u/TheThebanProphet

Mechs number 42-45 of my DCMS battalion+ force! Started with the Ostwar, then went Ostscout, roc, and ended with the sol. The scout I got as a single on ebay but the rest came with the Illician Lancers forcepack. Really happy as always with how these came out. With the school year approaching I am not sure if more mechs will be painted. I could paint 3 more randos to make another full lance with the Charger 3Kr I had kitbashed and I do have options like a Phoenix Hawk, Firestarter, Wendigo, Hatchetman kitbashed with a sword ala Shrapnel art, Thunderbolt, and Victor amongst many options. I also have a Clan Cavalry box that all the IIC mechs will be done in DCMS colors with the White Raven being a merc mech but I'm still undecided so let me know!

Kitbashed this Charger into a 3Kr a couple of months ago and finally got the wherewithal to paint it up and I am very happy with the results! I've been hankering for more MEL units with TSM and this guy fits the bill handedly! This is the first Kurita mech after hitting the full 40 for the mech battalion so this is number 41. For anyone that is curious the sword is from Kromlech sold as a bits blister of 7 "vibro-katanas" and I had carefully removed the pistol to the wrist mount it to the barrel fist with some green stuff. I have a Hatchetman that I put a sword on as well (inspired by semi-recent shrapnel art) and then after that I'm not sure if I want to finish this lance out and with what or move onto either the Ostlance (Ostscout, Ostwar, Ostsol, and Ostroc.) Or the IIC lance (Griffin IIC, Jenner IIC, Shadowhawk IIC, and Locust IIC.) Let me know what you think (esp what lance should be next - they'll all get painted its just a matter of what order.)

Buying ACES right away for the system back in November had left me with a ton of CJF mechs in addition to a few chassis sitting in my grey pile. After finishing* my DCMS battalion I decided it was high time to paint these ACES mechs. Now I am not one to paint box art - I hold myself to too high of a standard and plus I really wanted some Mercantile Militia as my friend plays CJF and I wanted to rib him a bit by collecting AML (he backs Chistu so every time we've played Scouring Sands hes always accused of being a plant for the OpFor.) I decided for this force to do a camo spec canon scheme and for AML they paint their forces in appropriate camo with blue trim and since Apolakkia is a desert planet I figured desert was the way to go (for a long while I was going to go CJF green but I couldn't decide on which green to go for so I just scrapped that idea in favor of deseer camo.) The Zaku pink lenses were also inspired by my friend who's a big Zeon guy. In addition to the ACES mechs I also threw in the Turkina, Night Gyr, and Jade Hawk to round out the force into a full mech binary with a point of armor. I may add a few more mechs to this as I had just got my hands on a Fire Falcon and a Mad Cat that will slot in nicely once I find a couple more mechs to fill that star to make a trinary. What's also cool about painting these as canon AML is that the same scheme is used for CJF Gamma Galaxy 9th Talon (camo w/ blue trim) so I'm covered in more eras too. Let me know what you think as I am quite pleased how these came out despite batch painting these and hating every moment of it (I prefer to paint minis one at a time - is slower but I enjoy the process.) I'll prob go back to my DCMS until Snowblind drops and I can expand my bears a bit - there are plenty of mechs that need paint!

I would like to preface that two years ago I got into Battletech and decided that I wanted to start collecting Ghost Bears. I decided to collect them using the Clan Invasion RAT and made a post about that army about a year ago after I painted every non IIC on that RAT. A year ago I decided to pivot to the Inner Sphere and the ilClan era with my personal 5th Sword of Light battalion the Yokai Group. Two weeks ago at the end of June I finished my 40th mech to christen the completion of the mech battalion and the 2500pv AS game I played last week waa a good reason to take some family photos! I've featured all these units as I went through my painting/collecting journy here on reddit but only as individuals (or a small group for the first few units.) I'm happy with how this force turned out and look forward to adding more mechs into the Yokai Group's roster. I have since taken a small break to paint my most recent project which I finished last night and will be posting a family photo soonish but for now I just wanted to celebrate this milestone in my BT journy!

Been meaning to post this but have been super busy but last week I played this monsterous 2500pv AS game with my full Kurita mech battalion and support against 2 mixed battalions of Davion in the ilClan era! We started at 1pm, finished by 9pm, and played 3 full turns before calling it. I managed to squeek out a win by tying objectives and getting about a mechs worth of pv over the Davions! We have plana on a rematch later this summer. One thing I really like about AS is that it plays really well at higher scales (esp with formation movement) as the game didnt break down it just slowed down. I'm going to be making a separate post showing off the entire battalion but I am happy to say that at least every unit got played with at least once thanks to this game!

The Grand Dragon! My second dupe of my force after the Panther and just like the Panther I decided to change up the scheme compared to my OG Dragon in so far what elements are gold and red to better differentiate without breaking the overall scheme and without having to number the bases. This scheme I think better frames the cockpit and CT to look more like a dragon's face! This mini also made me realize a mistake I made on my OG Dragon - I had not notice the rear weapon on that mini vs this Grand Dragon from the Kurita FPs where it is absent. The Grand Dragon is mech number 40 and after one full year I have hit mech battalion strength! I will be taking a family photo soon to show everything off all at once. That said my Kuritan force doesn't stop here as I already have plans for another company or more of mechs. That said I may be changing gears to another project or two but I'll likely be bouncing back and forth over the summer between those and expanding my DCMS.

​

The Akuma! A beautiful monster of a mech - pretty much a Kurituan baby Atlas. Originally I was going to add a Kanabo to the right hand like I did my gothic Atlas (last photo) but decided against it as the Akuma doesn't have the MEL keyword but the Atlas III does and since the Akuma is a discount Atlas anyway and is also Oni coded like the gothic DCMS Atlas I wanted to show off an Oni withour a Kanabo and an Oni with a Kanabo. For those who don't know there is a Japanese phrase "giving an Oni a Kanabo" which is effectively giving someone who is already extremely powerful an even greater advantage - kind of like adding fuel to the fire or gilding the lily. I am incredibly pleased with how the mech paintjob came out but I'm still having issues with the poppy red speedpaint leeching into my basing paste. I tried giving it extra time to cure and hitting it with matt varnish. Next step will be gloss varnish and even more time to cure before basing paste and matt varnishing. This Akuma makes mech 39/40+ for my DCMS Battalion! I am hoping to maybe work on my 40th mech in the next week or so and I have another company planned out including a kitbashed Charger 3Kr and a Hatchetman 5K (both come with swords!)

The Venom! My second mech paimted with AP Poppy Red as my base red and just like the Panther it didn't disappoint! Still had some of the red seep into the basing material but this go wasn't so bad and was fixable but I still gotta figure out how to pervent it. This Venom is mech 38 out of 40+ for my DCMS battalion. I painted this guy up on Saturday and on Sunday I painted the Akuma as mech 39 - just need to finish the base. I am looking forward to finishing this battalion (even though I already have another company planned once I hit 40.)

A(nother) Panther! My first dupe of my DCMS - this one is from the Kurira forcepacks whereas my first one came from the IS Support Lance FP. I figured since it was a dupe to try out AP Speedpaint Poppy Red instead of Citadel/Warhammer Baal Red and other than the fact that some of it leeched into the basing snow (no idea how it was dry for hours) I am very much impresses with it vs Citadel Baal Red. It gave me the same vibrant saturated red on the flats, actually did a better job pulling from the edges to highlight them, and actually shaded the recesses instead of saturatng them to be the same color as the flats since Baal Red has a ton of white pigment in it (hence why it doesn't do the contrasty thing as well as other contrast paints.) It also comes in a dropper bottle and is cheaper and I prefer speedpaint consistency to contrast paint. This Panther makes mech 37 for my Kurita battalion - May has been super busy but I'm hoping to be at a full 40 by the end of June and I already have my next company planned out once I finish the rest of the mechs from the Kurita FPs (Akuma, Grand Dragon, and Venom are still left.)

Yesterday I finally managed to hit MB4 with my Florida Man singles team. The screenshots I posted above was the final iteration of the team but was far from the original incarnation - there were many Florida Mons that helped paved the way for FLORIDA MAN's journey:

- Mega Feraligatr was a core mon for 95% of the climb, being only dropped two days ago for Mega Greninja.

- I also had Maushold for the longest time. The Maus is a super hilarious mon and may as well have been on the team instead of Arch as Arch did basically dick all. Tidy Up is amazing when you see a sterotypical stealth rock setter on the squad and pop bomb 10 packs are brutal.

- I had Heliolisk that I kept in the back to counter the demon fish (which ended up being on the team also for a while but didnt really contribute much past UB2.)

- Krookodile was on the team at start but didn't have a solid place for him and got countered pretty easily by anything that normally targets Garchomp

- Palafin was my planned sweeper to replace Basc easly because I wanted to be more on theme and also not use as many sweaty mons as I could but I didnt like how slow it took to set up and the risk of a bad swap to get to hero form and in general I do not like using Choice Scarf.

Now for the winning team - of the 6 mons on the roster my 3 MVPs are Skeledirge, Mega Meganium and Pelipper. These three mons single handedly carried me from UB2 straight to MB4. Of the three Pelipper was the most recent addition as I was toying with the idea of going rain only to then started facing rain counters. He was still very useful with sash, tailwind, and ice beam being my go to moves to knock out dragons and just own speed. Skeledirge is my guy, the true gator lord. Will-O-Wisp is great esp if they plan to swap away from you. I have fucked over so many Meowscaradas with it because after wisp lands they can't outpace my sustain even with leftovers being knocked off. Meganium puts dragons, ghosts, water, and honestly most mons by vomiting the sun and or fairy dust at them and the cheeky weather ball being fire type when megad really caught out a lot of people packing steel to counter him.

Now that said one of the reasons why I think all 3 of these mons are my MVP and mons like Basc wasn't touched after hitting UB2 is that the meta rn is really physical attacker heavy and many people build walls to deal with it. It's also why Feraligatr and Maushold got dropped but honestly may have well been on the team at the end because they are physical attackers that people can easily handle. I'm sure there is more nuance to the true answer but thats what I boiled it down to. As for Arch I never liked leading with em because people expect you to lead with it so its main use was to bait those counters out (additionally the mon isnt really jiving with me but maybe its not the team for it im more of a fan of H Goodra if we wanna talk mons of similar typing but I can see Archs appeal)

Last but not least how are these mons Florida coded? Skeledirge is a gator, Meganium represents Florida's flora and status as the Sunshine State. Greninja is an amphibian which is also common fauna. Arch is either the Three Mile Bridge connecting the Keys or kinda looks like the launch boom from KSC. Basc is a meth demon fish of hell. Pelipper is a pelican which brings hurricanes 100% of the time every time. Maushold is the Mouse's hold on Florida and also Disney World family trips. Krook is another gator, same as Feraligatr (the OG.) Heliolisk is a lizard which Florida has tons of and also sun coded with the Helio bit in the name. Last but not least Palafin is a dolphin and again Florida coded because sea life, seaworld, and also the Miami Dolphins.

Last pic is included as a Florida fit check - best I could do with the cloths we have so far in game.

Let me know what you think and I hope you enjoyed the read!

edit: wanted to add that last season I got to MB as a mono dragon gym leader named Deez. I posted about that here. I'm thinking every season I'm gonna try and hit MB with some sort of gimmick even if some meta mons make it. Mono dragon wasnt always easy but also having 600 BST mons helped. That said I am a Pokeboomer - only other game I play is GO and my last MSG was Silver. I don't run sweaty calcs and a lot of this is vibes but I've also consumed a lot of content ahead of jumping into champs so im not completely ignorant (just bad)