Week 4: I finish a unit of crypt ghouls

Week four has come to an end and I've just about managed to complete my first unit of Crpyt ghouls.

I have not yet assembled a ghast, but that will come how I've decided I want to model the blighter. I've been playing with ideas around some of the old Mordheim figures, or following Games Workshops lead and converting up a empire flagellant. I have a few from my empire army.

I have tried to combine a few on this base to make casualty removal a bit easier. The rock is just a bit of foam cut to shape. I experienced problems with the GW undercoat melting the foam, but overcame this with a layer of PVA. Now I just need to work out a resilient way of gluing the figures onto these rocks. The idea behind he rocks is that they will try to tie the various units together visually.

In total I need to bang together about seventy of these chaps, but I think it might be an idea to return to these in a bit otherwise I might just run out of enthusiasm.

All of the unit are mounted on magnetic strips to make carrying easier.

As regards progress, I promised myself that I would complete 16 painting points per week (each model is worth his units strength squared in painting points). This is now the end of week 4 so I should be upto 64 and I've only done 60. Ooops. Lets see if I can try and catch up a little next week.

The ghouls have been quite fun, but to be honest its now time to switch to something with a bit of colour in it. next week I plan to have a go at the Chaos marauder horsemen. 4 of these will stop me slipping further behind.

Week 3: A go at Crypt ghouls

After spending the first two weeks with Chaos warhounds I thought that it was time to try my hand with a little Vampire Counts. Cypt ghouls feature in both of my vampire counts armies, so the logical conclusion was to have a go at them.

The Vampire counts book states that these are living creatures and that "their skin is dark and filthy, their eyes bestial and insane, and their snarling lips reveal sharp pointed teeth". I therefore decided that I wanted these figures to look as if they had never washed, but I wanted them to look alive.

I went for a brown / grey look with a number of washes to create a dirty look. I have then added red washes around the elbows, knees and heels to try and make them look a little alive, from frail.

The colours kind of work on my painting table, but I don't appear able to take a decent photo of them...

Only managed to get 10 figures painted this week. That makes a grand total of 50 painting points in three weeks. The target was (3x16) 48, so I'm ahead of programme, but I only can see myself painting 10 next week.

Warriors of chaos 2000 points List 2

Kholek Suneater
The Troll King Throgg
3 Chaos Trolls
3 Chaos Trolls
6 Chaos Trolls
4 Dragon ogres, great weapons
Chaos giant, mark of slaanesh
Scyla Anfinngrimm

This army is is many ways just for fun, but is, occasionally, a very competative force.
Its quite fast and tough with lots and lots of big nasty monsters that can turn the enemy into so much pate. Kholek anf Throgg provide some nice leadership zones to protect the trolls from stupidity and Throgg also acts as a battle standard. Scyla is a fun character and has magic resistance 3 to help stop spells that would affect the whole army.
Syla and the giant provide flank protection as they are pretty much immovable (ones unbreakable whilst the other is stubborn with a leadership 10), the giant always strikes first too.
The army has virtually no magic resistance, no offensive magic, has hardly any missile fire and has nothing to deny rank bonus, however its speed and toughness will make it a hard nut to crack.

Warriors of chaos 2000 points List 1

Sorcerer Lord; barded chaos steed, mark of tzeentch, extra level
Daemon weapon, collar of khorne
Sorcerer; barded chaos steed, mark of nurgle, extra level
Book of Secrets, power familiar, conjoined homunculus
Sorcerer; barded chaos steed, extra level
Infernal puppet
There is no subtlety to these guys, its magic all the way. the Lord is a very good spell caster and a holy terror in combat (4-9 attacks at S5-7) although he may hit himself. The nurgle sorcerer generates 4 dice and knows 3 spells so is almost as good at csting as the lord but the nurgle lore has some very good spells. The last scorcer is there for support and with the puppet to protect against miscasts.
6 Marauder horsemen, mark of slaanesh, light armour, throwing spears, musician
6 Marauder horsemen, mark of slaanesh, light armour, throwing spears, musician
6 Marauder horsemen, mark of slaanesh, light armour, throwing spears, musician
6 Chaos hounds
6 Chaos hounds
6 Chaos hounds
The core choices are there to give a flexible flanking force that can get the sorcerers around the table to where their spells can do the most damage. The horsemen are fagile as a porcelain puppy but easy to manoeuvre and they won't panic. The hounds are a missle screen (bless them).
5 Chaos knights, champion, musician
5 Chaos knights, champion, musician
4 Dragon ogres, great weapons
This army is both straight forward and nasty. The wizards can belt out a large range of nasty spells joining whichever units will either protect them better or get them to a suitable position. the special choices give the army some proper hitting power and the lord can join one to give a nasty surprise in combat.

Week 2: Another 5 warhounds

Ok, end of the second week and I have completed another 5 warhounds. This counts as another 40 painting points (each model is worth its unit strength squared in points) and places me 8 points ahead of schedule. I have a feeling I might need these points in hand at some point.

I have used the same technique on these as on the previous 5 warhounds, but have slightly changed the brown recipe. These are scorched brown to beastial brown, to a mix of dwarf flesh and beastial brown. The fur is further lightened up to include the above mix with

 a fair amount of bleached bone in it.

All bases have a magnetic mounting so that they will sit in the movement trays with no problems. The mounting is just magnetic sheeting that is used for printing fridge magnets off your computers printer. Nice and easy, but not too cheap.

Next week, I'm going for a slight change in pace. I'll have a go at Crypt ghouls. These will fit in both of my Vampire counts lists, that way I can show progress against many lists at once. Double bonus!

Vampire Counts 2000 points List 2

Vampire lord, extra level
Master of the black arts, forbidden lore, lord of the dead
Skull staff, crown of command, biting blade
This lord is designed to be a terror in the magic phase. generates 5 power dice, knows all spells from a magic lore plus invocation) and gets +1 to cast and dispel. the crown is a fantastic item and lets you take advantage of the Vampires Ws without risking him in combat.
vampire
Dark acolyte, summon creatures of the night
Flayed hauberk, dispel scroll
A good secondary magic user who's quite resilient from a two up armour save.
Wight king; Barded skeletal steed, battle standard, lance
Drakenhoff banner
Expensive but since he gives the unit with regeneration and is damned hard to hurt anyway, he is worth it.
Wight king; Barded skeletal steed, lance
Good combat clout for the points
20 skeletons, light armour, hand weapon and shield, full command, warbanner
10 skeletons, light armour, hand weapon and sheild, champion
18 crypt ghouls, ghast
3 base bat swarm
15 grave guard, full command
5 Black knights, champion
3 fel bats
This second army is slower moving than the first but has a substantial magic phase and quite diverse range of units. The vampires keep the numbers up, even making some units bigger and allowing you to raise new units of zombies.
Both types of bat count as infantry for invocation, so can quickly become very large. These are for flexible protection. The fell bats make acceptable war machine hunters and the swarms are to make sure that the general is not at risk if the enemy outmanoeuvres you.

Vampire Counts 2000 points List 1

Vampire Lord; Extra magic level, nightmare,
Ghoulkin, dark acolyte, infinate hatred, summon ghouls
sword of might, walach's bloody hauberk, dispel scroll, black periapt
The lord is a good mix of magic and combat reliability. A level 4 because of the bloodline powers, he can put a power or dispel dice aside for the next phase. In combat he has 4 S6 attacks and his hatred applies every round, so he should hit most of the time. There is no limit to how many ghoul this chap can raise. Lastly his ghoulkin power means all those units of ghouls get a free march before the game begins (with any characters who have joined them).
Vampire; battle standard
Forebidden lore, summon ghouls
Flayed hauberk, power stone
the battle standard is a support character in every sense; despite being only a level 1, he knows all the spells from the lore vampires or one of the ones in the rulebook. So although he can only use 2 dice to cast spells, he has a lot of choice and the power stone means he can give a one shot attempt at a tougher spell later in the game.
Vampire;
Infinite hatred, walking death
Sword of battle, armour of night, talisman of lycni
This guy is fragile with only a 5+ save and dosen't have much casting ability. However, he's great for hunting down small units, war machines or vulnerable characters. His magic armour inflicts a -2 to hit modifier to all shooting whilst he's on his own, so regular shooting will rarely hit him.
20 crypt ghouls, ghast
18 crypt ghouls, ghast
14 crypt ghouls, ghast
10 crypt ghouls, ghast
The bulk of the army and a very solid bulk it is too. toughness 4 with 2 poisoned attacks each, ghouls are pretty decent in a fight.
7 Dire wolves, doom wolves
Dire wolves are extremely quick (m9) but are very poor fighters. they can hunt war machines but for the most part are best used to march block.
Varghulf
A very good lone monster and terror causer, his stats are good enough for him to go hunting small enemy units by himself or give a bit of clout to any ghouls stuck in combat.
5 Blood knights, standard, musician, royal standard of stigos
the hammer unit, frenzy, hatred and a stat line better than many heroes, these guys have the most devastating charge of any in the game.

Week 1: 5 Chaos warhounds

Week one is over and I have completed 5 chaos warhounds.

This counts as 20 painting points [a model is worth its unit strength squared in points]. This is ahead of the number required to meet the deadline for the year (16 per week). So far so good.

Amazingly this already counts as 8% of one of the Warriors of Chaos armies.

The warhounds required a lot more greenstuff than I would have liked especially at the top of the head. Without this work they would look like they had a massive center parting and a large hairlip.

I have gone for a paint scheme that makes them look a little like boars. This is not intentional, I was just keen to give them a pink nose and it comes out that way.

the camera is one I borrowed off work. I might need to work on my photo skills, there is a lot more variance in colour than there appears in the picture. If I can I will buy a better camera.

5 more warhounds are on the table waiting for completion next week.

This years plan

OK; Its time to decide what I want to do in 2010.

To this end I asked a friend of mine to pull together a 2000 point Warhammer Fantasy list for me for an army that would be competitive. He outdid himself and produced five lists. I liked the look of them and have decided that I would like to have a go at painting up four of the lists in a year. Two Vampire counts and two Warriors of Chaos armies (one of which is just a bit of fun). Therefore I need to buy, assemble and paint the following...

1 Vampire Lord, 1 wight king (with banner) on skeletal steed, 1 wight king on skeletal steed, 50 skeletons, 70 crypt ghouls (included in more than one list), 4 bat swarms, 15 grave guard, 5 Black knights, 5 fell bats, 1 vampire lord on nightmare, 1 vampire with banner, another vampire, 7 dire wolves, a Varghulf, 5 blood knights and 40 odd zombies (not included in lists but can be generated/called).

1 Kholek suneater, 1 King Throgg, 12 trolls, 4 dragon ogres (included in more than one list), 1 chaos spawn, 1 giant, 2 scorcerer lord on chaos steed, 18 marauder horsemen, 17 chaos warhounds and 10 chaos knights.

I need a way of monitoring progress, so have decided the following; each model is worth a number of "painting points" equal to its unit strength squared. So a zombie is worth 1 point, whilst mounted cavalry is worth 4 and a troll 9. This system may not be perfect, but it gives me a chance to judge how I am getting on.

Based on this and assuming a 50 week year, I need to complete 16 points of painting a week.

Maybe this is more than I can cope with, but I wont know until I try.