Best of: Tale of Painters January 2026

2026 started with a bang on Tale of Painters: In January we had loads of reviews for all game systems, unboxing videos, a comprehensive tutorial for the new Maggotkin of Nurgle, the Miniatures of the Year 2025, Sons of Horus, GUNPLA, 500 Worlds, and much more. Read here what you might have missed in January.

Tale of Painters is the unofficial miniature painting hobby magazine. For over 15 years, we’ve been your go-to source for honest reviews of the latest Warhammer models, miniature paints, and hobby tools. We also have 300+ detailed tutorials and painting guides, and of course, inspiring paint jobs and projects to share. Here’s a roundup of our best posts this month.

Reviews

Captain Titus and the Wardens of Ultramar are a must-have for Ultramarines and Space Marine 2 fans, check out our review here:

Plus more reviews:

• The Maggotkin of Nurgle got a huge release wave of new models, part 1 of our review covers the new Putrid Blightkings, Sloven Knights, and Rotswords
• Part 2 features the kits for Festus the Leechlord, Pestigors, and Pox-wretches
• The new Nightbringer C’tan Shard might be an early model of the year contender, and Nekrosor Ammentar is not to shabby either
• The Mechanicum Skitarii Battleforce introduces the Vultarax Stratos-automata in plastic, and a new type of Skitarii (I’ve noticed some issues with the kit though)
• Kill Team: Shadowhunt comes with two brand-new Kill Teams, the Celestian Insidiants for the Sisters of Battle, and the redesigned Raptors and Warp Talons of the Murderwing

Also check out the unboxing video for the Kill Team: Shadowhunt box, in which Stahly shows you all the components inc. the new half-size gaming boards for Descent Killzone games:

Tutorials, tips & editorials:

The new Rotswords are such cool sculpts that we had to make a tutorial for them:

Plus more:

• Dunk’s musings about the 500 Worlds campaign and the value of “end of edition” campaign books

Miniature showcases:

• Stahly has a Sons of Horus MkIII Despoiler Squad (find out why it’s no longer legal)
• For all our GUNPLA fans we have a black Ecopla RX-78-2 HGUC with lots of weathering
• Plus a showcase of all the miniatures we painted from the Miniature of the Year 2025 voting on Warhammer Community

Patreon update

We’d love it if you supported our work on Patreon. In addition to weekly behind-the-scenes posts, you’ll get bonus content like extra high-res sprue images for all our Warhammer reviews and more detailed masterclass PDF tutorials. You’ll also be supporting Stahly’s paint swatch project. He’s made it his mission to catalogue the colours of all miniature paint brands into professional, cross-compatible paint swatches and keep them up to date.

Here are this month’s key updates:

• AK replaced their Deep Shade washes with a brand-new range of 18 improved acrylic washes. The new washes are included in a free update for the AK 3rd Gen colour swatch, here is how to get the update.
• Stahly also added the 18 new washes (plus 4 new John Blanche Vol. 3 and 4 washes) to the multi-brand 11-in-1 Acrylic Washes chart. Get the update here.

This hand-painted comparison chart is available in my Patreon shop for a small donation (or by becoming an Autarch tier member). I also have swatches for Citadel Colour, Vallejo Game Color, Warpaints Fanatic, and Two Thin Coats – all cross-compatible with each other so you can compare colours across different brands. Check out my shop for details.

Thank you for engaging with our content this month. We hope it provided some useful tips and inspiration for your hobby. Feel free to leave us your feedback or suggestions here in the comments or on the feedback channel of our friendly hobby Discord server. Thanks a lot, and happy hobbying!