WIP Stormvermin Unit: 50% Completion

Well, after a bit of a marathon I've got another 5 Stormvermin done bringing the unit to 10. 

These are kitbashed from the mordheim plastic box & the old Empire rabble/citizen levy/whatever great weapon arms and a couple plastic chaos marauder shoulder pads to cover up where my green stuff skills failed big time.

I had to replace the plastic flail on the overhead pose as the plastic chain detail bit would break constantly. Pin, fine wire and a couple of chaos weapons and jobs a good(enough) 'un. I do not like these sculpts. I do not like plastic figs. I wanted a unit of twenty Stormvermin and I used what I had to get by.  

Sneak peak at the next 5, the "command rank" these will probably get a bit more attention with highlights etc but the focus is to get the army finished in time for Orctober Fest, I've missed out twice on it due to working on my skaven but enough is enough.

When am I going to play 5k games in 3rd edition anyway?

Today's Progress - Stormvermin Test Scheme

After a bit of thumb twiddling, just thumbs I swear; I came up with my Stormvermin test scheme. The unit is comprised of a variety of sculpts so I decided to finish all I had of each at once. Here are some close ups: 

The classic mace bearers

The notorious j'accuse pose

These are the best of the lot; 

And j'accuse

I went with white fur as I imagined they were the true chosen of the horned rat and personal bodyguards of the grey seers. 

I'm happy with how they've turned out. They were speed painted, I just wanted them done. 

I read some blog entries this morning on Realms of Chaos 80's, Oldhammer on a Budget and The Black Hole, and Eldritch Epistles which describes their endeavour to paint 1,000 point armies for BOYL next year under the guise of a Tale of Four Gamers Challenge, which is one of my favourite WD articles of all time (the original 90's endeavour, not the copycat articles years later), I've got the issues around somewhere so I'll give a good look round. 

I think it would be great fun to do the same for the American Oldhammer in the NEW World event next year provided there is one, God I hope there is one. 

I'll post more on some ideas I've got in the coming weeks but essentially it would involve 4, perhaps more players all painting 100 points a month culminating in a painted army of 1000 points. 2 players would be of good alignment and two of evil. Anyway I'm getting ahead of myself.

The challenge will start October 1st ending August 1st well in time for OITNW. 

This gives anyone interested a chance to finish off any smaller projects they wish to have finished (my skaven 4,500pts for example, oh I think it just moved thinking about it.) On a side note Paul Sawyer's beastmen have always been an inspiration of mine, I'll be sure to post some pictures from the appropriate issues in future.

That's all for now please comment and let me know what you think of the colour scheme and thanks for stopping by. 

A little help please.

I've gotten my Stormvermin assembled, sanded/corked and primed. I've got to 

  say I'm pleased with my pace so far but real life is always right around the corner waiting to bite you in the ass. 

I see very little hobby time in the near future, for who knows how long really. By that logic I can't afford to repaint miniatures should I make a poor choice in judgement. I'm getting ahead of myself, let me explain: 

My army colours are blue and yellow, here are some old army shots;

Perhaps I am just a wee bit biased but I think the army colours are dominant despite the different shades of fur/skin and metallics. 

But it became almost monotonous. So I changed it up, starting with my plague monks. In my little bubble of Warhammer Fantasy plague monks worship nurgle, and so I wanted them to look nice and drab. I used with Dheneb stone and Devlan Mud wash while picking out every scab, boil and tumor(?!) in a creamy red.

I really like how they turned out and their colours were neutral enough that the unit just sorta blends in, I painted the plague censer bearers to match. 

When I'd finished my clanrats it was time for my black skaven. 

I'd always loved the red stormvermin in 4th edition, I just changed up the colour locations but retained a similar palette.

With all my regular  infantry done it was time to move onto my STORMVERMIN!!

As an ode to one of my warhammer heroes the one and only Pete Foley! 

I've always loved the look of this unit, so much so in fact that I used a wizard to test a colour scheme;

I'll pastel the highlights in future or add red to make them really pop.

So I pose this to you my loyal subscribers; is a third unit out of army colours too much? Will my army end up looking like a bunch of miniatures just thrown together?

Or am I being OCD? 

Please comment vote and if you would please give an explanation. 

  

Today's progress: Black Skaven...the RETURN!

I finally finished the last two members of my black skaven regiment! These bastards have been on my desk for months but finally they're done. I hated even sitting at my painting table, their mere presence exhausted me.

Am I pleased with the paintjob? No. 

It's pretty obvious that I rushed through them today 

My kitbash and green stuff nightmare 

All that work and the skull shoulder pad came out looking like, well crap really. 

Ugh. I really feel sick when I think of how much time I put into him compared with the final result. 

The matching hero didn't turn out much better.

I will never leave the character model til last again. I felt totally drained and just rushed through him ignoring spots where I could've laid highlights like the sword pommel and gauntlets.

His red armour did turn out to my liking and I did put in some effort on the halberd's runes though; if I'm paying 25 points for it to be magical it should look the part IMHO.

So I now move onto the stormvermin regiment.

Whenever I feel burnt out I have 3 poisoned wind globadiers, 2 assassins, my final jezzail and 2 familiars to break up any monotony. 

Hopefully this will return my output to its previous calibre. To be honest or perhaps to vindicate myself there will be 255 completed rank and file Skaven painted when all is said and done, I really don't think anyone will be looking too hard at any one individual model.

I have 11-13 characters on top of that which brings the army to a close. 

I don't think I'll ever paint another 3k worth of a single fantasy army again. The time investment is too great and I can't imagine how long it would take to play 3k games. 

Lastly I wish everyone luck at oldhammer in the new world this weekend, I had genuine plans to go but a home reno, work and a host of other health issues lead to abandoning that dream. It makes me nauseated to let down the organizers. I sincerely apologize. 

If there is an event next year, scouts honour I'll be there, maybe even in the old world at BOYL! 

Thanks for stopping by. 

Today's Progress

Nothing crazy but I've finally gotten my 20 stormvermin assembled. Its comprised of an eclectic collection of figs; everything from the original Goodwin  sculpts up to the mordheim plastic set.

Originally I was just going to use plastic clanrats circa '95 to fill in the gaps in the unit, however I used that little cheat on my black skaven so I kit bashed (I guess?) some old empire militia greatswords and did a couple of simple conversions. 

This one turned out the best, the other two had some real trouble with green stuff so I had to waste some marauder shoulder pads to camouflage it. 

The unit standard turned out ok, I didn't want to have a duplicate and considering there are only 3 clanrats standard sculpts the conversion was one of necessity. 

Although not armed with a great weapon I simply had a pair of these figs lying around and thought he would look good as a unit leader non-character (because you have to designate a unit leader and place him dead centre in your unit)

Of course I had to make a real character to lead (more so to increase the unit count to 21 forcing my opponent to cause 6 wounds for panic or routing instead of 5). I don't know if he'll fit into my 3k list but an option for a character with great weapon will be a tempting inclusion. 

He got the usual elevated base to match the other characters in the army, but the original tail was overly dramatic so I salvaged an old one from mordheim.

Here's the gang all together, 35 (or so) figures to go and I've painted nearly all the skaven I own. I could always throw together another gutter runner unit or a fifth warp fire thrower but to be honest, I'd like to move on and get 1000 points of orcs and goblins painted and on the table.

Of them all I'm most pleased with the acquisition of this figure: a mordheim black skaven. He's covered in detail and I will see he receives a fitting paintjob.

After feeling the wrath of a man mangler I simply had to have one( then my usual instincts kicked in) and I had to have a lead belcher, then a spear chukka, so expect a machine heavy list with crossbows and cavalry. 

I've also written a list for chaos and high elves and I already have the figures....

Someday. 

Throt the Unclean aka Verminlord Beastmaster Finished

Pretty pleased with him, I just hope I roll the "Extra Arm" personal chaos attribute, how cool would that fit?

The Bale-Eye, I was sorely tempted to try an OSL technique but I lack the skill and my power glove wasn't making it any easier. But, it does look warpstonish, maybe I'll play it as blinding glare magic armour? Or a warpstonish charm. 

It seems every weapon I paint lately looks better from the rear. Ah well c'est la vie. 

I tried to go for a bone pommel but in the photos it gets washed out.

And lastly WIP on the characters;

They're coming along, nearly time for an army/collection shot a la Pete Taylor in the armies book.

Thanks for looking and pls comment .

Enjoy your weekend Oldhammerers!

Warpsquealer #2 painting complete

A bit of a rush job but he turned out ok, I intended to paint him in all purple robes with some yellow accents but then realized he would be in LA Lakers garb which I cannot abide

And the back end 

And a work in progress shot of the other batch of personalities 

Thanks for looking