Thy Soul To Keep - part 8

At the Behest of Another

The common folk of Wörtbad have been hoarding Realmstone on the instruction of an unknown master. Surely, it would be safer in the hands of capable warriors? (Skirmish Battleplan: Treasure Hunt)

The crew of The Raidho Othala - 59 Renown

The Rotmoons - 50 Renown

~ 🕱 ~

Juan Dee looked over his shoulder one last time then made haste, away from Fallow’s End House. Soon someone would find his message and share the fell news with their neighbours. In a matter of days the work would be begun. He hurried to tell the Rotmoons' shaman El Doctoro that the seed was planted and the crop would soon be ready for harvest.



Mattius Caboteur's heart sank as he read the notice. He wondered if he could convince the other villagers to help with the dreadful task. Fear of the consequences of failure in the eyes of Nagash was a powerful motivator but was it enough to outweigh the dangers of collecting Shyish Realmstone?

~ 🕱 ~

Admiral Grungi Gunnerson and the crew of the Raidho Othala swarmed out of the Realmgate.

Kapitán da Leeva and some of his followers rushed from the Charybdis Occulum toward the ruined barn. The orruk privateer was livid; the stupid villagers had obviously asked for outside help. Their fear had got the better of them in ways El Doctoro had not imagined!

Some of the other Rotmoons followed Walta Rally and Awkwardo, and headed toward the Realmgate.

Dragante took the rest of the crew past the Hurricane Bell.

An Invisible Geist surged out of the skull-cliff of the Hurricane Bell, passed straight through Dragante and stopped his heart!

The Rotmoons were the first to find a cache of hidden Shyish Realmstone (and Kapitán da Leeva was relieved that the day was not entirely wasted).



But the Raidho Othalas find one straight after them!



Tambor, the Rotmoon's drummer, was skewered by an Arkanaut.



The Raidho Othalas opened fire at the Rotmoons: Bold Rikk was shot by a Grundstok Thunderer with an aethermatic volleygun. 

The other orruks in his group were lucky to be missed by the stuccato fire of the volleygun but Percy Percy was blasted by a Thunderer with an aethercannon. Dudoso was picked-off by the Grundstok Gunnery Sergeant.

Garfio was gunned-down by Admiral Grungi Gunnerson himself.

Kapitán da Leeva stepped inside the ruined barn as volley after volley of Kharadron fire whittled down his crew.



Through sheer luck, Awkwardo withstood the vast barrage of focused Arkanaut company pistol fire aimed at him, only to fall at last when a mortar round landed next to him. As a result of this Walta Rally, Anzuelo and Geedo fled.



An Arkanaut spent a suspicious amount of time "searching" through a stack of barrels but found no treasure.



Parche tried his best to hide but the Arkanauts outflanked him and shot him under the skull cliffs.



The Raidho Othalas found their second cache of Realmstone.

The Admiral left one Arkanaut to guard it and the rest of the company charged forward to try and claim Kapitán da Leeva's find... The Kapitán took his loot and slipped into the darkness beneath the trees.

~ 🕱 ~

At the last moment the Kharadron avoided a draw (even though they had killed all-but-one of the orruks!) and won a Major Victory: holding 2 Treasure caches to the Rotmoons' 1.

~ 🕱 ~

Meanwhile in another part of the Harrowmark...

Olshovilaag - The Fiend of the Harrowmark

Most of the Harrowmark is covered by virtually-impenetrable forest: Seemingly endless leagues of dark, tangled, twisted and unnatural woods. It is a corrupted land: the dead trees are warped by death-magic, skull-formed rock formations tower over the forest canopy like islands in an arboresque sea. The symbols and motifs of death are everywhere. 

Things live in these forests: malignant, spiteful things. It is a brave soul that ventures under the dark bowers, brave or foolish, as few who attempt to navigate the winding pathways ever emerge again. The forests are shaped by the death magic that permeates them and the things that emerge from the shadowy bowers are shaped by the forest.

One terrible example is the dreaded Olshovilaag; the Fiend of the Harrowmark. A massive undead construct made from a conglomeration of monster parts, horns, huge black-feathered wings, lots of skulls, tree branches, bones, rocks and broken weapons. A Death-monster, born from the forest itself. A crow-winged “Terrorgheist". The sound of its beating wings fills the villagers of the Harrowmark with dread. It's screeching stops their hearts and shreds their souls!

🕱🕱🕱🕱🕱🕱

This project was a great fun to do and really fast - 9 days from starting building to finishing painting. I wanted to quickly make a large undead creature for a scenario in our Malign Portents campaign "Thy Soul To Keep", but I didn't want to spend any money on it. So I decided to keep it as a "bits box only" project.

A quick rundown of the source for the parts used includes: Flesh Eater Courts Zombie Dragon, Daemon Prince, Island of Blood Griffon, Thundertusk, Rhinox, Mournfang, Kurnoth Hunters, Dryads, 1990s plastic Dragon, Araknarok, Skulls box, AoS Large basing kit, Citadel Woods... and probably a few things I've forgotten! I have a lot of hoarded left overs from other projects but I was also recently given a big box of bits by a good friend. That helped a lot with this beastie!

"Sketching out" ideas!



I had no idea where I was going with this build, and that was quite liberating! I was just rooting through boxes of parts and trying things out. If they worked I glued them on and started looking for the next bit! I knew I wanted something that looked like a huge undead-bird-construct, but I didn't even know how big it was going to be at the end, let alone what it would look like!

I think the hind legs were the hardest part to make, as by the time I got to them I had an idea of what it should look like, but I had nothing in my bits box that worked. So I started assembling the legs a piece at a time, and covered the worst joins with flock once it was done.

The first stage of painting (for nearly everything I do these days!) was a spray black undercoat and zenithal grey basecoat. Then a drybrush all over with Ushabti Bone. This gives me a great pre-shaded base layer to work up from and picks out all the details nicely.

After that I just picked out bone and wood areas, so it wasn't all one colour/texture.









(The name Olshovilaag is a bastardised phonetic version of the Hungarian folklore term for the underworld - Alsó világ.)

Skarkrow's Ironjawz Ardboys - part 3

The announcement of more expansions for Warhammer Underworlds: Shadespire (along with a lot of other very exciting things!) spurred me on to actually finish Ironskull’s Boyz, and a few more of their friends.

Basha and Bonekutta:











Ironskull’s Boyz, for Shadespire:







Skarkrow's Boyz, for AoS Skirmish:



Runamuk:





Warboss Skarkrow: