Blood Bowl Markers - 'Infected Pallid Ale' Kegs

Continuing the streak for my beloved Blood Bowl Team: the Putrid Punters! Thematically related to the previous entry, the Horticulturist, here I am with some tasty, healthy and organic beer.

There is a generic upgrade for every team, the "Bloodweiser Kegs/Babes" which are supposed to reinvigorate the players after they are knocked out - and having some neat marker for those is easy enough. Still, for my Punters, I wanted something special, something that would fit well their alternative take on biology. I had this giant bell laying around and it was a perfect use for it. The second one took some more thinking, but I think it's not worse - a walking gland full of beer, which could be distributed through a fleshy tube - a more organic approach. Both were based on 40K poxwalkers - those small guys are perfect for generic Nurgle dudes. WIP post can be found HERE.

The painting was even better than converting in my opinion. First, there was this giant bell and metal is always welcome. Secondly, the sacs showing between the fleshy bits on the right one were supposed to look half-transparent, showing some contents inside - I never painted something like this, which is also nice. Thirdly, after all was painted I had to do all the water effects, with a large amount of resin in the bell and even more beady foam - also lots of fun. I'm quite satisfied with those.

Another note - I painted many nurgly and undead pieces in my hobby career, with its fair amount of gore and unsavory details, but in my opinion, the "walking keg" is my most disgusting miniature by far.

Edit: Forgot to mention, but this another entry for the small challenge "If not minis, then what?", so about what would you be doing if not hobbying. If I had this crazy amount of time, I would definitely try brewing my own beer. Perhaps more palatable to humans that this thing here.

While most Blood Bowl players and fans love to drink copious amounts of Bloodweiser, the Putrid Punters are beer snobs who bring their own hand-crafted kegs to every party, dismissing famous brand as watered-down parody of real beer. Created in their microbrewery by good Mr.Rotlaug, the Infected Pallid Alle (I.P.A.) is their beverage of choice - with just the right amount of foul bitterness mixed with tangy aftertaste of decay. They bring it to matches either in giant bells or drink it straight from the tap. Only with this behind the sidelines they can be expected to get up from knockouts more often.

Blood Bowl Nurgle Staff - Mr. Rotlaug the Horticulturist

It seems there will be quite a streak of Blood Bowl staff right now - and it's all for the smelly Putrid Punters of Nurgle!

After the Head Coach it's time for the Horticulturist. He's basically a wizard addition for the team, but the whole idea od a nurgly gardener with his free-range bio-vegetables was sweet and I had lots of fun putting this little "almost-a-diorama" together. The WIP post can be found HERE.

Festus was used as a base, because he's basically that as he already is. Still, that wasn't enough, so I have him a snazzy hat, a shovel, lots of healthy produce and a referee to taste his refreshments. He's supposed to be also a beer brewer for my team, so I wanted to put some foam on the guy tasting the brew - a new challenge for me. I made it with small glass beads mixed with gloss varnish and some pale green paint. Does it look okay?

Mr. Rotlaug here is also my answer to yet another challenge amongst polish bloggers, this time it's "If not minis, then what?", as a question what would one be doing if not wasting time and money on this hobby. I live in a modern (poorly lit) apartment, so no farming for me, but I do enjoy my houseplants and would probably work on them a little bit more if not painting minis. Close enough for the topic IMHO!

Every self-respecting Blood Bowl player knows that proper diet and good nutrition are the keys to success on the pitch - and Nurgle players are no different. Pedantic about the quality of their veggies, they often keep a small garden with only the best organic, bio, fair-trade and free-range greens for their high nutritional needs. Those who want to be even more serious about it employ a professional, a horticulturist - and the good Mr. Rotlaug is the one working currently with the Punters. While quite peculiar and difficult to understand (thick dialect developed in Averland), he’s nonetheless extremely knowledgeable and his veggies are truly exemplary. They are so good, actually, that they can be deployed on the pitch as a weapon - being so healthy, they are actually disgusting and distracting to other players that grew up on Big Moot Sandwiches and Orca-Cola - even causing stomach difficulties! Thus, the Punters rely on Mr. Rotlaug every time when they want to make a point of their exceptionally healthy diet and crush their weaker, poorly-fed opponents.

Blood Bowl Nurgle Staff - Marggh Mawgino the Head Coach

After a really long break, here I am again with some content for my beloved Blood Bowl team, the Putrid Punters!

This time it's the head coach, a character that gives you such a rarely used advantage, he's practically useless... but he's still an important person and a great modelling opportunity. As I mentioned in the WIP post, an ogre's body was the core idea for this conversion, all to make him this absolute unit of a coach. It works, he's towering over all his players!

I had to remind myself how to paint this yellow skin, but painting him was an overall pleasant experience. I have some other small things for this band planned, so this was a good warmup.

Through all the years and many time jumps, the Putrid Punters relied on their ancient and trusted coach Oughustus. Unfortunately, the stationary life of a coach made him susceptible to growing greater and more glorious with every season, until he became simply too big to fit in the time portal. Instead, he was consumed by the warp, never to be seen again. Some journalists argue that he ascended to daemonhood, watching the Punters from the comfort of Grandfather Nurgle’s garden. Hard pressed, the team pitched in and recruited a relatively new, fresh and fit head coach Marggh Mawgino. While he’s not as experienced as his predecessor, he knows much more theory and the modern take on Blood Bowl - so maybe together with his ancient, veteran players, they’ll be able to compensate for each other’s weaknesses and achieve something passable.

Lord Krvavrus, Harbinger of the Red Death

After some small sneak peeks through WIP posts, I can now properly start a brand new collection here, 40k Death Guard.

The general idea about them is to have them in all-white armor, with no extra decorative trims, like on a real military tank, but HEAVILY weathered. This then goes in a wintery setting. Amongst all that dirty white comes the red, all the fleshy bits will be painted as bloody viscera, standing out from the background. This guy here is the main leader of this new force and also a guinea pig for this whole new endeavor. And by new, I really mean new. There are so many "first-times" here, I haven't felt like this in years! I never painted any 40k, I never used chipping medium, I never used snow effects, I was very excited painting him, even if he's a little bit lost amongst the rust and grime.

Obviously, some fine-tuning will be needed on the technique, but I am looking forward to it nonetheless. I have lots of marines already primed, some terminators ordered, and conversion parts for the Blight-haulers waiting. Yet another new nurgle force coming right up! And there is another one in the works as well!

Krvavrus, fed up with Mortarion’s obsessions, decided to take his cohort and carve up his own path in the galaxy. Led by Nurgle’s own voice, they found a small, frozen mining world with a red dwarf casting its feeble rays upon it. Here, a blessing struck the whole force, a powerful disease that seemed to impart thoughts and purpose on their very flesh. The unworthy were overcome, turning into growing, pulsating mass of viscera covering the ground. The strongest were able to contain it and wield this new “Red Death” as a weapon against the inhabitants of the planet. The government is trying to diminish the influence of this new threat by dismissing it as just a “Red Scare”. Still, they do know that the situation is dire, for Krvavrus and his brethren won’t stop until there is a completely red planet under a red star, the first seed in Nurgle's great new plan.

Karel the Black, the Commander

Third Sokolov vampire for the collection, after the red one, the white one, here comes the black one. I even managed to find two variants of the model, so I was able to get him both mounted and dismounted.

A horse was unavailable for him, so I had to find something else. Through a weird trick of fate and horrible post service in Germany, I actually have two Bretonnian Green Knights... one of them will be actually used in my Bretonnian collection, but the second one was rather redundant, until I found that this vampire fits very well. This gives him a lot of extra flair. Shields were also missing, so I found them some replacements, simple ones to accomodate some emblems. Just like with Havel, I needed to add some detail to their clothes and barding and let's say that black isn't a very easy color to get it right... Everything is either completely drown in blackness or turns everything to grey. I tried finding some equilibrium and it kinda works, but I think it would be much more pronounced and pretty if I wanted to have him blue or green.

He's also my proposal for the "Mirror, mirror" challenge amongst polish bloggers - with an idea/character mirrored into something different, yet similar. So, instead of a chivalrous Green Knight, I have a cruel Black Knight, on the same horse model.

Three male vampires serve lady Ecaterina Sokolov - the red warrior, the white bodyguard and the black commander. The last of them, Karel the Black, is most usually tasked with leading his mistress’ forces. Brooding, cruel and with strong personality, this one, while still loyal, is the most independent amongst his comrades. Good quality for a commander, but this also makes him an unpredictable servant, ready to object Ecaterina’s orders more than anyone. She tolerates this, because in the end he cares deeply for her interests, even if he thinks his means are better. During the battle with von Greifens he was on a diplomatic mission, so Ecaterina had to lead herself. Next time Karel will lead and make sure that his mistress comes up victorious.

It was difficult to make photos of both models (the lance takes so much space!), so here they are once together and then separated.

Leader mode:

Fencer mode:

Iakob the Savage - WIP

After Havel, here I am with even more vampires! Just a conversion WIP though.

Back when WFB was a thing, there was a possibility to build a vampire character that's a murdermachine and melee and yet possesses the ability to use magic from the Lore of the Beasts. Thanks to the vampires' unique rules, they could retain their powers while using the spell that transformed them into monsters. A mountain chimera in this context was stupidly overpowered. Of course, it cost a lot and was very easy to counter, so nobody used it seriously. Still, I loved this idea so much that I wanted to at least model a vampire to fit that description, a powerful barbarian just barely containing his inner beast. And after that, of course, the transformed versions...

This is my take on this. The model is based on a Khorne Exalted Deathbringer from GW. I redid quite a lot with him, I expected this conversion to be much easier, but the ideas just kept coming. Because I'm using the same head as the one on Gavros, I kept his ears small and sculpted some weird tendril hair on his previously bald head. I'm really unsure if I like it... if it's bad after getting some paint, I'll just rip it off.

It's a miracle I managed to fit him on a proper 20x20mm base!

Blood Bowl Big Guy - Kryp'er the Chaos Troll

I started painting the smaller marauders and humans first for my Chaos Pact team only because it made sense from a narrative standpoint. This whole time, the most fun miniature in the whole bunch was the troll, it was the one that convinced me to get this team. Now, it's finally painted!

The idea here was to do the same color scheme that Chaos Trolls from WFB used. I always liked that one, but never had the opportunity to use it. Blue skin also nicely contrasts with the orange armor, so that's a plus too.

Nothing else to say here, just a great model from Greebo. Now to paint the other two big guys, a minotaur and an ogre!

With the core players for the Kreegan Krashers found, it was time for the heavy hitters. As it is customary for Chaos Renegades teams, the headhunter Dugtig wanted to go big - as many brutes and monsters as the rules allowed! He started with the troll - after helping recruit players for countless goblin teams, he already knew a good candidate. Kryp’er was a troll with an especially vicious streak and a tentacle for an arm - Dugtig tried to pitch him as a Sea Troll several times, but the greenskin coaches weren’t convinced. Now he would gladly take him into the Krasher’s roster! Sadly, Kryp’er was way too stupid to use that appendage as aptly as Rotspawns do, but thanks to its reach, he could always reach to help his teammates in a scrap.