Genestealer Cult - Macrocosm Space Dwarf Bikers Kickstarter

Today, amid the turmoil of the rapidly changing world we now inhabit, I have some rather unusual delights for you. A while ago I became aware of a new project from Macrocosm, some space dwarfs, including bikers. There were parts to convert them into mutants, which look very much like genestealer cult squats, so naturally I was most interested.

Chris from Macrocosm was kind enough to send me a selection, and I set to work. They are modular, so there are a variety of arms, heads, weapons, packs and so on. Along with the number of regular squat parts, there are several hybrid heads along with some mutated arms, and a dedicated hybrid biker body with an extra arm.

I used that very biker body here, on Dagur Griefkin, Atalan Jackal of the Kabeiri. The set was sculpted by Bob Olley and Alessio Cisbani. I'm quite the fan of both sculptors, and as Bob has sculpted so many genestealer cult minis before they fit in nicely.

The bikes are metal, so have quite a bit of heft to them. I recommend pinning where possible.

Here we have Baerdal Clawhammer and his gunner, Lythur Griefkin on a Wolftrike. (A very fine proxy for the Atalan Jackal Wolfquad) The trike is a charming mini, perfectly at home in a retro Bob Olley heavy cult. I do recommend painting it in sub-assemblies though. I tested out my scheme for vehicles for the Kabeiri on these bikes, and I'm quite happy with it. I think it'll work well on ridgerunners and goliaths.

The faces on the hybrids were a joy to paint, with lots of nice detail. I used mostly contrast paints on the skin, and essentially washed in all the colour over a Pallid Wych Flesh basecoat, with only one set of highlights over the washes.

There is also a set of infantry available. So for anyone wanting a nice squad of modular hybrid squats, now's your chance. The claw arm on this guy is a conversion, using the hand from the mutated arm in place of a regular squat hand. There are heavy weapons as well as melee and ranged arm options for these.

So, if you fancy some of these, head over to the kickstarter which is due to start any day now, and see what tickles your fancy.

Kickstarter - Shieldwall Fine Shields

A distinctly oldschool flavour to today's post. Some pals of mine are currently running a kickstarter for shields and shield inserts. You can check it out here. Shields are fun, and for those that like to freehand intricate designs on their shields, more power to you. As I get older, however, I'll take any shortcut I can get. Behold, this is one of those delightful shortcuts. Along with swanky shields you get themed inserts to suit most fantasy factions. Here are a few examples, though there are several shield shapes in addition to the rounds you see here.

Personally, I would probably paint the shield face wooden, then maybe fray or cut down an insert to show damage/weathering, then pop it on with the wood underneath showing through. A little run of ink around the edge maybe to blend the edge of the insert into the shield edge, and done. Swanky shield, minimal effort.

The kickstarter runs for another 24 days at the time of posting.

Bonefields - Goblin Undead

Today we have another tasty pair of goblinoid skeletons from the upcoming Bonefields Kickstarter from Macrocosm, a heavy infantryman and a fanatic. Well, I assume he's a fanatic on account of the nasty looking ball he's wielding. He looks like he means to do woeful harm with it anyhow.

There are several goblin heavy infantry sculpts as far as I know. They'd make a great bodyguard unit for the goblin vampire.

Macrocosm's Bonefields kickstarter begins Feb 23rd.

Bonefields - Dwarf and Goblin Warbands

I've just finished off the latest dead lads for the dwarf and goblin warbands for Bonefields, two more slayers and three goblin spearmen. As has been pointed out, the way I've painted the slayer's loincloth makes it look like saggy soiled underpants, which after I finished laughing about I decided only added to the undead horror. Truly a fate worse than death.

The painting has reached a point where they can now be called warbands. The goblin vampire above commands four archers, four spearmen, two swordsmen, one goblin hero and one heavy infantryman with halberd. I can also let slip what you get in the Bonefields starter set for the goblins.You get the lads here below:

So it's four spearmen, four archers and the goblin vampire. There is an insane amount of units you can add to this starting warband. I hear tell of undead Squi- ah, I mean rotund cave dwelling monsters, cavalry, command models and even war machines. The sculptors Alessio Cisbani and Darren Edwards are doing mighty work indeed, along with the indefatigable Chris Nicholls, owner of Macrocosm and creator of Bonefields.

As to the dwarves, here's the warband as it stands. The dwarf necromancer controls a dwarf hero, two dwarf wights, four slayers, (two with greatweapons and two with two axes) and four warriors with sword and shield.

For the dwarf side of the starter set you get four warriors, four slayers and the dwarf Necromancer. All told the set contains eighteen miniatures at the time of writing.

The dwarves are likewise set to receive a load of models to expand the warband. Cavalry, zombies, crossbowmen, command and even artillery.

I have two more undead on the table at the moment which I'll be using to build a painting tutorial for techniques used on the models seen above. One is another goblin heavy infantryman for rusted and worn armour and the other, the bone tutorial, is fanatical about his ball and chain.

The Bonefields Kickstarter kicks off on the 23rd of February.

Kickstarter - Dwarves at Arms

With less than three days left to go on the Dwarves at Arms kickstarter, I figured it was time to give it a wee plug on the the Mumblings, especially as I've been doing the concept and and design for it!

It has been the most successful kickstarter yet run by Macrocosm, who have three previous successful kickstarter projects under their belt. People just love dwarves it seems, though there are several rather fantastic non-dwarf add ons available too, but more on those later, especially the hobby horse riding ogres.

The twist with this particular take on dwarves is that the range is split up into dwarves from several historical eras. So far we have Crusaders, Normans, English Civil War, Late Romans, Vikings and Samurai. Each of these have several packs available. World War One Russian dwarves and Spartan dwarves are coming up as stretch goals. You can see pack 1 for the Samurai Dwarves below, which were designed by yours truly.

So, as you can see there's a massive range for dwarf lovers out there. The add on section bears special mention too, where you can add (deep breath) Jotnar (trolls) for the vikings, several sets of ogres, archers, cavalry, command, spearmen etc, WW1 tanks, treemen, a MASSIVE range of halflings, both fantasy and WW1, Monty Python dwarves, dwarf cavalry of various types, dwarf berserkers, a siege tower (chaos dwarf players should really check this out) and art prints. Check out the size of the trolls:

Huge eh? It also bears mentioning the kickstarter is really good value. There are a couple of other models I want to draw your attention to, as they are buried in over forty add ons. Look at these guys:

Ogres on hobby horses. Now, you might take your gaming a bit more seriously than I, and you may be thinking "What the hell, are you f*cking kidding me?" but for me, these are one of the best things in the kickstarter bar the dwarves themselves. A set of Monty Phyton Holy Grail dwarves and some of these lads, and you have a fine, fine theme for a warband. It also tickles me to think of these guys taking down some super badass chaos knights while making clip-clop noises.

As to the dwarves themselves, they are mostly multipart with several head and arms options, sculpted by the mighty Alessio Cispani.  Here's some examples:

Pretty cool eh? I'm sure the Vikings fans among you recognise the seer there. So, if you bear any love for the dwarves (or halflings, ogres or trolls), you'd be doing yourself a disservice not looking at this kickstarter before it ends.

Greenskin Wars - Kickstarter

If you're a fan of orcs, gobbos or trolls, the Greenskin Wars kickstarter by Diego Serrate of Pantheon of Chaos fame is worthy of your attention. The former Crooked Claw range (now owned by Diego) has been hugely expanded by Kevin "Goblinmaster" Adams for this kickstarter.

Those of you out there who are greenskin aficionados will know the kind of insanely good sculpts Kevin is know for, especially greenskins. Diego has several of his excellent trolls available on the kickstarter as well. The range has gotten quite big, with orcs, goblins, war machines, black goblins, trolls, tuskers, feral goblins (these are excellent), doom goblins, wolf riders, hobgoblins, chariots and a ton of characters. Here's some images of the range.

Pretty tasty, the black goblins are a favourite of mine. They look like real assholes.

Anyone with any love for the greenies will by now have probably already clicked on the link above, but if you've made it this far then let me tell you there's a goblin witch on the kickstarter that would bring a goblin enthusiast to tears. 

I won't put up an image, you'll have to go see for yourself.

Kickstarter - Dark Dwarves

Chris over at Macrocosm has just launched his latest Kickstarter, Dark Dwarves. Being a long time chaos dwarf fan, I'm pretty intrigued by this, especially as they are more in the 'spiky stunty' style. There are a lot of the units you'd hope for, handgunners, crossbowmen, axemen, but also more esoteric units, like the 2 man mortar and weapons teams like the bazooka,  flame thrower and gatling gun.

So if you're looking for some great value evil dwarves, head on over and take a look. The add on section is also offering some deals on the crazy popular Monster Balls from Macrocosm's previous Kickstarter. They're pretty hilarious and have a lot of gaming uses. The ball of steel is something I'll have to pick up myself I think. Who doesn't want a giant floating armoured cyclops ball?

Kickstarter - Pantheon of Chaos

Over the last year I've been working with some very talented artists and sculptors on the Pantheon of Chaos range, and we finally launched our kickstarter last night. The models are strongly oldhammer flavoured and decidedly evil, with champions, warriors, raiders, thugs, monsters, hobgoblins and behemoths, over forty sculpts in all, with many more unlock-able as the project continues.Since we launched last night we funded in under two hours, which paves the way for stretch goal goodness for such delights as the huge ettin and the mutant ogre.

So if you like a dash of unfathomable evil in your miniatures, take a look! Here are a few of the models from the range.

Pantheon of Chaos - Pre Kickstarter Miniature

With the Pantheon of Chaos Kickstarter now only a few weeks away, this pre-kickstarter mini has just gone up for sale on the Pantheon of Chaos Facebook page. If you like your heavy metal, this fellow might appeal. You can order one via the address on the image, or go to the thread on the Pantheon of Chaos Facebook page.

Kickstarter - Return to Colony 87

Last year Axiom ran a very successful kickstarter for his Colony 87 series of sci-fi civilians. Designed by Will Beck and sculpted by Michael Anderson, they were an excellent range of six civilian models to add colour to your games.

These proved so popular that Axiom has just launched a new kickstarter, Return to Colony 87. With six new sculpts this kickstarter has already funded and even beat the funding total for the original Colony 87 after only one day. If you're looking for some super characterful miniatures to grace your gaming table I'd highly recommend pledging. For those of you who missed the first kickstarter there is a pledge that allows you to pick those up as well. Several of the pledges have limited places left, so I wouldn't dawdle!

All the above minis were painted by the excellent Asslessman. More of his work on Leadplague.

Kickstarter - Diehard Miniatures

For those of you with a liking for Oldhammer miniatures, and for those of you that just really like great fantasy minis, the Diehard Miniatures kickstarter is currently ongoing. There are several factions, from the amphibious tech-laden Eru-kin to the undead, humans, goblinoids, humans, chaotic monstrosities and even and hawkmen. There are quite a few stretch goals planned too. The pledges allow some mixing and matching between factions, along with a large add on section if you're only after a few models.

Personally I'm looking at the snakemen, if they get unlocked, and the dwarf boar centaur. Anyone with an old school chaos dwarf army might be interested in this fellow. He looks happy not to be pushing a large warmachine/lawnmower. If you get me.

I'm a whirlwind! I'll tenderize you!!

These would work great for Warhammer, Age of Sigmar, and with the expansion for Frostgrave imminent, I'm looking at the undead knight. So, take a gander, there's a lot of good stuff to choose from.

Macrocosm - Malignancy New Releases

I've gotten to be quite a fan of the Macrocosm line of miniatures over the last while. Macrocosm leans heavily on the Rogue Trader era for inspiration, often taking long abandoned but still well loved factions such as the Squats and the Genestealer Cult and giving them a new lease of life. The range is growing extremely rapidly, with their current Kickstarter (funded and approaching the first stretch goal at the time of writing) giving us two more factions and new units for the existing factions. I've been lucky enough to be involved with designing the concepts some of the new models, and there are some very cool things coming.

Today, however, I'm going to look at some of the new Malignancy releases. First up, the Malformed Host Special Weapons set.

Malignancy Host with flamer

The Malignancy are a Godsend for anyone building a genestealer cult. Beforehand, anyone assembling a cult faced quite a job finding components, sculpting, converting and so on. Now, I love all that, but many do not. For those folks, these guys are the very thing. Even with my love of conversion, a ready-to-paint specialist like our flamer-toting friend above is too much to resist. There are several special and heavy weapons available. Like most Malignancy models, this guy is pleasantly chunky, and a nice clean cast. They are larger than you expect, in a good way. A huge amount of miniatures now are designed with 3d packages, and many are indeed technically excellent, this guy has the hand-sculpted individuality and charm which is so common in so many sculpts of the 1980s, and so rings my bell.

Malignancy Host with plasma gun

This host is much the same as the flamer, clean and well cast. None of the models in the images are cleaned up, they are straight out of the pack. I like the masks they are wearing too, more common on the 2nd wave Malignancy releases. 

Malignancy Infested Og

Next up, the Malignancy infested Og. This guy is big. You could pour him into a sock and cosh someone to death with him, no trouble. It's a 40mm base for this guy at least. Anything less than that and it's topple time. Again, a nice clean sculpt with very little cleanup. I would recommend pinning the hell out of him though, and maybe painting the gun separately. There are three head options, one hooded and masked and two hooded. The hooded heads remind me of medieval grotesques. I'm going to have a lot of fun painting those faces.

Infected Og Heads

I like the idea of infested Ogs, it gives the Malignancy some big guys, and something new and interesting for cult players. Here's a scale shot with a Primogen.

"Hey! Hey ugly!! This way!"

Finally we have two Primogen Hosts, the middle management of the Malignancy. These aren't new releases, but I hadn't reviewed them before, so here they are. They make good squad leaders, or could even function as the elusive Hierarch in a genestealer cult. Once again, they are clean casts with lots of nice detail. Bags, pouches, canteens, chitin covered third arm...

Oops. Little blurry on the front shot there. 

Forward, my swollen-headed brethren!

So, for devotees of the cult we have such rarities as leaders, specialists and hulking infected abhumans. For Malignancy players a growing range of horrific alien-infested nutters. Initially I was interested in this range for my own genestealer cult, but as they variety of models increases I am getting more and more curious about the Macrocosm universe and rule system, which is free, I might add. 

If you're intrigued, give the Macrocosm Kickstarter a look, there's never been a better time get some Macrocosm goodies for the Malignancy, the Diggers, or the new factions, the 3rd Race (mech battlesuits) or the Grem (well-equipped and very serious greenskins).

Macrocosm - Next Races Kickstarter Goes Live

If you likes you some Rogue Trader inspired miniatures, Macrocosm's new Kickstarter is now live, and very much worth a look. They are using it to launch two new races, the mysterious 3rd race, who utilise remote battle suits, and the Grem, a curiously well organised faction of greenskins. There are some nice stretch goals, (and some exciting ones to come) and they are offering deals on the existing factions, the Malignancy and the Diggers (Genestealer Cult and Squats). So if you were thinking of picking some up, now's the time.

Unsurprisingly, I'm a big fan of the Malignancy, and I'll be reviewing the new host specialists and infected Ogs very shortly here in Mumbleville.