Probably My Favourite Miniature

This time, I've repainted one of my favourite models ever. I first bought this miniature when I was about 15. I would have picked it out of a red Citadel catalogue when I was at school, and my friend Mark - or, more likely, his parents - would have added the serial number to a list of things to order by fax.

Anyhow, my point is that this model is brilliant. The sculpting is excellent, the concept is absolutely cool - its a demon wearing armour made of the bones of a goat, for goodness' sake - and aptly, it's completely metal. Actually, that's not quite right, as the shield is from a modern plastic chaos knight. Even the spindly legs make him look like something out of a medieval manuscript (well. the last level of Doom 2, at least). I imagine that he'd make a good Master of Executions for the Chaos Marine army - or maybe Lord of Duels, given his armament. That kind of thing.

The next two lowlifes are old metal Goliath gangers, whom I intend to use as Chaos Cultists, should the need ever arise. The chap with the small flamer is a "normal" ganger, and the man with the chainsword is a gang leader. As with the other Goliaths, I don't really like the style all that much (although the sculpting is fine, especially on Flamer Boy), and I painted them fairly quickly. I used a red undercoat on the skin, for a slightly raw feel, and the trousers were painted in contrast paint, as per their comrades. That's the whole gang painted, ready to soak up some bullets for their chaos overlords on the battlefield!

I've always felt that Chaos cults wouldn't just include robed worshippers of Khorne, Tzeentch and the other chaps. My feeling is that both Chaos and Imperial crusades would draw all sorts of loonies: soldiers of fortune, criminal gangs, crackpot militias, lasgun nuts and similar deranged types, tagging along in the hope of impressing the Chaos Marines enough to join their ranks - or just for the chance to nick a load of stuff.

So, I painted up a few renegade crazies as well. In truth, I've had these models knocking around for ages and I wanted shot of them. The woman (the slightly smaller model with the gasmask) is from a Kickstarter that Bad Squiddo did ages ago, although I cut her hair down a bit. I'm not sure where the two men are from.

So that's it for now. Another tiny dent in the huge pile of lead.

The Sea Dragon

Here's another thing that I've had lying on my desk for a very long time.

Ages ago, I bought a skaven abomination. With the help of a lot of DAS clay and a Tyranid head, I made the lower half into a dragon. I was never totally happy with it, and I decided to give it a sprucing-up and repaint to match my pirate ogres. It would make a good sea monster, that they had induced to help them.

I added fins to its body, neck and tail. The body fin came from a high elf dragon, and the other two were left over from some river trolls (which also joined the ogre army). The head received some "ears" from (I think) an ancient plastic dragon kit, and the crest was elongated with plasticard and green stuff. The barnacles on its back were just blobs of sculpted green stuff.

I made the base out of coffee stirrers and a small stick of dowell. There's something weird about painting wood to look like wood, but it works far better that way. I don't have a work in progress picture, but for comparison, here's the GW skaven abomination:

And here's another picture of the sea monster. I gave it quite a dark paint scheme, to suggest something that lives deep underwater. I'm not sure why it's got all those stitches all over it (perhaps a helpful ogre repaired it after a big battle) but it looks mean enough to join the ranks of the pirates. Arrrgh!

A Friendly Robot and a Big Green Chap

A couple more things from the huge pile of unpainted things.

First up, we've got a Privateer Press trollblood model. The trollbloods are very much Privateer Press' invention (they're basically heroic orc-type creatures), and tend to have either a Scottish or an early 20th century soldier-type look. I quite like the models, although they're inevitably rather cartoony (I've got a whole load of them somewhere...).

This particular model is a mercenary called Bull. While he's not exactly right, he reminds me a bit of Suruk the Slayer from Space Captain Smith. I painted his skin in the same way I did my orks and goblins: Russian Uniform washed with Dark Angels Green (or whatever it's called at the moment) and highlighted up with pink flesh. I'm rather pleased with him.

The other model is based on an old Ramshackle Games tracked lower body that I've had lying on my desk for about a year. I gave it a head made out of half of a smoke grenade launcher and some plasticard. I wondered about making it into Wall-E, but I couldn't get the arms to work (or stick to the rest of the model), so I just gave him big antennae made from the handles of a storm bolter instead. I expect he's a friendly robot, who rolls around helping out.

And that's it for the moment. Except for the sea monster.

Mantic Characters

It feels like ages since I posted here. It actually isn't - it's been ten days or so - but time is currently passing rather weirdly, and we seem to be in about the 120th day of February. Once again I've been dipping into the huge pile of unpainted models, and this time round it's Mantic.

Last year, or maybe the year before that, I got a load of Dreadball models cheaply. Most were the cyborg "Revenant" team, and a few were referees or fans. As ever, the concepts are fine, the sculpts are okay, and the casting isn't great.

Here are two cyborg orcs (or orks, or orx). I think they're the best models in the team. The detail is a little soft, but they've come out ok.

And here are two people who I think are either coaches or civilians. They were made out of less rubbery plastic than the orcs, and the detail was a good deal sharper. I made them bases out of plasticard and bits of wire. I really enjoyed painting them both. They'll make good underworld figures or "normal people" for the futuristic town.

Disco Sue is an important and extroverted local leader, noted for her large hair and dogged refusal to get with the times and dress like a post-apocalyptic cyberpunk.

Willy the Fish is a short-tempered fishman, who inherited an empire of crime after the tragic filleting of his former boss, Piscine Bob. He we see him shouting in outrage at an allegation that his enemies "sleep with the fishes".

Finally - and I'm saving the most exciting stuff till last - here are two concrete posts! Amazing! They're TT Combat MDF models, with the joins at least partly obscured by DAS clay. The posters were printed out from ones on the GW site.

After complaining about Mantic's stuff (which isn't actually all that bad) I went off and bought the All Out War Walking Dead game. The models in it are really nice: sharply-detailed one-piece sculpts. I might even get round to painting them one day.