Wheel Get Them Ready In Time!

In preparedness for an upcoming SkypeBoot against Kraken's chaos cavalry, I want to add some more mounted options for my greenskins.

Spider and Wolf Riders are already on the painting table, and in a fit of ambition that I'll never be able to achieve, I've started assembling some chariots.

You will ride eternal, shiny and chrome.

Awakening Of The Wood

Frequent visitors to my general's page (I know you're out there, those traffic numbers aren't just from me checking my spelling on a daily basis) may be aware that I've pledged to field Wood Elves for WoffBoot IX.

Champions of WoffBoot II - the Twang! Gang are back!

After several months going round and round the magic circle of my Empire wizards, I thought I'd better crack on and actually paint the army.

If I start early enough, I can avoid my usual habit of frantic painting sessions in the last few weeks before the tournament.

(SPOILER: I am going to be frantically painting Wood Elves in the last few weeks before the tournament).

Skycutter

While the glue I'd smeared over the hull was drying (a waterproofing layer, I thought, seeing as it wasn't sticking anything together), I started thinking about what the ship would be flying over. 

I did at one point consider a model ploughing through the ground. Just after the Mk. 3 hull, I think it was, when the idea of an actual ship-shaped ship felt like a rapidly receding possibility. Just as chaotic, I supposed, but also kind of tame. Not as iconic of something or other. And a total copout on the whole hull front. 

The rest of the chaos army has a bunch of crudely slopped-together carefully researched arctic tundra on its bases, and this would have to be no different. But it was going to be tall and top heavy as well, so it needed weight. 

Reluctantly, I ventured outside into the cold light of day. I took a heavy blanket to protect my nerdy skin, and by fumbling blindly around for half an hour I managed to come back in with some lumps of local rock that would do the trick. 

These, plus a length of extra-heavy-duty paperclip and the top third of a DnD skeleton, would do the job.

Pesky modeller, come back here with my legs! Why, I oughtta...

The hull was dry. So I made up as much green stuff as I dared from my tiny store, slopped it round the edges of the warshrine deck, put it on top of the hull and pushed. After a bit of scraping with a penknife, I had this:

Blobby greenstuff joint! Because of chaos reasons. Like, mutant flesh and stuff. Or molten metal.
Not shit modelling, no sirree. 

Drydock

Well, the vote was in. Once I finished counting it, I realised I was now commited to a project way beyond my abilities or resources.

But what the hell, it's not like I've got a lot else to do these evenings.

Having originally suggested it as a joke, I was actually pretty glad that this particular shrine was the winning entry. Most of the other ideas I had were just as impractical and fiddly, in all honesty, with the sole exception of the idea I was originally going to go with, the Maggot Wagon. But I just can't sit on an incomplete model for another six months. It rankles.

So, off to the planning board for me.

Giant axes for oars. That's probably authentic for the Viking Age, right?

These went beyond mere doodles, in fact. Because my idea included a bit of scratch building, I wanted it to look as good as possible. And that meant taking measurements and actually thinking about what I could or couldn't achieve with the kit I've got to hand.

The basic idea was a flying viking longboat. But when I actually committed some more scibbles to paper, it started feeling like a pretty major challenge. The hull was the big sticking point. What could I make it with?

In HD Battalions

 Mostly done now! Bases still to complete, plus post-varnish effects and details.

Do the shuffle.
Doo doo doo de doo de doo doo doo

It is possible to over-base a mini, you know.

In Glorious Technicolour Battalions

Just over half way...

Base coats and some inks down!

Excuse me! Yeah, look, I'm on the exchange program.
I'm looking for my travel buddy, the fimir, can anyone help me?

In Pale Battalions

Sorry to whoever runs into this on a tabletop first. Kas sent me a pair of zombie boxes to paint up, and I got a little carried away fleshing out the front rank. I've got 50 zombies to paint now, and I've only my own silly self to blame.

Oddly, I'm not too daunted yet. They're so much smaller than the 25mm based Marauders I'm currently used to, I feel optimistic that I can whizz through them.

As long as I paint at least one a day on average, I'll be done in time for the 'Boot!

Bringing Home The Bacon

Ten weeks until WoffBoot VIII? Damn, I'd better get painting!

My Savage Orc Waaagh! trundles along, slowly but inexorably, and next on the list are the Boar Boyz.

Half of them are taken from the leadpile, while the other half were painted up fifteen years ago and in dire need of a makeover.

Primary colours, photocopied banner, transfer stickers on the shields... the '90s was one crazy decade

I recall the 'singed effect' on the base of the banner was created by running a cigarette lighter beneath it. I was 20 at the time, which is a sad indictment of our higher education system.

I was planning on just repainting and rebasing these boys in accordance with the rest of my army. That was until I found the new-style boars (the ones that, radically, look like boars) for my chariots - and once they saw them, everyone wanted one.

After scrounging around the bitz stores, I was able to gather enough new plastic boars to remount my entire unit.

OINK! OINK!

Pokemon! I choose Chosen!

Ah, Christmas! Time for a Christmas bonus. In that I actually got one, from a London writing job that gave me a bit more than I was expecting. Enough to splash out on something that had caught my eye a while back. 

Santa? You've... you've changed...

Mierce Miniatures featured in one of the Cracking Gaming Blogs last December, Dice and Brush I think it was. He'd bought some of their minotaurs, and I was rather taken with their range of Celtic/Dark Age fantasy stuff. 

Charioty Begins At Home

So many chariots popping up on this blog, it's starting to look like Joe's Used War Machines Yard...

High quality maiming at low, low prices!

I've been dallying with the idea of a Savage Orc Boar Chariot ever since I made that fateful decision to beef up my original army. Online opinion seems to be divided at such a thought: the majority seem to think that complex war machines (such as the Wheel) are unsuitable for stone-age savages. Whereas I think chariots represent an appropriate level of tech for a pre-iron age tribe.

And should I cast my mind back to my War (What Is it Good For) Studies (Absolutely Nuthin') BA degree, I would say that chariots appeared as tools of warfare long before cavalry did. So if you can have Savage Boar Boyz, you can damn well have Savage Boar Chariots.

(So there you have it: three years of university education to produce the same level of understanding as Civilisation III)

Also Advertises Corn Niblets

Despite my scepticism of General Kraken's last WoffBoot army, I've come to think that a Giant could be a useful addition to my Savage Orcs.
(So yes, I basically eating my words here. Mmmm... adjectives.)

Much as I like the new Giant model, there are already two of them knocking around the armies of the WoffBoot, and adding another would make them look like a particularly unattractive tribute to The Rockettes.

Kick those legs up, girls.

Moreover, I've tried hard to steer clear of red/pink in my green/brown themed army, so a huge pale-flesh centrepiece (i.e. the Giant model I already have) would spoil that. The only thing for it - I needed to field a giant orc!

The Progress of Works

Well, I've mostly been busy with my other, more important, miniature collection. But in the odd moment when she's been asleep, I've got a few bits and pieces underway. Very little actually done, of course, but I felt I couldn't put any pictures of new stuff up until I had at least something complete to show.

I was so tempted to paint him a non-canon colour, like puce or violet.
Gandalf is certainly not going to be grey when I do him. 

If you banish all thoughts of the film, Radagast here is actually a lovely model. Plenty of tiny details, particularly the base, which bristles with tiny spiders and bracket fungus on logs. Sadly, the film overshadows my every thought whilst painting this, and Radagast's scenes in it were pretty much hands-down the worst.

Jet lag cure!

So I found a new cure for jetlag...

I got home from India at 1pm on Sunday, and after doing the usual washing, showering, food and unpacking I mulled over the best course of action for my day.

So after a bit of pottering, I picked up 12 undercoated seekers, and set about getting to work.

They are not quite done, but with base coat on steed, and highlight, and skins, metal and washes on the riders means I have black, final highlight and couple of bits of tidying and bases to do. I was initially planning on doing a single unit - but the semi-comatose brain, I ended up factory lining all twelve.

Want to play a game... how about hide and seek!

I see you

Savage Orcs Makeover

With one unit of Savage Orcs completed, I started work apace on the second (less than two months to WoffBoot VII).

This one required a different approach. While the first unit comprised of stripped-clean miniatures that I accidentally bought in huge amounts on eBay, the second unit was all painted and ready to go. Unfortunately, I had chosen the painting scheme as a feast of technicolour.

They are red and yellow and green and brown and scarlet and black and ochre and peach and ruby and olive and violet and fawn and lilac and gold and chocolate and mauve and cream and crimson and silver and rose and azure and lemon and russet and grey and purple and white and pink and orange. And blue.

I honestly don't know where I got the idea to paint them like that.

... honestly.

The Last of the Savage Big 'Uns

Say that quick enough and it could be a novel by James Fenimore Cooper...

The standard bearer and musician were repainted from my original unit. This saved a little time, as I didn't need to repeat eyes or bone necklaces. Although I had to completely re-do the skin (the earlier ones were a much harsher green) to make them fit the others, and remove their red/blue tattoos. Other repainted bits included yellow bracelets, blue banner poles and red toenails.

(Red toenails - what was I thinking? Were these Orcs getting ready for Saturday night clubbing? The other kind, that is.)

The plastic standard was taken from the Goblin sprue.
Orcs have no standards. This is a goblin joke.

Other amends I made since painting the first batch of Savage Big Uns: I removed the jawbone tattoos, as it was messing with the look of their faces too much. Each unit will have a different style of tattoo, so I'm glad to have painted my last skull-face.

Skulls are tricky - I don't know why Baron Samedi from Live and Let Die was so cheerful,
 when he had to apply that slap every night.

The Biggest Big 'Uns

For the second batch of Savage Orc Big 'Uns, I decided to treat myself and go straight for the big fellas.

The champion with the horned hat was purchased in 1998,
representing my first attempt to expand the Savage Orc army.
15 years is probably the slowest paint job I've ever done.

Three of this lot were part of the conversions I did. These models are my favourite of the unit because they are:
a) slightly bigger than regular savage orcs, being command group models, and
b) most of them are holding two weapons.

The Waaagh! begins (slowly)

My painting progress more or less ground to a halt in November (due to a novel-writing sojourn, and a few other minor distractions), but having set the date for WoffBoot VII, I am determined to have my Savage Orcs painted and ready to play (lose humiliatingly).

This equates to around 50 miniatures, with a couple of special models thrown in. An easy feat for three months, you might think, although it doesn't take into account my glacial speed of painting. I'm breaking up progress into stages, just to push myself along.

So here is the first batch: one-third of my Big 'Uns regiment:

Their furs and skins are fifty shades of grey - one of them even has the Punishment Stick.

Unboxing Day

So everyone's seen the Hobbit by now, I expect? Yes? No? Well, we can talk about my hurt feelings over that particular damp squib another time. This here's a gaming blog, not the graveyard I intend to bury Peter Jackson in.

Games Workshop, ever keen to leap on a marketing bandwagon (within a fairly narrowly defined lane of traffic, to be fair), have seized on the forthcoming trilogy to release a bunch of new models. And I, being ever keen to throw used money off a fiscal cliff, fell for the preorder offer and got this box here: -

The limited edition has indeed escaped from goblin town.
Unlike the reputations of the cast... no dammit I'm not getting into that here. 

It came in the post while I was out yelling 'Merry Christmas' repeatedly in Stockholm. That all went well, by the by, although the cost of providing endless Christmas cheer on stage was that I more or less forgot that real Christmas was actually happening at the same time, and was a bit too tired to fully appreciate all the sparkly lights and excellent hams that happen in Sweden.

But now I'm back home, surrounded by cribs and swaddling clothes that have nothing to do with the Nativity and everything to do with our lives this year coming, what better to postpone the assembly of the new cot than the glueing together of a plastic Sylvester McCoy?

This model of the 7th Doctor even has his spiky but loveable sidekick Ace tucked under one arm.
Wait, no, that's a hedgehog.

Continued Maraudings

Nothing very wild to report in this post. But I couldn't let a whole week go by without posting up some more work-in-progress pictures of the Marauder Hoard: -

The Shaggoth is coming along - I'm going with a Black Dragon look, complete with copper spear staff, the better to draw down lightning with.

No longer WIP, this - pretty bearable for freehand, by my standards.
See what I did there?

Shaggoy Dog Story

The last of my ebay buys has turned up now - for a grand total of just over £50 (including the parts of the postage that were included, rather than the bits I did myself), I got a box of warriors, a box of marauders and this splendid gentleman: -

It was a dark and stormy night, and this dragon walks into an ogre bar...

I've done some very limited conversion on him, not that he'll ever see the light of WoffBoot owing to points cost. I've always liked the model, though, I think it's a cracker. But close up, I found I wasn't as keen on the big axe as I was in the publicity shots. It's a bit... boring, really.

The option in the list is to leave him with either his basic fists (already S6), or give him an overkilly great weapon or an extra hand weapon. That latter option is worth the spare ten points I don't have anyway, I thought.

The resin sculpt was already glued together, not brilliantly.
After trying to improve on it, I've decided I don't like resin, it's not made for gluing.