WiP Build Day: Augusta the Mother Superior (SF), Survivors after the Butcher, and a murder of Vampires!

My habit of not opening things until I'm ready to work on them means that when I'm on a roll I end up outrunning my prepped projects. It feels great really!  Even if I have to stop painting and do some building.... when I'm really into the brush thing.

This week's builds include Augusta the Mother Superior from Raging Heroes and the next iteration of Survivors from our current Kingdom Death Monster campaign.

 Augusta is a massive terminator style armored sci-fi warrior nun.  Her retinue is in the assembly queue as well.  I'm low on 40mm bevel bases, having accidentally stocked up on the round lip variety, and think that these might be a good target for a set of 3D printed bases as I'm expecting the new printer to arrive in the next couple of weeks and bases seem like a good first project for it.

She comes in 4 parts and, due to the detailed baroque style, requires more cleanup than most Raging Heroes models. Once cleaned the model goes together well and RH has made clever use of the details to hide the joins.

 Speaking of Kingdom Death Monster... I've been anticipating the arrival of the Expansions of Death and was very excited to see a HUGE box on my doorstep!

I opened the box to find...

The Order of Vampire Hunters Kickstarter!

Not what I was expecting but still very cool!

Apparently I don't read my e-mail... they sent notice and tracking info .. etc..

I was still living in Transylvania when this Kisckstater launched and was really feeling the theme so... I bit for the whole set with the thought that it would be so fun to run a spooky Vampire Hunting game in Transylvania... and then promptly learned I was moving to Alaska... still a fun place to be and the extended day/night cycles would be interesting for vampires...

 Unlike Kingdom Death I'm hoping that this is a little more easy to run for community game night and to recruit new gaming blood... so to speak...  I love Kingdom Death but its a game for gamers and isn't as easy to grasp for new players as a good, old school,vampire hunt.

Here you see the regular production sets... the core game, three expansions, and four character or adversary mini packs.












... and here you see the thing about kickstarters that is so attractive... the freebies, extra loot, and exclusives that won't make it to retail.

In this case the extras pile is pretty huge and includes additional playing tiles, new Hunters and Adversaries, extra dice and some fang embellished dice bags.

So now, while prepping for the next KDM campaign session and finishing up the Star Saga core set, I need to learn this game and paint up the starter set to take to the monthly game night... and then there is Twisted calling... oh ... and Daughters of Khaine...  zoom zoom zoom!

Void Elf Hunters WiP and Dark Souls the Board Game WiP

Happy New Year!

I'm looking forward to working on loads of new projects this year and I hope you are too!

First up, from Dark Souls the Board Game we have the assembled cast of Player Characters.

The players can select The Knight, The Warrior, The Herald, or The Assassin.                               The sculpts themselves are technically good although none of them really excited me.         Part of that might be that there are only four of them and, except for The Assassin, they are all very similar in appearance.





I thought it was an odd composition to have a warrior and a knight but no pure caster... but its true to the video game.

I elected to go with a cool color mix for the player group and decided on the color scheme for the "Good Guy Floor"

The floor was painted as a large square patter of blue and rust.

The blue quarters were painted Deep Sky Blue, washed with Secret weapon Sapphire, stippled with Sky Blue and re-stippled with pure white.                                                           

 The rust quarters were the base Krylon bronze primer paint combo brush spattered with Secret Weapon Copper Fitting, and dry brushed with Gamescience Rustungs Farbe.

The Bosses, Mini-Bosses, and Elites of what I think of as the "constructs" group are coming along in their Red and Brass kind of way although the guy with the big bell-hammer is looking a little seasonal  >.> 

There is also the "Fleshy and Decayed" group and they are making progress as well.  They still have a lot of red but will replace most of the brass with bone whites.

 For the "big trash and little trash" group I started down a rotten road with purplish fleshy bits... this might be tricky given the low contrast with the red clothing bits so I'll have to work on bringing up the separation a bit.  Rotten greens might have been a better choice... certainly an easier one... but I was feeling that I wanted the trash group to be a little less green, red, and brass to underscore the difference between them and the more elite types.






The Void Elves are making progress.  The first group was primed with the Krylon Khaki Camouflage paint and dry-brushed white.  The pain seems to be adhering well and I'm hoping this is a quick and viable Ynnari theme... I can even retain the Void Elf nomenclature for the Ynnari faction.  I've got two more groups of five of these being constructed.

Finally the first mini getting prepped for Mantic's Star Saga!

Star Saga looks like it falls into the Action RPG light category more than into the Dungeon crawler boardgame category.  Lots of detail and fiddly bits. Templates, multiple action lots of character descriptions.  If it had a character creation system it would be on its way to being an actual RPG... I might have to work on that...  The Warpath Universe is looking pretty interesting these days and the first novel I read in the setting didn't disappoint.

We are looking forward to knocking out our first game of it this week.

Back to the brushes!

Mistress Slithiss SF and Fantasy

 Mistress Slithiss, Lust Elf Excruciatrix..

These models are the Sci-Fi and Fantasy versions of Mistress Slithiss.  They are visually related but they get to their floating, multi-limbed, incarnation of exquisite pain by different roads.

The models actually have no shared components which is kinda awesome!

 Both float above the battlefield and both sport numerous limbs but the Fantasy version has organic, clawed, tentacles while the Sci-Fi version is all metal and warped technology.

Here are some scenes with Shiveryah, Void Elf Sorceress Sci-Fi version.  Void elves are, more or less, straight up Dark Elves in space.. ie. Dark Eldar.... shhhh!

The Sci-Fi version of Slithiss could also be serviceable as a Dark Eldar Haemonculous or as an ADMech Techpriest.

 I'm really pumped up about the fantasy version because, in addition to being a great sculpt, its less of a proxy type figure than we usually see from Raging Heroes.  The whole Lust Elf line can be used as proxies for Slaanesh of course but I like the backstory of "The Burned Ones" and Chaos Elves have always occupied a rare, terrifying, place on the fringes of fantasy.

 The models are complex, each having eight parts... maybe more... oops! And the parts interact in a complex way. Since these are game pieces I took advantage of this interaction to add a few additional glue points to make the models a little more sturdy.

I went with a 20mm square base here because my Fantasy armies, RPG figures, and a lot of my terrain collection, particularly the huge pile of Tabletop World buildings, are scaled for this size base.  If I was new in the hobby I'd go with the larger circular bases just because they give more room for modelling but, with almost 40 years of work using 20mm bases for human size models I'll stick to them where I can.

 Because these were two versions of the same character I went with a similar color scheme on each. I'll use the Lust Elves as a Chaos warband although the SF versions (most of the Lust Elves do not have separate Fantasy and Sci-Fi version) may spend some time as "advisors" to my Void Elves... er Dark Eldar!

Most of my play these days is narrative and I use home brew rules for all the RH factions in a 40K splinter setting.  I'm also looking forward to the games and setting that RH is working on. While their core business is proxies they have done a lot of work creating interesting backgrounds for their models and I'm looking forward to exploring that.

 Initially I thought I'd go with a darker skin tone... kind of along the lines of the Slaanesh Daemonettes.. a purple/gray malevolent flesh look, but I had trouble with getting a purple based monochrome look that I liked at tabletop viewing range (ie. 3ft) so I lightened up the skin to get some contrast.  The addition of color coded wiring to the SF version makes it more fun to look at on the tabletop as well.

 Some WiP Cottage #2 from Tabletop World have got into the pictures.  I'm making a couple of changes to by basic procedure on these buildings, mostly some subsurface dry-brush and reversing the order of painting between the stone and wood, and it looks like it improves speed a good bit... I'm not sure the reversal works as well for the interior but I'll know soon.

As these are a wee bit on the run down side I might have another experiment in static grass... maybe!

 Next in line are the cottages, a shipping container, and some Undertown scatter while I start assembling the Void Elf Hunter squads.

The Hunter squads have a lot of fine parts so I'm curious to see how easily I can get them off the sprue...

That is a lot of limbs!

Mantis Warriors and Ork Dok & Grots WiP

We've been living in a hotel room for the past month which has played Havoc with my Hobby time!  I've got a few bits of work done but have mostly been consumed with the moving process.

Anyway I did manage to build and prep some of the new Mantis Warriors from Raging Heroes TGG 2, a Dwarf Drill from Mantic's Kings of War bonus points program, and an Ork Dok with some Grot assistants from Kromlech via Bits of War.  All are still very much WiP.

The Mantis Warriors are brilliant sculpts with fixed leg poses and ball joint shoulders.  There are, as is typical with RH kits, a fair amount of spare bits... in this case mostly claw arms in different poses, or heft. 

 I'm using the basing scheme I used with The Blood Rain and painting these in sort of an earth elemental style with the idea that I might use them as alternative Wracks for Dark Eldar, as Wood Elf Dryads, as part of a Forces of Nature collection for Kings of War, or Daemonettes.

I've based these Vallejo Foundation White and then base coated Vallejo Dark Flesh. In the test model I've followed that with an application of Secret Weapon Green Wash to hair and clothing bits then washed the whole thing with P3 Flesh Wash... which is a purplish flesh and seems to sit well with these colors.

The Kromlech Orks are hilarious sculpts and easily large enough to stand with GW Orks. they cleaned up well and take paint quite well but are a bit on the brittle side, as resin goes, so there was some breakage, particularly among the tools, that I'll have to patch up.

I've been experimenting with an ultrasonic cleaner on these new models with mixed results.  Hopefully that will improve as I get more practice using it.  Basically it does a great job on metal but resin is still hit and miss.  The Kromlech stuff came out clean on the first bath but the RH models took about four baths with some good scrubbing in between.

A Tale of Two Ravens part 2. and some TGG 2 freebies

 Raven the Chainbreaker.  Iconic Freedom fighter of the Jailbirds.  This model is in a great pose that such screams rage and rebellion. 

Here they are in both scales... heroic 28mm and 54 mm.

I've depicted her armed with silver ammunition and blessed guns thinking that she is the best, and possibly last, line against the Kurganov Werewolves that hunt the elusive rebel Jailbirds.

 In 28mm she'll take the field mostly against KST (Kurganov Storm Troopers) in my adaptaion.  She'll have bonuses against the KST (Particularly against werewolves) and will, of course, have a price on her head that would make her joining a Jailbirds Division unit in KST service impossible.

She is wearing Prison Pride Orange and appears as the Bloody Red Banner of Revolution itself. 

 The models come in 4 parts and this version is resin. 

 The 54 mm version was a lot of fun and allowed me to more easily see some of the details that I might have missed on the 28... like the little smiley face button and ribbon or the boot straps that are mixed in with the rags around her legs.

 Next on deck are a couple of metal version Jailbird Division LT Parkers and something from Mantic's Abyssal Dwarf Army.

 Lastly a couple more of the freebies from the TGG2 Kickstarter!

Based for Mordheim is Scout Celenia who will also often serve as a vampire hunter both in Mordheim and in Frostgrave.  With her is the mascot Tobias although this one is intended for use with the SF version of the Sisters of Eternal Mercy.

Scout Celenia has an awful lot of armor for a scout so I chalk it up to the vampire problem... and trimmed her with a little green just to be kind of scout-y...  I like the red blaze in the middle of her abdomen and she'll have that in common with the rest of her order.

Daughters of the Crucible TGG2

Daughters of the Crucible

Communication with the colony of Rorschach IV had been lost months ago and the Sisters of Eternal Mercy had dispatched the Daughters of the Crucible to find out why.  It was now clear that it had fallen victim to the predations of Void Elf pirates.

Unencumbered by the iconic power-armored habits favored by the rest of the Sisters the Daughters moved silently through the murky darkness of the warehouse in their own trademark body gloves. The Void Elves, under their infamous leader Ashara, had converted this structure into slave pens for the former inhabitants of the mining colony searching for control functions and guards.  The Daughters were careful not to alert any of the prisoners to their presence to preserve the element of surprise.  Clad as they were they could easily be mistaken for elves in the darkness, by humans anyway, so they moved quickly and purposefully about their mission.  Any Void Elf encountered was quickly, and silently, subdued by lightning quick strikes with bare hand and foot.  The Daughters have such control of their unique spiritual Martial Art that they seem to defy gravity itself when on the move.  Each silent punch, or kick, in the dark guided by the sure knowledge that an adversary would cross it's path.  Once on station Sister "Cookie" La Loca began the Mass, the flashes from her brace of double barreled revolvers turned the warehouse into a stop action film as she was illuminated, eyes closed, firing serenely and precisely into the Void Elf command element.  She recited "Darkness and Light"  as she fired and, at each congregational response, the other Sisters added their individual voice to the smoking darkness each consumed by ecstatic epiphany as she rode the "Sight" and the veritable hail of bullets never finding an accidental target... if targets were even the right word.  Sister Spookie Pepi, almost ethereal in the smoke and broken light, walked forward firing her brace of pistols, seemingly at random, while Void elves fell, surprised... as if they just happened into the line of fire.  By the time the prayer was complete the Void Elves had been destroyed and the liberation of the faithful could begin.









The Daughters of the Crucible are one of the few Orders dedicated primarily to service and street ministry maintained by the Sisters of Eternal Mercy.  Often seen among the masses of the cities they maintain close contact with the lowest members of the societies they serve and have become adept  at infiltration, quick strike, rapid response and covert operations.  The Daughters are among the most beloved units fielded by the Order and are uniquely equipped for their task.  They have always maintained their direct connection to the people they serve, even as the rest of the Sisters of Eternal Mercy drifted into splendid isolation and political distraction.  They are among the most spiritual of the Sisters that remain visible to the people, famed for their charity and compassion, their movements are almost magical. Typically they are employed independently, at squad strength or less, for missions where a full Battle Congregation would be difficult or impossible to use.  They are also used when the Order deploys a full Congregation in the role of scout or saboteur.





Equipment and abilities:

Eschewing the signature power armored habits of the Sisterhood at large in favor of psychically sensitive body gloves that neutralize their silhouette, scent, sound, and heat signatures to maximize their infiltration abilities they also carry unique double barreled revolvers which allow for very high burst rates of close range fire and they ability to carry specialized munitions.  The Daughters are also masters of unarmed combat and both abilities are influenced by their devotion.  They appear to have a precognitive  ability they call "The Sight" triggered by ritual prayer which permits them to melee or fire with their eyes closed for a boost to accuracy.  They are not technically even aiming at an opponent in this state but firing down lines of destiny and probability where their opponents literally move to intercept the bullet, foot, or fist that just happens to cross their path. This is an especially useful ability for night fighting and ambush tactics.   

I think there will be 9 different models for this unit (4 in the troops set and 5 in the command group) I managed to get 4 but am not certain which group set the come from... and it may be both.

Most of the Sisters of Eternal Mercy are armored up and they even have some terminator equivalents. The exceptions are the Davidians, which make great stand ins for Repentia, and the Daughters of the Crucible which I'll likely use as agents of the Inquisition or part of an Inquisitor's retinue. 

 The colors here are chosen to fit in with a daemon Hunter army that has been a regular feature at the annual Geekfest.  I recently acquired it from it's builder and painter A.M. and it'll be the subject of its own post in the near future... but more on that later!

I thought about adding Inquisition Icons to these, and left room to do it later, but I have hopes that Raging Heroes might produce their own game so decide to hold off a little while on the specific details.

 Ahh here is one of the Freebies from the TGG2 it's a mascot for the Sister's and... ack!  I can't remember if it's Vladimir or Tobias!  I have it labelled as Tobias but now.... I wonder!

I decided to go completely fanciful with the color scheme to emphasize its chimerical nature.  Kind of like an attack Owl/Parrot/Raccoon... in crazy colors!

The wee beastie is on a log which I extended a bit with greenstuff to get a better angle when viewed from the tabletop.  I typically paint things for view from three feet and on a gaming surface.  Often there are really cool figures with gorgeous faces.... looking down... and thus... un-viewable in the game environment.  I try to notice this and adjust the angles where I can.

 The sisters have colorful names as they are unit of Heroines or Champion types and not really faceless troopers.  From top to bottom of the post they are:  Sister "Cha Cha" Clemencia, Sister "Cookie" La Loca, Sister "Spookie" Pepi, and Sister "Two Tricks" Felicidad.

 The Daughters of the Crucible are part of the Toughest Girls of the Galaxy 2 Kickstarter from Raging Heroes.  If you like these you can still pledge for a couple of more days. They plan to open the Pledge Manager this week and will close pledges at that time.

Toughest Girls of the Galaxy 2 Preview; Executrix Champion Sephea and Dark Elf Mascot Violet

I got a preview set of the the freebies from the Toughest Girls of the Galaxy 2 "Darkness and Light" (TGG 2) and I'll be painting them up just as fast as I can manage but, even though the freebie set contains Sisters and Lust Elves I really fixed on Executrix Sephea and the Mascot Violet as my first targets.

 Its kind of funny that I first got interested in the Kickstarter because of the Sisters of the Chalice/Orphanage and then became completely enthralled by the Lust Elves and now have really started looking hard at the Void and Dark Elves.

 I usually play Dark Eldar in 40K and have proxied some RH stuff in my armies before... Asharah SF version as the Archon of the Blood Rain, and the Blood Vestals SF version for Wyches as well as the fantasy versions for Witch Elves.  Because I have a full blown Dark Eldar army already built and painted up I thought I'd have less interest in proxy Dark Eldar... boy was I wrong about that!  At this point I'll be building a parallel pure Void Elf army, complete with its own backgrounds, as kind of a "Darker Eldar" army that is related to my main Force  "The Blood Rain".



The figures are very finely detailed and crisply cast.  There are few mold lines and they are generally well placed.  After a thorough cleaning I primed up Sephea and Violet and set to work.







The Blood Rain has a very identifiable color scheme and the new Void Elf Shard is going to as well.  First things first, Asharah's Void Elves will be the "Vertigo Shard" and will have a lot of asymetric designs worked into the heroes and vehicles... I'm thinking that the Blood Rain will retain the old school Dark Eldar vehicles while the Vertigo Shard will get the new style... we'll see how that plays out for troops but these minis are so inspiring I might go there!

My first thought is to take the iconic Incubi... all black and skulls and scary... and re-imagine them in rose and indigo.  You see that here with Sephea and Violet... who will serve as the Shard's Communion Familiar... sort of a modified creature that talks to lesser beings so the Void Elves don't have to... The actual Executrix troops will have the same, or a reverse, of Sephea's scheme... all depends on how the rose sits against the flesh... tricksey!

 I imagine Executrix Sephea's first meeting with Val'orn Archon of the Hidden Kindred to have gone something like this:


 "Dire Lord!  The Void Kin vessel approaches as anticipated." whispered the diminutive Communion Familiar.
Archon Val'orn of the Hidden Kindred, vassals of the Blood Rain Kabal, winced.  He did not agree with this course of action but the Kabal  had chosen this path and he was compelled to obey.

 "Dispatch Ar'Rrath" he directed.








 "Void Sisters we welcome your arrival and look forward to this exchange. Klaivex Ar'Rrath is on his way to you. When can we expect your Executrix?" the tones of the communion familiar were carefully cultivated... radiating an indifference just short of actual insult... it was unclear, to the uninitiated, whether or not a reply was actually expected.


 "You may expect me now." replied a lilting and remotely amused voice from the foot of the command dais.  A tall blonde female Void Elf, for no outsider had ever seen a male Void Elf... if indeed any of them existed, clad in brilliant blue and pale rose armor stood gracefully in the single moment before the command deck erupted in furious activity.

 Two Incubi clad in the heavy armor, and bearing the signature great blades of their profession, moved rapidly to flank the new arrival.


 "How quaint, you actually wear....black... oh, and skulls.... yes there are skulls!  I imagine that is fearsome!" mused the newcomer.

"Stay your blades Incubi!" laughed Val'orn "I suspect this is Executrix Sephea... your new Klaivex."

The Incubi came to a sudden, and complete, halt as Val'orn turned his attention to Sephea... "I expect to learn something of that trick as part of this exchange but recommend that you use it with caution while you are among the Blood Rain."

For all his glib demeanor Val'orn was off his guard.  The Void Elves had a reputation that was equal parts mystery and terror, even by the standards of the Kabal, but this sparkling gem did not align with his own vision of fear.

"As you command Dire Lord, although... if I might mention such a trifle... while caution might be useful if simple fear is your desire" a slight pause, a blatantly incredulous eye cast toward the Incubi she was to command, she continued "it's usefulness is substantially diminished when invoking true terror."

"We shall see Executrix... we shall see..."  Val'orn retreated within the protective void bubble of his command throne and wondered again about the wisdom of this course.



The story is still unfolding but such an auspicious beginning!




Sephea and Violet, in its role as Communion Familiar. The Mascot "Violet" should probably be renamed to "Indigo" in my service since I painted her that way... but, reduce confusion, Violet she remains!

Sephea seen paired with a rare female Archon from GW.

Oh... before I forget completely!

Painting notes:

Skin: Basic Flesh (Vallejo), Flesh Wash (P3), retouched with Basic Flesh.

Indigo areas: Nightmare Black (Reaper), Deep Sky Blue (Vallejo) highlights, wash Sapphire (Secret Weapon), spot highlights Deep Sky Blue.

Rose areas: Rose Brown (Vallejo), highlights Brains Pink (Reaper), wash Drying Blood (Secret Weapon), retouch Rose brown, spot highlight brains pink.

Designs in the rose area were painted between just before the first wash using Deep  Red (Reaper)



I based her on the same Blasted Swamp (Secret Weapon) bases that majority The Blood Rain is based on.  I thought about a separate basing scheme for the Vertigo Shard but they may still be used with the Blood Rain quite a lot and it will be more unifying to have the bases regularized.

Oh! before I forget.... Sephea and Violet are both part of the big pile of freebies you get for pledging at the LT. level or higher.  It's still possible to join the Kickstarter if you do it before the Pledge Manager opens.  Raging Heroes expects this to happen in less than two weeks.

Next up... Nuns with Guns!