Chaos Rampant: Planning an Army

So there's two ways I could go about building my "Old School Chaos" army for Dragon Rampant.  I could buy figures willy-nilly, assemble units as I go, and hope for the best or I could plan ahead and go in with an idea of what I have ahead of me.  I've gone with the second.  

First things first, I decided to randomly determine which of Games Workshop's Ruinous Powers my army would follow.  I rolled a D10, with 1-2 meaning Khorne the Blood God, 3-4 meaning Slaanesh the demon of hedonism and excess, 5-6 Nurgle the plague God, 7-8 Tzeentch, the god of magic and trickery, and 9-10 being unaligned.  

A 4 means my army is dedicated to the sensual and depraved Slaanesh.  Iiiiiinteresting.  Not the Power I necessarily would have chosen for myself, but that's why we're doing things this way, to mix it up.  

The next step then was to pull up a PDF of the old "Realms of Chaos: Slaves to Darkness" book, and use the warband rules there to determine the composition of my Dragon Rampant army.  I won't end up with a nice, balanced force but I should end up with something fun.  

First up, my general.  A D100 roll determines that my general will be human, and a second D100 roll determines that, in Warhammer terms, they're a Level 10 Warrior.  So a fighter-type, not a wizard or spellcaster.  Easy enough.  A few more dice rolls determines that my general has a Bestial Face, which causes fear in those who face them and a bonus to Willpower.  

So I'm thinking my general is going to be a Single Model Unit of Elite Foot with the Fear special ability tacked on, and "Charmed" as his Leader trait.  Resistant to magic, he wades into the midst of combat, hacking down enemies and sending the survivors fleeing in terror.  I have a model in mind but we'll get there later.  For now, that's 8 of my 30 points taken care of.  

Next, I make three rolls on the Retinue chart and come up with Chaos Thugs, Beastmen, and a special! We'll come back around to that last one.  

Chaos Thugs/Marauders/Raiders are (in my head at least) a disorderly, bloodthirsty rabble barely kept in check by the general's force of will.  Well that's Dragon Rampant's "Bellicose Foot" right there! I don't think I want to add anything on, so we'll leave that at the basic 4 points.  

Beastmen I imagine as being much the same as Thugs/Marauders, but tougher and harder to kill.  I decided to treat them as Bellicose Foot with the "Extra Shiny Armor" upgrade, for 6 points.  

Finally, the special.  The "Other," the 100 on the D100 roll.  A few more dice rolls determine exactly what it is that joins my warband, and it is...a cockatrice.  Ooh! Now there's something different! What do we do with that? A cockatrice isn't as big and nasty as a hydra, chimera or dragon, so I don't think the Greater Warbeast profile is quite right, but let's call it a Single Model Unit Lesser Warbeast.  Both historically and in the Warhammer lore, a cockatrice has a petrifying gaze ability that turns foes to stone at a distance.  The Flame Attack upgrade, granting the Lesser Warbeast a ranged attack, would model this nicely.  And the wide, batlike wings on the 1990 GW Cockatrice model also call for the "Fly" fantastical ability to be added on, so let's call that another 8 points.  

So let's see, that puts us at 26 out of our planned 30 points.  Hmmm.  I could throw in another unit of Thugs/Marauders for 4 points, or I could pull 2 points off an existing unit and add in a unit of Chaos Warriors as Elite Foot.  I don't really have any ranged capacity at present and I don't have a spellcaster present either, which could hamper me in future games, but on the other hand, I knew going in that this would not be a balanced force.  I'll think about it and get something squared away.  

The Lost and the Damned: Starting my Chaos Rampant Project

My big project for this summer/year is going to be building myself a fresh warband for Osprey's Dragon Rampant, and I've set myself some limitations to keep things extra interesting:

• All figures must be metal, and either be pre-2000 Games Workshop or by new manufacturers working in the "Oldhammer" aesthetic.  
• No two copies of the same sculpt can be used unless I do significant conversion work on one of them.  
• All shields must have freehand designs painted on them, with an emphasis on John Blanche-inspired monstrous faces.  Realm of Chaos 80s' shield tutorial is my guide here.  
• Every unit must have a standard bearer, which will be outfitted with a banner I've hand-painted.  Every unit can optionally have a Champion attached, which counts for two Strength Points instead of the usual one.  Champions will be mounted on a 40mm base instead of a 25mm one to show their status.  
• I have to be able to field a viable 30-point warband before I can call the project complete.  

The army will be one of traditional WHFB Chaos; big angry guys in heavy plate armor, vicious thugs, raiders and marauders in a motley of lighter armor and miscellaneous weaponry, mutant beastmen and horrifying demons.  Because I'm selecting figures based on the "Oldhammer" vibe, color schemes will be likewise based on the examples Games Workshop's 'Eavy Metal team painted for the pages of White Dwarf back in the 1980s and early 1990s.  

Last night I got a start on two classic figures I managed to score of the Oldhammer Trading Group on Facebook, who will be part of a unit of various Thugs and Marauders; these guys are technically both.  Originally released in 1985 as part of the F5 Chaos Marauders line (or at least, intended for it), these two later showed up again in 1988 rebranded as Chaos Thugs, though their slotta tabs both still say "Marauder" on them.  

The axe-wielding Marauder with the big exposed beard was base-coated in Reaper's "Viper Green," and given a wash of GW "Biel-Tan Greenshade." Highlighting was done back up to Viper Green, and then the armor plates given an edge highlight of Vallejo "Escorpena Green." The raised portion of his left pauldron and his poleyns were then picked out in Reaper "Marigold Yellow," washed with GW "Casandora Yellow" and highlighted with Reaper "Sun Yellow." His beard was basecoated in "Ultramarine Shadow," and highlighted with drybrushings of "Ultramarine Blue" and "Ultramarine Highlight."

His shield used mostly the same greens as his armor, though I took the highlighting a step further with a little bit of Vallejo "Livery Green" over the "Escorpena Green." The face was also glazed with GW "Wayfarer Green" before the eyes and teeth were detailed.  

His buddy with the odd chain weapon had his armor basecoated with Vallejo "Squid Pink," and given a light wash of GW "Druchii Violet" before being built back up to Squid Pink.  The final highlight was Squid Pink with a few drops of Pure White mixed in.  Helmet, poleyns and elbow pieces were painted using the same Ultramarine triad I used on the first guy's beard.  Weapons were basecoated with Reaper "Tarnished Steel" and highlighted with "Pure Silver."

Bases were given a coating of Vallejo Sandy Paste prior to priming, and painted with Vallejo "Goblin Green." I'll probably go back and give them tops of them a drybrush of "Escorpena Green" to pick out the texture a little bit.  

Troll Repairs

A couple months back I scored a trio of 6th edition Warhammer Stone Trolls on eBay.  These figures were some of the ones that first got me interested in wargaming and fantasy miniatures back around 2001-2002.  They came already affixed to 40mm square MDF bases with a couple pebbles glued down and magnets inserted into the bases.  I set them aside for the time being as I have a project in mind for them.

Today, I decided I might as well get them primed and ready while the weather's nice, and I noticed one of them had a gouge taken out of their chest.  Fortunately, I had just the tools to take care of that.  Using some "Blue Stuff" thermoplastic, I made a mold of another troll's chest who was in an almost identical pose.  I then packed the mold with Green Stuff epoxy putty, producing a replacement troll chest once the putty cured.  I trimmed it down and affixed it to the gouged-out troll, and while a little bit of the detail got warped (I pulled the putty from the mold too early), I think once it's painted you're barely going to be able to tell anything's been done.  Overall, I'm very pleased.

More Frostgrave Terrain

I finally got around to digging out and painting a couple pieces of inexpensive 3D printed terrain that Gina bought me a while back for Frostgrave.  They aren't the best prints, with prominent printing lines across most surfaces (is this something that could have been sanded down?) but at arm's length or on a table surrounded by other terrain pieces they look just fine. 

"I am here. What dost thou wishest?"

One of the bigger non-scenery pieces I got in Reaper's Bones 4 Kickstarter was "Agramon, Pit Fiend." Unlike the previous sculpt of this character, whose size is somewhat disguised by his crouching pose, this version is striding forward purposefully, and we got our choice of right hands (open, holding a fireball, holding a cleaver-like sword, holding a crude stone sword) and heads (closed mouth or open).  After trying them all out, I went with the open right hand and the snarling face. 

Fully assembled he stands about 4" tall and has a wingspan just shy of 8".  He's a big boy, that's for sure, his sculpted base juuuuust overhanging the 50mm round base I glued it to. 

I expect most examples of this figure you'll see painted will be in darker shades of red, the bubbling pools on the sculpted base painted as lava, in keeping with depictions of Pit Fiends in more recent editions of Dungeons and Dragons.  I opted for a brilliant blue devil (basecoat Reaper "Sapphire Blue," followed by a wash of Drakenhof Nightshade, highlight with Sapphire Blue, then True Blue, and a final light highlight, mostly on the face and chest, of Sky Blue) and made those bubbling pools filled with fluorescent green slime (basecoat Vallejo Escorpena Green, washed with thinned Reaper Viper Green, highlighted Vallejo Livery Green, finally glazed with GW Wayfarer Green).

The wing membranes were basecoated with Vallejo Leather Brown, and washed with GW Seraphim Sepia.  They were highlighted with Reaper Golden Shadow, and then progressively lighter highlights built up towards the edges of the wings with Golden Skin and Golden Highlights.  Claws and horns were basecoated with Stained Ivory, highlighted with Yellowed Bone and Creamy Ivory. 

I normally don't mess around too much with lighting effects on figures, but once I saw how bright the green slime pools came out, I knew I wanted to give a glow effect to where the light from it would hit Agramon.  I think it came out pretty well this time. 

They Call Him...MISTER PIG!

Not much to report right now, but I did finish a "Dire Boar" out of the Reaper Bones 4 Kickstarter, which will serve admirably as a wild boar in my Frostgrave bestiary.  He's been glued to a 25x50 cavalry base and will be getting flocked probably tomorrow.

Body was basecoated in Brown Sand and the mane in Dark Skin, both washed with GW Seraphim Sepia and highlighted with Sandy Brown and Dark Highlights, respectively.  Not exactly a wild paint scheme, to be sure. I kind of think I maybe should have mixed some gray into the brown of the body, but overall I'm happy with this as a table-top ready piece.

I also started work on the new sculpt for "Agramon, Pit Fiend," a more dynamic sculpt with the demon lord striding forward purposefully, versus the crouched form of the previous sculpt.  I've basecoated the model in Reaper's "Sapphire Blue," because ultimately, I've never seen a blue Pit Fiend before and I think it'll look cool and different.  The kit came with four possible right hands and two different heads - I went with the open-mouthed, snarling head and an open right hand. He'll be fantastic as a Major Demon in my Frostgrave games.

Expanding My Frozen City

I'm not gonna lie, readers: I'm having some serious cravings to get some Frostgrave going again, and hopefully get a real campaign going.  Mordheim has been fun, but I'm finding I definitely prefer Frostgrave's simplicity and ease of play over the more number-crunchiness of Mordheim.  Both games, though, definitely call for a surplus of terrain on the table; I've described Frostgrave to non-gamers as "Magic Stalingrad," as warbands fight their way block by block through a ruined city.  To that end, I picked up a couple of scenery kits - the "Azyrite Township" and "Blasted Harrowheart" from my local Games Workshop store. 

Both kits came with multiple sprues of goldish-colored plastic to assemble ruined buildings for Age of Sigmar, providing cover to figures standing within 1" of them on the table, with a few sprues being in common between the two sets.  A few of the pieces were a little tricky to clip off the sprues but ultimately I had everything assembled - ten ruined building corners, two of which were two-story, along with a pair of grated trap-doors that I glued down to some spare 50mm square bases - in no time flat. 

The Blasted Harrowheart also gave me some heavy folded cardboard game boards to set the terrain up on, but we'll see if we actually use those; I kind of want to get a neoprene table mat with printed snow and cobblestones for Frostgrave games, but that might be down the road. 

Once everything was assembled, I undercoated the ruins in black and got to work.  I haven't started on any of the big pieces yet, but I've finished off seven of the smaller corner pieces.  Over a black basecoat, I drybrushed craft paint (as these were too big for me to want to use regular hobby paint) - a layer of "Espresso," followed by "Dark Grey" and a final drybrush of ordinary "Grey." Details were picked out in Reaper "Ancient Bronze" and "Blackened Steel," and the bricked-up archways were done with "Misty Gray" for the mortar and "Rust Brown" for the bricks.  I'm only posting pictures of two of these corner pieces, since they all look pretty much the same.

And just for fun, as long as I had these two pieces out, I grabbed a pair of handy figures and shot a quick vignette: