Monday, March 19, 2018

Herr Carstein has just arrived

Hello again,

It's been a while and I really missed posting. And painting.
But recently reality has thrown 'uuuge lump of shit into my life fan so hobby had to wait.

Anyway the previous post was about idea of building 2500 pts 5th ed Undead army. Since that time I've managed to paint ~530 points, which are:
- a skeleton (8 points)
- zombie horseman (28 points)
- vampire lord (495) - 5th edition rules after all.

For marketing purposes - here's current state of the main unit: (in theory) unbreakable tarpit of rotting flesh and bones. These should actually be skeletons but I think I'll mix skellies with zombies to make whole block more interesting. And heavy.
Freshly painted toys stand in the very middle:
my favorite vampire model from the back days and trusty skeleton champion emerging from below the ground:


I've always loved this sculpt: 100% member of Carstein family.
It's centerpiece of the army so decision had to be made which color scheme would fit it best: "official" night blue was really nice but I liked striking red published in 'Eavy Metal armies painting guide much more. 
But again - that would be the only such a colorful model in the whole army...
So looking for something in between Mr Carstein was painted rather simple and "believable":
since other vampired already wear violet / purple robes (funeral elegance...) this one also got similar outfit with some bright gems and healthy, dead-white complexion for contrast.

Looking at the pics now I think I should've added something on the black part of cloak- more than mid-grey highlighting...
It's sure fine for gaming purposes and I ain't going for Golden Demon (or anywhere else) with the piece, but leaving such a large area simply dark is kinda waste. 
Yeah... I'll definitely try to do something about it and take better photos: without filter on lamp minis cast shadows and raw photos seem to be "burnt". Thank Satan for GIMP...

As for the vampire's little buddy - it's my solution of the cloak problem:
model sure looks nice standing in the wind (maybe casting spells? or summoning storm? or whatever else) but that fucking cloak makes placing model between rank and file deaders pain in the ass.
There were several ideas about dealing with the problem:
- placing it on larger base: interesting idea for modeling purposes but idea was to make it gaming piece,
- using unit filler,
- not using cloak at all,
- something else.

I chose the last option: luckly there were some random bits of skellies in my bits box, which allowed to convert deader responding for vampire's call...
Convertion took like 10 minutes and I've finally found use for metal champion's head: I remember original owner used to fall because of head's weight.  



The army I am planning to assemble also contains cavalry:
not as main unit, which I used to field back days, but rather flanking group and / or mounted necromancer's cache.
A while back I got mysterious zombie rider (which actually turned out to be "Leopold the Exhumed" - Citadel C21 Undead Cavalry, sculpted by Bob Naismith, 1987) but it came with standard placcy skeleton steed instead of original one.
While looking for replacement for the mount I found Black Tree Designs skeleton cavalry: total Oldhammer! 
Models are simple but definitely fit oldschool army. There are 5 different skeletons riding zombie ponies, which is exactly what I need for the army.
Here's the first one - skleton horseman champion:



When the vampire's cloak is redone I'm starting skeleton chariot...