Just like Fantasy, when choosing and sticking to armies, I have the attention span of a sparrow. Every now and then, I get inspired by a random model, a book or even a movie, and it starts me on a course of enthusiastic collecting and painting. However, I am always drawn back to three armies. No matter what the flavour of the month in power gaming is, what the newest release is, or what tournament is coming up, I have kept three forces at the forefront of my collections.
The first is Space Marines. Seriously? I hear you say. Me and everyone ever.
It's no denying that Space Marines are the staple army of 40k, and that everyone has played them and has at least a handful of marines in a forgotten box in the garage. But I wasn't satisfied with a blue and gold Ultra army. Of the founding chapters, with no small thanks to a brilliant series of books by Nick Kyme, I chose to go with Salamanders. With their green and bronze armour, scaled cloaks, thunder hammers and fire on absolutely everything, they are one of the most characterful chapters, steeped in history and culture and tied so closely to their home world. Not only that, but they get some of the coolest characters in 40k in the form of Vulkan He'Stan and Chaplain Xavier (a model that was incredibly hard to get my hands on...), as well as the most bad ass loyalist Primarch out.
My second force is the polar opposite of the green clad protectors of humanity. Word Bearers. While word bearers are typically seen as one of the "boring" legions lacking a single focus on one of the four factions (or evil marine ninjas), this means that they have the flexibility of including whatever units they choose. And let's face it, the Crimson Slaughter should pretty much read "Word Bearers Supplement".
The third and final (and by far the largest) is the big green tide, ORKS. They were the first army I played and over the years, my collection has just grown and grown... And grown. My collection now weighs in at approximately 12,000 points. Disgusting, really.
I look forward to showing these armies to you in the future, and indeed putting them on the table for games, but in true "hobby butterfly" fashion, I'm currently very enthused about my current painting and gaming project, Necrons.
Now, I know what you're thinking and it goes something like, "Get off the bandwagon". But, alas, it was no power-gaming motivation that got me into necrons. It all started with a joke. I was chatting with a mate about how, in 40k, there is no colour scheme off limits. So with a smirk, I purchased the new plastic overlord and painted him pink. I looked at the final product and had a good laugh.
Then the longer I looked at it, the more I thought...
This doesn't look completely terrible! And so what was meant to be a single model for a laugh, turned into an army that is growing at speed. So without further ado, here's the current progress. 
As you can see, I haven't gotten very far, but I'm really happy with how the colour scheme ties together on the desert bases. Thanks to the Decurion Detachment layout, it makes collecting units simple, as I can focus on each section at a time, the first being the Reclamation Legion of course, the only mandatory choice. I haven't had a game with them yet, but am building towards a relatively sturdy 750 points. Then onwards and upwards!
It also dawned on me that today was the deadline for the Border Wars 1000 point stage of painting. And thanks to a carefully painted character and two big birds, I squeezed across the points benchmark.
Five of the Swordmasters have been carried over from a previous stage. The other five fill out the unit and add a standard and blade master to complete the command group. And as my naval theme grows more focussed, I've painted two of the old metal Great Eagles (that I aquired from an old friend) in the same colour scheme as a pale Sea Hawk. It's satisfying and motivating to see the uniform units gathering on my display shelf and only gets me more inspired to paint.
If you have models you'd like to display on this page for Border Wars, by all means, get in touch because I would love to show them off for you! There's some particular models from a particular Beastmen player (not me, there is another Beastmen player!) that are absolutely awesome!
Until then, time and sleep deprivation being what they are, I must leave you now. As always, thank you for reading, good friend.
Gabriel
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