An Absolutely Wizard Time

The Dogs of War army list allowed you to field Hireling Wizards with access to any of the Colleges of Magic. A wise general might have painted a generic wizard model, and so given himself access to any type of magic.

I fear this paint scheme limits me to one Lore in particular...

"I am a servant of the Secret Fire, wielder of the Flame of Anor."
(any resemblence purely coincidental)

The model is the Warlock Nicodemus, a Dramatis Personae from Mordheim. There's plenty to like about it - the robes and cloak are swishy, the staff is gnarled, the beard long and the hat pointy. He's a fraction bigger than most of the other models (in the character history, Nicodemus suffers from some gigantism curse), which makes him an odd choice, given that I went for realistic proportions everywhere else. But I'm a traditionalist, who likes his wizard hats pointy.


I re-used the colour scheme from a old squad of Necromunda Redemptionists: Blood Red robes and Sunburst Yellow flames (and because Citadel really can't do yellow - started the flames with a thick base of Skull White, added yellow, then glazed with Red Ink). The feather in his hat was the same technique as the flames, but with a heavier wash of Red Ink and a drybrushing of Skull White/Sunburst Yellow.

Trying something new with the cloak and hat, I went straight from the Skull White undercoat to several washes of Brown Ink (worked okay - at least it gave me a new type of brown). The staff was Chaos Black, drybrushed with Mithril Silver (I wanted a slightly metallic look), I also gave him a false eye of Blood Red and an artificial hand of Shining Gold. Actually, with all that kit, he could easily take on Lore of Metal too.



Gold hand, dazzling robes, red eye, bright orange feather.
Say hello to Disco Dumbledore.

The second spellcaster in the army in on a horse, and so gets a promotion to Wizard Lord. True to the unwitting Smurfette Principle of my forces (i.e. one female per army), I chose the Dogs of War special character Lucrezzia Belladonna.

Famed for her 'Wine & Anthrax' parties.

An arch-poisoner in the Dogs of War book (with some nice extra rules that can damage the enemy before the battle even begins), Lucrezzia is also a spellcaster, so makes an easy transfer to Empire Wizard (I'm thinking Lore of Death, or perhaps Shadows).

With the exception of the enormous sword being lightly held in one hand (I don't want to think about why serial monogomist Lucrezzia would have such strong wrists), the model is a really good one. The fine features and haughty distain is pure Borgia; the dress has some great details; the side-saddle pose looks plausible (unlike the 'park bench' posture of the early Bretonnian damsels) and the little bag of poison vials is a nice touch.

I was going for pale cream and dark velvet colours, so the white cloth had a Skull White base, a thinned wash of Bleached Bone to take the edge off, followed by multiple drybrushings of Skull White to finish. The skirt and sleeves started with Liche Purple, a wash of Black Ink and more Lich Purple drybrushing.



For some reason, I spent longer than usual drybrushing the flesh areas around the torso.
About 50-60 hours longer.

The three little poison vials turned out well - I just added a splash of ink (Red, Green or Blue) to a plain white undercoat. That seemed to give a nice translucent glass effect, with a drop of Snakebite Leather for the corks.

In addition to adding eyeballs - always a favourite of mine - this particular model also needed lips (I used Red Ink, rather than paint, for a smoother effect) and eyebrows (sodding eyebrows, I ask you).

What caused more trouble was painting the horse caparison. I wanted it to echo Lucrezzia's colours, so the horse had the same Skull White/Bleached Bone treatment as her corset. For the cloth, I started with a Worm Purple base, a wash of Blue/Red Ink (70/30) and drybrushed highlights of Liche Purple/Skull White.

Unfortunately, this ink wash wasn't able to bite into the smooth plastic and showed up as too blotchy, no matter how much I tried to drybrush it out. I seemed to get away with it on the horse's head (which was metal - KNEW there was a reason I prefered that lovely toxic lead). I initially ignored it, but it did detract from the decent paint job on the rider - assuming anyone's eyes would ever stray that far.


The horse? Seriously, you're looking at the horse?

In an attempt to smooth out the messy carparison, I gave it a coat of thinned Worm Purple, followed by more Worm Purple/Skull White highlights. That seemed to do the trick, and the horse's ass looked a lot better for it. The Poisoner of Pavona is ready for action!

"Ha! Never go against a Pavonan when death is on the line!"