More manky death goats

The Blood Bowl Pestigor looks like a fish.

This really saddens me. I think I know what they were going for, but it doesn't work for me.What does work for me are Pestigor, as readers may recall. Seeing as GW and I seemingly differ on what the galaxy's most unhealthy murder-goats should look like, I decided it was time to makesome new ones.

Both of these beautiful specimens are based around the bodies of Plaguebearers. They have the right bloated and sickly appearance whilst being more or less the right size and shape. First of all, I clipped the legs off and plained down the stumps.

Next, I cut the legs off of some spare Gors (my WFB Beastmen army has about 400 Gors, a fact I still can't actually explain and find faintly embarrassing, the point being that I can spare a few bodies). The legs had to be pinned onto the sides of the Plaguebearer bodies because the join will be both too difficult and too fragile otherwise. I then filled in the gaps with my usual PVA/tissue solution followed by green stuff.

The arms were easy to sort out. In one case I literally just lifted some Plaguebearer arms and repositioned the sword-arm. With the other one, I used a spare Gor arm. The burst pustule wossnames were just drilled in with a fine drill bit.

The heads are Gor heads, but they mainly looked like massive angry goats rather than creepy diseased creatures. So I filed off those big glowering eyebrows and replaced them with the eyepieces from the Marauder Horseman champion's horse. Getting these off the original component is NOT easy: you have to cut the eyepiece away with damaging it or taking too much of the horse's head. There's a nasty cut on my thumb to attest that it's a bit of a slog!

It's also worth noting that the Plaguebearer models have massive great necks. I needed to prune them back, pinned the head to the necks and then fill the gaps.

Once I'd painted them, there were some issues even with the filling, specifically around the leg joins. So I decided to hide the problem by bulking out the fur with black static grass. 

Sorry about the Gor arse. But it had to be done.

Anyway, that's another two added to the horde!

Refitting Beastmen Part 2: The Jabberslythe

"Beware the Jabberslythe my son, the lashing tongue, the madness comes..."

I've long been fond of the Lewis Carroll poem Jabberwocky, and the Warhammer Jabberslythe which is obviously based on it. I loved the description of it as an ungainly, flapping monster that slowly closes in on its prey as they go insane. There was only one problem: when the model came out, it was barely even intimidating. What appeared to be a large toad with horns was released (alongside the masterfully intimidating Ghorgon). Bizarrely, despite misgivings I actually purchased one. I don't really know why. It was a decision which I regretted very quickly. Considering it was designed for Finecast, the production gaffes were miserable. There was a gap between the halves big enough to count as a topographical feature. I asked GW for a replacement which was nearly as bad. Ultimately, I gave it up as a bad deal.

Many years later, I decided to have a go at it again, this time ignoring the model and focusing on the description. The two bits that struck me were the reference to the beast being 'part toad, part sludge drake [one assumes a degenerate dragon] and an insect and also the idea of it closing in inexorably at hopelessly insane victims. With this in mind I set to work.

There were two aspects that I really wanted for the model: the first was to show that it comes from the deepest, wildest, most monstrously fecund part of the forest. I started with a chariot sized base and one of the gnarly trees from the base of the Arachnarok which I had leftover from my Spiderfiler conversion. This would help show the hellish verdancy of the Jabberslythe's lair, whilst also lending some height and a creeping motion. The reason I needed the height was that I was determined to show the maddening effects of the Jabberslythe's aura. For this, the Helblaster crewman with his hands over his ears was a perfect victim. His wide eyes and open mouth can easily be arranged to show a wildly screaming man trying to block the sound of the monster out. When I painted him, I gave him stark, staring eyes with trickles of blood.

Now, the monster itself. Using the idea of 'toad', I started with the bloated body of a Rot Fly, filling in most of the rotted bits. I thought it might give a nice echo of Dali-esque disproportion if I used long, extended legs. I made these from several of the long legs from the Plague Drones kits, tipped with zombie hands to make them look more unsettling.

The wings are parts I got in a job-lot - I think they're from Kromlech. The arching head and neck come from a Steed of Slaanesh because there's nothing more freaky than those horrible daemon birdfish. The weird feelers around its face are from one of the big Tyranid gribblers, as are the wibbly tentacular forearms. The tail is the only part of the original Jabberslythe kit to make it into this version.

Posing was key for me: I wanted to emphasize the helpless horror which the Jabberslythe induces. I posed it to be creeping across the rotten tree, head leering down at the doomed Empire soldier, one of the hands reaching out towards him.

A conversion with this many bits together will lead to a few messy joins. To conceal these, I covered the painted monster's shoulders and abdomen with black static grass to serve as insectile fur.

Now, it still doesn't drive me mad to look at, but I think it fits the bill a bit more!

Refitting Beastmen Part 1: the Beastlord

Beastmen have always been my favourite flavour of Chaos in Warhammer Fantasy: there's something very evocative about herds of giant evil murder-goats loitering in the forests, an odd fusion of Visigoth and faerie tale monster. They're the thing that goes bump in the night. They're the monster that ate grandma.

But Games Workshop never seemed to quite get behind the idea. We're not talking about the same sort of self-inflicted problem as Chaos Dwarfs, but their efforts with Beastmen always seemed a bit half-hearted. The 2003 Beasts of Chaos release, for example, featured only one plastic kit and the importing of several 90s kits (this is in the same era as Bretonnians getting four plastic kits, Wood Elves getting three and Ogre Kingdoms getting four). One of the bigger problems for the Cloven Ones was the lack of variety in Beastlords. There was two released in 2003. Both were nice enough models, but they had problems. The great weapon wielding one was a one-piece casting in metal which made him almost conversion-proof, and the other had two separate axes but basically no way to customise him. Added to this, neither one of them was as imposing as we might like.

This was a problem which was unexpectedly solved when Games Workshop released its recent Beastgrave game. One of the factions was the muddled mess of conflicting identities and reused CAD that you'd expect from an AoS original concept, but the Beastmen were very much in the spirit of the Old World. What's more, the Bestigor was large enough to stand out as a leader in a Beastmen army. And look how freakishly well he stands on a 25mm square base!

So there it was: finally, a Beastlord worthy of the name. And that was just the start of my quest to bring the Beastmen into the modern age...

Gorgonok the Dread

So I've been quiet on the WFB front for a while, especially my Age of Rebuilding project. There's a good reason for this, which I'll discuss a bit below. But let's do the fun part first! 'Thunder over Nuln' should only be a couple of weeks away now, but for the meantime, this is the model and rules for a character that readers of Age of Rebuilding might recognise from some of the chapters: the nightmarish Doombull Gorgonok the Dread.

     Download the big man's rules.

I've had the idea of Gorgonok for years. Originally, he came about because with the endless fawning over Archaon, I really wanted to present a character for the Beastmen who could be seen as a monstrous, all-powerful threat. I wanted a guy who wasn't going to crawl to some Gods-pampered three-eyed idiot but would prove that the Beastmen could get it done. I used the GW Doombull model to represent him, but let's be honest... that model's so-so. I spent a long time thinking I was going to have to just deal with that, until Zealot Miniatures released their beautiful new minotaur models. This model is the 'Minotaur General'. Incredibly, he will cost you exactly the same as GW want for their Doombull.  And this model is incredible..

Look at the speed and power of this bloke. This isn't some giant clumsy cow. This is a guy who is going to be ploughing through the enemy's ranks before they've even got their halberds up. And that's what an armoured minotaur should look like. He looks like he's wearing a wrecked Steam Tank and it isn't even slowing him down. 

I originally envisioned Gorgonok as an albino, but the thing is that albinism is almost complete lack of pigment. I'm not a good enough painter for that, to be honest. So instead I decided that he would be very pale. The paint scheme is a base of Rakarth Flesh, a 50/50 Reikland Fleshshade/Lahmian Medium mix all over and then fairly strong drybrush layers of Pallid Witch Flesh and white. 

I think what surprised me most was how easy he was to paint. And he's one of those models that you really enjoy painting. 

Where have I been?

Today of all days is probably a good time to tell this story, because of the date. 6th May. On this day several years ago, I left a job for a company which I'd been at for a very long time. It was not my choice, nor was I dismissed. Indeed, I was a high performing staff member in a high performing team. That we were at the time one of the company's better assets was never denied. But nobody is safe from desperate management trying to demonstrate activity, and we were all made redundant. It's a strange experience: by the time an employer is willing to do that, you're probably fed up with them anyway. But that doesn't make it less offensive when they decide to get rid of you in spite of the fact that your department works well, makes money and is needed. In the most literal sense, ou jobs weren't redundant: the company simply thought that a short term saving could be achieved by shipping the jobs up north. As you can imagine, I was somewhat put out. 

After many years of working in the private sector, I have to acknowledge I was tired of it almost beyond belief. I was weary of the ineptness, the corruption, the constant need to stroke massive but fragile egos. Truthfully, I could not have entered another corporate role. I promised myself two things: I would travel a lot more, and I would find something actually worthwhile with my life. Once I realised this, I was able to get back in the game with relative speed and ease. I started working at the University a few months after departing the other company, and was bowled over. It wasn't perfect by any means, but the academic world is far, far kinder and more competent than the corporate. I maintain this after a long time working there. My only slight gripe was that I was a contractor, needing to pitch myself and gain a new contract each year. In December 2018, that changed when my boss offered me a permanent position. I was and still am ecstatic. In February 2019, I applied for a promotion (more to stop my colleagues yelling at me) and was surprised when I got it. And I realised with a sudden, jolting sense of amazement that I was happy. I was comparatively well off, I had a secure job which I thoroughly enjoyed, a decent nestegg of savings and I had managed to fulfil my promise to see at least two new countries every year. There are some I knew who, in the late-stage-capitalism sense of success, are vastly more successful than I. But I realised that after a rocky start to my career years ago, I had finally 'arrived' as it were. 

So why did this cause me to have trouble with Age of Rebuilding? The answer's simpler than you might be thinking. The truth is that... since my last update in March, I've just been enjoying myself. Just taking time. I didn't have writer's block. I didn't have a struggle with what I wanted to achieve. I will admit that I'd bitten off more than I could chew. I had this image of the narrative of the Empire/Lustrian alliance besieging Nuln, a separate Nuln army list and a seperate siege supplement. But honestly, I'm one bloke who writes for a living and only wants to write outside work... sometimes (this is also why you might find typos scattered through my work; I'm not damn well editorialising on my own time, and besides why should I do it if GW don't?). But mainly, the holdup has been caused by me just... kind of... living. I recently spent eight days wandering the national parks of Croatia, and as ever the new experience fired up my creativity again. Watch this space for 'Thunder over Nuln' very soon :)   

The Banegor rises

The largest, mos brutal and most cunning Pestigors inevitably rise to the top of their herds. Their power and authority is such that they regularly carry weapons forged by the Death Guard themselves. 

At the time of writing, it seems doubtful that GW have any plans to bring Pestigor back, but I rather like them. I've always had a soft spot for Beastmen. I got to thinking about the Plague Planet's feral populations, and I had the idea that the emaciated tribes are being bullied by tribes of monstrous Pestigor. The Death Guard actually treat them reasonably well, certainly more so than the human tribes, because the Pestigor are brawny brutes who make good shock troops! With this in mind, I set to work on this monstrous Banegor, a leader among the hordes.

The base is a Nurgle Chaos Lord, which they're currently selling under the name 'Lord of Plagues'. I swapped his head for an old Gor champion head. This did require sawing, pinning and poly cement. He looked a bit funny after that, so I built up a hefty throat out of green stuff. I swapped his axe for a spare Bubotic Axe from the Blightlord Terminators kit.

That's when the fun began.

He needed to look a bit more... Gor-ish. I cut a wide divot out of the front of each boot to form a cloven hoof, and then used green stuff to sculpt some fur. I can't give much avise about this - it's just a case of sticking to the task an persevering.

What am I going to use him for? Well... we'll see.

Coeddil the Damned, the Tree of Woe

And now for something completely different.

Working on my Death Guard recently made me think about this bloke who I made in 2017. He's part of my gaming group's Age of Rebuilding project, an alternative Warhammer Fantasy continuity where the world was saved and the Empire is busily trying to get itself back together. One of my early ideas was to have Coeddil (one of the three eldest treemen) return as a deranged chaos tree. GW touched briefly on this idea in the final End Times book, but as with most things in the End Times book, it wasn't terribly good.

Now, as to the conversion, this is a project which is very easy to explain but I'll warn you, pretty difficult to do, almost to the level of that bloody daemon prince but fairly work-intensive anyway.

The centre of the kit is a Maggoth's body. I put the torso and head together, but didn't attach arms or legs. Now, right from the off I wanted aspects of his Treeman heritage to show through, so I used the strangleroot and beard components from the Treeman kit as a tongue and... well... beard. I had to pin them and do a fair bit of filling.

Next came the legs. I was vaguely inspired by Lovecraft's Dark Young creatures. To this end, I a Citadel Wood which was sulking in my cupboard. I sawed the trees in half an used the bottom halves to create the three legs. This was very tough. I had to pin them in place and tack them with superglue whilst holding the body in order to get the whole affair stable enough to pour in some poly cement. When this was fully set, I had to do a lot of filling.

I arranged the top half of the trees around the top of his body, again gluing and pinning before filling some big gaps.

After this it was a case of finishing touches. I added an evil looking owl from the Dryads kit, a random Nurgling and a clawing Plaguebearer's arm on the base to be emerging from a pool on the base. The rags of flesh hanging in the branches are Woodland Scenics clump foliage painted to suit.

It was a lot of work, but worth it, I think. I use him for WFB, but he could serve equally as a Great Unclean One using the 'Garden of Nurgle' theme.

The Pestigor are back!

I have a peculiar admission to make: when the Death Guard Codex came out, I was perversely pleased that it didn't have Pestigors in it despite the fact that I wanted them. My reason for thinking that they might be in there was the presence of Tzaangor in the Thousand Sons army. In the end, of course, GW decided to have Poxwalkers as their fruity troop choice, which was fine. It was also fine because I'd already made this one and didn't want my work surpassed!

Making him was surprisingly easy when I got my head around the idea that I shouldn't base it on a Beastman. You can add all sorts of manky bits to a Gor, but you're really just creating work for yourself. Instead, I based him on one of the Plaguebearers who rides the Rot Flies in the Plague Drone kit. I never mount those Plaguebearers because I think that the Rot Flies look vastly more threatening without them. I removed the legs, and at the same time removed the legs from a Gor. It's worth mentioning that the legs of the Gor will not be going under the body but on either side of the gut. I pinned the legs in place to stop them flopping about and then filled the gaps with liquid green stuff. I left this to set before adding the rest.

The left arm was easy: that was just the arm from the same kit as the body. The right arm was easily made from a Gor arm with a sword from the Plague Drones kit. And the head is just a Gor champion head with an extra horn added!

Now I just need to make six more...