Blood Bowl Additional Players - Dark Elf Assassins

The Assassins Astrys and Ezion are here - they are a part of the Dreadspear Dragons Blood Bowl team. Minis used are the official, unconverted Dark Elf Assassins from Forge World.

They took more time than the rest of the team because all the glazes on their cloaks took much more time than I expected. I wanted to do something extra on them, but adding fancy freehands would just clash with their rather 'stealthy' look - so, getting inspired by the Forge World paintjob I decided to paint a gradient there, only making it a bit smoother and more pronounced than theirs. Other than that, they try to keep the same scheme as the rest of the players.

Also - I know how bad reputation those poor Assassins have and how almost nobody likes to use them in the game, but the models are still good (especially the female one) and I considered them way too iconic for Dark Elves to just ignore them. We'll see how they'll fare on the pitch later!

The usage of assassins has been steadily dropping during the last seasons, mostly thanks to coaches collectively deciding that they are just not that useful on the pitch. Still, some teams continue to use them - and one of them are the Dreadspear Dragons. Astrys and Ezion were brought from faraway lands (funny accents!) for two reasons - first, show the spectators some real, bloody Dark Elf play - and to secondly, actually stab some stubborn knuckleheads from time to time. Well, that and maybe throw a ball once a while. They might be rookies, but their acrobatics and incessant attempts at stabbing their opponents always bring eager spectators.

Zombie Legion - Miscellaneous

Part of the Zombie Legion

Almost exactly a year ago, on March the 25th 2018, after a crazy and difficult modelling journey, I posted the finished Zombie Legion. It seems fitting to post today the last of the zombie sub-batches, which I kept churning out during this year - and finally close this project. Here come the miscellaneous zombies, the ones that couldn't fit in any other group that I did, the dregs of the dregs, the last ones. This means that I won't be boring you readers with those old projects, now everything should be new and fresh.

You could always find some sub-groups or themes in Constantin's zombie legion, but at the end of the day, it’s still a chaotic, everchanging mass of reanimated bodies - some things just find themselves there without any great reason. Despite that, or maybe because of it, they fit with the rest just fine.

First is the filler with the Terrorgheist head, probably the most humorous part of the whole horde. The idea came to me when I got an additional TG head in a bought collection of bits - and where else could I excercise some non-seriousness if not with the zombies? Setting them up in this position was a bit challenging, but I think it all worked out rather good, considering those zombies have wonky anatomy either way.

And the remaining singular zombies. Some of them are more interesting than others, like the headless flagellant, the armless one or the only undead greenskin. The rest are just the most common zombies that can be built from the old set - but those are needed too for real diversity after all.

And that's it folks, the Legion is done. And for all the zombie fans, I'll be back with a giant and a dragon in the future - there are always more zombies to be built after all.

Three odd necromancers - WIP

For the last few months/years I have been slowly collecting miniatures to be used as additional necromancers - because you can never have too many of them - and now I finally got around to finish converting/preparing them all and maybe actually get them painted. Seeing that I already have some standard Necromancers (and Liches), with those I decided to make them a little special, with some additional theme than just 'an evil old guy'.

The first one shown here is Alarich Schwering, the most converted one, one that studied Lore of the Beasts besides his standard necromancy. I envision him in my background stories as a crazy, wild survivalist and to give him an appropriate look I made him a sabretusk pelt - out of Ogre Ironblaster bits and some greenstuff.

EDIT: Painted miniature can be seen HERE.

As for the second one, Matthias Schwarzfeuer, I got inspired by THIS miniature to make him really fancy, rich and extravagant - a necromancer that wants to break with the 'dusty old man' stereotype. It's mostly about painting, so not very much of that idea is visible now but I could still give him a fancy Empire hat and some additional gems.

EDIT: Painted miniature can be seen HERE.

And the last one, Ignatyi Ognemet, the least converted but also the one that started the whole idea of 'odd necromancers' in my mind. Long time ago, when I was reading 9th Age rules, I saw that they allowed necromancers to take Lore of Fire, which instantly gave me the image of a crazed bright wizard, only using green flames. I liked the idea enough to buy a box of Empire Wizards and build such a guy - he uses a flagellant head and some long hair to make him look more dishevelled.

After that, I decided to add some theme to the two metal necromancers that were waiting in my drawer - which you can see above. Much later I saw that 9th Age got rid of the old WFB lores altogether, so even if I would play that system, he won't make much sense. No worries though, all three odd necromancers should be interesting to paint and that's all that matters.

Wraiths of Siekerno

Finally, I managed to paint my rather unpractical unit of Cairn Wraiths, made out of converted Grimghast Reapers. I built them like this because I always wanted a unit of them, but I couldn't find the right models - and those wraiths were a perfect converting opportunity for that. They required very careful positioning, basing, additional weight underneath and can stand in only one configuration - but they do work! Good to see that it was possible to squeeze an AoS unit into such a tight WFB formation.

Unfortunately, the converting process wasn't the hard part, painting all the ghostly bits was. Maybe it was just me, but I really struggled to cover it all without missing anything in a reasonable amount of time. I guess the new Nighthaunt aren't really for me! Still, I am quite happy with how they turned out and must admit that it was all worth it! Also, I finally found a good model to try out verdigris and etheral effects at the same time - something that people have been suggesting to me for a long time. Now I have to consider making more minis like this.

Wanting to represent the 'Chill Grasp' rule from the 8th Edition WFB I also painted some frost on their scythe handles, just like I did years ago on my first Cairn Wraith.

The whole conversion process and problems related to it are shown in the WIP post HERE.

In the ages past, when Daremnych was waging a difficult war with another ancient tribe, he came to the village of Siekerno, asking for help. He wanted to ask their well-known and fearsome axemen warriors to sneak through the forest and attack his enemy’s flank during an upcoming battle. The men agreed, but when the time came, they didn't intervene, favoring the chances of the Great Priest’s opponents. Unfortunately for them, Daremnych prevailed through the bloody battle even without them - and came to confront the warriors after that. Already knowing his methods, the axemen of Siekierno fell to their knees, asking for another chance, willing to help and serve. The Priest gave them exactly that - killed them all and bound their spirits to his will, telling them that he will call upon them in the future - only then the axemen will get their second chance and opportunity to serve. Then he captured all the remaining villagers, divided them into small groups and forcibly integrated them into various tribes he had under his command. Now Daremnych, needing an edge against his vampire enemies, came to the forgotten ruins of Siekerno and called the axemen back - to finally serve him as they wanted so many years ago.

First, the whole tightly packed unit of wraiths:

And all of them separated:

Blood Bowl Nurgle Team - Rotters WIP

After getting into Blood Bowl both me and my wife played the video games to try out various teams - and while she did choose Dark Elves, I really liked the Nurgle one. Soon after that GW released their own take on the team and I was lucky enough to get a box of them later for Christmas. I don't want to use the team as-is, there is a lot of converting to be done before I'm satisfied with them, but it's a great base to build upon.

I started with the small ones, the Rotters. Our house rule is to give every player a single level-up at the beginning - to give them some skills and make the game more interesting - and with those guys, I chose mainly those upgrades that could be interestingly depicted on the mini itself. This is one of the reasons why I like Nurgle (or Chaos generally) in BB - all the 'Mutations' skills are just perfect as conversion potential.

Here they are all together with their upgrades:

And the close-ups.

The first two here have Kick and Guard. The left one was also the first one that I leveled-up, I really like having one kicking specialist on the team. He got reposed a bit to show his skill. I wanted to put a nurgling in front of him, but the base was getting way too crowded at that point.

The one on the right rolled doubles when leveling-up so I gave him a skill that will make him useful even if he's just standing passively. For quite a long time I wasn't sure how to represent his skill, unsure how would it work in practice. I considered covering him in spines, but later I just opted for shields - it is clear and obvious at least. That and I had some cool Nurgle-themed shields from the Putrid Blightkings kit to use.

Smiling players now, one with bonus Agility and another with a Big Hand. Agile one was fun to create - with that lucky roll, he suddenly became as dexterous as an elf, while still being a decomposing Rotter! I set him up in a fancy position and gave him long ears - to drive that elf analogue even further.

The second one here was also enjoyable to build, I got to use some of those Crypt Horror and Ogre bits. Weirdly enough, only after converting him I looked up that this mutation affects only one hand, not both! Well, that makes his skill even more recognizable and also look more interesting so I will keep it.

And the last two - Thick Skull and Prehensile Tail. Firstly - yeah, I know that Thick Skull isn't really a terrific skill option for Rotters, but I just really wanted to sculpt a turtle shell on one of their heads. I also gave him some additional greenstuffed nastiness to make him even more different from another rotter that uses the same plastic sculpt.

The one on the right was probably the simplest conversion, just a wire covered with greenstuff and boils - but not only looks nice, but he's also very good on the pitch too!