Squad Markings on Gants/broods of bugs

[rpricew]

So a couple of times I've lost painting score points because my broods of gants/horms/gargoyles don't have squad markings that are easy for my opponent to distinguish.

What do you do with your units?

I've broken down and painted the rims on the bases very different colors now, as an interim, but it throws off the paint scheme.

Please comment and advise.

[Anggul]

It's pretty ridiculous for them to penalise you for that. They wouldn't have squad markings, they're a hive mind, they don't need imagery like that. Heck they wouldn't really have 'squads', it's just for gameplay purposes for them.

[mattblowers]

Comment: those people docking you are douchebags.

Advise: don't play with douchebags. Best advice I've ever learned and I learned that in k-school.

On a more serious note, if it's a legit thing where you play and you don't want to move to, say, Orlando, where we don't do douchebaggery like that, try painting the bases slightly differen't colors. Dark brown vs light brown vs baylor brown etc. Otherwise maybe some pretty neon rings to hang on the different squads to differentiate. I dunno, I never ran into this.

[GuardDog78]

I don't even know where to begin ranting about how ridiculous that is...
You can't compare everything to the Imperium!!!

[nameless]

Basing material. I use a snow theme, so one set has rocks and the other has grass tuffs.

[blackrainbow]

Mar 23, 2015 21:05:24 GMT nameless said:

Basing material. I use a snow theme, so one set has rocks and the other has grass tuffs.

This is a good idea. I use small color markings on mine that are similar to many natural bug markings, al-la protein markings on many types of spiders or even Rorshach tests. You can keep it simple for the lil'giblies and then it gets pretty fun making them for the bigger ones. Or if you do one similar pattern, you can perhaps do a secondary color/outline as the "squad" marker. One last note that I really enjoy, is using this method to distinguish gaunts and gants that have performed heroically. Many other armies may add trophy markers, but I like to "grow" the different patterns on notable bugs (that is before they are reconsumed by the Hive). That one hormagaunt with a whole lot of colorful splotches? Yeah he survived three rounds vs Necron wraiths and whittled them down. Then chased after the scarabs in back to tie them up. Solo. Don't (preemptive: please do not swear) with that one.

Also, don't play with douches.

[Halollet]

What I've done is paint the rim of the base different colors that blend in with the terrain. For 3 units of gaunts on a rocky grass base, one will be green, another brown, and another grey. I can easily tell which is which but it doesn't take too much away from the unified swarm look.

[Freeman]

I use purple wool lengths.

Puts a nice line inbetween the differing units.

Lots of events do it. The string has always been fine but that's dependant on the actual rules pack. Ours tend to say units are easily distinguishable from each other using a system such as unit markings, so the string covers me.

If however it says units must markings painted on to differentiate them that would be a different story.

[cypheon]

a long long time ago when i ran exclusively GS-Cult, each GS unit's fleshy bits were painted a different color... the codex actually said the Genestealer armor -had- to be blue so the fleshy bits were the only parts that could be differentiated without getting docked points on painting...

[blackrainbow]

Mar 23, 2015 22:40:07 GMT cypheon said:

a long long time ago when i ran exclusively GS-Cult, each GS unit's fleshy bits were painted a different color... the codex actually said the Genestealer armor -had- to be blue so the fleshy bits were the only parts that could be differentiated without getting docked points on painting...

Whoa, that's wild!

[cypheon]

Mar 24, 2015 1:31:54 GMT blackrainbow said:

Mar 23, 2015 22:40:07 GMT cypheon said:

a long long time ago when i ran exclusively GS-Cult, each GS unit's fleshy bits were painted a different color... the codex actually said the Genestealer armor -had- to be blue so the fleshy bits were the only parts that could be differentiated without getting docked points on painting...

Whoa, that's wild!

It was annoying because the model showcase in the same codex had a green armoured genestealer...  The dwarf army book still does the same thing with dwarf slayers.. Hair must be orange! Here's a dude with his hair punk rock green!

[blackrainbow]

Mar 24, 2015 4:02:53 GMT cypheon said:

Mar 24, 2015 1:31:54 GMT blackrainbow said:

Whoa, that's wild!

It was annoying because the model showcase in the same codex had a green armoured genestealer...  The dwarf army book still does the same thing with dwarf slayers.. Hair must be orange! Here's a dude with his hair punk rock green!

Blech, mando-fluff strips so much from an army/game. And I like my fluff, just off the table in books or perhaps in list-building aka giving my Hivefleet a name or perhaps having a certain hive tyrant with one type of load-out a personal hero.

[broyston]

If they really try to enforce that kind of thing if you had a tervigon you would need hundreds of gaunts, one painted as a squad size of 3, one of 4 all the way up to 18, or lots of sqauds of 18 probably as you would never know what dice you would roll. This example might be taking it to extremes but by those rules.....

[rpricew]

First of all...I'm looking for creative and custom solutions here... not internet bashing of people that you know nothing about!!!

It's a painting rubric... if you have distinguishable squad markings then you get the extra 2 points and can move to the final judging round. Without them, then you aren't eligible for the Max Painting Score.

The people aren't "douchebags", they are just rewarding people who take the time to really dig into their armies and have found ways to do what I'm saying. There was another Tyranid player there that had painted base rims, but I don't like that idea.

I've run into this at several major events, and its being enforced at my local events. I confronted them the first time I heard it, asking "what about Pink Horrors? or really, Termagants are just a swarm" and the guys were cool, but firm that I needed to come up with some way of distinguishing them with painting, basing, modeling so that they were easy to tell apart.

Using the string method, would help my opponent, but would NOT help me to max out the painting score.

[blackrainbow]

Then you have a couple of options. First and primary, disregard our miss-led assault on those folks - my apologies.

Now, for the topic at hand. There have been some nice options listed here; different base colorings or flocking, different small patterns (change colors, keep similar patterns per brood), or even change the weapon loadout colors. EG, hormagant brood one has light green gun-symbiotics with a certain color highlights, and brood two has dark green primary gun-symbiotic color with the same highlights to lend to army cohesion.

I think there is an incredible amount of leeway for painting "bugs". If you like the paterns, just do a quick search for insect patterns. The first list that popped up for me was of butterflys, and gave a grand selection of patterns. You don't have to go with the colors (that gets crazy beautiful/complex) but some of the placement or patterns can easily be applied to your army.

As a closing word, what ever design you choose to go with, just start out the game with a friendly "hey, some folks mistake the the dark green guns for the light green guns, but I want to make sure you know that these color differences make them different broods/squads."

Good luck, and again, apologies for any side-stepping your questions.