Whether you’re new to painting Warhammer or you’re an old hand with paint brushes, you will have come across the term Battle Ready in Games Workshop publications before.
If a model is Battle Ready, it means it’s ready to game with – hence the name! Battle Ready models have their main areas coloured and a simple finish on their bases. This standard is also the minimum you have to hit to play events at Warhammer World to guarantee that every event has tables full of painted models, to create the best gaming experience for everybody.
Battle Ready isn’t a bar you have to pass to be allowed into our hobby. Rather, it’s an achievable and universally recognised standard that’s meant to say YES to your army, YES to accessibility and YES to more games with more painted models. Battle Ready is about making painting a celebration!
How To Paint Battle Ready
Battle Ready is quick and easy, regardless of your level of experience in painting miniatures. It involves using Base, Shade and Technical paints (the Classic method), or Contrast and Technical paints (the Contrast method), to bring your squad, army, or Legion to a satisfying standard that you can be proud of.
Base paints are bursting with pigment and let you block out all the colours you require. Shading adds definition to your models, and now, because the entire Shade range has been reformulated to flow better into the recesses of your miniatures, Battle Ready armies are faster to paint and look better than ever before.
You can also use Contrast paints for a different, more streamlined approach. These paints are designed to apply a wide range of colours to your models straight from the pot, changing the painting game by giving you consistent and reliable results in a fraction of the time. Simply undercoat with Wraithbone, Grey Seer, or White Scar, and add one coat of Contrast per colour on your miniature.
The 25 new Contrast paints mean that no matter the colour of your Legion, army, Warband, Kill Team, or Blood Bowl Squad, you’ll always have the right hue at hand. From ultra-vibrant colours like Aeldari Emerald and Frostheart to rich, dependable hues such as Baal Read and Leviathan Purple, there is a choice for every situation.
And whether you’ve gone for Classic or Contrast, to finish off, all you need to do is apply a Technical paint like Stirland Mud or Astrogranite to the base to make it look like your miniature is standing on a battlefield, and you’re done.
In just a handful of simple steps, you’ve got a superbly painted miniature, ready to take to the battlefield and fight for victory in your name! And with the release of a fantastic range of new Contrast paints, and new and reformulated Shades, Battle Ready has never been easier to achieve.
Repeat this a few times, or a lot of times (depending on your faction!), and you’ll soon have a whole army ready to descend on the battlefield and make your foes tremble – probably remarking on how great the enemy look, even as they’re crushed under your conquering bootheel!
Check out Citadelcolour.com for a host of Battle Ready guides for specific models, and make sure you sign up for the Warhammer Community newsletter to receive all the latest news about Citadel Paints.