Well, to celebrate losing my job today I thought I'd post some pictures of my latest Daemon unit - Flamers of Tzeentch!
I have to say I love these models. And they kick ass BIG TIME in the game! I'd love to have 50% of my points on these dudes. They're amazing!
You'll notice I didn't stick the arms on most of them (and filled the gaps with multi-purpose powdered filler). This was because they look pants with the arms and good without. Although I kept the arms on to represent the unit champions.
I painted them Liche Purple, Warlock Purple, Pink and White with two shades of yellow, orange and Blood Red for the fire. They were very quick to paint mostly using my characteristic damp-brushing technique.
The beauty of these babies is that you get two units for the price of one - for 40k and Fantasy. I've modelled them on round bases as they're Skirmishers and so they look better in 40k. And cause they look better that way anyway.
I'm really looking forward to using these in my next game (and I have a couple of games lined up). First though, I'd LIKE to finish off the two kinkiest units in Warhammer: my Daemonettes and Seekers of Slaanesh!
To the south of the Empire, the lawless Border Princes are wracked by war. Undead legions sweep north from the Land of the Dead. Orcs, Skaven and Ogres run rampant and spiteful Wood Elves strike from the dark woods. Against these dark forces stand the Dwarfs of Horn Hold, the Knights of Tempest Falls and the Men of New Sylvania, determined to stand firm; however if the undead can batter their way through the Border Princes then the Empire will be next. This truly is the Last Chance War.
Tuesday 26 April 2011
Friday 22 April 2011
Tactical Review: Massacre in the West Woods
MIKE:
You’ve got to love those dirty rat bastards. Three times I have been installed as Skaven Commander and three times I have hammered the Empire into submission.
Luckily my tactics were spot on, the plague furnace flanked by two good units and the Gutter Runners employed no more that 12” from the Empire’s backline. As soon as I had placed my scouts Tim was instantly worried, even though I couldn’t charge on the first turn I was able to move them within 6” to unleash the deadly throwing stars, meanwhile the deadly Plague Furnace creaked forward with the support of the Clan Rats and Storm Vermin.
I had to risk the catastrophic effects of the deadly 13th spell at the end of turn two as things were getting away from me. BANG 17 Greatswords dead, Tim’s tactics were left in ruins and I was left with picking of the remainder of his army. Easy pickings for my mighty rats…..
TIM:
Well!
I do try with my Empire and this time I tried my hardest ever. And I feel that I did very well. I got the balance right on the combat troops and the shooting ones. Coupled with my wizards I got the whole army working together exceptionally well. Slowing down and cutting his Clanrats down to size while I routed his Stormvermin set me up for a lovely three unit charge on his main Plague Furnace unit.
Nothing here was bad. All of it was good and I don’t think anything was wrong with any of that.
As I said in the battle report, it was the Gutter Runners and the 13th spell that ruined it all.
These Gutter Runners have done me down several times in a row now and I need to come up with a viable counter-strategy just for them obviously. I guess a unit in place to strike back at them or slow them up.
There wasn’t much I could have done about the Thirteenth Spell. It was very luckily cast and basically ruined my carefully orchestrated three-unit charge.
So what would I have done differently?
I’d have moved my Wizards out of the overrun path of the Gutter Runners. I saw that coming but one round too late. They could then have engaged them with magic and seen them off (perhaps). This however still would have left the Clanrat unit out front unopposed.
I think there were too many characters needing power dice (which I’ve said before) and I would say too many characters. I need to paint up a lot more infantry. And I’d also like to experiment with detachments. Apparently these are the only way to go with Empire.
We’ll see.
Meanwhile I’m going to pat myself on the back. I’m not there yet but my tactics here were a hundred times better than in previous game.
One day soon I’ll start winning… You’ll see.
Thursday 21 April 2011
Massacre in the West Woods
Mike (Skaven) vs Tim (Empire)
The war with the Skaven had gone on for weeks in the West Woods, deep in the heart of the land of New Sylvania. Unable to push through to their own lands, the Skaven and Empire forces had fought one another time and again, but though the Skaven general’s wily tactics and enfilading troop movements had driven back the State Troops more on almost every occasion, the proximity of reinforcements had prevented the Skaven from making any headway, trapping them in hostile territory.
Now things were going to change however.
Marcus von Drak had drawn up a carefully conceived strategic plan and more men than ever before were in place for the assault on the travelling Skaven army. Still relatively untrained, the Empire army had long been ill-prepared for full scale battle beyond the city walls. He had been optimistic in the past but now had a more realistic view of their abilities. Still, he was confident the time was right. His commander had gained the necessary tactical acumen to win.
This time it was going to be a massacre.
With the Skaven horde coming on, a huge Plague Furnace at its centre, the Empire army split itself into two parts: a gunline comprising Handgunners and Outriders along with a pair of powerful wizards, and an assault contingent: Knights, Greatswords and Swordsmen, bolstered by powerful heroes.
As soon as the ratmen came within range, the gunline opened fire, whittling away at a huge regiment of Clanrats and the screeching Plague Monks. A flurry of deadly fireballs set the monk robes alight and the pestilential vermin were incinerated in swathes. Generating a Fulminating Flame Cage, the arch wizard surrounded the advancing Clanrats in fiery bands that made them freeze in panic.
The Kinghts charged forward, crashing into the opposing Stormvermin and sending them fleeing then manoeuvred into position to charge the Plague Furnace in its flank. Meanwhile, the Empire infantry held ground, ready to strike forward simultaneously with the Knights, cracking the almost impenetrable nut of the Plague Monks.
The plan was perfectly executed and was working perfectly.
Only two problems had remained unforeseen.
For once again, the Skaven Gutter Runners had slunk into an enfilading position to the flank of the Empire gunline. And as they closed in, the Outriders horses paced fitfully, their unit leader unsure whether to turn and face them or stick to his orders.
He stuck to his orders, and that proved their downfall.
The Gutter Runners charged into the flank of the Outriders, pulling the brave men down from their horses. They cut them all down in a matter of seconds and their momentum carried them through into the flank of the Handgunners, trapping the Wizards before they could flee.
Suddenly the perfectly conceived plan showed a perfectly executed flaw.
And that wasn’t all. The second problem was yet to be revealed.
Generating vast magical power and ricking everything, the Plague Priest carried on the open berth of the Plague Furnace let fly his insidious sorcery and suddenly, all but five of the Greatswords were instantly mutilated, their bodies ruined by the Skaven’s Dreaded Thirteenth Spell.
The infantry still charged but what might have been a certain triumph was suddenly teetering close to an epic disaster.
If this wasn’t bad enough; with the Empire Wizards being cut down, there was insufficient magical protection in place to prevent the other Plague Priest from magically imbuing every single Plague Monk with filthy poison oozing from their fangs. As the fumes of the gigantic Plague Censer spewed out over the men of the Empire, all started to go horribly wrong. The Swordsmen, Knights and remaining Greatswords fell to the ground, raked with festering claws or gagging on the fumes. The horses of the knights spooked and turned, despite the cries of the Captain leading them and as they galloped away they were run down by the Stormvermin who had slunk back to the battlefield.
The remaining men were insufficient to mount any kind of credible attack. They continued to strike back at the vicious ratmen but they took more casualties than they gave out. They were suddenly losing and losing quite horribly.
The heroes of the Empire fought on but even they couldn’t withstand the unrelenting assault of the filthy vermin and one-by-one they were cut down until finally only a single warrior priest remained.
He fought on as all the surviving Skaven started to surround him, even then refusing to surrender hope, determined to battle on until all were dead around him.
But there were too many. He could not win. And soon he was as dead as the rest of his men.
Marcus von Drak’s plan had appeared perfect and without the dastardly ingenuity of the Skaven it just might have been. As it was he had been sure there would be a massacre.
Only now, at the end, it became clear just how right he had been.
Wednesday 20 April 2011
How to Base Models: The Arachnarok Spider
My good friend Neil has been nagging me for a while now to produce a tutorial on how I base my models. So here we are.
I think basing models makes such a big difference to how they look on the battlefield and aspiring toward having realistic good-looking models is one of my top priorities.
I've gone through many different trials for getting the perfect base colour over the years but it's only this one I'm really happy with. Even so, it does fail in one crucial way: It isn't transferrable to a snow-covered board. That is a bit of a shame.
Still, here's how I go about it, using the nice big base of the Arachnarok Spider as an example. Obviously the same principles apply to smaller bases and I follow these exact same steps then.
Here are the materials I use. In the big tub is Bird Grit. This is a product available in pet shops and Wilkinsons that is amazingly cheap compared to GW gravel (about 80p for a bag bigger than the palm of your hand).
In the smaller tub is fine beach sand.
Using black paint I paint the base then place it in the tub and push the gravel onto it. Sometimes it doesn't stick that well. In those cases, adding another layer of paint can help or using the beach sand to fill the gaps.
With models that rank up I don't do the edges of the bases but with monsters, 40k miniatures and anything not going on a movement tray I do. I find it profoundly weird that the established convention is that people don't do edges. I blame the random decision of somebody working at Games Workshop in the early eighties. To my mind a model looks more realistic and blends into the table better if the edges are done. It's a no brainer.
It's important to leave every stage long enough to dry or it messes things up badly. What I often do is use a drying lamp - basically a desk lamp pointing down at the miniatures. This speeds things along. A nice summer sun in the garden also works, as we can see from these pictures.
When the gravel is dry, paint over the whole thing with black paint.
Next up, give a thick wet-brush of Scorched Brown across the whole base.
From this point on things speed up as we're not applying too much paint at once so drying times are cut.
The next thing you need to do is dry brush patches of Bestial Brown across the base. Leave some of the Scorched Brown showing through.
When that's dried, do the same thing with Bubonic Brown - a rough overlapping series of patches that allows all the colours already on to show through in small areas.
At this point your base should be a mottled mix of patchy colours ranging from black through darker and lighter browns up to yellow and cream. It think it looks quite interesting and certainly blends very well into the warboard if that is painted following the same steps.
I think basing models makes such a big difference to how they look on the battlefield and aspiring toward having realistic good-looking models is one of my top priorities.
I've gone through many different trials for getting the perfect base colour over the years but it's only this one I'm really happy with. Even so, it does fail in one crucial way: It isn't transferrable to a snow-covered board. That is a bit of a shame.
Still, here's how I go about it, using the nice big base of the Arachnarok Spider as an example. Obviously the same principles apply to smaller bases and I follow these exact same steps then.
Here are the materials I use. In the big tub is Bird Grit. This is a product available in pet shops and Wilkinsons that is amazingly cheap compared to GW gravel (about 80p for a bag bigger than the palm of your hand).
In the smaller tub is fine beach sand.
Using black paint I paint the base then place it in the tub and push the gravel onto it. Sometimes it doesn't stick that well. In those cases, adding another layer of paint can help or using the beach sand to fill the gaps.
It's important to leave every stage long enough to dry or it messes things up badly. What I often do is use a drying lamp - basically a desk lamp pointing down at the miniatures. This speeds things along. A nice summer sun in the garden also works, as we can see from these pictures.
When the gravel is dry, paint over the whole thing with black paint.
Now you can get through a heck of a lot of black paint doing this. Did you know black paint is GW's top-selling item? But I have a solution! Go to your local DIY shop and buy a tin of Blackboard Paint. This stuff is identical to the stuff GW sells and you get a lot more for your buck. Trust me. You'll never look back!
Next up, give a thick wet-brush of Scorched Brown across the whole base.
From this point on things speed up as we're not applying too much paint at once so drying times are cut.
The next thing you need to do is dry brush patches of Bestial Brown across the base. Leave some of the Scorched Brown showing through.
When that's dried, do the same thing with Bubonic Brown - a rough overlapping series of patches that allows all the colours already on to show through in small areas.
To finish it off, simply apply another layer of overlapping patches, this time using Bleached Bone.
At this point your base should be a mottled mix of patchy colours ranging from black through darker and lighter browns up to yellow and cream. It think it looks quite interesting and certainly blends very well into the warboard if that is painted following the same steps.
Tuesday 19 April 2011
Project: Chaos Dwarfs - The First Complete Unit!
So now at last I have a (small but) playable army for my Chaos Dwarfs because I have finished painting 26 Chaos Dwarf Warriors using Mantic's Abyssal Dwarf models.
After painting the characters gold I went back and upgraded the warriors I'd already done to the same colour scheme and I'm really liking it.
You'll notice I used some Chaos Warrior, Dwarf and Marauder parts (coutesy of my good buddy Mike) to spruce up the command models. The Mantic parts aren't that great for that but combined with these they look excellent.
Now, to be rules compliant I would need to split this unit in two to play a game which I might do. On the other hand, if I delay playing with them for a while, I might have time to paint up a second unit before I do.
I'm VERY excited about reaching that objective, because points-wise, I'll then be able to get my Lord on Great Taurus. Just wait until you see that model! It's amazing!
Monday 18 April 2011
Tactical Review: Massacre at Dipswallow
I’d never played Wood Elves, even when I first collected Warhammer way back when, and to be honest I wasn’t sure what to do. Should I stay back and ping my arrows at those stout little fellows or should I dive in for some good old fashioned hand to hand combat……? Well I did neither with my Glade Guard or Glade Riders.
In the first round of Dwarf shooting they decimated my Glade Guard and took out a few Glade Riders for good measure so that should have given me an idea of what to do. This warning went unpunished and neither the Guard nor the Riders managed to get into combat all game.
My Treeman and Dryads were excellent. I used them as a battering ram through the Dwarven ranks. My Treeman killed (or for the sake of the campaign seriously wounded) Morgrim. The Treeman with the Ariels’ Blessing spell granting regeneration was an excellent combination. The lord on the mighty drake was awesome, hacking his way through the Dwarven crossbowmen and Thunderers.
Although my Wood Elf battle plan was very poor, luckily for me, Tims’ rolling was pretty poor after the first round of shooting. His cannon misfired and blew up which was a relief and he had no luck in combat.
The pros for me with a new army were that Glade Riders and Guard aside, I thought my tactics were pretty much spot on.
The cons were that the magic was very weak and the initial set up of the army could have been better.
Still victory was mine and the massacre of the dwarfs will live long in the memory…
Well yet another massacre under my belt! When I lose I do tend to lose big.
Mike had been rather worried for some time about the rules for Morgrim, suspecting he was too powerful, but he need worry no more. Morgrim got his ass handed to him by that Treeman! I have to say, Treemen are amazingly tough – they really are! It was a big mistake to go up against it alone. Maybe avoidance should be my top strategy there.
My warriors, Thane and Battle Standard Bearer did okay for a while but that Treeman did them in too!
One thing I did do right and that was to bring the miners on behind the lines. This was a tactic I’d seen work well with Mike’s Skaven Gutter Runners in the past. Against a gun-line army it is fantastic but with an army that moves forward it isn’t so good. I tend not to take them against assaulting armies.
That dragon!
I must admit I have a problem with big monsters. They always seem to be my nemesis. And once again I’m left feeling a little bewildered. I was down on points in this game again so I just didn’t have enough men to fight my battles for me. It would be interesting to analyse how many uneven battles like this lead to disaster. It’s nice to have them to make the map movement worthwhile but in-game it can be a bit of a challenge.
Two things that did do well were my Gyrocopter and Quarellers: mowing down Elves by the dozen. My Thunderers didn’t do so well though. Mike was wise to them and didn’t come close enough for me to blast him!
As for the cannon! Once again – it could have really done a lot of damage… but didn’t. Boom.
And something for Wood Elf players to chew on… The Athel Loren spell that gives Regeneration (Ariel’s Blessing) did a massive amount to keep that Treeman alive. If it hadn’t been for that, maybe Morgrim would have at least weakened it enough to allow the warriors to chop it down!
Sunday 17 April 2011
Massacre at Dipswallow
Mike (Wood Elves) vs Tim (Dwarfs)
Morgrim gave a mighty battle cry and thrust his axe forward.
“Attack!”
The Dwarfs surged forward toward the Elven lines with Morgrim riding the great bear Thurvar, warriors running on muscular but stunted legs behind him. To the far right a Gyrocopter zoomed forward, the Dwarf behind its throttle, lining up his sights on the Elven Spellsinger he saw slipping between the buildings up ahead.
The place of battle was on the edge of the deserted village of Dipswallow, in a narrow valley in a fold of Hades Ridge. It wasn’t ideal for the Dwarfs – there was far too much foliage to make it perfect – but Morgrim didn’t care. The momentum of his previous victory carried him forward. There was nothing that could hobble his righteous fury now.
Dryads ran to meet them but Morgrim cared not; Glade Guard levelled their bows, but the Thunderers and Quarellers he had commanded into position let fly, gunning them down: Morgrim worried not. Even the gigantic Treeman crashing through the foliage towards him did not give him pause.
Then a terrible roar broke out across the battlefield and suddenly a sliver of doubt crackled on Morgrim’s brow. It was a sound he had never heard in all his days on that world, but still it made even he sense his own mortality.
It was the war cry of a Blood Wood Drake and even as Morgrim charged the Treeman, the Drake swept down on the Thunderers, tearing them apart. Their weapons were no good. Its armour was invincible. It ripped them in twain with teeth and claw as Arodor Naurven, the Scourge of Bloodroot Forest, leapt from its back to join the fray.
As the Dwarfen warriors charged through the forest, Warhawk Riders soared round their flank, heading for the missile troops, even as the ineffectual cannon exploded, taking its crew with it.
The Dwarfs cut down the Dryads, losing some of their own but easily defeating their enemies then overran into the Elven Noble and Spellsinger waiting behind the line and cut them down too. But Morgrim wasn’t faring so well and quickly he was realising that his overconfidence was to be his undoing. Bolstered by Elven magic, he simply did not have the capacity to damage the gargantuan Treeman quickly enough and its tree trunk arms were dealing more damage back to him than even his magically strengthened armour could endure.
Glade Riders closed on the Quarrellers as the Warhawk Riders attacked. That section of the Dwarfen line was almost obliterated, but the survivors fought on, hoping to trap their foes long enough for Morgrim’s secret plan to initiate.
And initiate it did.
As all seemed lost, a stout regiment of Dwarf Miners emerged from the ground right behind the Elven Glade Guard and before they could adequately respond, the Dwarfs charged into them, bringing them down with their pickaxes. With the Glade Guard dead they looked round for other enemies and charged on but as another mighty blow came down on Morgrim, he could see that it was too late, and far too little. The oaken arms knocked him from Thurvar’s back and he landed in the thick undergrowth. From behind the dense foliage he could see the Blood Wood Drake take to the air once more and sail back toward the miners, even as the Treeman; believing him dead; stomped in the direction of the miners.
All was lost. Morgrim could see that. His rashness had cost them everything and might yet lose them the war.
There was nothing now but for him to flee in shame. He could not battle on alone, even if he had the strength for it. The Elven host and their Blood Wood Drake were, for now, undefeatable.
The entire Dwarfen host had been massacred!
Thursday 14 April 2011
The Blood Wood Drakes
The initial battle of the second War of Vengeance had ended badly for the Elves with Morgrim and his Dwarfs smashing through the Wood Elf cordon on Hades Ridge. The ancient dwarf was determined to drive his throng along the entire ridge and down into Bloodroot Forest. When he reached Linwe, the capital of the Wood Elves, he would smash every beam, alight every tree and slaughter every elf male, woman and child.
Maglor Telemnar, leader of the Elves, raged in his treetop Hall of Glory. His Dark Coven of witches had betrayed him, claiming the time was right for battle when it had not been, when all his manoeuvring had led to defeat and impending disaster. Telemnar had smashed every breakable item within reach and slit the stomach of his concubine in a rage. But the Coven came to him now, fearlessly, despite his wrath toward them, each of the four women smiling.
“You have trusted our judgment,” they said, all speaking in strange unsynched harmony.
“Trust that has led to disaster!” snapped Telemnar.
“Trust that has led you to this perfect moment.” They smiled their cold smiles.
“Perfect? My army was forced to withdraw!”
“And our antediluvian enemy grows overconfident. He pushes on, stretching his supply lines; takes risks. He thinks he is strong but he grows weak and we have never been stronger.”
Maglor Telemnar paused and a quiet smile began to play on his lips. “Speak more on this. Tell me of your scheme.”
“We will tell you,” they said, speaking still in their odd lilting conjoined words. “We will tell you of the Blood Wood Drakes.”
“The legend?”
“No. The reality.”
Telemnar sat. “Speak on women but don’t waste my time with myths.”
All four women remained still, their clothes moving in a shimmering mystical breeze.
“In ancient times, it is said that great dragons filled the skies across the old world, roosting in the high mountains and eating their fill of the creatures of the land. But that time passed. The dragons let go of their lives or entered long slumbers in dark caverns or darker woodland bowers.
“Of these once majestic wyrms,” they continued, “five great beasts found peace deep beneath the earth here in Bloodroot Forest, close to the point where the Blood Root itself cuts up from its most insidious depths. These dragons were perhaps once proud and honourable beasts but the taint of the Blood Root twisted their minds and their bodies to leave only hatred and rage in their ebon hearts.
“It has long been whispered that on the blackest night of the year, these drakes rise up to the surface from the deeply wooded and almost invisible chasm of Death Knell Gash; and that they take to the skies to hunt once more, devouring every inhabitant of a town or village of their choosing and leaving none to tell of it; only scorched ground and bloodstains in the earth.”
Maglor Telemnar sneered. “I have heard the stories. There is not a child within the Border Princes who has not heard them.”
“Indeed,” said the Coven. “But we have long searched for the Drakes; and we have found them. And we have communicated with them.”
“You… have?”
The pale grey eyes of the witches gazed upon him. “You thought our advice to you was a lie. You thought your defeat was a betrayal. But you were wrong. Now the Dwarfs have been lured into our territory. Now they rush forward with brash and foolish verve. Now they are most vulnerable to attack.”
They all smiled.
“And now we have the Blood Wood Drakes on our side.”
Telemnar sat forward. “You mean…”
“Yes,” replied the witches. “The Dwarfs cannot stop us now.”
Tuesday 12 April 2011
On the Painting Table: Chaos Dwarfs/Abyssal Dwarfs!
The new Abyssal Dwarfs Lords War Conclave from Mantic is a nice little set alowing you to create a good set of starting characters for a GW Chaos Dwarfs army.
Now I have a game lined up against my wife's Temestrians in the current campaign turn so I'm pushing to be ready for that. It's going to be a small game but a welcome one. How weird will it be to have Dwarfs with magic?!?!
First up we have my Lord. The model looks a little bit hi-tech for Fantasy but I like him. The most striking thing about all these models is the size. They're huge! I wouldn't say they're out of scale... quite but they're pushing it. I think they'll look fine on the battlefield. Just don't stand this guy next to a Space Marine!
I'm most of the way through painting my first complete unit of Abyssal Dwarf Blacksouls (that I'll be using as Chaos Dwarf characters).
Next up is the Daemonsmith/Sorcerer chappie. This guy is probably my least favourite of the three but he's still really nice. Observent readers may notice I have painted these golder than my previous Chaos Dwarf warriors. I liked it so much more that I'm going back and golding up the other guys.
Third and final, we have the Bull Centaur. This chap is really nice. He's the model I was least sure of before getting them but the one I like the most now. I enjoyed painting him and love the way he looks. Mantic are bringing out a unit of bull centaurs sometime so he'll lead them when they appear. In the meantime I'll probably have him running round by himself - see how that goes.
I've taken pictures for a painting tutorial of these guys so stay tuned for that... I'll get round to it sometime.
Monday 11 April 2011
On the Painting Table: Arachnarok Spider!
At long last it is here!
I can't tell you how excited I was when I first saw this model. I mean it; I really can't. But I was excited.
Interestingly it took me less time to paint the spider than it did to do all those goblins. The bad news from my perspective was that I paused for quite a long time after I was half way through before finishing. This meant that I lost the happy momentum a little bit.
But it is still good!
I used a range of reds (and some Gryphonne Sepia wash to do the body.
And this ALMOST officially completes my Spider Goblin army. I just have the Spider Shaman to base left. The second the new Tomb King army book comes out I'll be playing my first proper game with them. That's going to be amazing!
I painted the Forest Goblins to match the ones on my Spider Riders. It's amazing what a coloured feather can do to unify a look across an army!
Now pucker up! This guy wants to give you a nice sloppy kiss!
I can't tell you how excited I was when I first saw this model. I mean it; I really can't. But I was excited.
Interestingly it took me less time to paint the spider than it did to do all those goblins. The bad news from my perspective was that I paused for quite a long time after I was half way through before finishing. This meant that I lost the happy momentum a little bit.
But it is still good!
I used a range of reds (and some Gryphonne Sepia wash to do the body.
And this ALMOST officially completes my Spider Goblin army. I just have the Spider Shaman to base left. The second the new Tomb King army book comes out I'll be playing my first proper game with them. That's going to be amazing!
I painted the Forest Goblins to match the ones on my Spider Riders. It's amazing what a coloured feather can do to unify a look across an army!
Now pucker up! This guy wants to give you a nice sloppy kiss!
Saturday 9 April 2011
On the Painting Table: Wood Elf Dragon!
And welcome to my one hundredth post!
And to celebrate, get a load of the latest addition to my Wood Elf army:
Painting the dragon was pretty quick but he didn't start to look good until quite near the end (I got a little worried). Using a fairly large artist's brush (pack of five from the local pound shop), I dry-brushed him through the following colours. As the colours got lighter I focused more on the upper areas and the centre of the wings' membranes.
And to celebrate, get a load of the latest addition to my Wood Elf army:
I've never had a dragon in Warhammer before and although the High Elf one is great, I'm not super keen on the Wood Elf one. And I don't own High Elves. Yet.
This little chap is a Tood McFarlane Dragon that I've repainted and rebased to suit my needs. He wasn't my favourite McFarlane dragon but was close to the top of the list - and I got him for £2.60 off eBay!
I was a bit worried he would be out of scale but I think he's fine. Maybe he's a little on the big side but as long as I don't put him up against another (GW) dragon then it'll be fine. And who cares basically! He looks great and makes a beautiful centrepiece for the army.
I was a bit worried he would be out of scale but I think he's fine. Maybe he's a little on the big side but as long as I don't put him up against another (GW) dragon then it'll be fine. And who cares basically! He looks great and makes a beautiful centrepiece for the army.
You can search for "McFarlane Kommodo Dragon" on Google to see the original colour scheme and base. Although the base he came on was almost exactly right for a Warhammer monster base, I needed him to be able to attack a unit directly in front of him and those wings of his jutted too far forward.
A quick trip out to the garden later and I had enough shale to glue into a stack he could perch on, raising the height so that his wings didn't intrude on units in front. Don't ask me about the steel pins that stuck out of his feet. They were horrificially difficult to cut through!
Now the dragon in the army book is of course ridden by a Word Elf Lord. This wasn't a conversion I felt like doing so decided to go with the idea of leaving a space on the dragon's base with room for my current Wood Elf Lord to stand: the idea being that he's perhapsd just jumped off to kick ass.
Painting the dragon was pretty quick but he didn't start to look good until quite near the end (I got a little worried). Using a fairly large artist's brush (pack of five from the local pound shop), I dry-brushed him through the following colours. As the colours got lighter I focused more on the upper areas and the centre of the wings' membranes.
- Scorched Brown
- Calthan Brown
- Graveyard Earth
- Kommando Khaki
- Bleached Bone
For the stomach I did Desert Yellow and Bubonic Brown. This looked a little bright so I stuck an Ogryn Flesh wash over it to darken it down.
For the rocks I painted them black as usual then Adeptus Battlegrey, before giving them a Codex Grey and Fortress Grey drybrush highlight.
Now this guy is really nice and I'm really looking forward to seeing him in action. I have a game lined up day after tomorrow when he'll get his first outing against my Dwarfs, so tune in for that. I'll post the battle report as usual as well as a strategic review, which should be interesting.
By the way... You may be amused to learn that after taking all these pictures, within five seconds the base broke and the rocks cracked apart.
D'oh!
But he's okay again now thank God!
Friday 8 April 2011
Wood Elf Spell Cards
And here are the Wood Elf spell cards I’ve cobbled together. They aren’t as flashy as the ones GW produce but they’re functional.
Wood Elf spells seem to be a bit rubbish now that eighth edition is out (moving woods around used to have quite an impact) but they're still quite interesting. And you've got to love those miniatures!
Wood Elf Spell Cards Wood Elf spells seem to be a bit rubbish now that eighth edition is out (moving woods around used to have quite an impact) but they're still quite interesting. And you've got to love those miniatures!
Wednesday 6 April 2011
On the Painting Table: Chaos Daemon Horrors!
So I had five of the original metal Horrors, and then the new plastic ones came out. Which gave me the annoying unit size of fifteen. Being a bit anal about this kind of thing, this scratched away at me for some time until I finally found a pack of five of the old ones at a local model shop!
After a suitable cooling off period on my pile of unpainted miniatures I pulled them out and got to work.
Now I used a particularly quick of painting these little chaps: Liche Purple, Warlock Purple and Thingy Pink (I can’t remember the proper name) that GW don’t seem to sell anymore. Kommando Kahki and Bleached Bone for the teeth and claws and Bob is your father’s brother!
In Fantasy these guys are interesting because they function as a single wizard effectively. I’ve not had enough experience with them to judge how well this works but in 40k they kick ass!
You’ll notice I’ve based them on circular bases. These rank up on movement trays fine and leave them free for 40k games as well!
Bonus!
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