Brettonian Pegaduke (Part 1)

 ...or is he a Dukeasus? Either way, it's a Duke on a Pegasus. And he is an awesome figure indeed. 

Duke Needs a name.

I got him during my last trip to Knoxville when I stopped by CM Games in Cedar Bluff who were having a 50% off sale on their used Warhammer miniatures. This miniature was in good shape and was completely unpainted,  so dropping $25 for this guy wasn't a bad deal at all. By the way,, this was the same sale that I bought the Cygor at as well. 

And he also looks good on a car dashboard. 

Afrer getting him home I added grit to the base as well as a beastman skull, then I primed it. I then used Skeleton Horde on the Pegasus' hooves and the beastman skull. But that that's the extent of the progress I ha e made on this thing thus far. To be honest, I just can't settle on a paint  scheme (although I think I know which direction I am leaning towards...). But I am still undecided so I am going to mull over this a bit longer. 

Primed.

Little Big Guns Never Tire (Part 2)

Big bada_boom! - but with five barrels blasting off simultaneously. 

"Let 'em get a bit closer..."

Yes,  a classic Organ Gun from the early 1990s. I prefer this version over the plastic kit.  Even though it is mostly wooden versus the current solid metal style.  It just has more character and has a cool feel to it. Also, unlike the cannons, I  felt that I could paint the the wooden areas to match the army's color. 

Painted wood. 

I like it like the,, but I thought it needed something more. While digging around in one of my old catalogs the (2004-2005 to be specific) I was thrilled and inspired upon spotting this picture: 

Hats off for Colin Dixon!

It's Colin Dixon's version of this classic Organ Gun with a banner top added to the front of it. And it just so happened I had that piece as well. I just had to copy this simple conversion. Also, hats off to Mr. Dixon for basing his war machine way back then. I always thought the war machines looked better on bases and I was glad to see The Old World game* move forward with this. 

Banner top added with copper basecoat.

I also like the gold trim he used as well, and decided that the warm copper/gold color looks more striking than the cold color of the pewter/silver. 

These next two pictures show one of the crew half-way through with being painted. In particular I wanted to show off the Wyldwood Contrast Paint on the barrel. It looks great and I don't think i will ever go back to...whatever I was doing to get a worked wood effect before. Wyldwood wins it!

Once I was done with the artillery piece, I enhanced the gun barrels using Abaddon Black. 

After this came the grass tufts to finish the whole thing off. 

Backsides. 

Yes, I do like how this turned out. The crewman waiving the helm around has a stripped outfit but everything I attempted to paint those stripes I hated the results. So ultimately I just kept his outfit a single color. 

And that's it really. Now I just need to get this thing into action! 

"Cheerio!"

 

Big Black Orc Warboss

 

Oh yeah, "ezah big 'un!" I wanted a Warboss on foot to join my Black Orcs. To lead Black Orcs you gotta be da biggest and badest. Enter  Bazdogg Nekk-Choppa*, the commemorative release Orruk miniature released for AOS.  He is perfectly suited for this role, and, just barely, fits on a 30mm base. 

Primed +.

Once primed I set about painting him using Contrast Paints. It's important to note that I haven't glued on his head so that I could paint his tongue and mouth more easily. 

The first few Contrast Paints applied.

Black Templar Contrast Paint was washed all over the metals and flesh. 

Battle-Ready!

Caliban Green was painted on the flesh. Leadbelcher was carefully painted on the giant axe  then it was given a careful wash of Cryptek Armourshade. Back to the flesh, this was painted next with Snot Green then washed with Nuln Oil.

More layers.

Next my attention returned to the suit of armor. A layer of Evil Sun Scarlet was followed by an edge highlight of Wild Rider Red. 

Wild Rider Red.

After this Stormhost Silver was used to apply chips and scrapes randomly to the up raised parts of the armor.  

Done!

After that all the boney areas were painted using Ushanti Bone, Screaming Skull, Wraithbone and a final, minimal, highlight of White Scar.

Done! (From another angle).

And that is essentially it.  There is a random grass tuft stuck on the rear part of the base, but no further vegetation was necessary due to all of the rocky debris already on it. 

That axe looks like it was torn from something much bigger.

I didn't take many pics of the those final stages but here are all of the glamor shots taken from all the different angles. 

Backside.

I can't wait to get this guy onto a gaming table and see what sort of mayhem he can cause. (If you ever read my battle reports one can assume that the odds are high that he'll be snuffed out in an anti-climatic fashion after doing one cool thing).

I can't explain the Sigmarine mask, so I won't.

But just for kicks let's see how he sizes up next to the Black Orcs I painted back in October. 

"C'mon boyz!"

And here is the full mob.  It just occurred to me that I probably need another Black Orc or two (or maybe five or six) in order to get a Rank Bonus. But for now, I am satisfied with these guys as they are. 

"Waaagh!!!"

*My model is not keeping that name. I'll come up with a name soon though. 

Hobgoblin Khan (Part 3)

 Howdy my fellow hobgoblins! As you can see from this first image, the Hobgoblin Khan is now finished.  

Rampaging right out of the Darklands. 

But before I show off more glamor shots, I;m going to go over the final steps I took to finish this model. Lets start with his wolf, Flea-Nest the Scratcher. Painting him was simple, I just used three different colors of gray, with a wash of Nuln Oil applied before the final highlight. But I thought it needed something else, so having seen a few images online someone's paint job on a Fenrisian Wolves, I decided to apply some brown on the back and head of this wolf. I used Gore Grunter Fur Contrast Paint for this. I followed that with a light dry brushing of a light gray (I think it was Dawnstone? I can't recall). I painted White Scar on the belly and the whole underside of the wolf really. However the natural shadows in this pic sort of obscure that. Anyway, I'm pleased with the results overall. I guess the model itself is sort of goofy and doesn't stand up to the more recent models GW has produced, Still, I suppose it works well enough as a playing piece. 

Just imagine it's smell.

Onto the big guy himself (I'll come up with a name for him soon enough). The most important things to discuss are his red armor and flesh. HIs armor was finished by using Evil Suns Scarlet and a highlight of Wild Rider Red. I then picked out a few spots to add Stormhost Silver to represent chips and scraps on the armor. This really seemed to pop to me, and made the coat he's wearing truly look like metal armor. 

His flesh was highlighted up using Ushanti Bone and Wraithbone. I uses a spot of thinned Bloodletter Ink on his nose to give off that ruddy look that is typical of Warhammer Gobos. I think it looks good on this guy. 

Mostly done

It was time to glue the cloak onto the him, and, wow, check out that gap! 

Behold the gap.

Well, there was no way that was going to fly. During my earlier test fits, this gap didn't seem so bad, but now that I pinned and glued it on, well, I can't stand it. It was time to break out the green stuff!!!

Greenstuff sculpted.

I filled in the gap and sculpted in a furry texture. 

Greenstuff painted.

Then I painted it. And I got to say,  the results impressed me more than I thought they would. 

Anyway, with all that covered, this guy is now done. On to the glamor shots: 

I couldn't a decal that I liked to put on his shield. So I just left it red, but I did add a few battle scars on it to make him appear a bit more battle worn. I did this by applying a few random slashes of Stormhost Silver, but to give those scratches a bit more depth, I underlined them using a black micron. 

More pics of the rear view, and I gotta say I think my greenstuff work on his cloak has definitely been a success! 

My biggest regret regarding this model isn't the model itself. No, it's the fact that I don't have any more hobgoblin wolfriders for him to run around with. If you can find them on the secondary market, or any of Oglah Khan's Wolfboyz, they are very cost prohibited! 

Ok that's a wrap! 

Hobgoblin Khan (Part 2)

 Since last time I have made a bit of progress on this chap. I left that last post contemplating how to color this guy. 

Black, the most basic of basecoats

Inspired by the technique I have been using on the armor of my High Elves I had hoped to have that lightening strike twice by repeating that technique here but using Baal Red instead. So I painted the armor using Stormhost Silver then washed it with the Baal Red Contrast Paint. 

Baal Red Contrast over Leadbelcher test..

Although this created an interesting result it didn't quite turn out as I had hoped. However the armor and color scheme of my recent Black Orc project did work out as I had hoped so I am definitely sticking to the red color scheme.  Besides, no matter how hard GW tries to introduce new color schemes for the Chaos Dwarfs, and their Hobgoblin goons, after living through the '90s, there is just no way I can ever shake the red out the color scheme for these guys. I guess it's forever ingrained to my head-canon  now. 

 

Baal Red over all the armor.

Interestingly, while looking at older images of this model I realized I was missing the bow and quiver he is supposed to have.  But I can work around that problem. No, what I noticed is that his head, the hat in particular, is bigger than the one on the miniature I have. I can't tell if mine was modified somehow or if I have a variant. 

Catalog entry.

After looking at some 30+ year old pics of painted Chaos Dwarfs and Hobgoblins from White Dwarf, I decided to paint his hood-thing (I can't recall the proper name for it) a blue color. Which stands out nicely from all the red. I think whenever I get back to work on the Hobgoblin Archers I will paint the ones they have blue also.  

Base coats finished and progressing onward.

A lot of progress so far, now to carry it through to the end.

The Shadow Warriors (Part 1)

 I have always liked the concept of this unit and couldn't resist adding them to this force. They'll have a more-or-less support role, harassing the enemy with ambushes and flanking attacks or securing distant objectives and eliminating choice targets. Well, that's what I see them doing in my head; I'm sure there's a harsh truth in store for them once they hit the tabletop. 

I used the same base coating steps on these guys that I used on the Swordmasters, with a few notable exceptions:  I used Skeleton Horde on the bows and arrow shafts and Administratum Grey for the cloaks.

Before these guys could be finished they found themselves on the field of battle where they did quite well harassing and engaging the foe. 

I haven't had a chance to work on them again since that confrontation, but once I do that will be chronicled in Part 2.

Ellyrian Reavers (Part 1)

 

Ellyrian Reavers Champion WIP.  

A few months ago I bought some secondhand High Elf miniatures to augment and enhance the collection I already had. This filled some gaps in my High Elf  collection and allowed some expansion in other units. More importantly, they were mostly plastic whereas my older collection consists mostly of late '90s metal, some of which are mounted on jeering My Little Ponies. These secondhand miniatures were mostly from the 8th edition Isle of Blood boxset and are just amazing miniatures in comparison. Included in thia set were three units of five Elysian Reavers. In these first few posts I will be working on the first unit of five models. This first unit was primed black with a few of the models having their armor painted in a dull metal (Leadbelcher I think).

Base on base with green stuff landscaping.

The first thing I had to address was the the increase in base size. This wasn't a real problem as I decided that removing the models from the old bases was going to be a difficult challenge, so I instead cut the corners off of the old bases and glued the model to the new base. Then I used green stuff to build up the sides to create a more graded look. 

Grit added.

Next I added the grit and rocks. This makes it seem as if the Reavers are passing through some sort of rough and craggy terain. I wasn't able to complete their bases, but I did get a lot their base coats done, before they found themselves mustered for a battle. I was able to get metallic blue onto their armor just in time for the game..  And what game it was!  I was quite pleased with how the Ellyrian Reavers performed. 

Taken right after they routed an enemy unit.

Upon their return to Ulthuan (i.e. "home"), I added the grit to the remaining bases and set about trying to get these guys further along, if not finished. But we'll xhroncile that development in Part 2...

Even grittier.