Hello everyone,

I'm new to Imperial Assault and have a question about paints.

First a little background...my first FFG game is Armada and have done some painting of fighters and some basic repaints of some ships. Other then that painting miniatures is new to me.

I have a basic Army Painter set up paints, and they are ok for some of the figures I need to do like the Storm-troopers and the Probe droid, but when I look at the other figures that I want to paint I realize that I am going to need more paint. The paints I have are:

• Matt White
• Matt Black
• Greenskin
• Barbarian Flesh
• Pure Red
• Ultramarine Blue
• Leather Brown
• Daemonic Yellow
• Plate Mail Metal
• Strong Tone

My question for all of you is, does anyone know of a good set or some basic colors that I would need to paint the figures in the core set? I am willing to spend some money, but I don't want to break the bank getting ALL the colors that are in Sora stros tutorials.

Any guidance would be appreciated.

On 5/3/2020 at 10:27 AM, mcworrell said:

Hello everyone,

I'm new to Imperial Assault and have a question about paints.

First a little background...my first FFG game is Armada and have done some painting of fighters and some basic repaints of some ships. Other then that painting miniatures is new to me.

I have a basic Army Painter set up paints, and they are ok for some of the figures I need to do like the Storm-troopers and the Probe droid, but when I look at the other figures that I want to paint I realize that I am going to need more paint. The paints I have are:

• Matt White
• Matt Black
• Greenskin
• Barbarian Flesh
• Pure Red
• Ultramarine Blue
• Leather Brown
• Daemonic Yellow
• Plate Mail Metal
• Strong Tone

My question for all of you is, does anyone know of a good set or some basic colors that I would need to paint the figures in the core set? I am willing to spend some money, but I don't want to break the bank getting ALL the colors that are in Sora stros tutorials.

Any guidance would be appreciated.

First off, good luck with that. I don't even want to think how much I have spent on paint! There is a conversion chart floating around for Sorastro. Hopefully you can figure out the equivalent Citadel paints for what you already have. Also, realize that you get out what you put in. The more paints and the more techniques you use, the better the model. That's not to say you have to do everything the tutorial says. You can get away with doing half of it and the figures will still look amazing. Sorastro goes overboard. He's near a god, but he does more in his "beginner" guides than is necessary. I would recommend doing the base and the shades as he lays them out in most cases. Do most of the highlights (depending how much heart you want to put into the figure), and pick and choose your finishing touches.

I will go contrary to the previous answer: You don't need additional paints.

Start mixing your paints. And since you don't have large amounts of same troops, there is no need for an exact match on a colour.

Thanks for the answers guys. Good advice.

@mcworrell For my money, I'd say that the best bang-for-your-buck when it comes to painting miniatures would be to get a good wash/shade or two. I've been at it for only a few years now (I started with Sorastro's first videos) but I can tell you that my process for just about every miniature that I paint goes like this:

Step 1: Apply base colours

Me: Ugh... I really did not pick the right colours for this. They don't go together at all and this whole thing is looking pretty bad. I don't even really feel like painting this guy.

Step 2: Apply wash

Me: Ooooooh wow, that looks way better now! Okay, I'm excited again.

Step 3: Apply highlights

Me: Ok, great, things look fine. We're going to be OK!

There is a huuuuge difference in the look of a mini that has been washed vs one that hasn't. If you're only going to get one other paint I'd get Nuln Oil (or another black wash, but I've only ever used the Citedel ones) since the black kind of goes with anything in a pinch. But if you're getting a few, while painting IA I also got a lot of use out of Agrax Earthshade (brown) and Reikland Fleshade (for faces). On the core set I also used a red wash for the royal guards and blue/green/yellow ones for the trandoshans and some of the characters' clothes, but really you could probably get away with just black and brown if you had to.

2 hours ago, ManateeX said:

@mcworrell For my money, I'd say that the best bang-for-your-buck when it comes to painting miniatures would be to get a good wash/shade or two. I've been at it for only a few years now (I started with Sorastro's first videos) but I can tell you that my process for just about every miniature that I paint goes like this:

Step 1: Apply base colours

Me: Ugh... I really did not pick the right colours for this. They don't go together at all and this whole thing is looking pretty bad. I don't even really feel like painting this guy.

Step 2: Apply wash

Me: Ooooooh wow, that looks way better now! Okay, I'm excited again.

Step 3: Apply highlights

Me: Ok, great, things look fine. We're going to be OK!

There is a huuuuge difference in the look of a mini that has been washed vs one that hasn't. If you're only going to get one other paint I'd get Nuln Oil (or another black wash, but I've only ever used the Citedel ones) since the black kind of goes with anything in a pinch. But if you're getting a few, while painting IA I also got a lot of use out of Agrax Earthshade (brown) and Reikland Fleshade (for faces). On the core set I also used a red wash for the royal guards and blue/green/yellow ones for the trandoshans and some of the characters' clothes, but really you could probably get away with just black and brown if you had to.

Thanks for the encouragement. I do have. A black and brown shade and you are absolutely correct. They make all the difference in the world. Buying the other shade colors might be the way to go.

On 5/3/2020 at 1:27 PM, mcworrell said:

Hello everyone,

I'm new to Imperial Assault and have a question about paints.

First a little background...my first FFG game is Armada and have done some painting of fighters and some basic repaints of some ships. Other then that painting miniatures is new to me.

I have a basic Army Painter set up paints, and they are ok for some of the figures I need to do like the Storm-troopers and the Probe droid, but when I look at the other figures that I want to paint I realize that I am going to need more paint. The paints I have are:

• Matt White
• Matt Black
• Greenskin
• Barbarian Flesh
• Pure Red
• Ultramarine Blue
• Leather Brown
• Daemonic Yellow
• Plate Mail Metal
• Strong Tone

My question for all of you is, does anyone know of a good set or some basic colors that I would need to paint the figures in the core set? I am willing to spend some money, but I don't want to break the bank getting ALL the colors that are in Sora stros tutorials.

Any guidance would be appreciated.

I'm in a similar boat that you're in; I have owned Imperial Assault for a long time, and I love it to pieces, but after doing a Skype session streaming the game, I've come to the realization on the utility of having them painted. I've never painted any miniatures, and have never had any interest until now, and I haven't the foggiest where to start.

3 hours ago, Kunitzu San said:

I'm in a similar boat that you're in; I have owned Imperial Assault for a long time, and I love it to pieces, but after doing a Skype session streaming the game, I've come to the realization on the utility of having them painted. I've never painted any miniatures, and have never had any interest until now, and I haven't the foggiest where to start.

What I learned after the very first mini I painted (stormtrooper for IA) even a badly painted mini looks so much better than straight plastic. I have zero artistic ability and yet was so proud and happy with the result I got. I've been painting for three years now, and it's still intimidating, yet so satisfying when I finish a new piece. Just jump in. You wont regret it. While on the subject of stormies, use Sorastro Legion guide. Its simpler than the IA one, and in my oppenion looks better too.

On 5/15/2020 at 6:56 PM, Kunitzu San said:

I'm in a similar boat that you're in; I have owned Imperial Assault for a long time, and I love it to pieces, but after doing a Skype session streaming the game, I've come to the realization on the utility of having them painted. I've never painted any miniatures, and have never had any interest until now, and I haven't the foggiest where to start.

On 5/15/2020 at 10:39 PM, RKRichar said:

What I learned after the very first mini I painted (stormtrooper for IA) even a badly painted mini looks so much better than straight plastic. I have zero artistic ability and yet was so proud and happy with the result I got. I've been painting for three years now, and it's still intimidating, yet so satisfying when I finish a new piece. Just jump in. You wont regret it. While on the subject of stormies, use Sorastro Legion guide. Its simpler than the IA one, and in my opinion looks better too.

RKRichar is so very right. Just go for it. With very little experience I am having a blast! Since creating the original post in this discussion I just started painting with what I have and I am really happy with the turn out. I have decided that I may pick up a few colors here and there, but for the most part I can get the look I want by mixing the colors I have. There are two things I think I am going to buy:

1. A better brush. I have a ok one, but I think one quality brush will make all the difference.

2. A set of different color washes. I have black and brown as of right now, but the wash makes all the difference and the other color options would be great.

3. A magnifying visor helps a lot.

On 5/15/2020 at 10:39 PM, RKRichar said:

What I learned after the very first mini I painted (stormtrooper for IA) even a badly painted mini looks so much better than straight plastic. I have zero artistic ability and yet was so proud and happy with the result I got. I've been painting for three years now, and it's still intimidating, yet so satisfying when I finish a new piece. Just jump in. You wont regret it. While on the subject of stormies, use Sorastro Legion guide. Its simpler than the IA one, and in my oppenion looks better too.

That's encouraging to hear! I'm looking at paints now, what do you recommend as a good starter set for a complete novice?

2 hours ago, Kunitzu San said:

That's encouraging to hear! I'm looking at paints now, what do you recommend as a good starter set for a complete novice?

When I started I had zero background on painting. I couldn’t paint a wall. I have zero artistic talent. But I started with Sorastro’s YouTube series, and through that am able to get decent tabletop quality minis painted.

Just a fair warning - it gets addictive! Once you have a couple painted things hit the table, you really can’t bear the thought of deploying boring grey units again! So during our campaign I would try to look ahead at our mission coming up and paint as many units involved as I could.

For paints I only bought the citadel stuff. I now probably have 50 plus of them along with about 5 different shades. I would look at some videos of the first few units you are going to paint, and see what you need. If you start with Stormies (the worst to paint, but we all did our time grinding through them)- you’ll need white, nuln oil, mechanicus standard grey, black and I think leadbelcher for the gun.

When I first started I would watch the video of what I was going to paint and see what paints were used. That can be a little more effective than just looking at the final paint list from the video. Because sometimes you would realize he used this color that was a single tiny dab, or was like the 5th layer of a highlight - and could easily be omitted (for my ability and tastes).

If you decide you like it, don’t under estimate the value of good brushes. I don’t order anything crazy expensive, but once I started ordering the level 2 or level 3 brushes from Michaels (like $4 or $5 for a brush), they held their point much better than the cheap ones making following the lines of details much simpler. Have fun!

On 5/18/2020 at 12:54 PM, a1bert said:

3. A magnifying visor helps a lot.

It sure does. If you don't already wear glasses, I find that reading glasses somewhere in the 2.00 - 3.00 range are easier to manage.

Honestly my strongest recommendation for a new painter? Make sure your painting area is well lit! It really make a big difference.

You could theoretically paint anything you wanted just with what you have (pretty much having a black, white, the three primary colors, a skin tone, a brown, and a metallic silver can carry a lot of weight), but I'd still recommend picking up colors as you go along. Maybe not go all in all at once, but it'll give you more options as you go along. I'd definitely recommend grabbing at least a purple and an orange. Army Painter also sells a set that includes all 11 of their washes for a decent price, I'd certainly recommend picking that up.

It may be a bit late for this piece of advice, but... I'd definitely recommend not fully assembling the AT-ST before painting it. Or at the very least, not attaching the head to the centerpiece. It's basically impossible to remove once you put those two pieces together, and it makes painting the AT-ST so much more difficult (the same goes for General Weiss). If you prime the whole thing in grey, depending on how light or dark you paint it, it might still end up looking okay. But I'm still mad at myself for fully assembling the AT-ST before painting it (I only started painting just under a year ago myself, several months after initially purchasing this game), because if I look at it at the right angle, there are still unpainted spots under the head that I just could not reach.

EDIT: As a bit of a side note, I highly recommend watching Sorastro's tutorial on the Ruffians/Goblins/Orcs from Journeys in Middle Earth. Not necessarily because it relates to IA specifically, but because he goes out of his way to explain how you can paint a wide range of figures with just a small lineup of colors. It might give you some ideas going forward.

On 5/3/2020 at 12:27 PM, mcworrell said:

...but when I look at the other figures that I want to paint I realize that I am going to need more paint.

The first thing I learned as a painter (starting more decades ago than I care to admit), was that while I started off with "X" number of colors I always ended up needing more. It never fails no matter how many painters I talk to...unless that painter happens to mix their own shades. But for the other +95% of us, it's true. The second thing I learned was that you need to paint for yourself and at your own pace.

Frankly, the best way to figure out what you need is to sit down and puzzle it out. Decide which models you want to do, and work outwards from there. You don't have to follow the artwork in the game if you don't want to. A good example of that might be Onar Kona and Jynn Odan who both feature orange...Give them beige or red instead. If/when you get to Hera Syndulla, you can get orange if you haven't already acquired it, mix it yourself, or go with a different color. My Fenn, for example, is wearing a grey uniform and my Mak is golden brown/yellow and wearing a blue jumpsuit.

When I first started painting IA nearly three years ago, I decided I would paint Stormtroopers, Wing Guard (we were playing Bespin at the time), and the Rebel models that made up our group. After those were finished, I decided to add another couple Rebels and another group or two of Imperials/Scum. That way I was spending a much smaller amount of money on paint and not going bonkers getting all the colors!

Having said all that: based on this list:

On 5/3/2020 at 12:27 PM, mcworrell said:

• Matt White
• Matt Black
• Greenskin
• Barbarian Flesh
• Pure Red
• Ultramarine Blue
• Leather Brown
• Daemonic Yellow
• Plate Mail Metal
• Strong Tone

You can really cover the basics with another 10-12 colors. I would make sure you have two additional flesh tones (for light, medium, and dark tones), two additional browns (to vary hair colors, boots, belts, and straps), two good greys, and another lighter/darker shade to give you options in your other basic shades (a brighter blue, a darker red, etc.).

On 6/20/2020 at 9:43 PM, Strawhat said:

You can really cover the basics with another 10-12 colors. I would make sure you have two additional flesh tones (for light, medium, and dark tones), two additional browns (to vary hair colors, boots, belts, and straps), two good greys, and another lighter/darker shade to give you options in your other basic shades (a brighter blue, a darker red, etc.).

As I have been painting over the last month or so I have found exactly what you said here. The colors you listed above are on my list of colors to buy, now that game/hobby stores are opening back up in my area. Thanks for the input and the advice about just using what I have instead of trying to match perfectly to the character art.