Proxy Wars Episode 1: Mordheim

I play a lot of games, and dabble in quite a few more, and for many years I scrupulously used only the exact minis intended by the manufacturer for use with their game.  Its helpful, of course, especially in terms of WYSIWYG, but eventually everyone that plays a faction within a game ends up looking very similar.

( Brunhilde, Kinght of the Blazing Sun and acting  Witch Hunter Captain stands firm against an assault by a Sigmarite Sister and two Novices...Brunhilde is a real Heroine putting one novice out of action and keeping the remaining Sister and Novice tied up in melee for the rest of the game (top and left).  Brunhilde is from the Raging Heroes classic line and the Sisters are GW originals. Below: MVP Gretchin interrupts her journey rescue of Captain Brunhilde to ambush a novice sister that was searching for warpstone.)






For me, these days, the "Looks Cool!" factor is a big deal so I've branched out into proxies in a pretty big way. I'd always used the odd alternate manufacturer figure for special characters, especially those written up in the rules but whose figure was missing from the product line, or just because it looked like it would be a good fit as a sergeant or unit champion/standard bearer/musician as these types of miniatures were often available in only one pose or might even be entirely absent.

 The table was set with a Deepcut Studios cobblestone mat and a pile of Tabletop World buildings.  To give the game a "night time feel"  I used a blue light and a couple of overhead white spots.  The result was stark shadows and a gloomy night time feel while still maintaining enough light for comfortable play.

The match was the opening round of a campaign and first up were Witch Hunters vs Sigmarite Sisters!

 Fueled mainly by the amazing complete proxy armies that are available from folks like Raging Heroes, Avatars of War (Although they now have a rule set of their own in Warthrone), and Scibor, I'm building complete proxy armies as my first choice.  In doing this I'm not necessarily looking for a less expensive way to produce an army.  Raging Heroes, for example, is not a discount mini shop.  I'm looking for the minis that best portray what I want to play.







 There are downsides to proxy armies, of course, but they are largely confined to official company events and tournaments where there may be a requirement for official miniatures in order to participate.  I don't do tournaments for the most part so it doesn't really have an impact on my gaming.



(Above and above right: A large central melee broke out.  The Witch Hunters face off against the Sisters.  Witch Hunter Gretchin, supported by the Warrior Priest Whilhelm and the wardog Walter, faces off against the Matriarch Beatrix.  A lucky crit by Gretchin with the dueling pistol takes the Matriarch out of action before she can strike! Witch Hunters Hildegard and Johan hold fast in a furious engagement with Sister Superior Magda and two Sisters.  One turn later, Wardog Walter, and Warrior Priest Wilhelm add into the grand melee while Gretchin exits the area to head towards Mercenary Captain Brunhilde who is all alone and engaged in a lopsided duel.  Meanwhile two novice sisters decide to dodge the grand melee and scour the area for warpstone.)

After dispatching both the Matriarch and a novice Gretchin claims final victory by forcing the game ending route check...











The teams!  The Sisters spent more gold building their warband (492 to 485) but came up short on rating compared to the Witch Hunters.  The ratings ended up being Sisters - 68, Witch Hunters - 96 not enough for an underdog bonus but enough to notice.

 

The minis:  Sisters of Sigmar are all Games Workshop while the Witch Hunters are a mix of Games Workshop and Raging Heroes.

Take a seat on the Throne of Judgement!

 I see you are unrepentant!

It matters not!

Xenos loving scum have turned from the Emperor's light and so shall be cast into the flames!







Dreadtober roars on!

 This model is heavy... whew... and not many good places to grab it in terms of pushing it around the tabletop... not to mention those torches are gonna take some hits!

I suspect it will be one of those models perennially in need of repair... but it does look kinda cool in a stomp, stomp, BURN!  kind of way.

I'll be curious to see how the Raging Heroes War Throne looks with it.

The servitors were done with Reaper Vampiric Flesh triad and the Priest Himself with Vallejo Sunny Flesh and a P3 Flesh Wash... the P3 flesh wash is actually kind of purple and, sitting on the Sunny Flesh, makes the priest almost ruddy.  I wanted to emphasize that he is alive while the servitors are, more or less, undead!

 Anyway... my Sisters of Battle are nominally an Order of the Ebon Chalice or spin off... so have more red and white than black in their scheme... that's all speculative though as non of the actual Sisters are painted up!  To date I have this Throne of Judgement and a Monastery Keep that I've been working on from time to time for several years.

With the first Dreadtober project wrapped up I'll move on the the Iron Empire Mecha... it'll be in keeping with Dreadtober and is even spookier than the Throne of Judgement!

Dreadtober progress

 Progress on the Dreadtober Project!



The Throne of Judgement is being worked up from a black base... big surprise yo!

I got to thinking about being representative of my style of painting... and realized I hadn't really thought of that in a while.  I think, in the main, I'm a texture and process painter with a lot of layers of build up.. sometimes pretty heavy... and thence the texture... 

Typically starting with black and brushing everything with a dark grey so I could make out the details.








 After the grey the areas that would end up weathered or red got a brush up of scrofulous brown... love that color!






The model got a weathering pass of Rustungs Farbe... a bright white metal color.. and then all the scrofulous and metal brushed areas got a Secret Weapon Flesh Wash.

Bases got the pale brown over black, brushed over with tan earth and washed with Army Painter Strong Tone ink then re-brushed with Tan Earth... wood got the standard wood treatment. 

 Then on to scrolls bones and robes... for some reason these guys persist in viewing themselves as "The Good Guys" in spite of all evidence to the contrary.... so I thought yar!  white rube for the judgy Priest!... I'll trim it in red... vanity is a thing even for judgy priest types!

Anyway Jack Bone, Menoth White, Menoth White Highlight.

 Going forward... will be reds and then gold trim and actual black areas.

I've done this a bit inside out... where some of the raised detail was done before the recessed detail... almost always a recipe for failure but in this case a lot of sub color texture was done so Ithink it'll work out.... well see soon enough!

Dreadtober WiP and Tabletop World Townhouse 2

The Dreadtober project kicks off with a theme... Something old and something new!

 For the "Old" I decided to dig into the backlog of GW minis that I seem to have neglected lately... but still build something with relevance to my current projects...  Behold the Throne of Judgement!








Construction is well underway so expect some unhappy heretics soon!


The RH TGG interest of the past couple of years was sparked initially by a desire to have cool new minis to use for Sisters of Battle... that will still very likely happen but using the Space Nuns from the TGG 2 Light and Darkness... in the meantime
 I've done a lot of work on three new codices for including the TGG 1 as playable factions in our version of the Grimdark.

HERESY! you say? 

Indeed! 

I'm thinking about having the Witch Hunters/ Sisters of Battle invade my little section of the verse and vent their righteous fury on the Iron Empire... which I've been spinning up as a Necrontyr remnant kingdom in hiding... shhh!  They're mostly hiding from the Necrons!  

So....

I'll be building three Iron Empire Mechas as part of Dreadtober!  Of course... I mean to say that I'll be attempting to build three of them!  The construction process has not turned out to be very intuitive but I think I've... mostly... got it sorted... although there is the pesky issue of four very small parts that I can't seem to figure out the use of....

Here you see the four kits drying after the obligatory pre cleaning scrub.


More on those later in the week!








But wait!  To digress I popped out a Tabletop World Townhouse 2 that I'd primer-ed up before the big move.

You see a Reaper Mage standing in for scale.

 The second floor gallery/porch is very cool but is an example of base restrictions.  Bases have gotten a bit larger over the past few years and the 20mm square base for standard humans seems to have largely gone by the wayside (except for those great guys over at Mantic!)

 Which makes the porch unusable by most new minis... fortunately I have a lot of fantasy stuff based on 20s but not much new getting added.  I wonder if TTW will adjust scaling to accommodate the larger footprint of the new style bases in future?  That wouldn't be terribly incongruous if we consider that older houses have smaller footprints... and these are mostly a bit dilapidated...

 The expanded view of all the levels of the Townhouse.  This one is done a little more moldy than usual...

No one expects.... The Inquisitor's Retinue!

 So there I was digging through a box looking for some bit or other when I came across this assortment of Inquisitor's Retinue that I picked up from my good friend Pat a few years back and didn't manage to paint before packing up the house 2 moves ago!  Since I'm actually in a mood to paint some fringe Imperials it was a timely find!

I based these in the same scheme as I'll be using on the Raging Heroes IG project using Trenchworks bases from Secret Weapon Miniatures.

The Cherub was fun... if only because I got to scribble some cryptic messages on its proclamation. 

 I'll need a lot more practice to do fancy Illuminations in this scale but this proclamation captures the feel of the Imperial Cult as a movement of the working masses of Imperial Citizenry.

For the Preacher I wanted to mix fanaticism with the last vestiges of a fading glory.  To get the feel of a man who has joined the crusade because he has nothing left of his former high station except the clothes on his back and the weighty tomes of the Emperor's Wisdom that he carries with him always.

 The full set of minis that I found on this pass through the boxes.

The Lexigrapher follows the Preacher and, aided by the pair of Servoskulls, records every word. The Gun Servitor that protects him rounds out the group.  I picture the retinue as followers of the Preacher rather than of the Inquisitor so its actually thematic to show them without the Inquisitor that they would typically be seen to escort.

 These were worked up from black with three stages of bone white and highlight then washed with Secret Weapon Washes and painted where this treatment was too muddled.  This ended up generating a lot of the shadow effects and highlights were often achieved by glazing the surfaces to be highlighted with a lighter tone (like a yellow) and then thinly re-glazed with the original base wash color.

 A bit of attention was paid to the wires.  They are all color coded either on the cable itself or on the terminal plug.  There is nothing worse than a pile of unmarked cable!

 The retinue are the wandering remnants of a destroyed congregation and, as such, are scavengers by nature.  They not only carry their personal fortunes on their backs but their other equipment is also of mixed provenance due to the random nature of its acquisition during their long travels.  The Gun servitor sports a Multi Melta in an Astartes color scheme and might be a bone of contention in an encounter with Space Marines of any flavor.

I love Servo Skulls!  They are iconic of the poor man's way to continue service to the Emperor after the body... and even the mind... fails.  These scout and guard always recording the retinues efforts in the name of the Emperor!

Back to the table now... more projects are waiting...