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 

Final Skaven Regiment Finished

I couldn't stand looking at my last two Black Skaven sitting on my desk half painted, it was driving me nuts.

With some trepidation I picked up a brush with my sinister hand and the results are in;

The Ayatollah of rock and rolla, the bringer of base armed with a mace,

er...sword. Swords are good too. 

The standard bearer turned out a bit crap frankly. 

For some reason my dark tone wash just sucked the colour right out of him, I think it was due to the bottle being near empty so possibly the pigment settled at the bottom. On the plus side I think the skeletal bracket and topper turned out fine. 

As I said last post the ruinous powers are fickle, I like to think I've gotten some kind of ambidexterity; they turned out pretty good, for my sinister hand at least.

Here are the last of my skaven to finish up for this leg of the marathon;

Not sure if I'll use gnawdoom (3rd from right), I really like how festerlice turned out 

But he'll get painted up anyway. I am lucky enough to have 3 of him so I could use them as poison wind globadiers down the road. 

I've also been lucky enough to have familiars for my sorcerers so this little guy has to get finished up as well;

I'll just use them as clanrats unless I get an opponent who wants to eschew the armies book and play an open game using whatever you like, which to me is what the game was designed for. 

I've also managed to get some organization done; 

I'm less than halfway but it was humbling to realize how much unpainted lead I've got. I'm sure we all have a ton of it.

I can't wait to get this power glove off and get started on some 40k, painting up 20 models for a full game sounds very appealing right about now.

Thanks for watching and please comment. I'd like to hear what y'all think :) 

The Ruinous Powers are Fickle

There I was, 3 rank and file to finish, the Sirens call of Mortal Kombat X falling upon deaf ears. Nothings to stand in my way, not even:

A far too ambitious a conversion for a first timer

Pish posh get it done pansy!

Mild lines which only appear during painting, which then resulting in filed off fingers?

No problem green stuff up

Jobs a good un (for me).

Almost done, finish lines in sight: two wash coats, three highlights and I can move onto my last 5 characters and my reward project. Oldhammer USA weekend could happen! 

Man makes plans as they say.....

Eight weeks out of commission: 3 broken knuckles, nerve and tendon damage, probable plastic surgery. 

The wife asks are you sad cause it hurts? No love, I'm sad I can't paint or even hold a hobby blade or clippers.

The ruinous powers are fickle.

Scratchbuilt Black Skaven (sorta)

I'm pretty happy with my first attempt at a scratch built Skaven model. Well he's not really scratch built but hes got a scratch built spear shoulder pads helmet which for me is a step in the right direction.

actually it's a huge leap, gotta take the plunge and improve my meagre skills before tackling skitarii, alpha legion and renegades! 

I've never used green stuff to this kind of extent. I have honestly put 30 hours of my life into this figure so far.

It just seems like every time I pick him up I can tweak something here or put a little bit more liquid green stuff there. The fact of the matter is I could probably pour 30 more hours into him, now I just want to see him painted! I'm not happy really with the skull shoulder pad but it did teach me quite a lot.

I think this is how he would've turned out had he come out as a multi part plastic set and so we'll start here:

There definitely was a method to my madness when it came to assembling the halberd it was very simple;

I used a 1/16 drill bit and bored through the entire fist. I put a dollup of green stuff in the hole and fit in the long straight section of a paperclip.

From there it was just wrapped with extremely thin rubberized wiring, you don't have to be neat just keep the loops tight, grab a modelling knife and slide them up or down til they meet the fist.

The bottom end cap was taken from an old chaos beastmen plastic standard. Once these parts were assembled I pinned the arm in place; again with a paperclip. I used superglue and gave it a generous drying time. 

Only then did I pin the blade. I think it came from an old orc charioteer. I wanted the weapon to look as though it had two dedicated hand grips. I see the Skaven as being a much more hunched over tripedal race only raising up and clenching two handed weapons once their enemies are near. To emphasize that I wanted a metal disc base used for misleading unit numbers on charges and feints. I've also liked the look of thick rope surrounding the haft of two handed weapons and if you look closely it's nearly as thick as his forearm, pretty hard for a sword to hack through, and easy to trap a dagger in, leaving his opponent at his mercy, not something the Skaven are known for having in spades! 

The shoulder pads came from four rounds of trial and error all I can say is work in thin strips, let it dry (cure) and liquid green stuff is your friend. Liquid cement is not. If u ever need to glue something into green stuff efterwards I would recommend superglue. 

The rivets in the armour are again from an old nail decoration kit my wife discarded.

Don't get me wrong I still love my metal figs but I'll definitely be putting some cool little conversions into my next unit: the deadly (not really) +2 shock elite stormvermin with some plastic goodness.

Did I say Skaven finished by end of May? Well we are tricksy aren't we?

And I still gotta finish those nunchaku armed gutter runners. It never stops! 

Hand Made Halberds

I know many of you are skilled scratch builders but I am not, and scratch building Halberds SUCKS. I made my 29th member out of plastic so I could use my champion as a hero with halberd.

Anyway I'm two hours in three failed attempts. We'll see

Black Skaven Progress Part 4

Just a quick post today, 15 black skaven finished, 5 to go. As much as I dislike the shock elites in 3rd edition, I must say it has been enjoyable painting up halberds.

The front rank looks especially menacing.

I've only managed to get 2 more of them done. I could say I put plastic skaven in here to save lead figs, 

But the fact is they paint up quite nice, I find anyway. 

 They hold washes so nicely, they also gave me the chance to paint red again. Can't lie, I love painting red and have been known to highlight it all the way up to yellow/white lol. 

Well, ca c'est fini for today, I'm quite embarrassed at the length of time this unit has taken. For that reason I'm going to continue with the skaven until the end of May, finish a little reward project, and then change gears. 

Im not bragging here but I own a ton of unpainted lead; 

at least 3000 points of Chaos Regiments, 

about 2,000 points in gobbos, orcs and their assorted accoutrements.

I also desperately want to get my eldar pirates (The Void Dragons, Eldritch Raiders sounds terrible!) started and finished, and of course my beloved Alpha Legion, coolest of all known chapters 😀redone.

For all these reasons and more I have to move on. Anyway happy weekend!