Well hello there!

Howya folks, long time no see! Sorry about that but I've been sick as fuck the past while so my heads really not been in it, but I'm almost back to full health so I thought I'd share what I've been picking away at.

When I was a youngfella, one of my all time favourite series in White Dwarf was the Tale of Four Gamers, where Paul Sawyer and three other gw staffers collected an army over the space of a few months with a budget of £25 a month, with it all culminating in a four way battle report once the time limit had been reached. Now I could go on for ages about how £25 wouldn't get you the steam off a trolls piss these days, but I'm not stepping up on that particular soapbox today. 

Anyway, while chatting to a few like minded gentlechaps (I'm being polite, they're fucking animals) on Facebook, I casually mentioned how it might be a good idea to maybe run something similar at some point in the future on the Herohammer International Facebook page, given that its 4th/5th ed warhammer focus is very much of the time of the original series. The next thing I know, that fucking kangaroo worrier Captain Crooks had announced it with all due pomp and ceremony on the page, and the sign up thread was open; participants have to paint 250 points per month between June and December, which will leave us with a new 1500 point army for Christmas. Piece of piss!

Well, seeing as it was probably my fault, I duly put my name down, the question now was which army? Well, once I had a think, given the period covered I could only choose the army I'd always wanted back then, and factor in that I'm a fucking glutton for punishment, I chose orcs and goblins. 

Anyway, having submitted 280 points for June, I'm now into my next 250 point commitment, so I thought I'd show off what's been done so far:

So that's where the army stands right now, I'm really happy with how it's developing, hopefully I can keep hitting the targets!

And there you go for this latest nipple hardening installment on the blog, thanks for looking folks! And don't worry, my next post will be back to the warbands project with Ned, I haven't forgotten about it! 

Chaos warband meets a "familiar" face!

Well hello there! Between having the family visiting, being a bit under the weather and both mine and the nippers birthdays in the same week, I'm falling behind on things again, but if anyone is seriously aggrieved by the situation I am available to fight it out in a range of car parks throughout the East Riding of Yorkshire, so just let me know!
Anyway, over on the Emporium of Rogue Dreams on Facebook, we've had a competition on to convert and paint our interpretation of the infamous Abdul Goldberg, a recurring character in the scenario section of the original Rogue Trader rulebook. I won't go into too much detail here, but there have been extensive posts on many fine blogs about the man himself lately, in fact I'm pretty sure you can click in any blog that I'm following and you'll find something about him. Anyway, as usual I completely disregarded all the other stuff I should be doing and pledged an entry, to be fair I couldn't resist once it was announced that none other than Rick Priestly himself would be judging the entries! Anyway, this is my entry into the competition;

Abdul Goldberg; mercenary, scumbag and general arsehole. Not that he's a bad person as such, just definitely not a good one. Goldberg pulls the strings on countless rackets throughout the sector, from his Spook trafficking enterprise with the scavvy king known as "the Immortan" on (the now strangely quiet) Primus Hive all the way to his dealings in "sentient commodities" with the reprehensible "Funboy Three", Goldberg has so many fingers in different pies that it's easier just to assume that he has a hand in every shady endeavour across the sector.

Tales of his origins are as varied as his business dealings, with theories ranging from an ex guard officer to the heady notion that he is the Emperors own bastard boy. Goldberg doesn't bother to either confirm or deny these claims, but the true story is unknown to all but him. Whatever his origins, none can deny there's something special about him, as inquisitior Annolumen was heard to say, "that one could talk the pants off of a sororitas". His gift of negotiation has seen him build a sector spanning network, and his willingness to get his hands dirty has helped him keep control of it. Unfortunately for Goldberg, he is currently experiencing a slight setback, a meeting with a Blood Axe warboss on the newly ork infested outer rim was interrupted by a howling space marine and a small band of imperial soldiers ambushing the meeting and butchering most of the participants.. 

Putting his formidable skills of self preservation into action, Goldberg managed to hurriedly negotiate a deal with the strangely soft spoken renegade; in return for his and his remaining minders lives, Goldberg would assist him in his search for the warp gate, between the (now traitor) guardsmens geographical knowledge and his knowledge of the ork enemy and ability to communicate with them, The Gentle should find his mission time cut in half.

Of course, as soon as Goldberg can secure off planet transport he is out of there, and damn that brightly painted lunatic and his "holy quest"

Abdul Goldberg, flanked by his "Door Knockers"

Argyle is actually an agent of "The Funboy Three", permanently attached to Goldbergs organisation. He is ostensibly a go between for Goldberg and the slavers but in recent months has started to lean more towards an enforcement role; obviously Abduls skill at manipulation has been put to good use..

Saul is a degenerate, drug fuelled whirlwind. Goldbergs favourite enforcer by far, this quivering mass of sinew and stimulant is a constant companion always ready to use shockingly excessive force to further his bosses ends. Rumour has it he was an arbites judge that looked a little too deeply into the affairs of the Immortan on Primus, and after being "disappeared" by the scavvy king and worked on by his chemists the one now known as Saul was presented as a gift to Goldberg, the Immortan judging his violent outbursts "too vulgar" for his sensibilities..

Aaand there yis go, my warband entry for this week is done! Thanks for reading folks, stay tuned to The Work of Shaitan for the next installment!

The Fakkhaven Two

Hello again you lucky bastards! I've been ploughing ahead this week on commission work I'd fallen behind on while I was ill, but also managed to get the next entry in my collaborative project with Ned over at The Work of Shaitan, and this weeks thrilling installment (shut up, you know you love it) is a pair of beastmen... Now, if you've been paying attention, you'll remember I rolled up a pair of orcs to join Cohaagens little gang, but as I'd already rolled four chaos goblins, it was becoming apparent that I was heading towards a very greenskin heavy warband. Now, ordinarily that would be absolutely no problem, I love me orcs and gobbos, but seeing as how it's looking like I'll be spending the rest of the year on my greenskin army (more on that at a later date), I fancied a bit of variety before I rolled up my sleeves and got stuck in. So after a bit of a natter with Ned to make sure it was ok, and it was cos he's sound, I made the change from a pair of orcs to a pair of beastmen, cos as Ned himself said, what's a warband without beastmen?

So here I present my next entry, a pair of Bob Olley crackers that were an absolute pleasure to work on:

While the followers of Nurgle are known to be unusually cheerful for servants of the dark gods, the beastmen Aargash and Gholic are a remarkably gregarious pair. Arriving in Fakkhaven as part of Father Wormtastes carnival, they wasted no time in moving among the human citizenry, their horrific appearance at complete odds with their good humour. 

They delight in playing jokes on the populace, their braying laughter resounding around the village every time someone falls victim to their antics. Unfortunately, games such as "surprise smash", where Aargash distracts the victim with a silly jape while Gholic sneaks up behind and smashes them in the head with his mace, aren't really appreciated by their victims, usually because they end the day as a broken heap of flesh.

But the chuckling beastmen care not a jot, and fill their days "milking" nurglings into the water supply along with a myriad of other horrible tricks. While the human population are extremely wary of the pair, both Father Wormtaste and Cohaagen delight in their antics and overlook the worst of their excesses, for when the rotting beastmen are eventually roused to anger, they are formidable defenders of the noisome settlement..

Now, if you're still awake, here's some pictures: 

Stay tuned here and over at The Work of Shaitan for the next thrilling installments, Neds got another cracker lined up too! 

Thanks for looking!

Warband project: A necessary evil

Hello there! Bit late with my next instalment due to one thing or another, but I'm here now with another addition to The Gentles retinue, 3 out of 6 humans..

Having made planetfall on the now Ork infested world, The Gentle and Shard wasted no time in looking for clues to ascertain the location of the warp gate. The demon within The Gentle, while able to track the psychic emanations coming from the portal, was unable to pinpoint the position due to the high levels of background psychic activity emanating from millions of blood maddened greenskins. Shard however, is a tracker with few mortal equals, and between his skill and the vague directions from the demon, they have managed to narrow down their search area to a manageable size.

On their journey, they came across the remnants of an imperial guard garrison, their remote posting causing them to be overlooked in the chaos of the evacuation. Out of a platoon of thirty men, only six remained, starvation, disease and attrition from the constant clashes with greenskin patrols taking a heavy toll. The Gentles demon saw the number of survivors as auspicious in the eyes of its God, and so "guided" the renegade marine to offer allegiance to the survivors, an offer they reluctantly accepted..... 

"Yes we're following this renegade and his creepy bastard friend, but what else are we to do? We were dumped in the shit and forgotten about while everyone else fucked off, left to defend ourselves against these green maniacs. No, fuck that, and fuck the emperor for betraying us like that. The renegade, in that silly voice of his, has promised us a way off world if we can show him the way to something he's looking for. Won't say what it is, but I don't give a grox shit either, this is our chance to get the hell out of here and ahead of the green storm that's coming. Maybe we can join up with The Bastards, those mercs know their job, and they're very well compensated for it. Or maybe just kick back on one of the fringe worlds and stay blind drunk until the inevitable happens and the orks burn the whole system to the ground. Not a hope in hell of rejoining the regiment anyway, those pricks left us for dead, so as far as they're concerned that's exactly what we are. Yeah, thinking about it, this could all work out very nicely.. These dreams I'm having lately are a bit weird though, the women are fantastic, even with those big glowing eyes and weird claws where their hands should be.. It's probably just combat stress, but I'll bring it up with the rest of the unit if it keeps happening, just to make sure I'm not going too mad..."

So, there's your lot for this installment folks, thanks for looking and be sure to hit up The Work of Shaitan to see what delights Ned has for us next!

A return to Fakkhaven

How do fuckers, hope all is well! Still battling the yearly hayfever offensive, but I've managed to soldier on and add the first set of followers to Mr. Cohaagens little gang. Seven humans are now ready to help spread the word of the Father throughout the empire and beyond

While many of Fakkhavens original inhabitants have not survived, either from the pestilential presence of Father Wormtastes carnival or Cohaagens fanatical zeal, the village still has quite a substantial population for its size. Some of the original inhabitants immediately took to the worship of chaos, people like "Old Yurt", the village rat catcher, whose deformities made him a subject of cruel ridicule from the rest of Fakkhaven now finds unconditional love and acceptance in the new order of things. Brigands from the woods, once driven off with bow fire and halberd, now dwell in the shacks left abandoned in the culls, most are unconcerned entirely with the horrors that walk among them, happy to coexist as long as their business isn't pried into. Indeed, some have made a business of the occupation, and teams of thugs armed with clubs and mancatchers have begun to waylay travelers on the woodland tracks, dragging them back to Fakkhaven to "participate" in the vile festivities. For this they are richly rewarded, both in coin and favour in the eyes of Wormtaste, whose generous rewards are starting to manifest themselves amongst them. However, , the spike in disappearances in the area is starting to draw attention from the local patrols and it's only a matter of time before there will be a reckoning, at which time the rabble of Fakkhaven are ready and willing to stand with Cohaagen in defence of the village. 

The foul heart of Fakkhaven: 

Thanks for looking folks, be sure to check out The Work of Shaitan for Neds next entry (which is gonna be a cracker), and then tune back in here as I go back to space to start in a band of reavers to follow The Gentle!

Sneaky little bastard...

Hello folks! Absolutely fucked with hayfever at the minute so the output has dropped off, but I've managed to get my entry for the warbands project in with a chaos assassin for my Slaanesh renegade lads:

The assassin known as Shard has been the bane of imperial forces in the sector for decades, his covert operations disrupting everything from ammunition production all the way up to large scale troop deployments to the campaign against an Ork incursion along the Eastern Frontier. Shards needle rifle has taken the lives of both crime lords and admirals, what is seemingly a random pattern of murder has far reaching implications; the assassination of an arbites marshall for example, allowed the flourishing of a hidden slaaneshi cult hidden within the aristocracy of the spire of one of the systems major hives, eventually leading to a demonic incursion that required inquisitorial intervention, pulling vital military resources from the frontline of the greenskins campaign. The resulting ork breakthrough has enveloped three more planets, including one that contains an ancient eldar warp gate, the infiltration of which is Shards ultimate mission. 

Should Shard enter the webway, he intends to use his lethal skills to hunt the eldar through their own territory, in an attempt to disrupt the sensitive psychic network to allow his masters servants to finally finish what the eldar themselves started.

With the removal of the imperial presence from the planet, Shard now intends to venture to the supposed site of the portal and begin his endgame. However, while the chaos of an ork occupation is ample cover, it also raises the issue of tens of thousands of orks on the rampage, and as good as he is, even Shard knows he wouldn't last long against an entire warband alone.

And this is how Shard has come into the company of "The Gentle" and his reavers, hoping to harness the combat prowess  of his new allies as the perfect distraction to allow his mission to continue. Although he and the Gentle share the worship of their God, the renegade is nothing more to Shard than another weapon in his arsenal, to use and discard as he sees fit..

And there you go! I'll leave it there for now, cos I'm in a heap, but be sure to tune in to The Work of Shaitan for the next thrilling installment! Thanks for looking!

RoC project going medieval on your ass

Hello again! With Neds Khorne renegade in the bag, and our warbands taking (unpainted) shape, we've turned our attention to the Warhammer world and rolled up our fantasy warbands. As I already mentioned (hope you're paying attention), I drew nurgle for the fantasy side of the project, so I got rolling the other night and came up with an absolute beast! Anyway, here's some fluff:

The small hamlet of Fakkhaven lies in the shadow of the Drakwald forest in the empire, a benighted place full of bandits and other, much more horrific dangers. Situated as it is, Fakkhaven has been destroyed and rebuilt many times in its history, but it's hardy citizens struggled on stubbornly, and eked out a living as woodsmen and subsistence farmers in spite of the ever present danger.

However, for the past three decades Fakkhaven has enjoyed an unprecedented period of peace, and while its inhabitants have become aggressively insular, it has avoided the predations of the myriad creatures that call the Drakwald home. It has been this way ever since the carnival came to town all those years ago.

You see, the carnival, while displaying gaiety and bright colours, had as rotten a core as it is possible to have. This carnival was the noisome cavalcade of Cholerus Wormtaste, Great Unclean One of Nurgle, and he and his troupe had been spreading glorious rot across the back roads of the empire for decades before Fakkhaven even existed. 

But when the carnival came to the hamlet, they found it prepared for their arrival, in a way. A terrified survivor of their last performance had come to Fakkhaven ahead of them, and warned of the horrors about to befall the community. The carnival pulled up in front of hastily prepared barricades with a lone figure before them. The man was Ethbert Cohaagen, appointed leader of Fakkhaven and the best warrior among them, having served the emperor as a halberdier for a large portion of his adult life. While now in his fifth decade, Cohaagen was still formidable, his ex issue halberd, driven by his powerful swing, had ended the life of many a raider over the years. 

A lone, cowled figure emerged from the caravan and started towards him, his grip on his halberd tightening as he readied himself. From the outside he was the picture of determination, but in his mind he was wracked with doubt. He was old now, older than he had any right to be and he could feel his age catching up with him. He was slowing now, and wracked with dull aches and other discomforts, and if he was honest with himself, the blood in his piss was a very bad sign. The hooded figure stopped before him, and began to talk. It was a dry rasping whisper, and none that cowered on the other side of the barricades could make out what was said, but they certainly noticed the slump in Cohaagens shoulders as he relaxed his guard. Suddenly, the emissary stepped to the side and beckoned Cohaagen toward the carnival cart, and the people of Fakkhaven were both surprised and relieved to see Cohaagen make his way towards it.

After a time Cohaagen re emerged and made his way back to the village, his step noticeably more assured, a youthful swagger back in his step. He told the villagers to open the gates and allow their new friends in, their fortunes were about to change for the better in a way they couldn't conceive. The people were unsure, but did as he bid once Alfred Weissman was hacked in two for voicing dissent. Something had happened to Cohaagen in that cart, but terror at his newfound strength forced obedience. As the cart rattled into the centre of the hamlet and it's curtains drew back to reveal disease made flesh in countless horrible forms, Fakkhaven fell to its knees in terrified supplication.

However, Father Wormtaste is a generous leader, gregarious and jolly he delights in interacting with his new subjects, even if they usually end the exchanges wracked with hideous illness. Cohaagen has become the red right hand of Father Wormtaste, defending the passes that lead to Fakkhaven and hunting down escapees who haven't accepted the Word of the Father with single minded brutality. As for Cohaagen himself, he has never felt better, a new vitality courses through his now leprous flesh, and while he was strong before he is now capable of wrestling a fully armoured warhorse to the ground without any effort at all. He has even grown fond of the little mites that follow him everywhere, delighting in their ridiculous vicious antics. For Ethbert Cohaagen, life is good again, and he will do whatever it takes to keep it that way.

So there you go! Champion of nurgle with nurgling infestation and strength (+3!), so I followed that to its ridiculous conclusion and gave him a two handed weapon, because strength 9 attacks should provide hilarity down the road. For his retinue, I rolled 7 humans, 2 orcs and 4 chaos goblins, so watch this space! 

Now I'll hand the reins back to Ned for some Tzeentch magicky bullshit 😉 thanks for looking! Oh, and here's the man himself, Mr. Cohaagen 

Shameless plug time

Now then folks, how are we all doing? I'm sure the majority of you know about this already, but I'm involved in a Kickstarter that launched last night, and I'm wanting to spread the word!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/554542735/the-pantheon-of-chaos?ref=discovery

It's a throwback to the 80s era of miniatures, where instead of rank upon rank of plastic shite getting pushed across the table only for a rules argument  to erupt,we're going back to a better time of warbands of individual metal warriors creating a story as they're used in fun scenario driven games. This initial wave has already smashed its funding target (in two fucking hours!), and we've got some very tasty stretch goals lined up, and with future plans including a hardback rule/scenario book, why not pop over and treat yourself?😉

Let our powers combine!!

*this is a fucking wall of text, but there's photos at the end, so stick with it!*

How do folks, been very busy in real life lately so the painting has taken a temporary back seat, but I have had time to start something a bit exciting (well I think so anyway). 

In the last blog post I was banging on about the Khorne warband I was getting all tumescent for, but that led me into a conversation with Ned Gladdis (I can't do links cos I'm shit, but check out his blog The Work Of Shaitan if you haven't already, it's fucking magic) about a possible cross blog project based on the RoC warbands. The basic plan we've bashed out is we take two gods each, and do a warband for each one. However, as we were chatting, we realised we don't see too many Rogue Trader based warbands, so because we don't already have enough to be doing, one of our two warbands will be Rogue Trader themed. The overall plan is to alternate weekly posts on our progress until we have another bunch of minis to display in our cabinets, but as always that could be subject to change 😉

Still with me? Sound! I've drawn Slaanesh and Nurgle for the project, so after a bit of a think I decided to do a slaanesh worshipping renegade marine, as I've painted a fantasy slaanesh army already, and fancied a change. And it's this champion that I present to you this evening, Adolphus "The Gentle"

Adolphus barely escaped his chapter with his life following his exposure as a chaos worshipper during a particularly gruelling campaign on the moons of the Githrak system. As the trench war ground on, it began to take its toll on Adolphus, his heavy MkII armour making him the spearhead of multiple assaults, and the constant violence began to dull Adolphus' sensibilities to the point everything became a crushing cycle of blood and death and adrenalin. When the voice began to talk to him, he revelled in the new acts suggested by the soft whispers, and his assaults became more and more spectacular in their application of brute force. Soon enough the other members of his squad began to notice, and he became isolated as they realised he was cracking under the pressure, but with no surviving chaplains there was nobody equipped to help. 

It was when they found Adolphus bathed in the offal of six chapter serfs that his true nature was revealed, the curses he spat as he murdered his battles brothers was not his usual gruff tone, but a soft almost feminine rasp. The whisper in his ear was now the voice in his throat.

Now, my first roll was a marine champion, automatically equipped powered armour, and rolling for his equipment I got a bolter and a chainsword. Rolling for his reward, I got attribute: blood substitution (acid), which wasn't half bad, and then his personal attribute was...... Silly voice...

Right, so now I have a space marine champion who bleeds acid and sounds like Mr Slave.. I can work with that! 

For his retinue, I rolled two units of humans (5 and 7 respectively), and an assassin!! I've already gathered up enough pirates and mercenaries for the human squads, and I'm about halfway through the chaos assassin conversion (I'm fucking rock hard to get that one going), but that's for another time. I will now hand over to Mr. Gladdis on his blog, where this time next week he should be starting his Renegade rabble. Thanks for looking!

#justiceforgary2 and more fucking distractions

Hello there! I'm back from the pit of blogging laziness I slipped back into last week with another round of pictures of dubious quality and s side order of foul language, so here we go!

My #justiceforgary campaign is still ongoing, with my personal painted Morley sculpt collection growing by four of his ghouls. Now, I'm a fuckin terrible Paul Muller fanboy, especially anything ghoul related, so this was gonna be a tough wank painting wise, but like a teenager with a Woman's Way magazine, I soldiered on and arrived at quite a satisfactory finish (if I say so myself)

Now, when I posted these boys on Facebook, the main point of conversation was the huge bones they're running around with, and the piss was duly taken, however, in a fit of paternal protectiveness, I've decided that the background of these particular lads is that they keep raiding the necromancers ogre spare parts pile (to fuck with him you understand), so I'll be theming more models around this, including a skeletal ogre who's missing a few parts, so watch this space (but don't hold yer breath)

Moving on, this week I also got a scavvy gang done for a customer, so I thought I'd fold them into the #justiceforgary thing, as they are genuinely lovely models. My own gang is still being picked away at (it involves a lot of converting), but I thought I'd get these lads in for the cause too

They speak for themselves really, don't they?

And now for something completely different

I was chatting to the multi talented spaniard Diego Serrate of Troll Outpost and Space Riders (and soon to be Patheon of Chaos project, I'll get back to that in another post), and as our conversations tend to do, it got on to chaos warbands from the Realms of Chaos era. Anyway, long story short, I got distracted from my next big personal project and rolled up a warband. I got:

Level 10 champion; mark of Khorne (chaos armour) and blood substitute: molten metal

Using the guidelines from Realmofchaos80s, a level ten champ gets 3 rolls on the followers table, and from that I got;

4 beastmen

6 skaven

2 minotaurs

That's some good fucking rolls if you ask me, so after a root in some boxes, I've put together the warband, and last night started painting my yet to be named champion. I'll probably never get a game in with these lads, but it's a nice little sideline to the commissions I'm working on, and also soaks up some of the lead pile, which is always a good thing! 

So that's me for now, hope I didn't bore you too much (and if I did, don't let the fuckin door hit you on the way out ye miserable cunt), and I'll just say thanks for reading, and leave you with a few glamour shots of the latest addition to my howling griffons, very kindly donated to the cause by Mr. Steve Casey, who I think we can all agree is an absolute gentleman and a credit to this mass midlife crisis that we call Oldhammer. Til next time folks!

Impending ultraviolence..

Hello! Got the first wave of my marine project finished last night, so rather than a fly by night photo dump on Facebook I thought I'd document them in a bit more detail here. This is a bit of a personal milestone for me, as even though I've been collecting these little metal and plastic bastards for over 20 years, this is the first time in dozens of attempts where I haven't lost interest (or the will to live) halfway through a squad, and I now have a full marine squad proudly on display in my cabinet! Anyway, enough bollocks, here come the Boys:

Firstly, the command section. Lieutenant Bisley, T.F.U of the second company of the Howling Griffons has a remarkably distinguished (and violent) record within his chapter, given that he's only been a fully fledged marine for just over two decades. He and his strike force have responded to inquisitor Annolucems request for aid in investigating the communications blackout from the systems main hive city, and woe betide anyone who gets in the way of their "investigations". Lt. Bisley is flanked by chaplain Constantine who has pledged to ensure the purity of the force given that inquisitorial duties are rarely due to natural phenomena, and medic 1st class Fulci, an invaluable addition to such an "impetuous" outfit 

Fire team Alpha, half of 3rd squad, second company, also known as "The Boys", this is Lt. Bisleys former unit, and his first choice for any undertaking that requires that "special" touch. Led by Sgt. Patricus Sharpe (seen in the middle), Bisleys former second in command, this fire team is the close quarters section, well equipped with assault grenades and flame units to get the job done 

Fire team Beta, led by Corporal "Deadeye" Jones, is the fire support element, normally equipped with a heavy bolter to keep heads down while Alpha team get into range

The boys are currently en route to the rendezvous point with the inquisitor, more on whom will follow at some point soon. Thanks for looking! 

#JusticeforGary

Hello again you lucky bastards! Ive been mulling this post over in my head for a long while now, and I think it's time to put thumb to keypad and get it out there. 

Gary Morleys Nagash isn't that bad a sculpt.

Finished laughing/crying/shouting? Good. Let's continue. Recently, I was one of the multitudes that absolutely hated the original Nagash model. I'd owned it as a kid, and loved it, but as time went by and my "taste" developed, I was more than happy to go along with the piss taking of the clown headed bastard and the poor chap that made him. My own model was chucked in a box, unloved and ignored until Inquisitor was released and I hacked the poor fucker up to make a chaos magus. Fast forward ten years or so and a very good mate of mine handed me a big bag of undead miniatures, the result of a clear out he was having, probably to make room for more dwarfs (that fucker loves his dwarfs). In that bag was another Nagash, in very good nick too. But, as I was still blinkered, off he went into a box again.

Then the new Nagash came out. People were going mental for it, how impressive and big it was etc, etc. From minute one I thought it was fucking shite. Overpriced, overdone shite. With a tiny head. I kept thinking about Morleys sculpt, it couldn't be that bad could it? So I dug him out and started to think about thinking about doing something with him.

And then I did. And here he is

(The zombies are from a commission I was working on, but they look the part)

He's genuinely not that bad at all. A bit of repositioning gave him a better pose, and upon having a good look at his face, the major problem is the teeth run too far around the jaw, I imagine if he still had all his skin he's have a head like a South Park Canadian, so with a bit of fudging, he got some flesh on his cheeks. Also, whoever painted it for GW back in the day mustn't have been paying proper attention, his head isn't really a skull at all, given that it has eyebrows!  

Anyway, the upshot is, he's actually not as bad as everyone makes him out to be (in my opinion anyway), a little bit of thought and a less mental colour scheme goes a long way to sorting him out.

"So, you handsome bastard, besides you now championing a model you used to hate, what the fuck is the point of this post?" I hear you ask. Well, working on this big fucker has made me revise my opinion on Mr Morleys sculpting quite a bit, so I'm now actively seeking more of his stuff, in particular his undead sculpts (they can go in my army then, so there's method to the madness), to see what they're like to work on 20 years later when I have a much better idea of what I'm doing. I'm sure there's some gems to be found, and to that end the first part of the project landed on the doormat this morning:

It's a slow burn project, but something I'm quite looking forward to, so watch this space! And next time you're holding a Gary Morley sculpt in your hands, don't just sneer at how "shite" it is, give it a go and see if your mind can be changed too- or better yet, send the fucker to me! 😉

Thanks for reading folks!

Populating a dingy shithole

 Yep, still here, thanks for dropping by! Been hanging out with the cool kids on Facebook again, but with my latest adventure into the world of glue gun burns and foul language I thought I'd revisit my poor neglected blog, tucked away in the attic with nothing but a bucket of fish heads and the back half of a rat for companionship. 

Anyway, if you've seen my stuff on Facebook you'll know already that I spent yesterday hot gluing all sorts of shite together and then decorating it to finally kickstart the construction of the ruined hive that will form the bulk of the setting for the RT games I dream of playing one day, so first off, here's some shite photos of the pieces themselves before I regale you with pictures of stuff you'll have seen before, but now with added background 

Now on to the cast of this particular production:

The cock that needs no introduction, The Colonel and his mates have been detailed in an earlier post, but they've ended up stuck in this god forsaken shithole since the underlevels got cut off from the upper hive while they were delivering some "sensitive" merchandise to an old guilder contact of Sawn Off Borri. Nobody's sure what's going on, not even the imperial forces left behind to keep the peace, all that's certain is that the boundary doors have been clamped shut for the first time since the zombie plague two centuries previously, and with those doors shut, nobody below them is going anywhere 

"The Immortan" and some of his tribe. The Immortan and his scavvies have flourished since the upper levels of the hive went dark, taking advantage of the chaos and confusion to gouge out much bigger territories than they previously held, including a small but growing number of factory sectors which had allowed the production of not only more and better weaponry, but also better building materials, so that the shanty towns are being replaced by more permanent and higher quality settlements, which is making the Immortan extremely popular with the citizens who haven't yet joined the rapidly growing Church of the Family of the Sundered Firmament, members of whom have made numerous attempts on the Immortans life, mainly due to the fact that, as much as the remaining imperial authorities hate to admit it, the Immortan and his small but growing army is the main reason that the Church hasn't already swept through the underhive 

Unbeknownst to pretty much everyone in the underhive, The Church of the Family of the Sundered Firmament is actually a rapidly growing genestealer clan, based in the eastern industrial sectors, but with churches popping up in settlements from sump bottom to the uphive borders. The Father appeared three decades ago, tearing his way through a stress fracture in the roof of the eastern domes and devastating the congregation of a small workers chapel not far from the fissure. Since then he has bred his clan into the position of power they hold now, only the settlements under "The Apostate Immortan" have resisted so far, violently opposing any attempts made to set up churches in his territories. But it matters not. The Father and Mother have sent their Trueborn children into the vast mazes of ducts and channels that permeate the hives structure, soon they will bypass the sealed boundary walls and begin to spread the love of the Family amongst the upper echelons. The only worry gnawing at the Father is why the boundary has been sealed in the first place, for while the Family is a powerful force within the confines of the underhive, it is still to young and weak to stand against the typical imperial measures taken against their kind..

The Galactic Action Bastards are a system spanning "private security contractor" company under the command of The Galactic Bastard himself. Unfortunately for the Bastard, his hands on method of personally choosing new recruits (to ensure the highest quality practitioners of violence the galaxy has to offer), has come back to haunt him, as his clandestine meeting with the Immortan has left him on the wrong side of the boundary and, like the Colonel, unable to reach his ship and get the hell out of whatever situation is developing. Luckily for the Bastard, he is as always accompanied by his best men, including the bounty hunter "Fishbowl" Gorman and the Bastards very own, very vicious (and magnificently coiffured) son, affectionately known as "The Little Bastard"

Inquisitor Bäal Revan is the reason the boundary has been shut. He has used his considerable influence to seal the lower hive off to, as he explained to the hive nobility, stem the spread of a mystery contagion he has been following the progress of throughout the system. Obviously, the foppish upper classes threw their workforce under the bus in order to save themselves, and are also observing a strict policy of secrecy with regards their actions, as inquisitor Revan explained to them in no uncertain terms the disruption to their lives that a full imperial intervention would cause, and selflessly took it upon himself to remedy this distasteful situation. Obviously, the truth is wholly different. Revan is an egotistical maniac whose selfish actions are setting events in motion that could wipe the entire system off the map. Revans pet witch picked up the psychic trail of a burgeoning genestealer infestation within the lower levels of the hive, and the inquisitor, rather than cleansing it with fire and sword, has decided to contain it as long as possible, to study the effects of the infestation firsthand. With the help of his "Leatherheads", a private (and wholly despicable) mercenary outfit, he has commandeered an Arbites blockhouse to use as his base of operations. He has also engaged the services of the notorious and widely reviled "Funboy Three", slavers and people traffickers known and hated across the system. The Funboys have used their "skills" to secure victims for Revans experiments, which involve drugging the unfortunates insensible before turning them loose in areas identified as having high Clan prescience. It's then only a matter of waiting for the victims to reappear, more often than not infected with genestealer DNA, before confining them to the cells in the blockhouse to await the results of their impregnation. This course of action will obviously end in tears, but Revans ego has him convinced that he will be the one to find the way to stop these infestations, even though all he's doing right now is enabling one. Still, his influence isn't as all powerful as he believes, and his actions have not gone unnoticed, dispatches have been sent to the imperial sector command by members of the aristocracy who have more sense than vanity, and an inquisitorial task force is en route to find out just what the hell is actually going on

Aaaand there you go, fair play if you've made it this far! Thanks for sticking with it and I'll hopefully be able to further the narrative over the next while. Thanks for looking!