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Monday, April 21, 2025

Operation Heinlein: Strike Force Commander


"As a Space Marine officer, I prefer not to wear my helmet into combat. Heads up displays, thermal imagery, communication nets, real time location and the status of my Marines - plus the protection it provides are for sissies. Plus I can see my chain sword better without it.


As a follow-up to my earlier post on painting armored infantry, unh Space Marines copyright by Games Workshop with blood oaths, Dwarven runes and Chaos Demon lawyers, I finally found the commander for my Armored Infantry Strike Force commander for Xenos Rampant.



I was able to get the Boardgame “Space Marines” which is sold exclusively at Target or online from GW for the ridiculously low price of $25 US dollars. It’s actually a fun, fast game and comes with Lieutenant Titus of the Ultramarines and 10 Tyranid termagants and 3 ripper swarms. It pays to wait for sales.


Lieutenant Titus will get a new name for Xenos Rampant. I did the figure just using Citadel Contrast (CC) paints and as always use a quality primer! In this case I use Citadel Bone Wraith. There is a little paint on his face because I wanted to get a picture of the primed figure and almost forgot.



For the skin I used a base of Vallejo Dark Flesh and then added a wash of CC Darkoath Flesh for shading and detailing. 




The chain sword (let’s face it, chain swords are ridiculous but cool) is painted with CC Black Templar.



It’s time for CC Ultramarine Blue for the armor. I’m not worried about a smooth, even application as I want the armor to look like it’s been used in combat and not on the parade field.




The star burst is CC Blood Angel Red and I later cleaned it up with Vallejo Flat Red. 

The blue hanging rectory weird GW bone box I’m going to pretend it is a medical kit. I painted it with CC Aethermatic Blue and all of the leather is painted with CC Snakebite Leather.



The scroll under the skull is Striking Scorpion Green, the battle honor strips are CC Skeleton Horde with the seals CC Blood Angel Red. The skull on the base is also CC Skeleton Horde and the STUPID loin cloth, one more thing to get stuck in combat, is CC Nazdreg Yellow. The hilt on the chain sword is Vallejo Shiny Gold.


The wreath is also CC Striking Scorpion Green.


The concrete is CC Space Wolves Grey and the pipe will be eventually painted with CC Basilicum Grey.


I forgot to mention that the weapon and other bare metal is CC Basilicum Grey.

I used my usual basing mix of various sizes of railroad hobby ballast. I painted the base color Vallejo Luftwaffe Uniform WWII and dry brushed Vallejo Neutral Grey followed by Vallejo Light Grey.


The side of the base is Vallejo Flat Brown.




Always keep those bits. Since the leader has a larger base, I added a Necron arm to give it a little jazz.


Regular ole green static grass from Gale Force 9.




Ta Dah!



4 comments:

  1. Another great tutorial Neil, great looking miniature, really full of movement and you have done a grand job on him.

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    Replies
    1. Thanks! With game Xenos Rampant I’m really enjoying going back to these figures.

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  2. Replies
    1. Thanks Ray. I was really impressed how a minimum of Contrast paints made a figure look great. Sometimes less is more!

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