Blood Bowl Chaos Beastmen - WIP 1

Today I'm starting with a project that was brewing in my head since April at least - a very bizarre Chaos Blood Bowl team. Long have I admired all the brilliant conversions inspired by the Inq28 style, Lost&Damned books, medieval, baroque art, and many more - creating a blend when there's no place for common sense or logic. I never had any good excuse to try doing something similar - until I realized that the simple roster for the Chaos Chosen team would be a perfect canvas for such an endeavor. Such a take on Blood Bowl is not very common, which was an additional plus.  

I am starting with the beastmen - slowly, those kitbashes take much more time than I'm willing to admit. There are a lot of them and their ruleset is simple - some hands to handle the ball and horns, everything else is up for a conversion - a perfect canvas for my menagerie! The one on the left is probably the one that started it all - a running Chaos Giant's head. The conversion was simple and the addition of helmet easily makes this model 'sporty'. At first, I intended for his hand to emerge from his mouth, but I had others with this trick planned and that would interfere with the mask. So, he got thin limbs with arthropod joints dangling about as he runs about.  

The one on the right was invented when I was trying out all the bits that I bought for this project - I wanted a lizardman head on a buff torso - because beastmen shouldn't be only goats! Thin legs from a ghoul came much, much later - they serve as a nice deformed contrast with the rest of the body. Stay tuned for more.

The Lady's Favor

More Bretonnians from ye olden times to pass the time - and today, a Trebuchet! A beautiful model, I'm happy I was about to get it when it was still being sold.

Bought in 2007 (for my 18th birthday!) and painted in 2010, this was my first warmachine ever - and I wanted to do it justice with a proper scenic base. I made it out of an MDF board - all the crewmen and the trebuchet itself are removable. I'm pretty satisfied with it - nowadays I would add freehands on the little shields and avoid making those hard-cut stones on the edge of the base.

Unlike most Bretonnian lords, Crinierre is quite a progressive person, enjoying new inventions and innovations. That’s why he was always keen on employing war machines in his forces - and after getting a team of engineers from the Empire and traditional Bretonnian architects, he built himself a trebuchet. Manned by outlanders, fashioned to look like a cathedral, and even called ‘The Lady’s Favor’, it causes more traditional lords to talk about blasphemy. Still, even those disgruntled nobles are forced to admit the contraption’s merits when they see it working on the battlefield - and seeing them jealous makes the whole endeavor even more worth it to Crinierre!

Blood Bowl Human Blitzers - WIP

Okay, those here took me a LOT of time...  

When I was converting the Pestigors for my Nurgle Blood Bowl Team, I bought myself a generic Chaos team. 4 Beastmen got convinced to work for Nurgle and another 4 were reserved for another project - which left me with 4 Blockers. After a bit of thinking, I decided to turn them into Blitzers for my Human/Bretonnian Team. This would both give me the whole allowance for Blitzers and make them much more distinct - the original ones relied on helmets to make them recognizable, which fails when I changed all of their heads... Thankfully the blockers are not mutated, not very spiky and up for a conversion - I envisioned them as some weird ubermensch Bretonnian nobles, not needing full armor when they have muscles!      

Then, the whole process began... I filed down the bracers on of them, then left the project for a week. Then I swapped the head on another one. Two weeks pause. New hands for that one - and a week of something else later - you can see where it goes. I don't even know why it turned out like this. In the end, more than 50% of the work was done in one week, after many months after starting. Oh well.      

The first two are here. The one on the left has some enhanced knuckles, with 4THE LADY engraved on them, to leave a Bretonnian mark on every fool they punch - that's Mighty Blow. The second one sports a big shield on his helmet - that's a Guard skill.

And the second pair. The one on the left sports some horns and a skull - because chivalrous doesn't mean nice - he has Frenzy. The other one has a hand on his helmet - and that's Sure Hands obviously. The spike on his bracer is also a Fleur-de-lys, I found a single, last one amongst my Bretonnian bits - so here it goes.

Hod the Chief Trumpeter

After Horik the Lord Commander and Knutr the cranky old slayer it's time for the third one of the heroes I painted for my 'Hill Dwarfs' project - Hod the optimistic trumpeter! Just like with the previous ones, it's a middlehammer dwarf on a bright green base, a nostalgic trip to the times when I was just starting with Warhammer.

The model is officially named 'King Kazador', but seeing how I want to make my 'hold' an unimportant, backwater one, I decided to downplay his royal characteristics and reduced him to being just a thane with a fitting role - the main trumpeter of Karak Valldar. In comparison with the previous ones, this one looks the most classic - with a simple pose and weapon held high, so to do him proper justice, I tried painting him as colorful as my painting style allowed for - he was pretty simple in the end, but enjoyable nonetheless.

Now that those three are done, it's time for some troops - and war machines too! Still, seeing as this is a slow project in a particularly slow time in my life, it will take some waiting...

While subterranean dwarfs can rely on their strong lungs and good acoustics of their tunnels for communication, the hill dwarfs of Karak Valldar must use some help in that regard - that’s where trumpeters come into action. Using impressive horns, they sound elaborate calls that help their leaders command the troops on expansive, grassy hills. The current Chief Trumpeter in the hold is Hod, a relatively young Thane serving under Horik. What sets him apart from all his comrades in Karak Valldar, he is earnestly enthusiastic about his work here, immune to the grumbling attitudes of older dwarfs. Lacking resources, goblin raids, irritating inspections from their superiors, Hod can find something positive in all of that and more. Hill dwarves can laugh at his naivete, but secretly they admire his view on life and find some kind of comfort in it during all the hardships.

Blood Bowl Horticulturalist of Nurgle - WIP

The third character that I kitbashed for my Nurgle Blood Bowl team as a member of the staff, we've had a doctor, the coach - so now there comes the wizard!

Just like Dark Elves and Chaos Chosen before, Nurgle also got their own specific wizard - he's called a Horticulturalist and he's themed heavily around plants and farming. I looked through the range of fantasy minis and I found good old Festus to be the best match for such a character. Still, there was a lot of converting to be done - and now I can say he definitely earns his own post here, it's not that much of a padding as before.

I cut off his staff to turn it into a shovel, he got himself a straw hat, the box on his back is filled with some extra veggies, there are 2 toothy plants behind him on the base, as well as maggots, a buried head and more veggies. Besides that, the poor sod he gives his drink to, he got converted too, so now he has proper pants and a baseball cap - I intend to paint him as a referee.

This one should be fun to paint.