Sunday Night Bloodbowl

As mentioned last post, it's a new Bloodbowl season, and I'm fielding Orcs. Waaagh!

Andy Lawhammer - coach of the the Salzenmund Seahawks  is running things, and we kicked off on Sunday with a few friendlies. The New Orcland Hate-riots scored a 3-0 loss to the elven Laurelorn Lions - though we won on casualties! - and a hard fought 1-1 draw against the Rune Forged dwarves.

This spurred me on to paint up my ladz - albeit quickly - and here are the first batch: the heavy hitters:

#1 - Gurfang, Black Orc Blocker

#2 - Tufslab, Black Orc Blocker

#4 - Bloodjaw, Blitzer

#5 - Grimsnarl, Blitzer

The 9th Age

So, I haven't posted in ages (pun intended), but that's because I haven't been painting much over the last two years.

With the demise of 8th Edition, the discontinuation of Bretonnian miniatures by GW, and the birth of Age of Sigmar (yuck!), I had little inclination to forge ahead with my Bretonnian army. So they gathered dust, and my paints dried up in their pots. 

Then, a conversation with my good chum Andy Lawhammer, turned to Warhammer, and we discussed playing with older versions of the rules. I mean...why not, right? But as we rattled through the different editions, they all presented problems...too imbalanced, missing rules...

Then Andy told me about The 9th Age, a community based update of 8th Edition. A quick perusal of the rules and forum, and I was sold. Next day, I broke out the paints. :)

I'm no longer collecting Bretonnians, it's the Kingdom of Equitaine now.

I'll post again soon, to discuss army lists, but for now, here's a pic of my expanded Men at Arms unit - technically a peasant levy now. 

I had to give the standard bearer a bloody mark on his shield, as the transfer got knackered during placement. Frustratingly, I only have 19 here. I am sure I assembled 20, so I must have lost one somewhere. Under the T9A rules, I need 20 for a minimum unit. Luckily I have just got my grubby mitts in another battalion box, so I'll be able to round the unit out soon. 

I'm working on two more KotR; next update when one/both are done!

1 Down...just!

And with little in the way of fanfare, that's my first Bretonnian unit done. 10 men at arms, including champion.

I was very pleased with how quick these were to do. Real army-painting stuff:

1. spray black undercoat
2. drybrush model with Eshin Gray (using large drybrush)
3. paint metal areas with Ironbreaker
4. paint brown areas with Gorthor Brown
5. paint flesh areas with Cadian Flesh
6. give detail areas a wash with Agrax Earthshade
7. give detail areas a one stage highlight with base-coat (Ironbreaker, Gorthor or Cadian)
8. add transfers to shields
9. tidy up
10. base

And you're done. 

Really quick;having the single wash for all detail colours helps speed things up, as does the black base, which means I don't have to be too neat with the wash. 

I have to give more props to Geoff at CitadelSix Custom Design who did the transfers. They tie the unit together brilliantly, and there's something nice about seeing my family crest on all those shields!

When I was assembling these, I was really pleased with the champion's pose, thrusting his halberd over his shield-rest.Very cool. Then I tried to rank them up. D'oh! Still, it just about works. :)

Next knight is about 60% done  - the white undercoat is making it all look messy, so it's taking longer. 

Next update when he's done, unless my resolve goes and I do the next 10 men at arms. I am really pleased with the poses for the musician and standard bearer. 

VBB

Back in the Saddle...

After an extended hiatus, I've decided to dust off the brushes again.

Down at Andy Lawhammer's last week we played a game of Dreadfleet, which was quite a lot of fun. The mechanics were unnecessarily clumsy and it suffered a lot, for me, through comparison to FFG's excellent Star Wars X-Wing Miniatures game (which I have been playing a lot. A lot.).

But it was fun, and it was Warhammery. And, having sold off my Orcs and Goblins (for shelf-space and money to buy more TIE fighters!) my mind turned to my nascent Bretonnian force. A few days later, and I have another knight done.

I present to you Robert De Cendres!

I'm happy with how he's turned out. What I'm enjoying about painting Bretonnians, as opposed to the Greenskins, is that I can paint differently. My men at arms I am army painting, very quickly.  The bowmen get a little more attention. The Knights, as there are fewer of them, and they are larger, get a bit more. I've deliberately not  over-highlighted the barding, as I really want the block of colour effect. I highlighted the crest a little more. 

I'll take some pictures of my Battle Standard Bearer (as I just realised I haven't done that yet) and get him up here soon. 

In terms of the future, I'll be speed painting up some more men at arms over this week, to get them up to a minimum unit size of 10, and working on another couple of Knights. I'm breaking out the dreaded white undercoat as I'm going to try some lighter barding colours for variety.

More soon!

Skaven Blood Bowl Team: finished (kind of...)

Done.

:)

I finished my first bunch of Skaven, i.e. my starting team. I probably won't actually field all of them at once, needing to spend some pennies on reroll/fan-factor, but it's good to have options. I may regret not investing in a rat ogre though, as apparently +Lindsay Law will have an ogre tomorrow. Eek!

Anyhoo, back to the rats: namely my final 4 linerats:

I coulda been somebody, I coulda been a gutter runner!

This one is probably my favourite. I love the hood, and the humps sticking through holes, as if he's mutated and burst through it, hulk like. :)

Linerat #12

 This one's pretty standard, nothing exciting to note on him, except that I decided to skip #13. I figured, as it's the Horned Rat's sacred number, I'd leave that space on the roster empty (or save it for a star player... ;) ).

#14 & #15 - slaves

 A number of the Skaven models have chains and collars on, fitting the race's use of slaves. I quite like the idea of some of the Skaven team being "professionals", in it for the warp tokens, and others being slaves, owned by the manager. Very gladiatorial.

But I was left with a problem with these two: they're topless. I could put their numbers on their loincloths, but all the rest are on back or head coverings. What to do, what to do...

I know! Brand 'em!

HISS...Squeak squeak!

Ouchy. Now, I'm not actually very happy with how the "branding" worked out. I tried to replicate images of branded cattle I found online (charred round the edges, slightly lighter skin tone in the middle), but it didn't quite work, and I may well revisit later.

The Marienburg Stealers

And here they are in all their glory. The Marienburg Stealers. Overall, I'm quite happy with them, considering they're so hastily converted and painted.

Now, to see how they fair on the field...

VBB

New balls please!

Just a quick update today, with some more of my converted Skaven blood bowl team.

Today I have a couple of linemen, and my throwers.

As I mentioned before, I wasn't happy with the thrower conversions, and I remain unsatisfied. I may have another go in the future (when I either secure some new balls - ooer, fnar fnar, etc. - or try making some in green stuff), but they'll do for now.

So here's the first one, lucky number 7:

#7 - looks fine from this angle

Hmm, are you sure that ball is regulation standard?

Definitely not an orc skull? You promise? OK. 

So finding a hand in the throwing position was beyond my limited means: I tried using a spare orc shaman hand I had, but it was too big, and too awkward. So I opted for simply having the ball tucked under the thrower's arm. It's a symbolic ball, anyway. But as I lacked balls - ooer redux - I used what I had to hand. In this instance, an orc skull.

It's vaguely ball shaped: I thought I'd get away with it, and initially painted it red. But it was obviously a skull, so I repainted it skull coloured. What the hell, Skaven probably would play using orc skulls. Or even cheat by bringing on their own balls...

He looks pretty fierce from this angle.

About the size of your ball, sir...

For thrower the second - #8 - I used an undead helmet I had left over from the bitz Andrew gave me. It actually looks pretty good, as one of the plastic balls in the game has metal spikes/collar like that. If you look too closely, of course, it becomes apparent that it's too small, and the wrong shape, but I refer you to my earlier "skaven cheat" point. (Or point behind you and yell "Saulot!". That's for you +Lindsay Law ;)  )

My linemen - linerats? - are pretty dull, though I have a few interesting ones next time, For now, here are the first two, bog standard ones.

 Do you only have one eye?
Who said that?

Block-block!

Nothing much to say about these, but I think they look OK.

The final 4 linemen are more than half done, so should have the starting team done in a couple of days, which is handy as I should be trying them out this Friday...

Gutter Runner

Couldn't resist. :)

Anyhoo, the reason for today's post is I have another 4 players painted: gutter runners this time. The sneaky, shifty assassin-types of the Skaven army, these have long been some of my favourites in the Skaven army, both on the tabletop and in the roleplaying game (I have fond memories of +Lindsay and I chasing some through the streets of Nuln in +Andrew's WFRP campaign...).

Photos below: same drill as with the Blitzers, I picked body/heads that were naturally appropriate (i.e. hooded/robed), then enhanced where I could. The first two I armed with punch-daggers, but clipped the blades off, leaving them with some nasty looking (but wholly Blood Bowl-legal) brass knuckles.

Sneak-sneak!

Punch-punch!

Then I made this fella. I had a spare cloak from my wolf rider conversions, so I slapped that on. As I was perusing the hands on offer, I noticed one with a sneaky dagger hidden along the forearm, As these are my sneakiest players, it just felt right. :)

Me? The #6 Gutter Runner for the Marienburg Stealers?
With a knife under my cloak? With MY reputation? 

Then the final one...I spotted another dagger wielding arm, and remembering that the Skaven's attempts at subtlety don't always work as intended, I threw caution to the wind, carefully concealing this dagger with...well, with nothing. 

Stab-stab! 

Not subtle, but it appealed to my sense of whimsy! 

So that's 6 players down, and the team are looking like this so far: 

The Marienburg Stealers WIP

I'm chuffed with how quickly they're coming along. They're not well painted by any standard, but they'll do, dammit!

Incidentally, I was going to crop the top of that photo, but my out of focus fire in the background looks uncannily as if the Horned Rat himself is watching the team being assembled eagerly, so I left it in.

A few days off the blog now, but I'll be back in a week or so with some more players.

VBB
PS - I got the Blade Runner font from FontMeme

The Marienburg Stealers

As I sit here, sipping a homemade cappucino, I'm feeling pretty pleased with myself. While days spent lolling on the couch or playing on the PS3 for 8 hours straight are all well and good, there is an undeniable satisfaction in achieving something on holiday.

OK, all I achieved was to make my mind up and paint some models, but still. Baby steps.

So, my chum Andy Lawhammer's been making a top-ten of GW games (speaking of which +Andrew, where's number 4?...) and at number 5, he placed Blood Bowl. Cue much reminiscing, a brief encounter with Google, and he's bought a copy. And given how much I love the game, it's no surprise I  wanted in on the action.

But what team to pick? Initially I planned to buy my own copy of the game and convert the plastic humans to become a Bretonnian team (like this chap on Warseer), and indeed I may well do that in time (as if nothing else it'll give me an excuse to buy and paint some Knights. And I do like knights.)

But for now I plumped for those nefarious ratmen, the Skaven. Now, the GW Skaven Team are fine (you can see them here), but they're 30 quid, there's only 12 of them, and they're in metal. No thanks. Instead, I picked up a plastic box of clan rats from +Baz Morrison's shop and set to converting. They're all converted now, and I'll paint them up over the next week or two. Some I'm pleased with. Some, like the throwers, are not brilliant, but they're OK for now.

So, without further gilding the lily and with no more ado, I give you the first two players of the Marienburg Stealers.

Blitzer 1 - Krikt

Blitzer 2 - Vurk

On the whole, I'm quite pleased with them.

I picked more armoured heads/torsos, to fit the blitzer look, and I added a couple of spare savage orc "plumes" (hairsquigs?) to make them stand out from the linemen. A couple of other random orky bitz went on too, to give them shoulder pads (which the linemen will be lacking...).

They're not well painted, nor are they thoughtfully converted, but you know what? They'll do.

I haven't put numbers on yet, and I'll probably flock the bases eventually. The name, Marienburg Stealers, is obviously derived from Pittsburgh Steelers. I was going to do them in black, but it didn't look right and I have a lot of green paint. :)

Speaking of green, I also had time to finish off the first of my new Orc units for WFB (a bigger post on my Waaagh in a week or two): my sister in law +Gillian Bruce got me some Savage Orc Boar Boyz for my birthday (ta!) and here's the first of them: the standard bearer.

Oink!

I was relieved that my ability to speed-paint orcs hasn't diminished in the 6 months or so since I last had time to wield a brush. The boar I'm especially pleased with. The photo doesn't do them justice (I really do need to work on my photography, I know: an iPhone camera in a softly-lit living room is not a photogenic environment!).

Ride the Pig...bash some skulls...

 I was really pleased with the boar's face. This time, I highlighted it all the same: skin, tusks, et al. Gorthor Brown, Tallarn Sand, Ushabti Bone, touch of White Scar on the tips of the tusks. Then I applied an Agrax Earthshade wash, but only to  the skin, not the tusks, and the effect is great.

Yeah, I'm wielding this huge banner like a sword, what of it?

It worked so well, I did the same thing on the rider's leather/wood/bone bits. It's not quite as effective there, but it's so very, very quick I'm going to stick with it.

So there you go. A productive day, by the standards of school holidays, any way.

Isn't it? Wasn't it? Standard.

The other day I posted about a couple of conversions I did for my army; given I'm playing Andrew B's shambling hordes on Monday, I figured I'd best pull my finger out and get on with the painting.

So I did.

LEADBELLY: Orc Battle Standard Bearer

Converted from the Avatar of War shaman model, with weapons and standards from the Orc sprues and armour and skulls from the undead sprue. I wanted him to stand out, and since red was the detail colour for my army, it made sense to do his cloak and standard in that colour. 

Given his rag-tag, mismatched armour, I decided to paint the banner as if it had been looted. So I painted it up with a black chevron, intentionally aping the design on the shield of my wolf rider musician. The idea being that Morthang's Waaagh have tangled with a Bretonnian army before, squishing some Knights Errant in the process. Then I slapped some orcy glyphs on top. The skull design has been repeated across my army, but I added a crude, stylised flaming sword, as he is Morthang Da Burna's standard bearer. 

I'm super-chuffed with how he turned out. He's virtually unrecognisable as the same model as my shaman Drogrot Gorkeye. 

I was concerned he'd look more similar from the rear, as the cloak has a lot of detail. It is amazing, though, the difference a paintjob makes. A shield slapped on, and a banner to draw the eye, combined with a lick of red paint and Gork's your uncle. 

Leadbelly from behind

I decided to "dirty up" the banner and his tattered red cloak. Initially I was going to use a brown wash (Agrax Earth Shade to the rescue) but it turned the glyphs a funny pink colour. Once that dried, and I redid the white glyphs, I opted for a drybrush of bown/black instead, and it worked really well. 

Once I put him in the unit, he looks even better, nicely offsetting the red of the shields. Here he is with the Orc Boyz unit "Da Red Skullz" and their boss Grak Skulltaker.

Leadbelly in situ with Da Red Skullz

 Finally, before I sign off, here's a shot of Leadbelly and Big Toof, my savage orc big boss. I did take a shot of Big Toof in Skargutz' Boyz, along with Drogrot the shaman, but Big Toof's sword is blocking Drogrot from the camera, so I'll try that again later.

Da Big Boss Men. Or rather orcs. 

Here's hoping the Ld boost and battle standard (which allows a reroll on all Ld tests, as well as an extra +1 combat resolution) will prove handy. I know Big Toof's attacks will...

Drogrot & Morthang

Drogrot & Morthang...sounds like a firm of Orc solicitors. I can't imagine there's much market for Orc legal advice though...

''Ello, Drogrot & Morthang!"
"I was bashin' stunties and Grimfang stole me squigs!"
"Well?"
"Can you 'elp?"
"Yeah. Bash Grimfang an' get yer squigs back!"

I don't remember Ally McBeal being like that.

Anyway, to business. Or pleasure, rather, Drogrot and Morthang are, in fact, the two characters I've just painted for my army. Wahey!

The characters themselves were actually created by Andy Lawhammer for our WFRP game. When I decided to make an Orc army, and to have a Wyvern-mounted war boss leading it, I recalled our PCs facing a Black Orc on a Wyvern. Well, I say facing. He swooped down, his Wyvern ate our rock-hard NPC henchman in one gulp, and we ran away.

So Andy filled me in on some of the details, and lo and behold! Morthang da Burna.

Morthang da Burna, on his wyvern

That flaming sword represents the Grudgebringer sword, as featured in Dark Omens and Shadow of the Horned Rat. The sword, once borne by Captain Bernhardt, found its way into the hands of this mighty Black Orc. I converted Azhag the Slaughterer with a burning wizard sword, graciously donated by Andy. In game, I'll use the Ruby Ring of Rhuin to represent its fireball attack.

A more detailed view of Morthang.

I'm pleased with how the flaming sword has come out. You may just be able to see the hint of runes I did at the base of the fire (Grudgebringer, in our canon at least, is one of Alaric the Mad's Dwarven runeweapons). Obviously Morthang has attached it to a bit of bone to give him a proper, Orcy handle (the original plan was to strap the sword onto a huge Orc choppa, but it looked silly).

The reasons for his red crown are twofold. I wanted his helmet to stand out. His armour looked rag-tag, so I wanted to paint it all bashed, rusty iron. But the helmet looked cool, with the little crown-like peaks and what-not. But, when I got to painting it, I realised I had a limited palette of colours to use. In particular, I've yet to pick up a gold colour (hence Morthang's bone hilt). I'd already done one model, an Orc Boss, with a red helmet, and liked the effect, so that's what I went for.

In a full game, when I can afford the points, I'll probably give him The Trickster's Helm. It's a pricy magic item, but quite useful for a tough old Black Orc (it forces enemies to reroll successful to-wound rolls). There's also a nice connection to my WFRP character, Adhemar, that would take too long to explain here.

Morthang from the side! From the side! (obscure Lee Evans reference)

Overall, he's painted more roughly than I'd like. I'll probably tidy some bits up (I've manged to get red in the wyvern's armpit. Wingpit?) and some of the drybrushing's a bit rough. But once he was based, he really came together, and I'm pretty chuffed overall.

Now, Andy also mentioned that Morthang was accompanied by an Orc Shaman, Drogrot Gorkeye. This fanatical visionary is convinced Morthang is the reincarnation of Mork himself, destined to bind all the Orcs together in the greatest Waaagh the world has ever seen.

Now, while the Warhammer Orc shaman is a cracking model, it didn't really capture the steely-eyed intensity Andy was describing. So, I turned to Avatars of War, who do some cracking figures. Their Orc Shaman, in particular, is wicked, and looks the part. So he became my Drogrot:

Drogrot Gorkeye; driven

I love this model. The detail, the pose. Brilliant, and really fits the character. His cloak has some cool details on it too, severed hands and skulls and what-not.

Detail on Drogrot's cloak: pleased with the severed hands!

Through an online shopping debacle, I've ended up with two of this model: I intend to convert one to become a Battle Standard bearer, but more on that later.

I've wittered on for quite long enough, all that remains is to tot up my points so far...

Lords - 320 (25%)
 Morthang on Wyvern

Heroes - 190 (15%)
 Drogrot (level 2), Mord (level 2)

Core - 615 (49%)
 10 x Savage Orc Big Uns, 15 x Orc Boyz, 20 x Goblins, 10 Spider Riders, 5 Wolf Riders

Special - 135 (11%)
 5 x Orc Boar Boyz

Total - 1,260

Not bad, not bad at all. I should also mention here that I'm using Quartermaster, an army building app that is aces. Love it.

I still have a Savage Orc Big Boss to finish painting, and a BSB to convert, and I think I'll buy myself some Savage Orc Boyz this week too. Time Skargutz's Boyz got reinforced.

Waaaagh!

'Ere We Go, 'Ere We Go, 'Ere We Go!

So, while my painting speed has slowed down dramatically since the start of term, I have finished my next unit, and the final unit from my battalion: the Orc Boyz.

 

Orc Boyz

I'm really pleased with how they've turned out. The models are lovely, and characterful (albeit characteristically difficult to rank up), and I think the unit looks good, despite the very quick, production-line paint jobs. 

Boss

Here's the Boss (unit champion) of the Boyz. I'm yet to come up with a good name for him, though I think "Skull-taka" may be an appropriate epithet. 

Boy

This is a bog-standard Orc Boy. Nothing special about him, except he reminded me of the old Heroquest Orcs, which were the first models I ever painted.

Heroquest Orc - not painted by me!

See what I mean? I suspect the sculptor did that deliberately. Made me smile. :)

Musician

Here's the musician - it's hard to see in the photo, but one of his eyes are white. There was a scar modeled on, so I thought it would be nice to have that eye blind as a result.

Standard Bearer

Yes, once again I went for the lazy option of the totemic standard. Can you blame me? :) I like this model, though he does look like he's walking into a Force 10 gale. He's been counter-balanced with a penny in his base, and he still tips over all the time!

I'll do a post about choices and army building soon(ish), as well as a step by step on my wolfriders. 

Until then...Waaaaaaaagh!

Like a boss

So I'm painting my final unit from the battalion now, my orc boyz. I had a lot of fun sticking them together; there are lots of little extra details - skulls, spikes and whatnot - so when it came to making the boss (unit champion) I decided to go a little over the top. What the hell, they're Orcs!

Boss.

I've given the orcs the same shield design, which features a red skull glyph, which will give the unit some colour. I decided to give the boss a red helmet too, to make him stand out. I think the other Boyz will have metal helms.

Boss from other side (don't ask me for
imaginative captions, I'm tired!)

I like how he's turned out. The ridiculous spikes and skulls look OK actually, and I like the helmet. The photos don't show that the eyes are painted, because they're the same colour as the helmet.

But I'm chuffed. Just 14 more of the buggers to paint and the battalion is done!

Arachnophobes, beware!

Unit #4: done!

I painted my Spider Riders a little brighter, to make the army as a whole more colourful. I'm not 100% happy with the effect, but it definitely fits the army colour scheme. I may, when I do another batch, opt for a different spider-effect.

Not as professionally photographed as Andy's!

One of the things I'm not sold on is the eyes. Red on red is a bit weird, but I couldn't think of another colour I wanted to do them. I could do green, I suppose? I may go back and do that later. Another thing is that they don't photograph well: the standard in particular is leaning forward at a weird angle.

So that takes me up to over 600 points.

That's all for now, first practice games tomorrow... (or later today, I should say!)