Water Bases for Chaos Space Marines

Far, far away in our old apartment, I started working on a Chaos Space Marine army. Then I played a bunch of games with them and decided they're just awful without transports. I really couldn't bring myself to buy and build a bunch of vehicles, so I set the army aside.

A sampling of the fleet of bases I made.

I did, however, manage to get their bases done in an interesting way. I made based them in such a way that it looks like the army is stomping through streams. I stole the general idea from Casey's lava bases, but I don't actually know if the methods we used were the same. I really don't know how he did them.

Marine isn't finished, but I think he looks snazzy on that base.

I coated the base in wood glue first, to smooth out the textured surface. I layered skull white, asurmen blue, enchanted blue, ultra marine blue, regal blue, and then asurmen blue again to get the gradient. After it was dry, I put a brushing of 'Ard Coat over top to give it the glossy water look. I glued on the gravel after the paint dried.

They are different from the usual grassy-land bases, but I'm not entirely pleased with how they came out. Next time, I would try to blend it together better. A lot better. I honestly think the colors I did was the best option I had, but I should have started with the dark colors and blended them up instead of the other way around.

If I had thought about it further, I'd have chosen to put grass there instead of the lame gravel. Grass loves to grow near water, so why I made it a desolate hellscape is beyond me. If I decide to go forward with the army, I think I should scrap these bases and rework them. The idea is cool, but the execution is just too poor.