Mord's Ladz

Waaagh!

Second unit: done.

As I mentioned last post, I elected to make a unit of Goblins my second unit choice. Mostly because I like the sneaky devious beggars, but also because I wanted to try out some proper army painting.

While I wouldn't describe my Savage Orcs as masterpieces, I did spend some time on them. But a Greenskin horde is, well, as horde, and if I'm going to get it painted, I'm going to need to relearn the skills I honed working for GW: production line painting.

And behold, the slightly blurry results...

Goblin Archers. Fear us.

I'm pleased with how they look en mass. Taken individually, they're a bit scrappy, but as a unit they look good. The bows and skin tones are fairly consistent. The clothes are mostly brown, of various shades, with a little grey in there too. Most of the top knots are grey too, with a little red here and there for a splash of colour. The shields are all different too, with different coloured skulls on them etc.

I didn't want any sense of uniformity: this lot are the scavengers of the Old World, stickin' folks with arrers, then lootin' their corpses. Indeed, I may ask Andy & Lindsay Lawhammer if they have any spare shields or helmets etc. that I can mix in with my next gobbo unit for a bit more variety.

Another reason for the more basic paint job, and production line painting, is that they're much smaller than the Orcs. Less than half the size!

So, with 2 units and a hero choice painted, I've got myself a legal, albeit tiny, army.

So, what's the damage, points-wise? As I track the running total, I'll assume full command groups, but no magic items. When it comes to playing, there will be shinies, and I may not always need bosses in units, but for now, they're in.

No magic items, precious?

Here's my list so far:

Mord: 90 points
Goblin Shaman (55)
Level 2 upgrade (35)

Savage Orcs: 125 points
10 x SOs (80)
Additional Hand Weapon (10)
Boss - Skargutz (15)
Musician & Standard Bearer (20)

Goblins: 110 points
20 x Goblins (60)
Shields (10)
Short Bows (10)
Boss, Musician & Standard (30)

TOTAL: 325

Mord's Ladz: Waaagh!

325 points, eh? That's... not a lot. And both units are only MINIMUM sized. Wow. 

Still, onwards and upwards. I reckon I'll probably invest in another battalion box later, not to mention the converted wolf riders. And I'm definitely getting some nasty skulkers. And maybe a Wyvern. Or an Arachnorok Spider. Or both. But that's all later, when Uncle Visa is feeling less stressed. 

For my next unit, I've opted for Boar Boyz. Orc heavy cavalry. I'd love to say I picked them because they're high points value, but the truth is I picked them a: because the models are wicked, and b: because I knew I was going to give them spears and shields. I'm not sure yet how I'm going to arm my orc boyz or spider-riders, so this option allowed me to delay deciding for a while. 

Until then, Waaagh, and all that.

Gobbos

So having painted up everything I owned, by completing my shaman, yesterday I picked up my battalion and began putting them together.

Mord

My choices were Orc Boyz (infantry), Orc Boar Boyz (heavy cavalry), Forest Goblin Spider Riders (fast cavalry) and Goblin Boyz (infantry).

While I love fast cav, and spider riders in particular, they're going to need a little conversion work to make them look less static, so I opted for my Goblin Boyz.

Goblin archers

I gave them short bows - Gobbos have a WS of only 2, but a BS of 3. While ranks of Gobbo spearmen look cool, they're not much cop, unless you're using the unit as a meat shield to deliver characters into combat. As that's not my style, I wanted a unit that would look good, and would make sense, character wise.

Gobbos are sneaky gitz, so short bows it was. A musician is a must, to reform to maximise shooting / combat, and they're so cheap I gave them a standard too. I also opted to give them shields (1/2 a point each!). I put a boss model in there, but truth be told I'm likely not to bother with a boss.

They were tricky as hell to get to rank up, but they look awesome.

There were also loads of bitz left over, which got me to thinking...I mentioned before, that I'm not a fan of the wolves that come with the Goblin Wolfriders. And honestly, can you blame me?

Wolf Riders are awesome: these wolves are not.

GW did recently release some outstanding wolf models, for 40K, in the form of the Space Wolves' Fenrisian Wolves.

Fenrisian Wolves from GW: raaaawr!

Baz mentioned he'd seen them converted to carry Gobbos, but the cost of converting Wolf Riders onto those is prohibitive, if I need to buy boxes of wolf-riders, throw away (or try to resell on ebay) the rubbish wolves and buy the cool Fenrisian Wolves. If, on the other hand, I had the bits for wolf-riders left over...

So I checked my sprues. I have tons of Goblin heads left over, as well as some bow arms, lots of spear arms, command arms and shield arms. I have shields. I have heads. I have cavalry legs - this is looking promising... I have everything I need. Except torsos. Dammit! No torsos.

Luckily, I found a bits seller on ebay, and for just over a tenner, I've got 20 goblin torsos winging their way to me. They'll still be expensive wolf-riders, but not nearly as expensive, or as wasteful. But I won't be converting those until next month at the earliest. This month's budget is well and truly spent!