Painting Monstrous Creatures is not a thing that comes naturally to someone easily distracted by the 'new shiny'. Nor someone lacking discipline - but the Beasts of Chaos Ghorgon was not only a large miniature, but also something I was going to finish before starting anything else - and what a fateful decision that was! You see the Ghorgon is not only large... but PACKED with detail. It's actually an excellent model, beautifully done, with more skulls than an Undead army and more leather straps than a Slaanesh meet and greet.
There's also a lot of alternate parts - from hands to forearm armour - so I took that extra armour and gave him knee and shoulder armour to give him a heavier appearance. Haven't seen this done before, but I' sure I'm not the first.

The colour of the flesh unites him with the other Beastmen in my force (unit examples below) which is a Celestra Grey base, with a Skavenblight DInge/ Lahmian Medium wash and then progressively lighter Celestra Grey/ Ceramite White highlights. Painting the skin was a pain as I decided to avoid large areas of colour and instead went for a strokes - look closely, it gives texture to something would obviously not be a flat colour. Thought that with the scale of him, the skin needed some sort of texture. The touches of red fabric also unite him with the rest of my force. There is a lot of warm colours on him to contrast with the cool skin colour - the leather, the red fabric, the tongue and then there's touches of cool like the green and purple gems. The leather has had a few comments - this is actually quite simple - Terracotta base, Ratskin Flesh highlights and then a very watered down dark brown wash. It flattens the colours together nicely.
The metals are all rusted with thinned brown paint and some very watery orange in the crevices, but the sharp parts of the blades are clean of rust to show they had been sharpened for war.
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Overall I'm very happy with the result and would consider doing another, but after a bit of a rest! The Start Collecting Beast of Chaos is excellent value as it comes with this and some troops.

Bit of a small pre-order week today, which could actually be a blessing after the huge Nighthaunt releases for Age of $igmar and Kill Team for 40k - but what would a weekend be without at least something top tempt us. Personally I miss these being first shown in the weekly version of White Dwarf (not that our WD even ever turns up anymore) but the internet is a hungry beast, so here we have it. 
Next week sees the release of a new twist on an old favourite - it's Speed Freeks! Ork Klans via for supremacy around (you have to admit) a rather small area. These minis are really nice, the bikes not straying too far from art we have seen for decades and the buggies are a big improvement on the old model for sure. Apparently the buggies in this set are exclusive to this set, and with only the boxed set being released this weekend and no individual sets, it may be unlikely we know if they are for a while.
By the way, is it just us or does the book's cover art (below) look like Steve Bisley art?
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In books next week, the Limited Edition Corax: Lord of Shadows hits the shelves as does the Age of $igmar-themed Sacrosanct & Other Stories  plus a timely audio book release, Prophets of Waaagh! with a picture on the cover almost directly copied from a scene out of the newer Mad Max film.
In somewhat more exciting news, the Horus Heresy series is coming to an end (as such) with the Siege of Terra finally beginning. Next week sees the beginning of that part of the story arc with The Horus Heresy: Heralds of the Siege a collection of short stories - some in print for the first time and others were originally released as audio dramas.
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is it an exciting pre-order week? No - but it's one week closer to the glory of Slaanesh!

Hasbro have just announced part of their new War on Cybetron Siege line up will include some new Micro Master 2-packs, and by the look of it they have taken some inspiration from two other Hasbro lines - G.I.Joe and MASK. Have a look at Swindler (below left) and Stormcloud (below right) then have a look at the MASK vehicle Thunderhawk and the Night Raven from the G.I.Joe line.

Although not exactly the same, there does seem to be some serious inspiration. This is of course not the first time these properties have crossed over - in 2008 G.I.Joe brought out a Matt Trakker figure and in 2015 Transformers released a figure, Viper, based on the Cobra Rattler from G.I. Joe.

These crossovers are great fun - and for fans of the franchises a great addition to their collections!

​Kill Team - elite squads of troops pitted against each other, and this week Games Workshop have introduced the Commanders Expansion Boxed Set, which includes a 120 page book, 33 Universal Commander Tactics cards (7 cards covering the psychic powers from the book, along with Psybolt from the Kill Team Core Manual), 20 blank Commander datacards, a double-sided Commander token sheet.  
To go with this boxed set are Commanders for each faction - Ankra the Colossus Necron Commander, Feodor Lasko Astra Militarum Commander, Fireblade Twinflame T’au Empire Commander, Gaius Acastian Deathwatch Commander, Gitzog Wurldkilla Ork Commander, Magos Dalathrust Adeptus Mechanicus Commander, Torrvald Orksbane Adeptus Astartes and Vysa Kharavyxis Drukhari Commander. Each Commander is moulded in this new coloured platsic GW are using and come with a datacard, a skill tree card, 5 Tactics Cards (including 2 Tactics exclusive to this set) plus a sheet of tokens for use in games of Kill Team. Kill Team seems like Necromunda for 40K, so should make people pretty happy!
Away from 40K, last week we saw some cool new teams for Warhammer Underworlds: Nightvault, well this week you can get some card sleeves for those factions - the Eyes of the Nine and Zarbag’s Gitz. 
In books, the next Primarch book is out - Vulkan: Lord of Drakes. There's been some good press about some of these, so be interesting to see the verdict on this one too. 

For some extremely odd reason I have been thinking about some of the Specialist units for the War Hounds Legion. Not really sure why - I mean I have enough infantry still to paint, but this entered my mind. Maybe it's because I want the Specialist units to have slightly different markings and I want to explore that. Already the Scimitar pilot has the markings, so why not expand it a bit - thus this Destroyer guy. Now firstly, I'm not convinced the War Hounds would have used Destroyers, in fact they seem like the type of Legion that would shun them, but you never know.

I knew right away that I didn't want the ruined armour, but I did want to have some effect on their armour from the specialist weapons - no paint chips, but something. Considering the War Hounds were a very chivalrous if violent Legion, their armour would be clean at least! Here I opted for some Brown washes in the recesses and around bolts to show there had been some wear. The helmet is an Iron Warriors one and I really like the design but it may not fit the Legion. Here you could argue that he looks like a Chaplain, but the thought was the unit would be themed around the idea of death - skulls etc!
Now the Specialist markings I mean are the shoulder pads - notice the blue bars on the side of the markings. This is on both shoulders and will differentiate them from normal units. Possibly the best Bronze shoulder trims I've ever done BTW! Happy with those. There's a bit of neatening up to do on some of the paint, but overall he's done.
Ss the Specialist units start to take shape. I doubt I will do anther Destroyer - it was more a fun test.

We're going to show our bias today and start the preview with the new Warhound Titan for Adeptus Titanicus. This has ALWAYS been a favourite, so it's release not only spells the end of the Titanicus release that we have seen, it also means that the process of painting up a few of these begins. Luckily the Warhound comes in a two-pack, and by the picture (right) they are very much like the original metal Epic scale and are tiny!! To command your Warhound pups there is also the Warhound Scout Titan Command Terminal Pack - why include the means of paying them with the miniatures when you can sell them separately, right? With way too much written about these awesome minis lets move onto some Age of $igmar with new minis for Warhammer Underworlds - this week it's teams for Tzeentch with ​The Eyes of the Nine and the Goblins with Zarbag’s Gitz. Zarbag’s Gitz is a great set of amazing looking characters, including a very Brian Froud looking armoured Goblin. The Eyes of Nine is a bit disappointing, despite the inclusion of a female Tzeentch Cultist! The requisite themed dice for Zarbag’s Gitz and The Eyes of Nine (incredibly similar to the Thorns of the Briar Queen Dice Pack)are also on pre-order. Interestingly after the success of the Kill Team Carry Case, guess what? There's an Underworlds Nightvault Carry Case too. These disappear very quickly BTW. There's also the re-release of Steelheart’s Champions and Garrek’s Reavers for Underworlds: Nighthaunt, but if you do won them already you can just buy the Underworlds: Nightvault – Echoes of Glory cards. It's the third time these minis have been released, so just release the cards and make it simple please.
In books we have a few items actually, The Beast Arises: Volume 1 (which is an omnibus of the first four books and well worth a read!), Gotrek and Felix: The First Omnibus (which includes the first three William King Gotrek & Felix  novels plus five additional short stories), Horus Heresy: Shattered Legions (which includes ten short stories including the novella The Seventh Serpent which revisits the ragtag crew of the starship Sisypheum) and Book 2 of the Dark Imperium trilogy Plague War.
It's a Made To Order week too with Galrauch (a Chaos dragon kit well over 30 years old),  Throgg the ogre which is an amazing kit only let down by not having an army to lead, the Skaven Plague Lord Nurglitch and two Beastmen models - Morghur, Master of Skulls and Khazrak the One-eye. 

Happy weekend to you, and with each weekend comes the lottery of "time to empty my wallet" vs "ooooh, more money for next week" - yes it's pre-order time!
This week sees the release of a new boxed set Wake The Dead which pits the Ultrasmurfs against the Aeldari in the War Zone Vigilus. It's pretty cool to see the Aeldari get some love - despite to older Guardian models - plus there's two new commander models in this set, a Primaris Lieutenant and and Aeldari Spiritseer. This set is at the higher end of the price scale for boxed sets, but all the models are multi-pose plus there's the Wave Serpent.
Kill Team also gets some reinforcements this week with the forces of goodness and light (at the end of a Pulse Carbine), the Tau Advance Team Starpulse and the Exalted Scythe for Necrons. These sets also come with barricades from the Wall of Martyrs. For old school anime fans, the Tau team's name seems to be a bit of a pun on the Science Ninja Team Gatchaman and Secret Combat Team Go-Rangers - being that the Tau aesthetic is based on the Japanese anime genre. That alone makes me want to buy them. In fact doing them up like an anime team is not a bad idea... Kill Team also gets the Wall of Martyrs Environment Expansion  which comes with a double-sided Kill Team gameboard on heavy card stock, tactics cards etc etc plus an Imperial Bunker, a set of 2 Imperial Defence Lines and an Imperial Defence Placement. Pretty cool! Now of course we get the Tau and Necron Kill Team Dice - which close up can look a bit cheap, but the Necron ones look quite cool.
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In books, Inferno! Volume 1 is out next week. This is the first in the relaunch of the Inferno! brand and brings you new short stories from the worlds of Warhammer 40K, Necromunda, Age of $igmar and the ancient lands of the Warhammer Chronicles and written by debut and current Black Library authors. This should actually be very cool. The paperback version of Legacy Of Dorn is also out, as is the Imperator: Wrath of the Omnissiah Paperback.
Next week is also a White Dwarf week. Bit of a week cover - they all seem to be blending into one another at the moment - but they promise a whole lot of stuff we have already seen (Warhammer Underworlds, Beasts of Chaos, Adeptus Titanicus), Getting started with… Kill Team, Ultimate Guide To the Titan Legions plus a stage-by-stage painting guide for the new WARHOUND Titans for Adeptus Titanicus. 

When the new Beasts of Chaos army was announced, one of the very cool things was the Start Collecting Beasts of Chaos set. This had light infantry (Ungor), a heavy infantry unit (Bestigor), a spellcaster (Great Bray-Shaman) and a monster (the Ghorgon/ Cygor combi-kit) - a great start to any army, especially in this era of magic. The Ghorgon/ Cygor combi-kit was cool before, when added into this kit it became amazing value; you effectively get the heavy infantry and spellcaster for free! With Beastmen in the air, the Start Collecting set was ordered and we were really surprised at the kit as a whole. It's sizeable, packed with a tonne of detail - and even on it's own - the $90 price tag is well worth it. The Sylvaneth Spirit of Durthu kit gets a lot of attention for it's level of detail - well this kit is definitely on par with both options, detail and scale.
We're going with the four armed Ghorgon model - rule of cool - but definitely considering another one. Now of course the painting may be an epic pain in the arse, so that could change, but for now until it sits gathering dust, revel in the beauty!!
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++ If you follow us on Facebook, you would have seen that after years of disappointment with GW Mail Order in Australia, we decided to try Emerald Hobbies & Collectables & it arrived on the Tuesday after release. Couldn't ask for more. This is not a paid endorsement - just a heads up to Aussie & Kiwi buyers ++

Shadespire has really grown from an Age of $igmar off-shoot to it's own games system with considerable amounts of investment from Games Workshop in new minis and accessories - and this week we get the next installment Warhammer Underworlds: Nightvault. This release is interesting as they must also see the need for people who don't want to buy the whole game but want to add the minis or elements to their existing Shadespire force. Both the Thorns of the Briar Queen and Stormsire's Cursebreakers can be bought separately from the game (with the themed accessories listed below), as can the Mirrored City Boards Pack. There are also accessories available for the game; the Nightvault Deck Box and ​Nightvault Playmat plus the Stormsire's Cursebreakers Dice Pack, the Thorns of the Briar Queen Dice Pack plus the Magic Dice Pack which can be found in the Nightvault game, but these are prettier, and of course the themed Stormsire’s Cursebreakers Card Sleeves and Thorns of the Briar Queen Card Sleeves. Leaving the best until last, there's a really cool scenery set, Nightvault Arcane Hazards, with some pieces for games which are probably well worth a look and if you have a look at the pictures - much bigger than you'd think. 
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In books next week we have Blood of Iax in standard Hardback or in Special Edition. This is an Ultramarines Primaris story based on the characters from the Black Library Advent Calendar tale A Brother's Confession. Primaris and Ultramarines in the same story - be-still my beating heart - please let me mortgage the cat...  

Have you had the chance to have a look at the new Kings of War Vanguard miniatures from Mantic? There's some really awesome sculpts from a variety of races​. While you're at it, check out the massive Kings of War Giant! Years ago, when Mantic first started, the plastic wasn't that great - but I hear these days it is very much improved, so I have to say that i'm tempted!