The Comm Guild Maelstrom's Edge

- by Iain Wilson

Maelstrom's Edge V2 is on the way, so this seems like the perfect time to build some new armies! The upcoming V2 Rulebook includes sample lists for each faction, and I thought it would be fun to build them all so that I can use them for some battle reports. I decided to start with the Epirians, because, well, robots are cool.




The force list for this project is focused around bots, although has a few Contractor units in there as well for variety. For simplicity, the rulebook sample list is built as a single detachment led by a Journeyman Handler and includes two Scarecrow Snipers. I decided to tweak things slightly by making one of the Scarecrows a Command unit and splitting some of the bots into a second detachment, but otherwise this force is the same as will appear in the book.



In a force led by a Handler, bots are the main focus. The Journeyman’s Bot Handler ability, improved by the Aerial Uplink, allows them to keep suppression under control for the force’s bots, while their Push the Machines ability allows you to reactivate an already activated bot unit, doubling the effectiveness of the Hunter or a Scarecrow each turn. By including the Command Scarecrow, the force gains an additional command point each turn, and having the second command model allows the force to be more spread out while remaining in a command radius bubble for orders and bot protocols.



These Command models are largely built stock, although I repositioned the head and weapon on the Command Scarecrow, and used a Broken head (with the helmet hung on the belt) for the Journeyman. The Aerial Uplink drone is a 3D print of an upcoming model.

The presence of the Apprentice Handlers in the Spider Drone units gives them the freedom to move out of the Scarecrow or Journeyman’s command radius without losing the benefit of orders and bot protocols.





I used another Broken head for one of the Apprentices, and repositioned some of the Spider Drones' legs to add a little variety in their posing.

The inclusion of a few Contractor units helps provide some additional firepower in the force. The Recon Package in the Scout unit can paint enemy units for the attention of the Strike missiles on the Defender's weapon drones and the Hunter mech.







I used the arms and helmets from the Faction Expansion Sprue on the Contractors, as I wanted this force to have that better armoured look. The drones in these units are 3D prints, and these models are currently available as printable STLs, although a plastic kit is currently in development, for release as soon as possible!

To round out the force, the Firefly drones provide some fast-moving harassment and paint enemies for the Strike missile units, while the Scarecrow and Hunter serve as mobile fire support and focus on taking out enemies too tough for the Contractors or Spiders to deal with. In addition, selecting the Master of Machines faction objective potentially gives the force an additional free bot protocol activation each turn, allowing the Hunter to move more quickly around the battlefield, the Scarecrows to pump out additional firepower, and the Fireflies to more effectively dodge enemy fire.







With everything built and based, I'm looking forward to getting some paint on! I'm going with a blue and black scheme, as I don't have anything already in those colours, making it a nice opportunity to do something different.

Stay tuned for part 2!



To build your own force of remote controlled robotic doom, grab some Epirian models from the Maelstrom's Edge webstore here!

What are you working on? We would love to see your models and terrain in the Comm Guild Facebook group!

For other building ideas, modeling tutorials, army spotlights and conversion walkthroughs, check out the Hobby section of the Maelstrom's Edge website here. And while you're there, grab a copy of the Maelstrom's Edge V2 Beta rules!

The past few months have been a little more quiet than usual, as the Maelstrom's Edge team focused on getting the V2 rulebook finished. The good news is: We're finally there! We've hammered out the last of the kinks and polished things up as much as we can, and the book is finally ready to send to the printers!


Click for larger image

So, what's next?

Well, we've still been working on other bits and pieces in the background. We currently have a new plastic frame in tooling that includes four separate small kits - two to bolster the upcoming Kaigus Pact release, some upgrades for the Epirian SecDef, and a plastic replacement for the resin Epirian Contractor Drone!


Click for larger image

Our rollout of 3D printable STL files to go alongside our resin model range is also set to continue, with Epirian SecDef boostpack troops on their way at the start of July.


Click for larger image

After that, there is plenty more to come! We have a number of models currently in development to flesh out gaps in the existing range, along with the aforementioned Kaigus Pact entering the battle as a new faction. We'll have more on these very soon.


Click for larger image

And now that he's released from editing duties, Iain will be getting back to work on modeling articles and battle reports to showcase the new rules. Stay tuned!

In the meantime, try out the Beta version of the V2 rules by grabbing the PDFs from the Maelstrom's Edge website here, and grab models to assemble your force from the webstore here! Free shipping applies to qualifying orders - check your cart for details.

You can also find a series of articles looking at different aspects of the V2 game here.

If you have any questions on the V2 rules, the model range, or any other aspect of the Maelstrom's Edge game, feel free to pop in to the Comm Guild Facebook group here.

- by Iain Wilson

It's been way too long since I made some terrain, so I thought I would squeeze in one last article before Christmas!

My kids had some juice in a takeaway meal the other day that came in an interestingly shaped bottle that I thought was worth having a play with. After giving the empty bottles a wash, I set to with tools and terrain sprue bits and came up with this little advertising hub.




The first step, as mentioned above, was to wash the bottle and remove the label.



I used a razor saw to remove the screw thread part of the neck, and then gave the cut end a bit of a sand to smooth it down.



Then I sprayed inside the bottle with some grey paint. This isn't an essential step, but it does help to make the finished piece a little more opaque, particularly if the exterior paintwork gets scratched on the table later on.



To disguise the bottle's bottom, I grabbed an appropriately sized miniature base and a trio of fans from the second Maelstrom's Edge Terrain Sprue and glued them in place with some Oily Glue.



For the advertising part of the build, I whipped up some signs to fit into the recesses around the bottle, printing them out on photo paper so that they were nice and glossy and bright.



On to painting! I sprayed the bottle with a medium grey primer, and then a zenithal layer (sprayed from an angle above, to leave the darker grey underneath) of a very pale grey. This went straight over the shiny plastic, as the Rustoleum primer that I use generally sticks fairly well. If you're wanting to make your paint more durable and stick better, you can give the outside of the bottle a light sand with some fine sandpaper to break the gloss.



I added in some dark grey (Vallejo Heavy Charcoal) into the deep creases, and added a couple of strips of yellow using Vallejo Nuclear Yellow.



Next up came some weathering with a sponge and some more Heavy Charcoal, before gluing the signs in place.



Finally, I painted up the fans on top with some a Vallejo Beasty Brown basecoat, a drybrush of Citadel Chainmail and a wash of Army Painter Strong Tone, and then dirtied everything up with a drybrush of some more Beasty Brown into the creases and forming some drip marks down the sides. Then I dropped it onto an old base I had prepared a while back, and it was ready for the table!



If you wanted to break up the original bottle shape some more, you could easily add some supporting buttresses around the bottom, or add some lights above the signs.



To build your own pillar of commercial doom, grab the Maelstrom's Edge terrain sprues from the webstore here!

What are you working on? We would love to see your models and terrain in the Comm Guild Facebook group!

For other building ideas, modeling tutorials, army spotlights and conversion walkthroughs, check out the Hobby section of the Maelstrom's Edge website here. And while you're there, grab a copy of the Maelstrom's Edge V2 Beta rules!

Tamakin units are the valuable core of Pact forces. They are equipped with smaller, less powerful variants of the Dart Host and Ripper Claw symbiotes used by Muharis Sentinels, perfect to either make head-on assaults or harass the enemy with short ranged fire. While not particularly effective fighters, the ease with which Tamakin can be spawned allows enormous numbers of them to be thrown at an enemy, while those that do fall are recycled and returned right back into the fray.


Click for larger image

Stay tuned for more sneak peeks! In the meantime, try out the V2 Beta rules by grabbing the PDFs from the Trial Rules section of the Maelstrom's Edge website here, and grab your models from the Maelstrom's Edge webstore here! Free shipping applies to qualifying orders - check your cart for details.

You can also find a series of articles looking at different aspects of the V2 game here.

If you have any questions on the V2 rules, the model range, or any other aspect of the Maelstrom's Edge game, feel free to pop in to the Comm Guild Facebook group here.

The heaviest of the combat suits available to Lorican Champions, the Brutus is a walking tank, carrying the largest and heaviest hitting weapons in the Remnant arsenal. Brutus Vanquishers provide fire support with massive Fodina Heavy Lasers or Heavy Flechette Launchers, while the Brutus Breacher gets up close and personal with its Arena Shield and Breach Hammer.


Click for larger image

Stay tuned for more sneak peeks! In the meantime, try out the V2 Beta rules by grabbing the PDFs from the Trial Rules section of the Maelstrom's Edge website here, and grab your models from the Maelstrom's Edge webstore here! Free shipping applies to qualifying orders - check your cart for details.

You can also find a series of articles looking at different aspects of the V2 game here.

If you have any questions on the V2 rules, the model range, or any other aspect of the Maelstrom's Edge game, feel free to pop in to the Comm Guild Facebook group here.

While on the surface equipped similarly to the troops they command, Triarchs have their pick of the armoury, and so tend to equip themselves with the best available gear. As Karist military forces prefer to dominate through intimidation over outright warfare, Triarchs like to present an impressive profile to their enemies. As such, their armour is often embellished with decorative trim and robes to better show their exalted status within the military caste. For all their pomp and display, however, Triarchs are competent as both commanders and fighters, and will fearlessly lead their forces into fire when the situation warrants it.


Click for larger image
The lowest rank of ordained priest amongst the Kaddar, Proselytizers have yet to develop the oratory skills to sway whole crowds, or lead a large military offensive. As missionaries, Proselytizers work quietly amongst a planet’s population, gathering small groups of believers and setting the stage for their more experienced brethren to expand the movement into something greater. When combat is called for, Proselytizers are embedded within military units, where they inspire the troops to greater efforts, or use vocal tricks and the message of their faith to weaken the combat zeal of nearby enemy troops.

Stay tuned for more sneak peeks! In the meantime, try out the V2 Beta rules by grabbing the PDFs from the Trial Rules section of the Maelstrom's Edge website here, and grab your models from the Maelstrom's Edge webstore here! Free shipping applies to qualifying orders - check your cart for details.

You can also find a series of articles looking at different aspects of the V2 game here.

If you have any questions on the V2 rules, the model range, or any other aspect of the Maelstrom's Edge game, feel free to pop in to the Comm Guild Facebook group here.

- by Iain Wilson

The 'Lightyear' movie from Pixar was accompanied by a 'Hyperspeed' range of rather cool vehicle and ship toys. While the 1" figures are too small to be useful, some of the vehicles actually wind up looking just about perfect alongside gaming miniatures. The truck, in particular, was just too good to not put on the table. So after grabbing some on special from a local department store, I pulled one apart and painted it up, to see how it would look!




The truck is reasonably well detailed, and so to get the best results I decided to take it apart rather than trying to paint the fully assembled model. This turned out to be more difficult than expected, as two of the screws holding the back of the truck together are hidden behind the rear wheels, and the axles have textured ends that don't just pull out of the wheels - I wound up having to cut them and make a new rear axle. If I do any more of these, I'll probably just go the easy route and paint them assembled.

The truck in question before any modification:



I sprayed the chassis and wheels with Army Painter Matte Black, and the rest of the truck with Uniform Grey and then a zenithal spray of Matte White, so the grey stayed in the creases.

I didn't sand the vehicle before painting, as I was feeling lazy. The paint stuck fine to the plastic, although the printing on the sides of the truck back is slightly raised, which left a noticable shape under the paint. So I decided to just use that existing shape as a template for my own coloured decoration.



I kept the painting fairly simple, painting the seats with Army Painter Hardened Leather Speedpaint, and drybrushing the chassis with Citadel Boltgun Metal. The tyres were painted with Army Painter Uniform Grey, and then the chassis and wheels given a coat of Speedpaint Gravelord Grey. I wanted the truck to look a bit used, so after reassembling everything I weathered the white with some Vallejo Heavy Charcoal applied with a sponge, and drybrushed on some Vallejo Beasty Brown in the crevasses. The various lights were picked out with white and then various appropriate Speedpaints.

The finished truck, with the original for comparison:



I'm calling it the 'ParSec 12 Medium Transport'. You'll get there in a ParSec!





Once you've built your own fleet of cargo-carrying doom, head to the Maelstrom's Edge webstore here, to pick up some miniatures to attack it with!

We would love to see your models and terrain in the Comm Guild Facebook group. Pop in over there and share what you're working on!

For other building ideas, modeling tutorials, army spotlights and conversion walkthroughs, check out the Hobby section of the Maelstrom's Edge website here. And while you're there, grab a copy of the Maelstrom's Edge V2 Beta rules!

The armoured troops of the Karist Enclave exist to provide a gloved fist for those situations where skilled oratory and social destabilization prove insufficient. This week, we're taking a look at a small Karist force put together for V1 by Marten, one of the members of our Maelstrom's Edge development team.




About his force, Marten says: "This is my 90pt Karist force. It's fairly small, which I find convenient for trying out new rules at first. I'm a fan of 'regular guys' in my forces. Hence there is no mature Angel, but two full sized squads of troopers, four Tempest Elites carrying the force's big guns and two Praetorians because they're cool. A Shadow Walker and a full complement of Minnows make up the fast element of the force, led by a Kaddar Nova.

The colour scheme was inspired by the painted examples on the Maelstrom's Edge kickstarter of 2015, combined with then new-to-me Warcolours paints which had a nice 5 tone 'blue grey' set.


The Kaddar Nova overlooks his force, accompanied by his Praetorian escort.


Karist Troopers, including a Heavy Trooper equipped with a devastating Cybel Lance.


The second unit of Troopers, with a Ripper Heavy Grenade Launcher, and the deadly, teleporting Shadow Walker.


Tempest Elites are implacable fire support for Karist forces.


Though comparatively small, Minnows are no less ferocious than older Angels.



To get started on your own army of over-zealous doom, pick up the Karist models, or any of the rest of the range from the webstore here.

What are you working on? We would love to see your models and terrain in the Comm Guild Facebook group!

Remember to also grab a copy of the Maelstrom's Edge V2 Beta rules so you can get into the action!

Epirian forces cut a distinctive figure on the table, with their militia forces backed up by a range of specialised robot troops. This week, we're sharing a look at a small Epirian force put together a while back by Marten, one of the members of our Maelstrom's Edge development team.




Built to fit on the table in 90 points for the V1 rules, Marten's force leans heavily into the various bot options. Contractors are all well and good, but accompanying them with chaingun-equipped support bots is even better!


Contractors wisely ensconced in cover.

Fireflies are comparatively fragile compared to most other Epirian bots, but are superb when you need to get some firepower across the battlefield in a hurry.


A Journeyman Bot Handler directs his Firefly cohort onto the battlefield.

Spider Drones are handy for decimating enemy troops, coming equipped with twin machine guns or flakk guns, and also excel at digging into cover to avoid enemy fire.


A unit of Spider Drones with their Apprentice Handler move up the centre under the watchful targeting lens of a Scarecrow bot.

A Scarecrow Sniper is a much more fearsome presence than its gangly frame might imply, capable of pummeling the toughest enemies at range with its shoulder mounted Maglock Railgun, or repelling closer foes with clingfire or chemical spray.


A second Scarecrow Sniper stands overwatch at the rear of the deployment.



To get started on your own army of robotic doom you can pick up these models, or any of the rest of the Epirian range from the webstore here.

What are you working on? We would love to see your models and terrain in the Comm Guild Facebook group!

Remember to also grab a copy of the Maelstrom's Edge V2 Beta rules so you can get into the action!

- by Iain Wilson

A good collection of trees is handy for fleshing out your battlefields, but commercially-made trees made specifically for scale modeling can be expensive. I've shared a few different ideas in the past for making your own foliage, including using aquarium plants, expanding foam, and Christmas baubles covered in hot glue.

Over the years, one of the more common budget tree ideas I've come across is to use pine cones painted green. They have the advantage of being vaguely tree-shaped and inexpensive if you have pine trees nearby, but tend to wind up just looking like pine cones painted green. I thought I would see if I could come up with an easy and cheap way of improving on this idea a little, with this result:




To get started, I collected a bunch of pine cones in assorted sizes, preferably as close to fully opened up as possible.



I took an old, large paintbrush and painted the outside of each pine cone with a generous layer of PVA glue.



Then while the glue was still nice and wet, I dipped the cones in a tub of green flock, rolling them around to get the flock covering all of the glued areas.



I don't normally use sawdust flock for modeling, as for its primary use (for grassed areas) I don't like how it looks, although I have used a finer flock in the past for making hedges. But I had a big tub of this stuff that someone gave to me years ago, and this seemed like a good use for it.

The flocked pine cones:



To finish up, I gave the trees a light spray from above using Army Painter Army Green. This dulled down the bright green of the flock and gave it some depth. I then used hot glue to attach the trees to some circular plywood bases. At this point, they can be put on the table as single trees, placed on top of a shaped terrain piece to make a forest base, or fitted to a textured base board. For the latter, you can glue the trees directly to the base board instead of using the circles, or texture around the circles so that the trees are removable, making for easier storage or the ability to remove trees when they are in the way for model movement.



The end result, to be honest, still looks somewhat like pine cones painted green, although the illusion works a little better from above at normal playing height. For a little more work, you can also prune away the pieces from the base of the pine cone to create a trunk protruding from the bottom, like this:



Or, to get even further away from the pine cone look, you can use a slightly more liberal coat of glue and cover the whole thing in landscaping foliage, like this:





Once you have your forest of pine-scented doom, head on over to the Maelstrom's Edge webstore here, to pick up an army to run around in it!

What are you working on? We would love to see your models and terrain in the Comm Guild Facebook group!

For other building ideas, modeling tutorials, army spotlights and conversion walkthroughs, check out the Hobby section of the Maelstrom's Edge website here. And while you're there, grab a copy of the Maelstrom's Edge V2 Beta rules!

- by Iain Wilson

I've been fascinated for a while now by the various designs floating around for coffee tables and the like that 'float' with some clever cable design making it look like they have no actual support. In a moment of whimsy this week, I thought it might be fun to recreate this sort of design for the gaming table. And so... this happened:




The main part of the structure is made from various bits and pieces from the Maelstrom's Edge terrain sprues. The circular windows on the bottom of the platform have a piece of thin plasticard behind them with a hole drilled through the centre. This allowed me to feed some clear fishing line through the holes and glue it onto the back of the plasticard. Once everything was painted and assembled, this would (I hoped!) securely hold the fishing line in place.



The base for the piece was made from a sheet of 2mm foamed PVC and some 6mm foamcore, with a few more bits from the terrain sprues for the support piece. I drilled holes in the base piece matching up to the holes on the platform corners, and made an indent beside each hole on the bottom of the base. This would allow the fishing line, when glued in place, to sit in the indents leaving the bottom of the base nice and flat.



Everything needed to be painted before final assembly, to avoid getting paint on the fishing line - I wanted the line to remain as unobtrusive as possible.



I glued the fishing line into the window ports and glued those in place on the bottom of the platform, and then glued the central support line in place. The it was just a matter of pulling the corner lines through the base holes until everything was sitting square and secure, and gluing the ends of the lines in place on the bottom of the base. There was a bit of breath-holding when I turned it over, and much rejoicing when it turned out to work as intended!







It's a bit of an odd piece for gaming terrain, but sometimes it's fun to make something just to find out if you can!



To build your own generator platform of floating doom, you can pick up the terrain sprues along with the rest of the Maelstrom's Edge range from the webstore here.

What are you working on? We would love to see your models and terrain in the Comm Guild Facebook group!

For other building ideas, modeling tutorials, army spotlights and conversion walkthroughs, check out the Hobby section of the Maelstrom's Edge website here. And while you're there, grab a copy of the Maelstrom's Edge V2 Beta rules!

- by Iain Wilson

Fences can provide an interesting extra dimension to miniature battlefields, as they block movement without necessarily also blocking line of site. This can force some tactical decisions around model placement and movement around the table. In this week's article, I'm sharing a quick and easy way to make some fences for your table.




I came across these Lego-compatible fence pieces on AliExpress completely by accident, and thought they seemed ideal for gaming. They come as a pack of fence sections, and join together with separate clip pieces, and they're a nice, dark metallic grey colour. So for the really quick and easy version, you could just take these, clip a bunch of them together and plonk them on the table as-is and call the job a good-un.



I wanted to fit them in with my existing terrain a little better, though, so I grabbed a couple of Maelstrom's Edge terrain sprues and set to work. I started by trimming up some reinforcing struts to about the same height as the fence panels by cutting off the top and bottom segments.



Then I took some 3mm foamed PVC and cut strips the same height as the struts, with about 4mm extra width either side - as a happy coincidence, this was the same width as two of the struts, so laying the struts side-by-side on the PVC served as a handy cutting guide.



I glued the struts in place on either side of the PVC strips to form reinforced fence posts, and then cut some shorter strips to serve as bases for the posts. The bottom segment removed from the struts, cut in half diagonally, made some perfect supports to strengthen the attachment between post and base.



With everything glued together, the clips for the fence pieces slot snugly onto the PVC and it all stands up nicely.



I made a bunch of posts, and for good measure cut one of the fence segments in half and attached some more reinforcing struts on the inner sections to make a two-part gate. The whole thing slots together and by twisting the holding clips can go around corners into whatever configuration is needed.



With a quick coat of rusty paint (Vallejo Beasty Brown spray with some splotchy spray of Tamiya Pure Orange and a light drybrush with Army Painter Fire Lizard) and some grey for the PVC parts (Army Painter Uniform Grey with a drybrush of white and some Vallejo Beasty Brown drybrushed into the creases) the fence is ready for the table!





To build your own fence of chainlinked doom, you can pick up the terrain sprues along with the rest of the Maelstrom's Edge range from the webstore here.

What are you working on? We would love to see your models and terrain in the Comm Guild Facebook group!

For other building ideas, modeling tutorials, army spotlights and conversion walkthroughs, check out the Hobby section of the Maelstrom's Edge website here. And while you're there, grab a copy of the Maelstrom's Edge V2 Beta rules!

- by Iain Wilson

This week, we're taking a look at the multi-part, poseable plastic kit for the Epirian Foundation's feared security bot.

Scarecrows are area patrol units, designed to provide security to various types of property ranging from industrial perimeters to agricultural and terraforming facilities. Equipped with an advanced suite of thermal and motion tracking sensors, the Scarecrow is designed to detect and deter any non-authorized biological or technological intrusion into its designated patrol area.




The Scarecrow kit is designed to build a couple of different variants of this farming-bot-turned-military-asset, which lets you field the regular Scarecrow Sniper in a Hammer slot, or the Command Array-equipped Command Scarecrow leading an all-bot force. These can be armed with a shoulder mounted railrifle, and either a clingfire sprayer or chemtek sprayer on one arm.



If you 'borrow' a second clingfire sprayer (leftover from building a chemtek variant, obviously!) you can also build the twin-flaming Subjugator variant that often accompanies Contractor Suppression Teams.



The best part of the Scarecrow kit is its extreme flexibility. With separate ankle, knee, elbow and shoulder joints, the Scarecrow is our most poseable kit, and being plastic is a fantastic base for adding alternate parts and mixing things up even further.



To build your own implacable robot of avian-frightening Doom, pick up the plastic Scarecrows in a pack of two from the Maelstrom's Edge webstore!





While you're there, you can download the Maelstrom's Edge V2 rules from the Trial Rules section of the website here. The Beta rules documents contain all of the rules for playing V2 games, but keep in mind that these are just 'preview' documents - some rules may be revised based on feedback, and the final layout including background material for the factions and the Maelstrom's Edge universe, artwork and other 'flavor' material is missing.

For other modeling ideas, tutorials, army spotlights and conversion walkthroughs, check out the Hobby section of the Maelstrom's Edge website here.

What are you working on? We would love to see your models and terrain in the Comm Guild Facebook group!

- by Iain Wilson

My adventures with Army Painter Speedpaints continued this week, as I'm slowly piecing together a force from various miniatures to run as an Imperial Guard army in 2nd edition Warhammmer 40000. This week's addition was a plastic (and slightly converted) Karist Kaddar Nova!




This model uses mostly the standard Kaddar Nova parts, although I added in a right hand, glaive and pistol from the Faction Expansion sprue, as this chap will be fielded as an Inquisitor Lord armed with a force rod and hand flamer.

As per normal for Speedpaint work, I started with a white spray basecoat. The armour is Zealot Yellow, hung upside down to dry so that the paint would pool into upper recesses. For the skin, my initial tests with Crusader Skin straight over white were not what I wanted, so this time around I tried an experiment. Starting with a coat of Skeleton Bone, I applied a very light drybrush of Matt White and then the Crusader Skin, and was quite happy with the result. The eyes are a thin strip of white with some black dots in the middle, and then any mess around the edges cleaned up with some more Skeleton Bone and Crusader Skin.



Proper curing time is still something of a mystery with Speedpaint, and in certain conditions the paint can reactivate when painted over if it is not completely cured, so I have taken to applying a light coat of Anti-Shine varnish over the first, main colour and then applying any white touchups and subsequent Speedpaint colours over that, and this seems to do the trick.

I used Grim Black for the black parts on his tabard and arms, and Gravelord Grey for exposed metal parts. The grey gives a good metal stand-in without actually being metallic, and there's enough of a contrast between the grey and black for the two to wind up looking sufficiently different.



The blades on the glaive and the various glowy blue bits were painted with Highlord Blue with accents of Matt White, while the handle of the glaive is Hardened Leather.



The tabard is Blood Red, applied in two layers - one for the initial colour, and then after that dried, some additional red dabbed into the deeper creases for some extra shading. Then, with all of the colours in place, I added some highlights wherever seemed appropriate on the model with a little Matt White.

Finally, I painted the base with a coat of Dark Wood, drybrushing when it was dry with a little Skeleton Bone, and then added Matt Black around the rim.



So, that's one squad and a character down, and the rest of the force in progress.



Stay tuned for more!

To build your own Psychic Lord of Proxied Doom, pick up the plastic Kaddar Nova kit from the Maelstrom's Edge webstore!

While you're there, you can download the V2 rules from the Trial Rules section of the Maelstrom's Edge website here. The Beta rules documents contain all of the rules for playing V2 games, but keep in mind that these are just 'preview' documents - some rules may be revised based on feedback, and the final layout including background material for the factions and the Maelstrom's Edge universe, artwork and other 'flavor' material is missing.

For other modeling ideas, tutorials, army spotlights and conversion walkthroughs, check out the Hobby section of the Maelstrom's Edge website here.

What are you working on? We would love to see your models and terrain in the Comm Guild Facebook group!

- by Iain Wilson

My long-awaited Army Painter Speedpaint Starter Set finally arrived last week, and I was impatient to give them a test run. I've had a bunch of plastic SecDef models assembled for a while, for a little side-project, and figured they would be perfect for the job. So I grabbed the first squad of models out of the hobby box and set to work!




I started off with a basecoat of Army Painter Matt White spray. I did experiment on a couple of initial test models with a plain white basecoat and a zenithal base using white and purple, but decided that the zenithal basecoat didn't make enough of a difference to the end result to be worth the effort.

(A zenithal basecoat is where two layers of colour are used - a darker colour in the recesses/undersides of the mode, and a lighter layer sprayed down from above. This can be handy when combined with certain painting methods, particularly using thinner 'glazing' paints to accentuate shading and highlights.)



For the uniform, I went with Highlord Blue, applying to any visible cloth areas and trying to avoid too much spillover onto the armour plates. I also added the blue to the raised surround on the helmet.



After a quick touchup where necessary with some Matt White, I painted a layer of Hardened Leather over pouches, straps, boots, gloves and face, and then went back over the face with Crusader Skin. The double layer on the skin was to give a darker skin colour - my initial test showed the Crusader Skin to be a bit more washed out than I wanted, but layering it over the Leather gave a nice, dark tone.



Next up, I painted over the weapon, belt, exoskeleton, and helmet commlink, targeter and chinstrap with Gravelord Grey.



For the armour plates and helmet, I went with a coat of Zealot Yellow. This settled nicely on the lower areas of the plates, providing a lovely contrast against the blue uniform.



To finish up, I added some Blood Red over the goggles, and while that was drying added some gravel mix to the base. Without a dark brown in the starter set, I used a 1:1:1 mix of Hardened Leather, Blood Red and Hive Dweller Purple over the gravel, giving it a drybrush of Tanned Flesh and Ash Grey (regular acrylic paints) when it dried. With a quick run of Matt Black around the base rim and some white specular highlights on the goggles, he was ready for the table.



The unit assembled - regular SecDef models, with a custom made energy mortar using some plastic tubing and parts from the 2nd Maelstrom's Edge terrain sprue.





They're not perfectly neat, but for a quick, table-ready paintjob these paints are fantastic, giving some perfectly acceptable shading and highlights with a single coat. I'm looking forward to getting the rest of this force painted up!



To have a go yourself, pick up the plastic, multi-part SecDef kit from the Maelstrom's Edge webstore!

While you're there, you can download the V2 rules from the Trial Rules section of the Maelstrom's Edge website here. The Beta rules documents contain all of the rules for playing V2 games, but keep in mind that these are just 'preview' documents - some rules may be revised based on feedback, and the final layout including background material for the factions and the Maelstrom's Edge universe, artwork and other 'flavor' material is missing.

For other modeling ideas, tutorials, army spotlights and conversion walkthroughs, check out the Hobby section of the Maelstrom's Edge website here.

What are you working on? We would love to see your models and terrain in the Comm Guild Facebook group!