Stargrave 3 - Captain Aesir Vortag

We all have our favourite champions. Tiny metal, plastic or resin protagonists that we've become unreasonably attached to as they've battled in our name down the years. This is one such mini, a venerable warrior that has been leading my renegade hordes since I was a teenager. May I introduce Captain Aesir Vortag, formerly of the XII legion.

Vortag has a much storied history, mostly from some decades ago. Back in the late 80s and early 90s the Captain (though in his hubris he was Lord Vortag back then) led his renegades warbands against all comers. Myself and my buddies at the time gamed A LOT back then. We were all about Rogue Trader and then 2nd Edition 40k, and we played the bejeezus out of them. We built our own rudimentary, but enormous, campaign system. We even recorded many of our games in a large ledger, complete with maps, drawings and army lists. I have it to this day, and I get quite the warm fuzzy feeling when I look back over it. I was very close to posting one of my early doodles of Vortag in action from the ledger, but I will spare you that.

The Captain and his heretics butchered his way though Ork warbands, Tyranid hordes, loyalist Astartes, Imperial Guard detachments and assorted Eldar pirates. He accrued favourite enemies, and they harried one another over many a tabletop. 

Aahh... such days. 

But, eventually, the guns fell silent. Vortag's enemies took ship into the void (or college, as it was known on some worlds), and with no wars left to wage, the Captain and his warband made for the stasis pods. It was to be a long sleep.

Years passed, and other heroes came to the fore. Games came, games went, but I always had a tremendous soft spot for the infamous Captain.

 And so, when a plan for some of my gaming brethren to gather this Spring for a Stargrave weekend, I decided it was time for a new chapter for my slumbering hero.

Vortag is one of the Jes Goodwin Warhammer Fantasy Realm of Chaos champions. One of the curious set that seemed to be blessed with 40k weaponry and technology. Back then, chaos champions could indeed be gifted with rewards from the 40th millennium. They make very fine fallen legionnaires.

At the risk of getting overly maudlin, I found it quite an emotional experience finally getting paint on the old villain. I used mostly contrast paints and medium over metallic base coats. His tail and sword were blended and stippled, before getting a unifying glaze or two. I had been using Flesh Tearers Red mixed with medium for red chaos armour, but I wanted to turn up the vibrancy on Vortag so I added some Blood Angels Red to the mix to make it roughly 1:1:1. It was extremely satisfying finally getting him painted. He's one of four great heroes of my early days of gaming that I wanted to give such treatment to. The other three are still awaiting their turn.

Space rippled and shivered as the space hulk translated back into realspace, or rather, most of it did. Sections of the hulk tapered off into translucent ghost-shapes and tatters of best-forgotten memories. The hulk, the Odyssey of  Devotion, was never truly in one place, and it's labyrinth of ancient passageways could lead a traveller to an infinity of destinations and times, whether they willed it or no.

One such lost soul shivered into existence in the stillness of an abandoned gunnery deck, the dim lumens barely casting enough light to lift the figure out of the darkness. It stood there, in the silence. The darkness seemed to deepen, shifting and reaching out before suddenly recoiling as the warrior heaved a long cackling exhalation. Captain Vortag of the World Eaters Legion addressed his ship:

'Finally. Finally. You see, Malum? I told you. I told you I would find my way back.'

Around the speaker more figures coalesced, similar in aspect. The grim ruin of fallen Astartes, only barely recognisable as once noble space marines, but no less dangerous, and infinitely more wrathful. Some had clearly had to make battlefield repairs. Others seemed no different than moments, years or centuries earlier, when they had been scattered across the void. Others had had to abandon their armour entirely, and wore archaic or primitive replacements. Yet more had simply not returned at all. 

They regarded their leader expectantly. Vortag did not give the expectation time to fester into recrimination.

'My brothers. Let us see what has become of both ship and crew in our absence. Let us see what gifts Inquisitor Balthazar Malum has left us.'

For now, Vortag leads a mob of the Odysseys mortal crew, but I do have some of his legionnaires in the painting pipeline.

Stargrave 2 - Mutants and Murderers

 

Two more for the blood God. My band grows just a teeny bit today with the addition of another pair of absolute bastards. May I introduce Gerhart Voke and Abelard Dake.

Abelard Dake is another Diehard miniature, and a particularly crazy mutant. He's wonderfully nuts, and makes a great companion to Conrad Freig, who is also from Diehard. They both function as Ravaged Troopers in my Stargrave warband.

Abelard lost his life in service to Khorne as Conrad did, and was similarly revived by Khorne (after a fashion) to continue his ravages as a berserker. Life with a knee-face is probably pretty terrible, but that giant chainsword probably makes up for some of the practical setbacks. He keeps his hair looking sharp too. Somehow.

Gerhart Voke. This guy. This guy looks like he is just the WORST. Look at that face. I mean, he must just love his job. Gerhart hails from The Blooded Killteam box, which is just cracker, and contains the long lost and now found again chaos ogryn and corrupted commissar. Some of the new 40k chaos kits are just magic. The Accursed Mutants and new Jakhals kits are delicious. 

Gerhart is, as you'd expect, a heretic Astra Militarum trooper. Many such wretches serve Vortag, though few with the zeal and delight Gerhart displays. A total psychopath, he finds the service of Khorne a kind of murderous paradise, and indulges his brutal impulses with frenzied abandon. His continued existence, given his lack of caution in the face of enemy fire, is statistically almost zero, which has piqued Vortag's interest. Perhaps Khorne has plans for Gerhart.

Next up, the man himself, Aesir Vortag.

Stargrave 1 - Beginnings of the Murderband

A change of direction here at the Mumblings this day. A grand meeting of my compatriots is planned in a few month's time for some Stargrave action. This meeting is a follow up to last year's very enjoyable Ghost Archipelago meet-up where I took the crew of The Kraken on to greater glory and had a very fun time doing it.

This year it's all sci-fi flavoured, and I'm using it as an opportunity to paint up a group I've long wanted to see on the table, namely Vortag's Murderband, Vortag is a character from my very earliest days of gaming, a World Eater Captain fallen far from his glorious origins as a brother of the XII legion. With just a scant few of his brethren left in his company, he has been forced to recruit warriors of lesser provenance in order to bolster his ragged command.

But despite his predicament, his ambitions are lofty indeed. 

One of these lesser warriors is Conrad Freig, beloved of Khorne. A mortal berserker, Conrad's devotion to the creed of gore is total. So pure was his faith that on his death, Khorne, though taking Conrad's skull as his due, breathed new life into his torn corpse. Conrad rose again, altered, but filled with almost unbearable zeal, ecstatic in the knowledge that his own skull had been deemed worthy. He, and others like him now serve as devastating line-breakers for Vortag's warbands.

Conrad is a Diehard mini, and I used a combination of contrast and standard paint techniques on him. Contrast paints are settling into my painting armoury nicely now. I love making glazes with them, and I've taken to using Wraithbone primer as standard now.

Hopefully I'll have another couple of murderous nutters finished shortly.

Sláine 4 - Skull Sword Champions

Today we have MORE skull swords for the Sláine project. This time a pair of champions. One from the new Warlord range, and one far older fellow, an OOP sculpt from Foundry whose time has come at last.

This guy had resided in my box of 2000AD minis for many years, with no project to call his own. With the release of the new Sláine game though, his lonely days were over, and as a little extra I decided to make him a champion, hence the 32mm base. 

Even when you've had a mini in your 'to paint' collection for years, I find it interesting that you only really look at it closely once you decide to paint it. I'd never noticed the little triskele on his sword hilt, or the fact that he actually had eyes. 

I painted him as the rest, and the contrast paint took to him well. His shield was very plain compared to the flamboyant designs of his new peers, so I freehanded a triskele on there to jazz him up some. 

It's rather satisfying having him finally added a wee force of his evil brethren.

Speaking of shields, look at this! This guy was a mini I'd been really keen to paint since the start of the project, with his massive over the top Gwar concert shield. He's a little more fancy than the basic skull swords, he has a fancier helmet, a better weapon, more bangles and that amazing shield. Let's see that barbarian Sláine get through this!

His basing is the same as the rest bar that little pile of bones. I think they belonged to a mouse. It's been in my bits box for about twenty years.

He's manspreading like crazy, but then big skull shields are great for confidence.

 So, a pair of new champions joins the force, giving me three heroes. It's past time I added more mooks, so another three pack of axe-wielding skull swords is up next, and a creepy Drune priest.

Sláine 3 - The Lord Weird Slough Feg

The Sláine project continues with one of my childhood favourites, Slough Feg. His pose is based on the iconic Bisley drawing for the Horned God series.

Feg is Sláine's predecessor, the old horned God, and he is not planning on retiring. Having thrown in his lot with Crom Cruach and the Dark Gods of Cythrawl, he now leads the Drunes, intent on destroying the land of the young. Also, he is as mad as a box of frogs.

How could you not love him? he also gets some cracker lines in the comic. His odd syntax only adding to his macabre appeal.

So yes, Feg, all round top guy. 

As to painting this loon, his skin took me a while to get right. I didn't want him to look too undead, as he isn't, just super old and fairly stinking. I uses GW Contrast paints almost exclusively, bar some highlighting. A mix of Basilicarum Grey and Fyreslayer Flesh mixed with medium finally gave me a nice wash for the skin. Over that I glazed, mostly in the recesses and on the elbows, knees and knuckles, purple, pink and red to add some unholy life to the flesh. Some minor highlights of Flayed One Flesh and finally Pallid Wych Flesh and that was it. 

The rest of Feg used techniques I'd tried on the Skull Swords for leather, cloth etc. All pretty natural materials. His horns and progressive washes of Contrast browns from Skeleton Horde down to Garaghak's Sewer, mixed with medium. 

So, now that the main man is done, it's time for some of his champions, and yet more Skull Swords.

Sláine 2 - Skull Sword Pack 1

 

So, that's my first pack of skull swords for Sláine complete. I'm sticking with the Contrast paint approach for this project, and I'm learning more about their uses all the time. Right now I'm of a mind that they won't replace my traditional way of working, but they will certainly add a very nice set of new techniques to my painting arsenal.

The Siocast these fellows are made from holds an insane amount of detail, and is quite pliable. These lads won't break in a hurry. On the downside, files are useless. The material shreds when filed, so a super sharp scalpel is your best friend when cleaning mould lines and such. It holds paint just fine, at least it holds primer fine. I'm using Games Workshop Wraithbone primer on these lads.

So considering I'm using new paint techniques on a new material, I think these lads are turning out pretty good. The shields designs are great, particularly the one you can see just above here. The designers have taken a lot from the art of Belardinelli, who drew the Sláine strip in the early days. 

Skull sword packs come in 3s, and die easy, so I have a couple more groups of these evil guys to paint yet. I need a bit of a treat though, so next up is their evil boss, the lord weird, Slough Feg.

Sláine 1 - Skull Sword Contrast Test Model

The recent Sláine release from Warlord Games was something I've been waiting for for a while. I'm a huge 2000AD fan, and of Sláine in particular. With some friends already painting up factions for the game, it wasn't something I wasn't going to be able to resist. So I gently laid aside the Silver Bayonet for now and took up the stone axe.

I decided to paint up the Drunes. I'm more often than not drawn to the bad guys, and their leader, the Lord Weird Slough Feg, is a childhood favourite. He's like Skeletor's cranky grandad. Sláine draws on rich seam of Celtic history and myth, and laces it heavily with delicious fantasy tropes. The Drunes, my faction of choice, misuse the Earth power running through the land, eventually turning it sour in their greed. So a lot to identify with there from modern life. At least Feg is straight up about destroying the world. Would vote for.

Anyhow, I decided with this project to go full Contrast paints, pale primer, the works. So with some (loads) of help from Juan Hidalgo's YouTube channel, I set to work on the first Skull Sword.

Lord Vade- I mean Feg will not be pleased.

Skull Swords are Drune soldiery. Bearing the dreaded Triskele and willing to part heads from shoulders at their master's slightest whim, they are a nasty lot. They wear breath masks to protect them from their Drune masters foul stench, as Drune priests begin to decay as they become more powerful, and you can only get someone a Christmas deodorant gift set so many times.

Yeah, look at those Skull Swords, getting their... asses... kicked...

I was on new ground painting this fellow, so there was a lot to learn. I usually paint metals first, but this time they'd be the last thing I painted on the mini. I find contrast very pleasing to work with, but up until this point it had been more of a supplement to my style. This was a another level though, and I'd have to dispense with some tried and tested ways of doing things. Old dog, new tricks? I dunno...

I borrowed heavily from Juan's Kruleboy Eavy Contrast painting video, as it has lots of natural materials like leather and wood. I find his videos suit my style well, and aren't too time consuming. One thing that did give me a bit of a pain in the arse is re-touching the primer after working on an adjacent area. That said, the Skull Sword took about four hours in total. I reckon I could shave an hour off that now I have the colours picked and I'm not searching for techniques. I'd probably batch paint troops too, maybe groups of three, which, conveniently is the size of a unit of Skull Swords in the Sláine game. 

I painted the bases in my usual recipe. Some dead leaves and withered plants give a nice impression of sourland.

I do like the control I get with painting the metallics more like I paint other colours; base, wash and highlights for the most part. I usually use a lot of drybrushing on metals, and I think I still will for things like chainmail and such. Contrast paints are fantastic, but they are just another arrow in the painting quiver. I do love being able to tint metals with Contrast so you can easily turn a single basecoat into steel, bronze, gold or whatever. I used Canoptek Alloy as the base metal colour on the Skull Sword as I like the warmer tone.

So, with the tester done, time for some buddies for this fellow.