Skeleton warriors (Highland Miniatures)

Painting skellies is kinda like knitting:

you get pissed - you paint some bones - you get better.

Too bad I didn't realize it bit earlier, but apparently better late then never.

Anyway last week I excavated another part of spoils of war looted during Oldhammer Weekend 2022: skeleton warriors unit from highland Miniatures range. Models look pretty cool: poses are different, proportions are correct - these guys definitely fit Warhammer range. There's one flaw though: since these are printed, they are also really fragile (those thin limbs and spears especially!). So fragile, several models arrived broken and it's even despite the fact they were pretty well packed. So yeah, if I could choose - purely of gaming purposes I'd pick plastic models instead of printed. Luckly I still had some spare limbs left by the previous boneheads unit, which added bit more vatiety to the freshly dug out death squad.

I have only 15 models from this line so I think these will be just support squad for the main unit or screaming skull catapult / second class character bodyguards. Of course - that is only in my head, because don't think there's even slighiest shade of chance these will move an inch after I put them in the display case hibernation chamber 😵

So here they are - corpses in the park. I think I've managed to adjust lighting a bit so photos turned out really decent:

And some scale shot: restless skeletons are defending city park against Dusk Realm Demon:

And here - skeletons supported by Mr Carstein himself and converted battle standard bearer are trying to convince chaos lord of Slaanesh city park and fresh grass is no place for heavy barded ponies:

Dwarf Slayer

One more old fart crossed off!

I am really glad it's not haunting me anymore, 'cause it spent last 3-4 years in washing liquid plus I really do not like the model ^^

As for the model itself - I got it second hand long time ago, and the plan was to paint it for gaming buddy. But after first painting attempt I realised I really, really do not like the sculpt so model ended up on the very bottom of Pile Ov Shame. It's spent several years in the hole, when I decided to wash it off off and give it another chance. I still didn't like the sculpt at all, so it spent few more years washing off instead of getting painted.

Until now.

It pisses me off there are still some miniatures waiting for Cthulhu knows what in the washing jar, so decision was made to save them all: one by one, starting with the piece I don't like the most ^^ Back days it was meant for souvenir, so it was painted as one - for the same buddy actually. He was Warhammer Game Master when we were still into RPG and was big fan of dwarves. Miniature's pose makes it kinda silly looking standing on ground level, among other rank and file models, but it's really cool leaping down. Decent material for display piece. So here it is: one more down, too many more to go:

And the scale shot - Mid Nor Scourge Bearer about to be decimated:

Arkhan the Black - finished! 💀

Another painting nightmare was just saved from Pile ov Shame oblivion.

It took long time to get this model so really cannot wait to see it display base leading undead chartiot platoon. Sadly both cases are full so looks like I need another Ikea Detolf. 

Painting this thing was pain in the ass. As mentioned earlier the model had to be painted before assembling to reach everything and shit. Sure it makes painting easier, but it takes much more time which I really don't like. I wanted to paint original banner first, but whole thing is colorful enough already. 

Must say I like what the final result, maybe except for that Lollipop of Damnation carried by mr. Black. The idea was to keep original colors, but it turned out as some stupid plastic toy.

See? 😁

The model got slightly larger base then original (5" x 5") so taking photos took some limitations because of small backdrop. Definitely not enough space for 3 or 4 more chariots...

Arkhan the Black - work in progress

Here I am again. Still alive.

Just as I promised to myself I took a break from painting weird sh!t and decided to paint bag full of ancient bones and magic stuff rotting on the very bottom of washing jar: Mighty Nagash's first lieutenant: Arkhan the Black. Back days it was one of those dream models I could never afford of even get where I live. Always considedred it badass sculpt: undead pope pillaging South of Men Empire. Ohhh... How nec-romantic... 🥰

I got the model ages ago but long after I quit playing Undead and Warhammer Fantasy at all. Those days I used to paint pretty lots of stuff for Ebay auctions and for commissions so there were funds for whims like Arkhan and other useless miniatures.

When I got it (it was second hand, badly painted piece) I was pretty sure it was complete. Kinda was: when it was stripped and examined it turned out although where were all parts, some of them were broken so it took some extra time to pin and assemble whole thing properly. Horses which came with the set were broken so I had to replace them. Looking at the model now I think it was good idea to add some variety to the ponies (thanks, Radek!). Just exactly like with other undead chariots I have the base was made of PVC sheet. This time it's 5" x 5" square to provide enough space for the horses and yoke. It's not much according to the rulebook (I guess) but I really don't give a f#ck about them. And besides - it's my toy so I guess I can place it on whatever I want, right? 🤔

One thing that bugs me now is the banner. Should I paint original, super-striking banner from Undead army book or rather stick to black and white banners used for all units in the Undead Army. The stripes look kinda more sinister and make nice contrast to rather colorful model, but think decision shall be made after the Black Pope is panited.

So here it is: the current stage. The black pope himself arrives when (or rather if) I can re-attatch it's broken Staff of Damnation:

There's one more tech-thing: apparently either blogger got screwed or I've been spamming those posts for too long but "Spam of the year" list is messed. There started to appear post much older then a year. Tried to reset it but with no effect. Any idea what could be the reason of it would be appreciated 🙄

Moon Clan (Chaos beastmen) #5- finished! 🤘🏻

"...and it will be a time of great strife, when the moons are united in darkness and the dead shall walk the earth once more..."

The Children of Chaos project is finally finished. Models have actually been painted a while ago, but now they got proper display base. As for the base used about 10 years ago I painted other unit standing on the same thing - Fabius Bile's  Plague Marines. Back days those chaotic creatures got a trophy on Pyrkon painting contest, and now - beastmen were planned to appear on Oldhammer Weekend Poland 2025 (3.10-5.10.2025).

I even signed up for Warhamer Fantasy campaigh, but sadly real life kicked in and hobby plans got dumped. Oh well, maybe nexy year. Or maybe never...

Like mentioned before - working on these oldies was lots of fun. These sculpts are essence of Warhammer spirit for me, and no printed / digitally designed hi-tech boring model can change that. Right now to take a step back from Warhammer I brought good ol' Deathjack on painting desk, but after it's done I deeply hope to assemble another warband from old range. Don't think I have enough junk to assemble Rogue Trader style band, but surely I have enough greenskins for the project...

Looking at viewers counters these models were damn popular compared to other stuff I paint. No idea why - my guess is GW released fresh Beastmen armybook or something. But we'll see what happens when new stuff leaves painting desk. So here they are and back to work...

Take care! 🐐

Moon Clan (Chaos beastmen) #4

Another bunch of beastmen got just finished so apparently Chaos Children warband project is nearly done. The gang is only dozen or so models, but must admit I've slowly started getting sick after painting Chaos only stuff. Looking forward for some change on painting desk. Olive green change...

The last trio are champion (beastlord), standard bearer and school bully - minotaur. I had lots of fun working on them: painting paper banner brings lots of memories. I still prefer paper banners over plastic or icons on stick. It's light so small model can carry pretty large standard without falling off. Bad Moon ain't new idea - 10 years ago I used it on the first zombie dragon project. Sure it should be greenskins' stuff but at the same time it's Warhammer Fantasy, and when it comes to worshipping evil forces - Chaos is not picky.

New models were painted using the same color palette as rest of the group so they all look nice marching together. They still need basing and display base but since it requires lots of pva glue - it also requires lots of time for drying and therefore it gets dedicated post. There's never enough Chaos spam after all... 😁

Minotaur sculpt got pretty aggressive, assaulting pose so for postcard purpose it got worthy opponent - Skaven rat ogre, trying to block falling axe with it's steam-powered, corrupted claw. And because poor rat-man is outnumbered it's assisted by mysterious Raze from Dark Age range. I know it's not Warhammer but who the hell knows what those twisted engineers from Clan Moulder have been working on recently: there might be rat-head under that mask as well... 

For some mysterious reason photos turned out to be kinda overburnt - no idea why: models for matt varnish as always, I used same set of lamps and tested background (pic of Moon Clan #2 were much better). My guess is the Horned Rat got pissed I dared to use rat ogre as sparring partner for minotaur. No matter what the reason is I might dig out light box trying to get as good photo conditions as possible. Ok, back to basing work to get this thing off the list:

Moon Clan (Chaos beastmen) #3

Before launching hobby-spam there's quick technical annuncement. As you can see I've slightlty changed layout of the blog. I think it's temporary (header seems bit too massive) but we'll see shortly. I've also dumped "best posts ever" widget. I was nice to have most popular posts around, but sadly most of them contain old pics f#cked by Photobucket back days, so they weren't much cool anymore because of that silly Photobucket logo attatched 🙄

Also a while back I found a bug is "spam of the year" section as well: 

the top post (the one with Plague Marine)  was launched in 2014 and yet it's still on the top last year's best chart. No idea why: there's no way to make any post sticky, tried to re-launch that gizmo - no effect. I can sure delete old post but the again - why should I surrender to some stupid bloggy bug? 🙄

If you have any idea how to fix that - shout, I'll be grateful for any help. 

As for the proper topic - another 3 villains joined beastmen gang, so the project is ~70% finished: there are 3 more fellas to be done + basing. I was deeply hoping to bring them for Oldhammer Weekend Poland 2025 painting contest, but sadly once again real life stepped in so the plan got dumped. Oh well - at least I don't have to rush with them anymore... The guys got bit more reddish flesh tone but apart from that I tried to keep the same color palette so whole team looks coherent marching together. Painting those oldie beastmen is ton of fun, but really cannot wait to cross them off the list to paint something from science fiction range (like Chaos Cultists band from 40K...):

And finally: goat boys vs squid boys split second before a brief but vigorous fight erupts!

Moon Clan (Chaos beastmen) #2

Chaos Children at the horizon!!! 🐐🐐🐐

Yeah, so summer holiday is finally over (thank Slaanesh, Cthulhu and Satan for that...) so I could deal with some job backlogs and grab a brush for a while to expand Moon Clan crew. Like before I chose 1 gor + 2 ungors to work on and once again painting them was total fun! These models ara fuc#ing amazing!!!

There's so much character packed into those tinies and each models can almost tell own story. Not even mentioning the faces - these little bastards look just so corrupted and evil from a distance and resemble Diablo creatures so much! The one with dwarf's head is surely a child eater! 😨

As for painting I stick to middlehammer era aesthetics: vivid colors and clean, bright paintwork. Hopefully. After years spent on painting everything dark and dirty clean painting it's a breath of fresh air over painting station. Bases aren't finished yet - they'll be done after whole wargand is painted to make all models coherent.

So here they are - goatmen and fallen ones deep in perilous ash wastes enviroment:

Here - on mellow fields of Border Princes:

And here group shot - inbred clan about to chew on some plague zombies:

Time to pick another trio and thing about proper banner...

Moon Clan (Chaos beastmen) #1

After dealing with Army of Slaanesh Warriors I started digging in ye bucket ov shame to find something old to reanimate and feed display case with it later. The initial plan was to paint something from Warhammer 40.000 - back days I started gathering some bits to build combat patrol size / RPG squad of Chaos renegades. I don't play WH40K but such warband would surely provide tons of conversion possibilities and therefore - tons of fun!

While browsing my resources I found that old display base which was made years ago. It was supposed to be part of Mordheim greenskins band. I even painted 2 or 3 goblins and snotlings suicide squad, but that was just it 🙄 

During excavation works it turned out there are some beastmen models from the very best period ever and I have just enough of them to fill the display base! Chaos Gods be praised!

Most of models have never been undercoated, rest had to to be stripped to get fresh paintjob, worthy Children of Chaos!

As for this line of models I saw them for the first time in WD#218: it was that White Dwarf where Tale of 4 Gamers started, where models for fresh Chaos army were presented. I fell in love in Chaos since the very first glance into new Chaos force - sadly Beastmen and Daemons were 100% metal so it was totally beyond my reach those days 😢 

These models are not only übercool (and until now are the best Beastmen GW released ever) but also they remind me those creatures from Diablo: fallen ones and goatmen 🤗 Speaking of which - ost from Diablo 1 is just brilliant background for painting these guys... 

So here they are - first part of the project: about to deal with Redemptionists gang in juicy green ash wastes:

Da boyz:

And whole Moon Clan. And at the same time by whole Beastmen line collection:

Bloodthirster / Daemon prince

Actually I was hoping to paint something slightly different but it's hard to drop Warhammer Fantasy habit when it hits back... 🥴 Slaanesh warriors army has been finished but there was one more oldie daemon model dug deep under the pile of shame which could be used as alternative genral: Khorne's Bloodthirster.

It's really old model and I got it somewhere during high school era - which was really long time ago. Since that time I tried to paint it several times - with no success. Since that time model also got it's original whip-hand broken and then lost. In fact I was more then lucky I found spare hand in bits box which could be used on this model...

As for painting I was hoping for more reddish tone but Vallejo reds I have are more rapsberry then red - no idea why. In fact I had other bottle of red ink which was red as fu#c but this one is just damn rapsberry... On the other hand that's not much of loss because apparently it's the only model from under Khorne banner, so decision was made to paint it as Chaos Undivided creature or maybe even Slaanesh style to fit Warriors army.

I am really glad I've FINALLY crossed this one off the list. It was way too cool piece of Oldhammer history to be left in the bucket-of-shame-purgatory. So here are the pics.

First - one of the most epic duels possible back in 4th /5th edition: mighty Bloodthirster facing Lord of the Dead - Nagash! These were days there single models were pure metal and pretty small compared to modern (stupid as fu#k 🙄 ) standards...

And below - Bloodthirster and Dusk Real Demon in deadly struggle with Daemon Prince of Slaanesh:

And some solo pics:

Gotta check if there are any more old farts on the bottom of bucket of shame worthy rescue...

Take care!