Olivia Von Koss and the Barrow Watch

If you've been following my #HobbyStreak on Twitter and Instagram, you'll have seen some of the progress I've been making on my Soulblight Gravelords army led by Olivia. Here's a look at everything I've finished, and a continuation of Olivia's narrative following her resurrection: 

 

Wight Kings and Queens

Wights and Wight Kings have always been among of my favorite unit types in Warhammer. Here's a look at my older Wight Kings, and the new Wight Queens that I'm working on.

The Legion of the Infernal Skull, A Legacy of Death

As long as I've been playing Warhammer, I've been writing backstories for my characters and updating the lore as significant events happen in games I've played or in the evolution of the rules. I've collected many of them in this blog over the past years. This post is a compilation of everything so far, with a few updates to reflect the current status of the army and to fill in some of the blanks and flesh out the remaining characters.

 

  

Kings and Wings

Commission work has been keeping me pretty busy, but I managed to squeeze in some time to paint the kings:

Attentive readers will notice the bracers on the one with the raised axe. After the initial conversion, I thought his thin, bony arms and the way the cape bulged out in the back was making the figure look a little portly in the middle. So, I shaved down the cape to give it a more natural hang, and bulked up his arms by sculpting bracers. I also concealed his sides a little more with some knives and pouches taken from the plastic Grave Guard kit. All this helps give him a more heavily armed and armored appearance, and further distinguishes him from the other king.

The red armor uses a formula I had discovered years ago while painting my battle standard– It's basically Scab Red with a (very) little Blood Red and Dwarf Flesh mixed in for the highlights. To keep things from going too pink, I apply a thin glaze of Brown Ink and Scab Red in the recesses.

The Varghulf is proceeding slowly, but surely. I've got the reposing and sculpting of his body finished. The Balrog wings have been suitably tattered, and pinned in place. All that remains is to putty the joins and add some fur on the arms.

As you can see, I'm simultaneously working on some bat swarms. I've never been too keen on the "official" bat swarm models. The bats are too large, and they all have the same, upright pose. I settled on Warmaster Fell Bats to use as swarms. They're small, posable, and separate, so each swarm base can look totally unique.

The bats and Varghulf will all be "airborne," pinned into tombstones to create a scenic base. I picked up the Garden of Moor hoping to cannibalize some posts or statuary, but there really aren't any large, solid pieces that would be good for mounting the Varghulf. After some searching, I came across a set of resin grave markers by Custom Dioramics at my local hobby shop.

Once the Varghulf's sculpting is complete, I'll model all the scenic bases for it and the swarms, and paint them all in one batch. I guess that will be sort of like a unit grind.

'Til next time!

Modeling: Wight Kings

I've been talking about converting the new plastic wight king kit for a while. This weekend, I finally sat down and built two of them, armed with double-handed weapons

Here's how:

For the first king, I began by clipping away the shield arm. I also removed the hourglass from the tombstone (it just wasn't working for me, visually).

After attaching the chain mail skirt to the front, I used some epoxy modeling putty to build up the mail on the side of the leg since that area would be visible without the shield.

Before attaching the king's torso, I removed the scabbard. Then I attached him to the base, and added some extra ballast to enhance the ground texture. (Note: If you're assembling a wight king for yourself, gluing him to the base should be the last step after the cape is attached. Once he's on the base, the cape won't fit. I learned that the hard way, but we'll come to that step in a bit...)

I puttied some extra fur over the join on the shoulders, and repaired the chain mail sleeves. I also added a bit of an interior cloak in the gap on one side. Once that was finished, I added the wight's hellfire. The plastic king is perfectly suited for this– I simply treat it as an open crown and putty right over the helmet. The result is similar to the "head brazier" that's all the rage with flagellants & zealots.

The cape and arms were next. I clipped away the wight's sword and added it to my parts box. It will look great in the hands of another character or unit champion. To build the double handed axe, I used arms from the older Skeleton Warriors regiment box as well as Tomb Kings skeleton arms. The axe head is from Privateer's Madrak Ironhide, with its runes and detail filed away or filled with putty.

Here's the wight king with his arms attached. The smaller portion of the cape fit in with no issues. I had to flex the larger portion of the cape to get it to "pop" it into place. Aside from the arms and extra putty work, the model is pretty "stock."

For the second king, I got a little more ambitious. I wanted a distinctly different pose, and settled on an overhead swing. I began by carefully cutting the bat-wing leg armor and keys from the torso (those went in the parts box and will make their way onto a necromancer at some point) and removed the skull scepter from his leg. I cut the model in half at the waist, and removed the tombstone so I could model the base differently.

The molded-on shoulder pads were too low to accommodate the raised arms, so I clipped them away. The shoulder pads from the plastic Grave Guard regiment were used instead. I also shortened the spires of the crown, and used the small skull from the scepter to create an ornament on the front.

I cut a small sliver out of the model's back and glued on the torso with a slight lean to create more action in the axe swing.

After a lengthly search for skeleton arms that would work well for the pose, I finally settled on the Tomb Kings' chariot spear and sword. Only a slight bent in the right elbow was necessary to get the arms positioned the way I wanted them.

As with the first king, I pinned the pieces together to create the weapon arms. Since the backward lean was making it impossible to fit the cape in without cutting it anyway, I glued the model to its base at this point, using a skeleton as the "prop" under the wight king's foot. The shoulder pads were trimmed and glued in place.

For the waist armor, I used parts cut from the torso of the vampire included in the plastic zombie dragon kit. These were glued in place, and I used putty to add some extra chain mail on the legs and sculpt new sleeves.

I sculpted some fur over the joins of the shoulder pads and added a belt buckle. To help hide the rough spots on the sides of the figure, I modeled straps around the torso. The raised foot also needed some putty work so it would look correct. The axe head and hellfire came next.

The final step for each model was to add its cape and putty the seams and fur on the back. To further differentiate the two figures I cut away a portion of one of their tattered capes.

Here are the two finished conversions:

I'm really happy with how these guys turned out, and they will make a great addition to my army. Now to get painting...

'Til next time!