#Ra Shelwe

[sylvianasart]

Today I played in an OPR doubles tournament. So much fun. A huge variety of opponents I'd never played before, Guard, Space Marines, more Chaos, Mechanicus, even more chaos, and Tau.

My craftworld, Ra Shelwe, formed a tenuous alliance with a faction of Nurgle followers that had some sympathy toward Eldar due to a shared desire to aid the Eldar god, Isha. (Though perhaps we had different ideas of what that aid would really be). The Guardians of Isha embarked to... Something? I'll come up with a lore mission overall sometime.

We won all 3 of our games, "oddest duo" (lore-wise), and even tied for "best painted", as voted by the other participants.

I had an amazing time, this is a dang good game. <3

More images and short battle reports under the cut.

First game, we faced off against some guard and butter marines. A pair of sacrificial zones would attack units inside them, and award points based on toughness taken. My farseer performed some psychic rituals to purify the land (secondary objective VP). Wave serpent tried to shoot down a plane, failed. My wraithlord had its debut game! (I haven't shown off the photos of that one yet). Wraithblades escorting my farseer wiped out 2 whole units in a couple of charges.

We took the win, I don't want to face a great unclean one ever.

Second game saw us fighting for control over 5 points with another chaos faction and the tech-obsessed Mechanicus. My guardians bravely held one of our deployment points. War walker Lorde's over the landscape, picking off medium models here and there. The great old one did not last through the first turn. Knights are scary. I need a wraith knight.

We squeezed out a win, but mostly due to time constraints. If it had gone to the 4th turn, we may have struggled to maintain the lead.

3rd game and an encroaching storm threatened to wipe the surface clean, while only a single point allowed the opportunity to leave the planet. Our enemies, another chaos faction and some sadly misled tau, sought to hinder our escape. The unclean one again showed its menace in taking out the enemy riptide during the first activation of the game. I'm so glad it's on my side. One broadside put up an impressive fight, surviving 2 charges and a gun volley, before finally being taken down by my wraithblade's charge. The storm forced us all in close and fast, and a target rich environment made it difficult for both sides to prioritise targets. But Ra Shelwe was victorious and escaped. I guess a few of the nurgle marines did too.

We took the win, and most of our models survived to escape. So many points. XD Too many points. It was great.

Overall, I had a fantastic time. The size of the games were great, 2k per army, for a total 4k per side, or 8k on the table. Losing a full unit in the first couple activations felt fine, cause you have so many remaining.

There were a bunch of people there I didn't get to play, but being able to play against 6 new people in just 3 games, and form new connections with club members. So good. I don't think I can get away with calling myself a newbie anymore. XD

[sylvianasart]

I been doing some painting. Nothing new finished yet, but progress!

First up, my wave serpent. Best side first, lots still to do, but it's presentable at least for my upcoming tournament on the weekend.

I don't remember if I've shown this one in it's in-progress state before.

This little guy is entombed inside. I painted him some 3 years ago when I first got the kit, and hadn't yet decided what I was doing with the canopy. After painting that opaque, I thought about magnetising it, till I gave up and glued it down. I never liked the lack of helmet or gauntlets anyway. Too much skin showing. XD

I've made a start on the underside, there won't be a lot here but some metallics, a couple of white panels. But most will be dark and unpainted, as there will be a stand here eventually.

Wraithlord progress. Shaded! That's it. I need to do the head, but I keep forgetting to get the tools I need for the marble effect I'd like to spray.

Finally... New toys :3

I have a super-original-never-before-seen plan to paint them with dark bark and pink cherry blossoms. Taking a quick look into sylvaneth lore, my main colour scheme would be fairly uniform across my "glade", but some units, like the kurnoth hunters, and the treelord if built as a spirit of Durthu, are more like representatives of the nature goddess, and may come from other glades originally? So may or may not match my own glade's colour scheme. An interesting idea, but I'll probably colour them similarly anyway.

I need to get myself a little turntable and light booth for taking nice turnaround gifs when they're done.

[sylvianasart]

Progress!

So yeh, you've seen my wraithblades before, so that's not new, but I have now painted up all the gun arms for them. 5 wraith cannons and 5 D-scythes. They're a little rushed, and the colours are not exactly what I wamt, but they did turn out well enough I think. Pictured is only one wraithcannon, but I promise the others are all done too xD

But I have also finally started working on my wraithlord, finally, after I bought the start collecting box 3 years ago. Im very slow with these things xD

Also some bonus progress on wave serpent spikes and some extra wraithlord bits. The head needs some fancy air brushing, so it's not attached yet.

Can't wait to show more when I get there. I love that aesthetic of the wraith constructs, so eventually I will have many of them. Hopefully. If I can find some.

[sylvianasart]

Been doing some lore stuff for my custom craftworld. Poking around Aeldari symbols and a bit of language. So allow me to introduce:

Ra Shelwe

"Ra Shelwe" is supposed to mean something along the lines of "Song of Soul/Light" in a kind of lamentation way. Very dramatic. Wiki told me "Shelwe" means "Song of". "Ra" was just pulled from Maugan Ra and Kaelis Ra, referring to "Harvester of Souls" and "Destroyer of Light"; and, without any more info, I assumed it meant light/soul as similar meaning (like a persons "inner light"). Though honestly that could refer to the Destroyer/Harvester pairing instead. Ehh, afaik there isn't any canon on the meaning of many Eldar words, if someone tells me otherwise I can always change my mind xD.

Symbols were referenced from Andrew Hick's collected Eldar stuff. The main insignia for the craftworld is made from a variation of the "soulstone" symbol using some wraithguard fins (? terminology?), and a tear of Isha. 'Cause dramatic eldar. The background symbol is "Salvation". Again, full of drama.

Overall the banner idea and layout was based on some inspiration from some craftworld banners my image search turned up, that apparently came from MirageKnight32 on DA. They're pretty cool, go check them out.

Anyway, lore-wise, Ra Shelwe are a reclusive and don't get involved much in the galaxy (I've only managed to field them in like 5 kill team games, and 1 larger game, in the last 4 years). They made some beeeg unspecified mistakes in the years immediately following the birth of she who thirsts, which has left them few in number, wraith focussed, and FULL of angsty guilt. (If I remember this population make-up is kinda similar to Iyanden? Kinda similar colour scheme too really. Hence why I originally put Iyanden's insignia on my Dire Avenger's flag though.)

Now to hate myself as I try to paint this onto every vehicle and banner. Can't use those standard eldar transfers anymore :D