Thursday 31 August 2017

(Lead) Mountain Musings - "General's Handbook" September 2017

Nurgle WIPs - The Great Unclean One and Herald of Nurgle have been primed, washed and dry-brushed
This month's randomly themed attempt to try and reduce my overwhelming collection of metal, plastic and resin miniatures has been superseded by the release of the "General's Handbook 2017" by "Games Workshop", and my subsequent desire to field 1,000 points of (pure) Nurgle for "Age Of Sigmar". Fortunately, the latest version of the "essential resource for all warlords of the Mortal Realms" doesn't appear to have greatly affected the previous Matched Play cost of my Host, and as a result my horde of twenty Plague Bearers of Nurgle (200 points), Herald of Nurgle (100 points), two Beasts of Nurgle (120 points), three stands of Nurglings (80 points), Rotbringers Sorcerer (100 points) and Lord of Plagues (100 points) still totals 700 points.

This means I only need to paint a humble 300 points of miniatures over the next few weeks, and when one of them, a large "Finecast" Great Unclean One, tallies a whopping 240 points on his own, it should be an easily achievable goal. Perhaps unsurprisingly therefore, I have somewhat raised the difficulty of this particular mini-project by adding a partially-pigmented Herald of Nurgle (100 points) to my painting queue, alongside an almost obligatory (third) Beast of Nurgle (60 points).
Beast Of Nurgle WIPs - The Chaos Daemon has been undercoated and heavily shaded
I have 'dusted off' my towering Greater Daemon of Nurgle before, but am so determined to finish the "Behemoth" this time round that I have already started work layering, washing and dry-brushing his large Plague Flail with "Vallejo" Gunmetal Grey and "Citadel" Nuln Oil. The sculpt's "Corpulent Mass" is simply packed full of open sores, wriggling worms, and cherub-faced Nurglings, so I have no doubt I'll be spending a fair few hours elbow deep painting pustules, pimples and festering boils...

My (second) Herald of Nurgle is equally as distressed physically, and has actually been converted using a large scythe from the Blight Kings "Age Of Sigmar" plastic boxed set. Having previously painted one of these 'mortals who somehow resists the ravages of Nurgle’s Rot', I'm hoping to get this miniature finished in short order, and thus be able to buttress my unruly formation of Plaguebearers with a herald at either end.
Plague Guard WIPs - The Heretic Astartes has been primed and then layered
Finally, I have assembled a third "truly horrendous aberration". These "Finecast" pallid slugs are one of my all-time favourite "Games Workshop" sculpts, and I have had to wait quite a while to secure another model after the company's webstore 'ran out of stock' earlier in the year. In the past I have painted these 'writhing tentacled' horrors with a predominantly green and tan palette. This time round I thought I'd try a more poisonously pus-like colour scheme.

In addition to increasing my Host of Nurgle's size, I have been unable to resist 'dipping my toe' into the Eighth Edition of "Warhammer 40k" as well. This is largely due to the fact that my "Age Of Sigmar" warband is perfectly capable of being fielded on the "41st millennium" battlefield without any problems whatsoever. Indeed, simply using the eligible models I already own I can readily put 572 points of Chaos Daemons onto the tabletop.
Faramir battles Lurtz and a band of Uruk-Hai for the glory of Gondor
Sadly however, so 'unshooty' a force is not going to survive long up against any opposition armed with even the simplest of ranged weapons, so at some point I am going to need to add some much needed firepower to my army. A contingent of Heretic Astartes would fit that bill rather nicely, especially Plague Guard, so I have assembled a single plastic miniature from the "Dark Imperium" boxed set to use as a 'test piece'.

34 comments:

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    1. Oh yes, Phil, and hopefully plenty of "LoTR" BatReps to come, as I've dug out my entire mini collection to use. I just hope it doesn't encourage me to paint more ;-)

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  2. I have to face the fact that my 40K days are over and I'm going to be shifting a large mountain soon.

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    1. Oh dear... I was in a similar position until "Kill Team", "Shadow Wars" and now Eight Edition arrived. All of these have really ignited my WH40k interest; especially as my "AoS" army already provides half an army!

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  3. " Blessed be thy Pestilence" seemed a fitting start to a comment all about nurgle !With your great unclean one, break it down into smaller chunks ( for example do all the left leg) because he is covered in extra little details they are easy to miss trying to do the same detail all at once. This will also add interest as you then get some variation over the model.
    Interesting choice of colours on the beast so far Simon, at this stage add some other colour glazes before you highlight up the model. You could try purple in the shadow areas and also for bruising. Red around the skirt of the slug part and also around wounds and sores, also try some patches of green.
    From the base colours you've laid down I'm guessing the 40K model is going to become very rusty !

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    1. that`s sound painting advise actually.

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    2. Many thanks Dave, I'll give a few of those a try; albeit my Beast is a bit further progressed than the WIPs show. I do want to make this one stand out from the other two though, so some ideas Ref additional colouring are much appreciated :-)

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    3. "From the base colours you've laid down I'm guessing the 40K model is going to become very rusty!" - Indeed, Dave. I was actually going to use my trusty "Mig Productions" Extreme Rust Wash on my Boromites (and so wish I had now), so thought I'd try it instead on the Plague Guard instead; especially as they seem to be so packed full of detail and my normal method of painting would take me an eternity!! :-)

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    4. No problem mate, you can add most of these colours at any stage, shall watch with interest how the plague guard develop

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    5. The new "GW" plastic Plague Guard are truly awesome, Dave, can't seem to put the damn model down currently.

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  4. That looks like a truly fearsome beast you are working on Simon, really looking forward to seeing you work your magic on him.

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    1. Cheers Michael. Hopefully my "magic", whatever that may be, will indeed work on the Great Unclean One.

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  5. I bought MDRGs, so even though I won't be buying SBH it'll be interesting to read the upcoming batrep.

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    1. Thanks Roy. I really hope "M&DRG" works for me as it does for me, and I'd be very interested in your opinion as to whether "SoBH" is tempting or not.

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    2. Yep. Got the board and terrain sorted for a game. Bought in figures for 4 a side, and just need to paint them up now. I've had to modify the standard character archetypes for the Vulcan V'Shar agents (Pure Humans, but with an additional mental mutation to fit the species), Starfleet as standard Humans and Klingons as Mutants (but with either the Dashing, Tough or Coup-de-Grace traits). All things being well I'll be up and running asap.

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    3. That sounds absolutely awesome Roy, looking forward to seeing that very much indeed :-)

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  6. Nice to see "real" as in Tolkien Orcs. None of this GW green skin rubbish.

    Songs of is rather good I shall enjoy following the campaign.... I may even emulate it.

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    1. Cheers Clint - I'm so glad I didn't go Orruks for "AoS" now ;-) I'd be highly delighted if you'd care to emulate and post some "SoBH" AARs of your own.

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    2. I am re-working the army lists for Riff wars ("Arabs" vs French Foreign Legion. ) So nw you know what rules I inend to use for my Beau Geste (Carry on folow that Camel project)

      But I will need to build 2 campaign trees. (one for French and one for Riffs). Just so it does not become a one off game at the club and totally disposable which has happened in the past.

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    3. But a lot of players still have LotR figures so this could be an exact copy as well. I will see how we get on and take it from there.

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    4. That all sounds awesome, Clint, as you had me hooked when you first posted about 'Arabs' verses French Foreign Legion - my fave battle as a nipper with airfix plastics :-)

      Clearly there's lots to look forward to at your club and on your blog. You just need to move a little further south ;-)

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    5. I live in KENT any further south and I would be French.

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  7. Yaay more disgusting Nurgle! Even better he's a Great Unclean One

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    1. Thanks Andy. Fingers crossed I can finally get the brute painted and finished.

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  8. Good luck with September's outputs mate. :)

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    1. Cheers Leon. Still a few more "G.I. Joe" minis to post, and Shipwreck to finish :-)

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    2. I look forward to seeing them mate. :)

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  9. hmmmm I was thinking of LotR the other day too. Wow, the amount of fun and the number of games I must have played with this 40mm collection of yumminess in the past. Aaah happy days. Best of all.... the whole collection is fully painted, long, long ago. and ready to pull out and play with at the drop of a hat.
    For now I`ll be strong and stick to my other two main topics.

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    1. Cheers Steve. I don't have a large collection of "LoTR"; well fully painted at least. But enough for a 4-5 game campaign I think... and it might encourage me to paint a few more ;-)

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  10. Return of the Nurgles ! I'm sure I'll be impressed with the finished figure.

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    1. Thanks Joe. My fingers are crossed for the Great Unclean One.

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