of Oldhammer projects on the go.

J

Slocombe's Warbots - Part 1 - Sam

Hello, today I have a classic Oldhammer miniature that I hardly know anything about! 

This is my first post on Slocombe's Warbot's the 'Sam' Type Light Wardroid, released on the Citadel Miniatures October 1987 Flyer and sculpted by Tony Slocombe.  I am lucky enough to own all 3 miniatures from this range and I am enjoying breaking open those 'Limited Edition' TSF15 WARBOTS blisters open to give them a lick of paint like they should have, 2 other warbots accompany it in the range the MkII 'Sprinter' Assault Droid and 'Deathblow' Class Heavy Droid which will also be receiving a paint job before the year is out.

Now we get to the controversial bit, I have always been a Battletech fan and played it 1988-92 and I found all these warbots reminiscent of the Battletech mechs so when I posted a work in progress photo on Twitter, a friendly follower @Leaky_cheese replied with a Battletech image by  Duane Loose that was almost identical and other followers pointed out a likeness to the Battletech Vindicator mech, yeah, yeah I here say so what, continue reading...

Well this train of thought lead to me having an idea on the origins of this range and I am happy to hear your thoughts. Like the other obscure Rogue Trader robot range released in October 1987, the 'Limited Edition' SFD Giant Robots, well while I was painting some of these lovely Bob Naismith sculpts I noticed they had GW 1984 date stamps on the bottom which harks back to a time when Games Workshop were still producing miniatures for licensed games i.e. Judge Dredd, Eternal Champion, Dr Who, etc, 3 years before the decline of the licensed games so my idea is were the Slocombes Warbots and maybe the SFD Giant Robots created for an early attempt of 1984 Games Workshop acquiring the Battletech license and failing to do so is why we see these Robots incorporated into the Rogue Trader universe and released 'Limited Edition' maybe trying to claw some money back from this endeavour?

Or it could be just wild ramblings of a mad robot fan.

I went for an Imperial Army type colour scheme with lots of rust and battle damage it seemed fitting, added a few old transfers from various kits and distressed them, added a bit of colour to the power source and visor.

Anyway enough nonsense here's the picts.

'Sam' Type Light Wardroid

'Sam' Type Light Wardroid

'Sam' Type Light Wardroid

'Sam' Type Light Wardroid

'Sam' Type Light Wardroid

'Sam' Type Light Wardroid

'Sam' Type Light Wardroid

TSF15 Warbot blister about to broken open

TSF15 Warbot open and ready to assemble

Twitter followers asked for a size comparison so here you go, a very tall miniature that would make an excellent robot for Inquisitor as it is slightly over 54mm high.

Size comparison

Thanks for visiting,
J