Patlee Salamander Stargazer on Celestial Shrine

 

I've always wanted a Skink Mage Priest to run as a rebel faction hero.  There have been a few notable Skink heroes but the Slann always had a lock on the Mage Priest role.

Raging Heroes Infinite comes to the rescue with the 3D printable Patlee Salamander Stargazer on Celestial Shrine.

This was printed on a Photon Ultra in Anycubic Basic Gray resin and was painted directly on the resin with no primer coat. In retrospect, models with this much gold would probably work out better over black resin.

I'm finding that I can often leverage the color of the resin to either speed up painting or to get new effects. So far paint adhesion and durability have been excellent.

In this case a regular process for the gold color is Brass Casings (Secret Weapon (SW)) base, wash with Flesh Wash (SW), Drybrush Necron Compound (GW). Over black resin that would have been all that was needed. Over the gray I ended up doing some lining with Dark Tone Ink (Army Painter (AP)). I'm still not entirely happy with the color depth for the gold.

 
I've recently been playing a lot of Horizon: Forbidden West and have really enjoyed the way colors are depicted for tribal societies. Its making me reconsider some of my more earth tone heavy schemes for medievals, elves, etc...

Speaking of earth tone heavy schemes... I've been tinkering with some Supers and Pulp Action Heroes with some 3D printable files from Bombshell. I'll also be doing some Retro Sci-Fi and messing around with Counterblast.

Back to the bench!

RoC Chaos Dwarf Whirlwind

This guy accompanied many a Chaos Horde into battle in the 80s. The model was showing its age and I thought I'd do some touch ups, rebase it and generally do some long neglected maintenance.  Lets call him Hagar.

First things first... Hagar needed to be removed from his old cardboard base. Typical of the 80s the base was flocked, had a couple of raw pebbles glued to it, and... unusually... a hob-goblin child (Grenadier iirc) added for scenic context.  The little Hob isn't visible here but will show up later as I'll recycle it onto the new base.

Having divested Hagar of his old base it was time to give him a new one. This base was from Reaper (R) and was layered with White Pumice (V). Grooves and hoof tramples were made before the pumice dried also a couple of Citadel (GW) skulls, and the Hob-Child... which is still hidden behind fat old Hagar!

The base was given a coat of Flesh Wash (Secret Weapon (SW) and brushed with Sunny Flesh (Vallejo (V) brushed with Sand (V), and a final top dust of Splintered Bone (R).

I used Wet Mud Weathering Powder (Forge World (FW) set with Glaze Medium (V) to get the churned mud beneath the machine that tracks out the rear of the model.  This dried very flat so I used Satin Varnish (V) to give it a wet look.

Static Grass (mud) was the final bit on the base.

The Hob-Child can be seen sitting in the tattered remains of an orange shift crying as Hagar drives obliviously past her.  Fortunately she was spared the mowing doled out to everyone else!

For Hagar and his machine I retouched rather than re-imagined.  The metal parts of the machine were treated to my usual yellow or white metal work ups and the skin was painted Sunny Flesh (V), Flesh Wash (SW) and Basic Flesh (V).

The shield was updated from a faded gold to a more solid color with Brass Casings (SW), Flesh Wash (SW) and Silver (V) highlights. Baby Poop (SW) was spot washed to add color to the shading. Fresh Blood (R) highlighted with Phoenix Red (V) was used to accent the eyes and color the gums. Teeth were changed from base metal to off-white using Graveyard Bone (R) highlight with Splintered Bone (R).

Wood was Flesh Wash (SW) and Sunny Flesh dry-brush to reinforce the old wood color and make the grains pop.

Hagar's horns were redone as they had faded to a nondescript gray over the past 3+ decades.  Handle Wood (R), Flesh Wash (SW) brushed out with Graveyard Bone (R) and Splintered Bone (R).

Some lining with Soft Body Black (SW) wrapped up the project.

Its great to have Hagar ready to renew his assault on the tabletop! The modern oval base should make a good fit with newer games and not be to much trouble when he returns to the fight Oldhammer style!

Back to the desk!

 

Mantis Warriors

 I'm back from an extended stumble around the Balkan States.  Its a fascinating part of the world that I had low familiarity with.  It was an amazing time, I got a lot of great new ideas to work with, and my Romanian is getting closer to being "passable"! 

Playing catch up... again!

Here are the finished Mantis Warriors from Raging Heroes!

 They are meant, as all things Raging Heroes have been to date, as proxies for various games.

This set is based for use with my Dark Eldar or to use as Daemonettes in a Chaos Army for either WHFB or WH40K... I guess that would really mean AoS these days as well!

 The minis are resin, multi-pose able with arms, head, and the torso/leg section ball jointed.  the legs are a single piece so are not individually pose able without major surgery.

I chose woodland colors so they would have a wider variety of potential uses and green can still look quite evil and menacing too!

The water effects were an experiment. My Dark Eldar army uses these Swamp Bases from Secret Weapon.  I was using Citadel Water Effects to fill the bases after painting but have had a lot of issues with the water effect never really setting up.

  Its ok for display pieces but my stuff is almost always for game use so I wanted a more durable finish... not to mention the long term dust and handling problems... like leaving finger prints on the lager water surfaces!

Anyway I tried Vallejo Water effects but failed to notice that they are opaquely pigmented.  I'd asked about how they performed at a hobby shop in Germany and was shown a clear sample... which I mistook to be representative of all their water effects .  I used Atlantic Blue... which completely obliterated the painted insides of the bases... and left a deep blue finish that was very ... un-swamp-like!

I washed over the water effects with Secret Weapon Sewer Water and hit it with some gloss spot varnish.  The results were good and its a lot easier to replicate, not to mention a lot less work, than my original method.  I'd still like to come up with a viable clear solution but it'll do for now!

 I liked the Musician a lot.. having a violin as the martial instrument does seem pretty edgy and ideal for chaotic or evil armies! 

This is the unit champion.  Its most noticeable differences are the head, which sports and elaborate set of horns, and the right arm which has a larger, fancier, shoulder.

Next up... some legacy GW servitors and the rubber vegetation from Atenocities Workshop's Forward Base!

Supreme Ironcaster on Greater Abyssal

Its a Mantic kind of day.  I'm trying to clear the stuff that is currently on the table while I begin preparing to move at the end of next month.

I started this guy a while back when my wife, my nephew, and myself went on a Dwarf jag!  This is the first of the Mantic Abyssal Dwarfs that I painted as a result of my participation in the Kings of War 2 ed. Kickstarter.

The model is huge and based on Mantic's Dragon.  It uses the plastic body and wings of that model and marrys it to a huge metal head/saddle/Ironcaster.  It's a good thing the base is so large as the model is tres top heavy!

 The model was painted in sub assemblies, sprayed black and brushed up with basic colors then washed and highlighted.  The saddle area got some patterning that was buried under a few layers of red glaze.

The Ironcaster himself has filed teeth and looks to be wearing clothes made out of large bits of material roughly stitched together.  A very... evil cannibal... kinda vibe. I elected to treat it as the tanned hides of fallen foes... possibly used in the process by which the Greater Abyssal, which is a denizen of The Pit and not actually related to Dragons, was bound to the Ironcaster's service.

 The Model will also Serve in my WHFB Chaos Dwarf army... which exists in my collection mainly as an allied contingent from 3 ed... I've been collecting for a bit and will update to the Tamurkhan list using an appropriately heretical mix of Mantic and GW models.

I still have not made the transition to Age of Sigmar... and I may not for mass Fantasy Battles.  I understand its a good, fun, game but its not Warhammer as I know it so instead of leaping directly into something Nothammer from GW I'm looking at a lot of different rule sets.  So far I've investigated Kings of War, 9th Age, Shieldwolf, and Warthrone to fill that Mass Fantasy Battle slot.  Of that group, so far, I prefer 9th Age and Kings of War.  Warthrone seems a bit twitchy with leadership and Shieldwolf isn't as far along in development as the rest. It's also entirely possible that I'll just fall back into a modified WHFB 3 ed. updated with the models and some the rules improvements of the later editions.