Army for Sale: Skaven Horde....

Update!: Both this and my Undead Skaven army have been sold. 

 Alas, it's time for the last of my WHF armies to go; farewell, my skittering hordes of vile ratmen. We had a blast, and I do mean a lot of blasts. The skaven were an army made to go sideways, and you got a laugh out of it every damn time. 

A bunch of Black Tree Designs models (supplemented by 5 slaves from another range) these metal Clanrats were cheaper as a mob of 20 than a box of GW plastics. Ditto the Plague Monks, Stromvermin, and Gutter Runners below. They didn't come with banners, just poles, so I made some suitably ratty ones from actual cloth scraps from the lining of an old backpack. 

The frenzied plague monks were actually the best unit in the whole codex. Their speed combined with multiple attacks made them an absolute buzzsaw. Didn't wear a scrap of armor, either. 

Stormvermin looked tougher than they played, which was fine because I didn't want the enemy throwing his tougher units against, say, my weak clanrats

This sneaky distraction created as many problems as they'd solved for me, and more than once caused a chain-reaction panic run back to my edge of the board. 

The burly Master Moulder at the end was converted from a Reaper Orc. Some buck teeth and green stuff went a long way to making a buff taskmaster, and believe me, the skaven need keeping in line. I always liked clan Skryre, too. Their weird ramshackle inventions gave the army as a whole a lot of character. 

As warmachines went, the Screaming Bell was a pretty good one, although you had to have your clanrats push the damn thing everywhere, and when they went running.... well...

Perhaps my all-time favorite warmachine was the Doomwheel. This one was built out of the parts I could order from the very much missed GW bits site. They didn't have all the bits on order, so I had to convert up the rest; the back cogs came from some dwarf warmachine or other from another range. Yes, those are are crossbows on the hubs instead of huge blades, which proved to be a boon in the long run because it's easier to transport on its side. 

It was great when it worked, but when the warp lightning cannon misfired, ooooooh boy. Kiss anything nearby good-bye.

The two big Rat Ogres are, in fact, Reaper models converted up to be suitable ratty. At the time, like many others in this army, they were substantially cheaper than the equivalent GW models. Only the one in the middle of the upper 3 is a GW one, in fact. The other two are also from Black Tree. 

While the unreliable Warpfire Thrower always worked reliably for me, the Ratling Gun once scythed down two blocks of my infantry like so much wheat. I never laughed so hard during a wargame in all my life. 

Those three Jezzail teams on the bottom used cannons from another range, but I think together they all look suitable ramshackle enough to be a skaven unit. At the time, you couldn't do much better for missile troops than skaven jezzails. (sigh.)

Buy them together with my undead horde and you get a truly monstrous army LOL.

Ebay listing here. 

Blast from the Past: Warhammer Fantasy Samurai Dwarves

EDIT: This army has been SOLD.

This was my first army, painted nearly 20 years ago, so bear with me if the painting's a little spare. Quite honestly, I can't believe I never shot and posted them before. They're based on the sculpts from company called Old Glory. At the time I had a few fantasy dwarf models from D&D, but wanted something a bit different for the battlefield. Samurai are always cool, so, upon seeing these models in the local (now shuttered, sadly) game store, I seized on the idea of making an army out of them. My one regret was never finding suitably asian cannons for them, though.

Because the sculpts were limited, I had to improvise with what was available for characters and commanders. The Five Sages represented each element (air, water, void, earth, and fire, respectively). My favorite has to be the ice-themed water sage with his snowy base and greenstuff-sculpted beard. 

These ronin could fill in any number of roles, from a small independent unit to more character models. Not everyone is an immortal sage, after all. 

Despite their slow speed and somewhat limited charge range, dwarven warriors were (at the time) some of the best infantry in the game. A solid block of 25 warriors was nothing to sneeze at. 

Likewise, a block of 25 hammerers offers a lot of staying power and could flatten whatever it was pointed at. Sharp eyes will notice some Rackham sculpts at the bottom. Because there were, of course, no hammers in the Old Glory range, I was forced to kitbash their weapons. 

The dwarven army list had no ninjas, but it did have miners that could arrive from underground and chuck blasting charges, which struck me as a very ninja-like thing to do. They could easily bolster their numbers with the ronin sculpts above, as well.

Long range firepower came in the form of a unit of crossbowmen. above, and the below handgunners, whose ranks I never quite filled out. I wish I'd been able to find a set of dragon-mouthed cannons to add some long-range punch, but alas, I haven't played WHF in years, so it's an addition that may never be completed. 

This post is also for archival purposes, as I'll be putting this army up for sale on eBay soon. It kills me to do so, but quite frankly, times are tough and I need the money more than the dwarves.

Edit: On sale now. EBAY LINK HERE

Merry Christmas,Everybody!

In celebration of the season, a nice little diorama of dwarves welcoming in the Yule Beer. I dunno about you, but I always loved seeing the little Christmas Village scenes at the local hobby store when I was a kid. Seeing model trains run through intricately detailed miniature landscapes was probably one of the things that spurred me into our hobby. 


I played WHF before breaking into 40k, and the dwarves, as an army and a miniatures choice, will always be near and dear to my heart. Having missed out on the first few incarnations of the White Dwarf himself, I picked this one up on the anniversary of WD magazine (which, coincidentally, I no longer buy b/c of the price and poor content quality):

Their "official" paint scheme for the model is anything but white, so I immediately painted him grey-white as appropriate. Not the most contrasty paint scheme, but he's called the White Dwarf, which I assume doesn't refer to him being an albino pygmy dressed in reds and greens.  All three figs and the shield were painted separately, and the shield required some major pinning to make it structural. If I ever field a WHF dwarf army again, this model will stand for my general. The published rules for the actual legendary trio are pretty unbalanced (and fun) but I don't see ever using those on the battlefield. 

The beer cart I made for use in playing the first part of the magazine campaign Bugman's Lament, in which you have to defend a beer shipment trundling its way across the battlefield. I'd always hoped the dwarves would gain a beer cart as a chariot choice when the codex was rewritten, but oh well. I still had a lot of fun making this model from bits and bobs, not to mention forgotten minis found in the dark recesses of my local game store. The cart and barrels are from the Mega Miniatures Dungeon Decor line.

Sharp eyes will notice the dwarf as converted from a standard bearer, with the mastehead cut off and shaft bent back into a whip. I cut and reposed the feet, too. The strongbox beneath his bench came from a Grenadier ogre, I think. Those horses were packaged in loose baggies and sold for $3 apiece, and the yoke connecting them to the cart is made of sprue. The stowage hanging off the sides came from the Mordheim Dwarf Treasure Hunters, among other things. 

Because this photo series was done on my kitchen table instead of the lightbox, the lighting here isn't choice, and the colors are getting a bit washed out. Mea culpa.

The idea of the scenario was to get as many beer carts as you could past the intervening goblins and off-board. I went beer cart-light and escort-heavy, opting to blast as many gobbos as I could with Thunderers, and block off any trolls with heavy-armored fighters and a Slayer or two. The special rules for the scenario said you could mount a Thunderer on the cart and fire his weapon in addition to the drover's while on the move, so I did just that. It was touch-and-go for a couple of rounds, but I managed to pull off a win, thanks to the low leadership of the gobbos and the stupidity of the trolls. 

The supporting cast for this little diorama is a nice little cross-section of my dwarf collection. Another Bugman is in there, accompanied by Malakai Makaisson and a bunch of artillery crewmen and clansmen. The two female dwarves are from Reaper Miniatures fantasy line, not to mention being out of the ordinary as dwarf minis go. You don't usually see a buxom dwarf rogue, not to mention a firey Runesmith (Runesmithstress?) in GW armies, and more's the pity. 

Lastly, the buildings. Made from styrofoam, modelling tallus, sprue, and dozens of other bits and bobs. I plan to do a detailed post about them later, since I love working on terrain and don't do it often enough (mostly because I have no place to keep it).

Merry Christmas to all of you and your families. Hopefully this holiday season you're getting together and crashing your armies against one another over some spiked eggnog :)

Lackeys....

As gaming systems go, it's hard to beat the D&D parody Hackmaster. Their first edition rules set re-created the labyrinthine expanse of first/second edition Dungeons & Dragons, along with their own special flavor of brutality (armor with its own HP value, criticals tables, crippling physical/psychological defects) and managed to add in something new in the form of not one, but four levels of lackey: the sidekick, the henchman, the protege, and the hireling. So, in the course of playing, our party managed to accrue a number of these, not the least of which was my shieldbearer, pictured above. This little guy's function is to follow your character around, stay out of combat, and when a tower shield finally runs out of hit points, he hands you another. He doesn't accrue hit points and can't stand over your character's body to defend him/her to the death. He just hands you shields, and maybe drags you over to the party healer. Maybe. If you remembered to pay him.  Since he's a halfling, I built him using green stuff, skaven parts, extra shields, and the odd pouch. He also has a bell on his belt, so I can find him under whatever rock he's cowering under after hostilities have ceased.

I liked my skaven-halfling so much I decided to build another, more to watch my back and shoot at things, not to mention guard our followers and pack-ape. If he looks a bit burly for a halfling, that's because skaven have a more rigorous exercise regimen and as such, are beefier. The head is from the plastic flagellant sprue, and is technically a blindfold, although I thought it made a fine mask for a thiefy-looking rogue. 

The Pack-Ape is a hardy beast no adventuring party should be without, chiefly because he can carry heroic amounts of crap up and down the ladders, pits, stairwells, and shafts you inevitably encounter. Of course, you have to have a minder or two to keep him from getting attacked and going apeshit (yes, there is an actual rule for him going apeshit ). I made this sturdy fellow out of some orc bits and every extra bit of stowage and crap I had in my characters bin, including shovels, pickaxes, a bucket, and ale barrel, and a large sack with a blue-stockinged foot sticking out of it. I almost stuck a sheep on there, too, but I couldn't find a place to hang it, convincingly. Yes, he's wearing pants. No one wants to see an ape's ass when you're in a dungeon. There are worse things to worry about.

Camp guards (occasionally used as random brigands), made from some spare empire spearman legs I got as part of a bits lot, along with burly armored skaven torsos and flagellant heads/arms/bits. These guys are pretty much there to guard the base camp and die pretty quickly whenever we take a few into a dungeon as extra manpower. Their stats are never very good, and we arm them with spare mundane weapons from the party's stores. 

Lest you think lackeys are limited to the fantasy realm, I made these guys from spare parts round about the same time I was working on my Admech Arch-Magos. Sharp eyes will spot the genestealer hybrid, epic titan bits, and the arm cannon from a Jagermech. 

I think one of them even has the command section of an old epic Manticore tank in there somewhere, not to mention the necron heads cleverly hidden under those cowls. 


Happy Labor Day!

Sale!

Time to clear out some stuff that's just taking up space (not to mention I really need the cash), so I'm putting some models up on eBay, including the above Tau Hammerhead. Head on over and check out the listings, which include some GW Ogres from 1984. 


Links to the listings (click straight through to eBay):


The Tau Hammerhead (I was thinking of a Shirow Masamune-themed Tau army, and this low-vis sniper tank was originally also going to have a set of legs and be a Spider gun platform. The guns and sensors swivels/traverse, the rear door opens, and the landing gear are removeable.  If it doesn't sell, I might just strip the model and convert it to go with the Fuchis...)


More pics of the Hammerhead:

Other links to other stuff:


Ogres (8 of 'em) (Stamped "GW 1984 on the bottom! I just never got around to painting them)


War Altar of Sigmar with Grand Theogonist Volkmar (only one horse, though)


Reaper Minis Shadow Dragon (Have you always wanted one? I suppose it's make a nifty bottle opener...)


Reaper Minis Frog Demon (perfect for a Great Unclean One!)


It occurs to me that they'd sell more painted, but assembling/painting is half the fun, isn't it? 


Happy bidding!

Vampire Skaven Part 3: The Doomtrain

Now that we're past the footsloggers, here's my favorite model in the entire army, if not my Warhammer Fantasy collection. The Doomtrain came about in those heady days when you could just order bitz willy-nilly from Games Workshop. The Storm of Chaos had just come out (yes, I've had it that long) and with it, the lovely Hellcannon kit in all its awful glory. About the same time I was painting dwarves for my friend Brian, and he paid me in trade with an Imperial Steam Tank (yes, the old-school metal model). A Hellcannon and a few bits orders later, and this monster came about.

This is another one of those cases of a model practically building itself. The Hellcannon and Steam Tank parts went together like they were made for each other, and the Screaming Bell bits followed shortly thereafter. The thing was an absolute joy to build and paint, to boot, from the little furnace full of soul-fire in the back to the wight-skaven drivers. It's also too long for even a chariot base, so damned if I know how I'll ever use it in battle.

The little stools of the Warp-Lightning Cannon's engineer minders actually fit right into the little peg-hole in this steam tank deck piece. I particularly love the little gauges and dials, which fit the skaven to T. 

The huge jaw piece for the Hellcannon still sits in my bits box, but the bigass skull piece needed minimal embellishment before fitting to the Steam Tank hull-turned-cowcatcher. I fitted skaven icons over the Empire shield mountings, and the warpstone reactors just fit the model perfectly. The end-bits even run into the grooves on the massive cog-wheels. 

The warlock-engineer hanging off the little platform to the side was an afterthought, as were the chains streaming off of the smokestack on the front. Of course, since this thing is powered by the souls the machine sucks out of the living, what's the stack for? I don't even think the steersman can see over it, anyway. If I could come up with a base to fit it, I might even enter it in a Games Day mini competition. I'd have to come up with track bits that would even hold it up, but it weighs a ton, so stability is ensured. If I did enter it, I'd also want to make a tender for it, if not some other, equally interesting car. 

Here's a shot from the other side. No crewman here, owing to the theory that odd numbers and asymmetry are more interesting. Those warpstone reactors look cool any way you turn them, so no problems with symmetry here, either. I thought of fielding it using Black Coach rules, but it looks even more durable than one of those, if not more deadly to the surrounding troops. 

This is a beauty shot, not an actual battlefield pic. If it were, the thing would steamroll right over that poor rat swarm in the front. Next time, we polish off the army showcase with cavalry. 

Vampire Counts: Skaven Pt. 2: Infantry

Continuing the saga of undead Skaven and the necromancers who love them, we have the backbone of every army: ranks and ranks of infantry:

Keep in mind the new book was not yet out when I was building this army, and at the time I was favoring skeletons as troops instead of everyone's favorite, zombies. Cheap the zoms may be, but I preferred the idea of troops that struck on a reasonable initiative number.  Mega Miniatures puts out blisters of 20-25 skeletons for around $20, among other things, and these were perfect starters for the army. Add in a single Clanrats box and you have all the bits you need for pretty much anything having to do with skaven and the dead in any combination.

Every 5th head or so in the Clanrats box is a bona fide Skaven skull, which is fantastic. I hewed at every other head with an X-Acto blade until they looked sufficiently skeletal. The Mega Minis skeletons are quite characterful,  being dressed in tattered armor and equipped with all kinds of weapons, from axes to greatswords. Though Skaven themselves are kind of stumpy (at least, the last edition's were) the more upright skeletons mesh well with the current designs.

When you combine the skeletons with Skaven parts and paint them appropriately necrotic, you get a whole new level of character. The fleshier ones could even be zombies, if you want.

Even given the poses and different stature, all of these actually rank up in a tray quite well. I didn't even do any pre-measuring and ranking. 

And the obligatory command, complete with a nice Skryre rune on the banner. The musician and banner parts are courtesy of the handy-dandy command sprue from the clanrats box, which inexplicably has the banners and gubbins of other races on it. Cheap to cast, I s'pose.

The Grave Guard are lovely minis from Privateer Press' Iron Kingdoms line. I got a pretty good deal on some from eBay, and being three to a blister, they were quite a steal at the price. Steam-powered Frankenstein's monsters seem like something a Skaven Necromancer would bolt together in his lab for heavy infantry, and power fists say "instant death to medieval soldiers" to me, so they're a reasonable stand-in for regular Grave Guard. 

For some reason, I was never quite sold on the idea of banners until I actually had to make them for fantasy armies, and then I found I rather enjoyed them. That chap with the bell might've been a monk or a beggar in life. Now he stomps into battle, forlornly ringing his bell. 

Since I play more 40k than WHF these days, I've been using more and more of these fellows as servitors in one way or another. My Adeptus Mechanicus army needs them for its artillery pieces as crew. If there's ever an official AdMech codex with servitors as an entry, I'll have enough to send a horde of them at an enemy (or failing that, a squad or three)

Next in the series: Cavalry.  (Yes, that means mounted Skaven.)