Mord

A quick follow up to yesterday's post, "Who's the Boss?"

Yesterday I painted Skargutz, my Savage Orc Boss:

Skargutz - Savage Orc Boss

 Today, I've painted my first "hero" level character, Mord - Goblin Shaman:

Mord - Goblin Shaman

Mord - rear view

He's the sneaky git who is manipulating Skargutz's boyz, bringing them to the greater Waaagh, and here they are together:

Characterful...

I really wanted to post this blog for that last shot - the scale difference between the Orc boss and the Goblin is really pronounced!

Who's the Boss?

Yay! I've finished my first unit: Skargutz boyz. I'll post pics of the whole unit once I've based them, but for now, here's the main man ORC himself, Skargutz.

Skargutz: Savage Orc Boss

Not that kind of cold one!

 I'm pleased with how the unit, and Skargutz himself, have turned out. A few of the models, including Skargutz, have scaly skin for their "clothing", rather than fur. As I'm trying to keep these Orcs Old World style, exotic creatures like alligators are out (hence the fur looking like wolves, rather than zebras or tigers). I was stumped as to how to paint the scales, when I remembered that Lindsay Lawhammer is collecting a Dark Elf army. A quick message later, and she told me her corsairs' cloaks (and probably cold ones too) were a dark red up to orange. So now it looks like my boyz took down a cold one or two.

That's the fella...

I made a few other changes to his paint scheme to make him stand out. His face got a slightly brighter highlight, and I painted his top knot red. I also did his weapons differently: I may decide to give him a magical weapon, but his blades are very clearly chipped stone of some type. I considered obsidian (which has anti-magical properties in Warhammer canon), but instead I opted for Warpstone. Orcs are less prone to mutation, right?

Skargutz from above

I also discovered that his right eye is missing, making the eye stripe warpaint that most of my unit have make more sense. On the subject of inspirational warpaint, I tried to think about what Skargutz should have. As well as some on his face, and lightning bolts on his legs, I thought he needed something to motivate his ladz. Since Orcs lead from the front, this meant an impressive warpaint display on his back:

Skargutz from behind

Waaagh! I've used the orc skull glyph on most of the unit, and so it seemed fitting for Skargutz to have it on his back, so all the boyz can see it, and be whipped up into a frenzy. 

So, first unit done, it's time to think about what next.

I've decided to go for a general, multipurpose greenskin horde. While a themed army can be fun, it's also quite limiting. When I worked at GW and so could afford to buy - not to mention borrow - multiple armies, that was fine. But as this will be my only army, a little versatility is no bad thing. That being the case, tomorrow I'm going to pick up the Orc & Goblin Battalion box. It's pricy - at £70 - but the troops included would come to about £85 separately, so it's a decent saving. Plus, its contents - Orc Boyz, Orc Boar Boyz, Goblin Boyz and Forest Goblin Spider Riders - are exactly the units I would take for a starting Waaagh anyway. 

"Battalion" sounds too formal, no?

I've also made one other purchase in the interim - yet to be painted. I've been thinking about characters - all joking aside, Andy Lawhammer has been able to convert a pegasus riding general because he's an extant character in our Warhammer roleplaying campaign. I don't have that basis, so I need to choose something characterful and effective. And, to be honest, right now I don't know what that would be. Do I want a sneaky Goblin Warboss hiding in a big unit of boyz? A powerful Orc Warboss on a boar to lead the cavalry on a charge? Or a Warboss or Shaman on a wyvern? (Ooh, a wyvern...)

But I had a hankering for a character to paint. But what kind of character could I pick, that wouldn't nix any of the other options? Then, it struck me: a Goblin Shaman. He can go in a unit later, if I want, or he can skulk about on his own. What's more, when I saw the Goblin Shaman model, I noticed something cool...

He has a little skull, with a bone in it, like a mortar and pestle. No doubt it's intended to be him crushing up mad cap mushrooms or somesuch, but another thought occurred to me. What if he's the shaman applying the warpaint to Skargutz boyz. That's unorthodox, true, but Goblins are cunnin' and sneaky gits, after all. What if this devious shaman has stumbled across a small mob of Savage Orc boyz, and in that uniquely goblin style of being simultaneously desperate and tricksy, he ends up tricking their boss, leading him out of the depths of the forests and towards a greater Waaagh...?

So I bought the shaman. :)

Meet Ugg...

In a shameless rip off of Andy Lawhammer's "Meet Karl", here's my stage by stage painting guide. I'll assume everything's straightforward; any questions (or indeed advice) much appreciated. See you in the comments. ;)

Stage 1 - Undercoat
Because I am not a crazy mentalist, I opted for a black undercoat. Sprayed black: you don't need to see that, so on to...

Stage 2 - Basecoat Flesh
For this I used Waaagh! Flesh. I applied a neat first coat, followed immediately by a second, very quick "wet brush" (like a drybrush but with more paint on the bristles). This ensured a smooth coat, especially on the larger, flatter areas of skin (like the back muscles).

2 - Basecoat of Waaagh! Flesh

Stage 3 - 1st Highlight Flesh
For this, I drybrushed Warboss Green.

3 - Drybrush Warboss Green

Drybrushing, in case you don't know, is when you put paint on the brush, then wipe most off, before flicking the brush over the areas you want to highlight. It is a very quick way of highlighting. It looks great on sharp angular surfaces, but can look dusty if the surface is smoothly curved, like a space marine shoulder pad, or, say, savage orc muscles...

Stage 4 - Shading

As drybrushing can leave a dusty effect, and there's lots of mice musculature detail, I applied a wash with Athonian Camoshade, a very dark green ink wash. This runs into all the crevices, as well as smoothing and deepening the overall colour.

4 - Wash with Athonian Camoshade 

Stage 5 - Finishing the flesh

The final stage of the flesh is a final highlight of Warboss Green. This is a fairly minor highlight, just drawing out major areas that look too dark. The face gets the most attention, so that all the edges are sharply defined as Warboss Green. 

The beauty of savage orcs is their warpaint. Any mistakes made on the skin tone can be covered by a glyph. Lazy? Moi? 

5 - Flesh re-highlighted with Warboss Green

6 - Basecoat Details

I've always found the key to army painting (that is, painting an entire army to look decent together, but primarily to play with, rather than for display) is to limit your palette and choose straightforward colours that are easy to apply. So my bone and leather details use the same colour range, with the leather essentially being one tone darker.

Leather - Gorthor Brown --> Tallarn Sand --> Ushabti Bone

Bone - Tallarn Sand --> Ushabti Bone --> White Scar

So for stage 6, I basecoated the leather Gorthor Brown and the bone Tallarn Sand. I also basecoated the fur Eshin Grey. 

6 - Basecoat the details - Gorthor Brown, Tallarn Sand, Eshin Grey

7 - Shade the details

Again, when army painting, laziness is a virtue. It's all about efficiency, and Agrax Earthshade is very efficient. It's a brown wash, which, conveniently, works on my bone, leather and even fur. What's more, if a little seeps onto the orc skin? It looks fine. 

So, a quick wash over the bone, leather and fur really picks out the sculpted details.

7 - Shade the details with Agrax Earthshade

 8 - Highlight the details
Now it's time to highlight the details - the end is in sight! I use the colours listed above to finish off the various savage orc accoutrements.

Leather gets a highlight in its base layer of Gorthor Brown, before getting a fairly heavy highlight of Tallarn Sand and a final edge highlight of Ushabti Bone (in some places - don't want it looking too pale.

Bone gets a Tallarn Sand highlight, followed by a fairly heavy Ushabti Bone highlight, with White Scar to finish.

Fur gets drybrushed with Fenrisian Grey, then White Scar. I don't rehighlight with the Eshin Grey, as I want a starker contrast on the fur.

8 - Highlight the details

9 - Flint Weapons

I left the flint weapons to last because they're the aspect I'm least happy with. The box art has them painted a bright grey, almost concrete in colour, and I don't like that. I've opted for a darker grey, highlighting black with Eshin Grey and Fenrisian Grey, then washing with Agrax Earthshade. I'm still not 100% sold on it. 

The problem is that there's lots of chipped flint detail, but it's not sharp enough to really require a line highlight. 

I'm reasonably happy with the effect, but I may revisit them before I varnish them.

Highlight the flint weapons - Eshin Grey then Fensrisian Grey, then Agrax Earthshade Wash

10 - Finishing Touches

The finishing touches really make the model - eyes and warpaint (plus any tidying up required). 

The eyes are Screamer Pink, Evil Sunz Scarlet and a tiny dot of Squig Orange. You may think you can't see three colours there, but trust me, if I missed any of those stages out, it would look worse!

The warpaint is Fenrisian Grey, then a White Scar Highlight. I've opted for an arm band on the right arm, and a lightning bolt on the left shoulder, plus some face paint. That's the general theme for the unit, with variations on each orc as the fancy takes me.

10 - The finished Ugg!

Ugg rear view

 Part of the fun of savage orcs is their crudeness (not that way! Although, that being said, also that way!). So my clumsy, childlike attempts at drawing symbols and glyphs look authentically orcy and "in character". Score!

I painted another orc at the same time as Ugg:

The Third Orc

So my little unit is up to three painted orcs, with two more half-done. Here's how my boyz are looking now:

Waaagh!

All in all, I'm feeling pretty damned chuffed. Next post will discuss my plans for the army, as well as my painting set up.

Thanks for reading!