Animosity III - The Prime Dominion, part 3

I finished the first piece of scenery for my Hysh board and I have pre-ordered the Shrine Luminor, so I'll soon be able to start work on more pieces.

The whole piece was spray undercoated black, then zenithal basecoated grey (both Halfords matt primer rattlecans). I dry-brushed the plastic parts with Ushabti Bone.

For the ruins I basecoated them with Karak Stone, dry-brushed Ushabti Bone, then washed the whole thing with a mix of 10 parts Contrast Medium, 1 part Ultramarines Blue and 5 parts Aethermatic Blue. When the Contrast paint was completely dry I lightly dry-brushed Ushabti Bone a second time. The areas that had pooled with too much blue then got a focused wash of very thin Karak Stone, so the blue still just about showed through the Karak Stone, but much less intensely.

The gold details were basecoated with Retributor Armour, washed with Agrax Earthshade and dry-brushed with Stormhost Silver.

The tohnasai tree trunk was painted with Gore-Grunta Brown Contrast and lightly dry-brushed Ushabti Bone again. The rocks were just washed with Nuln Oil.

I went for an "early Autumn" look on the foliage: a Wraithbone basecoat, followed by a coat of Nazdreg Yellow Contrast, then a coat of Militarum Green Contrast. It gives a nice brownie-green colour that works with my Autumnal Warcry board but still looks green enough to feel like Hysh and not The Harrowmark. I also used "Scorched Grass" static grass to finish it off, instead of my normal "Dead Grass", to add to the slightly-less-deathly look.

Animosity III - The Prime Dominion, part 2

After giving up on the idea of using artificial bonsai trees (the affordable ones look really cheap and nasty in real life) I managed to get hold of some of the old (and sadly out of production) Citadel Woods. With a bit of careful branch-removal and assembling the leaves "wrong" I have been able to reproduce the Hyshian "tohnasai" trees that the GW studio team made for the Lumineth promo photos. I have saved all the removed branches to make smaller trees!

The Shrine Luminor is on pre-order this weekend, so the next stage of my Haixiah board can begin soon!

Update (2021-03-24) - I built another tohnasai tree. I tried to take some step-by-steps during this build.

1. Lay out a circle of big leaves.

2. Glue on more over the joins.

3. Glue smaller ones over the top.

4. When dry, flip and attach the tree by gluing leaves against it underneath

Three tohnasai trees (and a little shrub):

Burlok Damminsson and the Reckless Endrineers, part 2

The Reckless Endrineers:

An Arkanaut Captain, 5 Thunderers with Aethershot Rifles, and an Endrinrigger with an Aethermatic Volley Gun is just under 1000 points in Warcry.

For the Thunderers I used Space Wolf heads instead of the masked helmets. The neck joints needed more work than I'd hoped but I think they match the look of the helmetless Kharadron in the Battletome art quite nicely. after a lot of indecision I settled on using the same colour scheme as my Realmgate Wardens (which is pretty much the standard Hammerhal Aqsha uniform of dark blue and gold). I don't plan for the two forces to grown into an army but you never know...

The next two models for the warband are finished, and along the way I updated Burlok Damminson to match their colours a bit more closely. I also changed his collar to red because I liked the extra colour on Dagnai Holdenstock, the Cursed City Kharadron adventurer.

Update (2021-03-18) 

Three more Thunderers finished! I think I'm going to leave the Endrinriggers for now and paint some more scenery. I'll come back to the dorfs later.

Animosity III - The Prime Dominion, part 1

Animosity III is brewing behind the scenes: it will be set in the Prime Dominion, in Haixiah - the hinterlands of Hysh. So I've been thinking a lot about making a Hysh board with the Shrine Luminor (when its released) and some artificial bonsai trees.

I have a vague plan to cut the rocky island in half horizontally, ground the top half as a "normal" building (i.e. not a floating island building!) and flip the bottom half to use it as a rocky "mountain". I am also looking for the ruins from Teclis' base to use on the bases of two or three fake plastic bonsai trees.

The paint recipe, on the back of the Teclis box, for the ruins is apparently a Karak Stone basecoat, with Spacewolf Grey Contrast Paint over the top, then a highlight with Karak Stone and lighter greys. I like the blueish tint so I will be going for that look too.

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This will all have to be acquired and done before the summer, so I want to keep the number of pieces of scenery quite low. I've ordered three fake bonsai trees from Ikea and part of Teclis's base ruins. I'm keeping an eye out for more ruins at a price I can afford. Now I just have to cross my fingers that the Shrine Luminor is released before the summer! For now all I can do is drawings...

The Badfangs - Bonesplitterz of Aqshy, part 14

The recent reveals of Hedkrakka’s Madmob, the new Bonesplitterz for Warhammer Underworlds, inspired me to make a few more savage orruks for my Warcry warband.

So Gurkfang, Rogtoof and Legbiter have joined the Badfangs.

As usual for this mob, they all have masks made from scrap they find in their adventures through the Mortal Realms. Gurkfang's is a piece of a Kurnoth Hunter, Rogtoof has part of an Ironjawz Brute's armour and Legbiter has some kind of aelf helmet. All of them wear cowls made from bakka-lizard hide over the back of their heads and additional decorations like feathers and stone trinkets.

The Badfangs are Bonesplitterz orruks from the dry and windswept Uzmorgarg plains in the wilds of Aqshy. The Badfangs tribe have an oral tradition, myths and legends that have long been told and retold, passed down through the years, of their time as travellers among the stars. They believe that in an age long ago they roamed the cosmos, they were not natives of Aqshy but they came from some other, unremembered Realm. They chased god-beasts across the void, riding in the belly of a creature they called the ur-whale, but they crashed into the Great Parch by accident while the ur-whale was battling another god-beast.

In some versions of the stories the ur-whale was killed by the other god-beast, in other versions the Bonesplitterz accidentally killed it from inside by cutting their way out in an ill-considered attempt to get at the god-beast that was attacking it.

Whichever version they believe, they all agree that in the crash they lost their ability to travel the cosmos and they were stranded. They still carry with them a sense of adventure that continues the tradition of travelling, exploring and finding new monsters to defeat.

So, loaded up with the most potent and powerful of the magic bones the tribe has found, the Badfangs followed Wurrgog Prophet Hogrog Ug Weirdklaw, hoping to ride a god-beast through the cosmos once more. They all still wear their traditional masks, in the style of various god-beasts, to protect them from the void between Realms.

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I'm really looking forward to adding Hedkrakka and his gang to my warband, with the addition of tradition Badfangs god-beast masks of course.

The Great Oubliette of Shyish, part 14 The Map

In an effort to find a way out of the Great Oubliette, should they find the Adm'rul or not, the Cleavermaws had started to map the magical flux of the seemingly endless dungeon. Uzzog showed the crew how to plot the levels of magic onto a map by counting the number of creaks that the Dead Man's Chest emitted while watching a 3-minute sand-timer and noting the number on their location on one of their scrap-paper sketched maps. He knew it would not be terribly accurate, as the levels rose and fell constantly but he hoped it would be enough to spot a pattern and find one of the hidden gates out of the underworld.

"...six, seven, nine, ten..." said Liberty Snik, his face screwed up in concentration.

Dogwatch Fug interrupted "You missed eight, mate."

"... eleven... what?" said Liberty Snik, annoyed.

"You missed eight," said Dogwatch Fug, "which you went 'six, seven, nine' and didn't say eight."

"I did too say eight! Now you've made me miss one and I've lost count" said Snik, even more annoyed. "We'll have to wait for the sand to run out and start again now!"  in a louder voice.

Mr Sludga noticed them arguing and moved toward them, fuming. The crew immediately stopped shouting and tried to look like they were doing their job.

"We'd have had to anyway as you missed eight, like I just said." muttered Fug.

"Shut up." said Snik. "One, two... "

Sludga gave both of them a punch in the head, just to make sure they remembered their task.

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The Adventuring Party:
Kaptain Mogrum (Wurrgog Prophet)

- Bonesplitterz spell: Bone Krusha

- Bonesplitterz Command Trait: The Power of the Beast

- Loot: Scroll of Translocation (single use)

Lost Uzzog (Ship's Wardokk)

- Loot: Gravesand Ossuary (single use)

- Bonespitterz spell: Breath of Gorkamork
Mr Sludga (Savage Big Deck-Boss)

- Bonesplitterz Artefact of Power: Greatdrake Toof Sword
Mr Deadwood (Savage Big Deck-Boss)

11th Exploration Roll - The Map

Dungeon Fight!

4 Glaivewraith Stalkers, 8 Chainrasps and 4 Grimghast Reapers

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The orruk pirates found themselves on top of a hill and paused for a few minutes to look around and get their bearings. Lost Uzzog stared at his aetheric compass for a few moments while the needles and dials span.

The others noticed the Nighthaunts approaching a long time before he did!

The Chainrasps and the Glaivewraiths held back for a while but the Grimghasts drifted forward slashing blindly and at random with their scythes.

They suddenly charged up the hill with scythes raised. 

Two attacked Mogrum but the Kaptain fended them off, and the other two attacked and injured Sludga and Uzzog. 

Mogrum dispatched his two and Sludga dealt with the rest. Uzzog only then looked up and realised what was happening, and that he was bleeding!

Deadwood laughed at Uzzog and pointed at the other spirits that were now moving.

Mogrum blasted the Glaivewraiths with arcane lightning and they disintegrated into nothing but scraps of ragged black cloth.

The orruks moved down the hill to engage the remaining Chainrasps.

Sludga and Deadwood charged through them and sent them all to another underworld.

When it had gone quiet again, Kaptain Mogrum spotted a piece of paper nailed to a tree. He went closer to investigate and found a partial hand-draw map, it looked like the Adm'rul's work!

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Chamber cleared!

Map Fragment discovered. (When the Cleavermaws have found three Map Fragments, they will be able to locate the Adm'rul and begin trying to escape the Oubliette!)

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The Adventuring Party Update:
Kaptain Mogrum (Wurrgog Prophet)

- Bonesplitterz spell: Bone Krusha

- Bonesplitterz Command Trait: The Power of the Beast

- Loot: Scroll of Translocation (single use)

Lost Uzzog (Ship's Wardokk) - two wounds sustained

- Loot: Gravesand Ossuary (single use)

- Bonespitterz spell: Breath of Gorkamork
Mr Sludga (Savage Big Deck-Boss) - one wound sustained

- Bonesplitterz Artefact of Power: Greatdrake Toof Sword
Mr Deadwood (Savage Big Deck-Boss)

The Trap

12th Exploration Roll

Dungeon Fight!

Two units of 8 Chainrasps

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As the Cleavermaws moved on to the next area Lost Uzzog used his Weirddokk powers to heal himself. He was about to do the same for Sludga when another two bands of Nighthaunt appeared.

Chainrasps formed out of the shadows of mausoleums and prison cells, to the north and south of the orruk pirates.

Mogrum and Uzzog summoned their arcane energies and blasted the band to the south, shredding them with the power of Gork and Mork.

Mr Sludga and Mr Deadwood charged.

Sludga got to the enemy first, his Greatdrake Toof Sword carved a viscous path of destruction through the entire northern band of ghosts!

The Dreadwarden to the south realised he was alone and evanesced...

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Chamber cleared!

Second Map Fragment discovered.

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The Adventuring Party Update:
Kaptain Mogrum (Wurrgog Prophet)

- Bonesplitterz spell: Bone Krusha

- Bonesplitterz Command Trait: The Power of the Beast

- Loot: Scroll of Translocation (single use)

Lost Uzzog (Ship's Wardokk)

- Loot: Gravesand Ossuary (single use)

- Bonespitterz spell: Breath of Gorkamork
Mr Sludga (Savage Big Deck-Boss)

- Bonesplitterz Artefact of Power: Greatdrake Toof Sword
Mr Deadwood (Savage Big Deck-Boss)

13th Exploration Roll - The Encampment

Long Respite - time enough for Sludga's wound to be healed by Uzzog.

The Cleavermaws found the remains of a campsite. Someone other than Nighthaunt had been there quite recently! A triangle of canvas was tied up as a makeshift roof over a corner of a ruined building. They couldn't be sure but they felt like the way it was knotted was nautical and that gave them hope that they were on the Adm'rul's trail.

14th Exploration Roll - The Library

Dungeon Fight!

8 Chainrasps

4 Myrmourn Banshees

But that's a story for another night!

(I felt that the fights are getting a bit easy for the Cleavermaws, so I decided to add the Myrmourn Banshees to whatever they met next.)