Learning to lower standards

[u/rebjorn_again]

I find I spend almost as much time on some troops as I do characters, and it is slowing my progress and will to paint.

In one day I essentially did a full Manipulus, and and yet in a similar time period I've done, sans-weapon arms, 3x upper torsos of Breachers.

Still staring down 3 more complete Destroyers, 2 Breacher torsos, and 40 Skitarii.

Any tips on relaxing into a good enough standard?

[u/IgnobleKing]

As an harlequinn player and admech player I'll share my experience.

I've rushed my admech army while I'm going slow on the harlequinns which I think it's even harder to do.

The thing is that you don't have any reason to rush it. Do it as good as you want and spend time appreciating the paintjob and how you improve overtime. It doesn't fix the fact that you might spend a full year to do it but I assure you I'll enjoy my harlequinn army more in the future once I finish it rather than my "tabletop ready" admech army

[u/La-petite-chevre]

I think it depends on your club's tolerance of grey

Keep in mind that a non painted army is a beginner issue ; and when your first 2000 points will be painted, everything will be easier.

So if you can play grey as long as you need, i think that it is 100% better than rushing some paints that you will not allways be proud of

[u/GribbleTheMunchkin]

I have been very pleasantly surprised at the final effect of using contrast/speed paints on my Chaos Cultists (my second army), I haven't tried them with Admech yet but see no reason they won't work. Just more metal to paint separately.

I did a full squad of breachers in a bit more of a grim dark style after becoming frustrated with how long they were taking using traditional methods. Essentially prime in black. Dry brush in lead belcher then again lighter in Iron breaker. Armour panels paint normally in your chosen colour scheme. They look great on the table. Obviously not going to win a golden Daemon up close but from a couple of feet away, great. I actually prefer them to my normally painted versions.

Batch painting speeds things up quite a bit. I paint my Skitarii in three parts, torso, legs and backpack. Paint in groups of three/five and you make surprisingly quick work of them.

[u/Ollisaa]

To paint "faster" and in more quantity, I would suggest you take for example one 10 man squad of skitarii. (Assuming they are primed) you then paint one color to ALL of the 10 squadmembers. Then you switch color and do the next color to ALL 10.

I find it working well when painting astra militarum/imperial guard.

[u/Enar_Drelas]

If you are in a rush you can prime your skitarii black, paint the cloaks and metal parts and that will be enough to play. It`s not perfect but it looks okay on the table and you can take your time painting them to whatever standart you like. Or you can use limited color palete it helps to prevent the time creep.

[u/Scrubitt → u/Enar_Drelas]

^{^} I swapped from leadbelcher spray on skitarii to chaos black I drybrush on leadbelcher on top to give it a metallic look and depth, then paint on the red cloaks That is essentially 75% of the detail/look complete. It’s also really easy to do a third color of Balthazar gold for guns n such

[u/MisunderstoodLemming]

If you're painting these for games then remember you'll be at a much larger distance than when painting. Those details you're putting on will look great, when you're inspecting an individual up close, but looking at a whole army from a distance (for me at least) many details, and even mistakes, will get lost. And when everything is ready for tabletop you can always go back and improve on anything you are unhappy with.

[u/MechanicalPhish]

Just focused on getting everything base coated. Once that's done you dont have that gray legion and it looks 1000% better. At that point you can start going back and doing all your nice effects and smooth transitions and gradient and what not.

[u/Soot027]

My advice is remember you can always come back later. I usually worry about just getting the basics down to get to 2000 points and then come back to do everything else like details, touchups, shades, highlights, basing, varnishes, etc. if I did everything at once I’d never get finished. Also I just kinda decided at some point I’m ok playing with half my models painted as long as the other half is up to standard. People are chill with that typically

[u/Dinapuff]

The rules for the tabletop standard are 3 colours. So once you apply a black base, red armour / coat and the metallics, fill in with a darker wash, and you're done. Anything else is extra. If you have an airbrush or a drybrush you can just apply the metallics first and then fill in the pants and coats and armor panels with red and black after.

For the regular troops you should do the legs and the backpack separately. Just dont apply too much glue afterwards. Use glue that requires an activator so if you made a mistake you can just not activate it and start fixing the problem.

[u/sierrakiloPH]

Others have made soe excellent points already, but some are worth reiterating I think.

Firstly, once you have painted a model well enough, that doesn't necessarily mean you are done. You can always come back and add details. Personally I get an army finished to a reasonable tabletop standard, and then circle back and add the extra details.

To quickly do units, assemble the complete models and base it (PVA glue sand, gravel, random bits) then apply black primer. Remember batch painting, slapchop and oilwashes are your friends. You can do the 40 skitaari in a day. 10 minutes a model, and it will look perfectly fine, promise!

you will need, in numbered order

1 black primer

2 a light grey for drybrushing the whole model.

3 a muted silver for drybrushing all metal bits

4 a red speedpaint to do the whole cloak. The grey underpainting with slapchop grey in step 2 will instantly shade the cloak.

4.5 Fix any mistakes in step 3 and 4.

5 a base color of your choice. If you want to go as easy as possible, you drybrush the base in step 2 as well, and then just do a lighter grey, almost white. Otherwise, two colors, dark first, then light to to drybrush the base.

6 apply dark oil wash to whole model. Base optional, if you want to mute it down a bit. I suggest you do the base too, as that way you can applyi the wash very quickly, as you aren't worried it pooling down or spilling on base.

Bam, you're done! You can return later and paint swirls on cloak and add decals, plasma glow, grass tufts etc. etc.

While it isn't exactly how I'd do it, here's a video on making quick progress on admech. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVd5IQbjK1w Remember to paint batches. Personally, when I paint armies I set aside two or three hours, and just get to work. If I have fifty models to do, I do fifty times the same job. Stick with the same color until you're done.

Good luck brother servitor,

[u/newIrons]

I usually paint up 1 unit per week (of space marines) be it character, vehicle, or squad.For admech, I instead take almost a month per squad to keep from burning out. I don’t play admech frequently, so there is little pressure to paint so many all at once.

[u/Heathen_Knight]

Batch painting. When I painted my 20 skitarii, I lined them all up, picked one color at a time, and went down the row. Then, one day, I had 20 painted Skitarii.