Schwartzweald Part 1

Well hello there!
Right, time to start getting some ideas down for this modest little project. I think the best way to keep this current ball rolling is to make it into a story, one that evolves over time to hopefully become a proper mythology of a small corner of the Empire. I'm setting it all in the Old World of warhammer, as thats what I know and theres plenty to draw from while still adding elements from real world folklore too. This will be far fron "canon" (what a fucking silly term), but I'll muddle along and try to develop the story of Schwartzweald, a tiny hamlet deep in the forests of the Drakwald. Here we go!

The inhabitants of Schwartzweald 1: The Militia

Bargash, Marshal Ulric, Deputy Klein and the dwarfs, Thorek and Bolli

Marshal Ulric is the grandson of the "founder" of Schwartzweald, Retter Gruber, an ex state trooper of the empire. Grubers exit from service is still a bit of a mystery, some say he retired on a modest pension after a particularly vicious campaign against a chaos warband while others claim (very quietly) that he was a deserter who made off with a large portion of the paymasters wagon. Either way, he staked his claim on the small clearing he ended up in and began the life of a hermit, but as time went on, more disparate (and desperate) folk came to settle the area, a situation which Retter quickly warmed to, given the hostile nature of the deep woods he called home. Ulric is a proud and fairman, and very capable in combat, having been trained by his father and grandfather, whose armour and sword he wields as his badges of office.
Deputy Klein is the son son of Albert Klein, the woodcutter, another ex soldier from the Ostermark who was blinded in one eye in battle, and released from service in return for trading his eye for the life of his commander. He tried life as a sellsword for a while, investing his retirement purse in a fine suit of plate armour, but his fighting days were behind him and his subsequent wanderings eventually led him to Schwartzweald, along with his new wife, a camp girl from the mercenary outfit he ran with. Klein the younger is not exactly an exceptional warrior but has dreams of following in his fathers footsteps, something his father has no intention of allowing, so his post as the village deputy is more a compromise than a calling.
Thorek and Bolli are all that remains of a dwarf merchant caravan that was set upon by a beastman warband while traversing the woods, Ulric and his former deputy happened upon them enacting a fighting retreat, harried by a pack of ungor. With the humans help, they managed to scatter the hunters and the dwarfs pledged what was left of their lives to Schwartzweald for the assistance, and have been a valuable asset ever since
Bargash showed up one day, decided he liked the place and hasnt left. While some in the village are wary of an ogre wandering about, he is a remarkably gregarious example of his race, and his sword arm is most welcome in keeping the peace

Anders "the gobshite", Klaus and Marcin

Anders unfortunate nickname is absolutely deserved. He fancies himself a duelist and claims his sword and dagger were gifts from an Altdorf noble who he saved in battle, but in reality he found them on the rotten corpse of an empire soldier he stumbled across in the woods while on the run for petty theft. Still, he's handy enough with the blades, and always willing to throw himself heroically at any trouble, so the rest of the militia is more than happy to "send in the gobshite"
Klaus and Marcin are the local pest controllers. Having grown up in Schwartzweald they have a great working knowledge of the area and its non human inhabitants and work extremely well as a team, whether it be flushing rats from the tavern or caving in goblin skulls in the deepwoods

Gerrard, Hermann and Norbert

Trackers and hunters (and sometimes poachers if the opportunity arises), the "brothers Grim" are all members of the same family, the Geirhardts, who live on the outskirts of Schwartzweald. Hermann, the eldest, is a terribly ugly man, some say he has orc blood in him but never within earshot, as he is a savage fighter and like a ghost when on the hunt, both factors ensure his place as a respected member of the community. 

Gerrard is also a very capable woodsman and archer and the two brothers have more than proved their worth in both feeding the village when times are hard, and defending it when times are harder. 

Poor Norbert is an idiot,in less enlightened times he would be called a simpleton but he is a happy lad, and under the watchful eye of his older brothers he is becoming a wicked shot with his bow which more than makes up for his other, numerous shortcomings. 

Bolga the druid and Bjark

Bolga isnt officially a citizen of Schwartzweald, he wanders the surrounding woods grumbling to himself and drinking the various wines spirits and beers he brews himself. He is welcome in the village, and makes some spare coin selling surplus alcohol and advising the farmers on the best way to cultivate their meagre crops in the difficult soil. He likes to frequent the tavern as much as he's able, but doesnt like to leave Bjark alone for too long, the bloody thing keeps getting himself in bother. Although not willing to get too involved in the running of the village, if danger looms he and Bjark will meet it head on with all the ferocity you'd expect from a half drunk druid and his bear best friend.. 

So there you have it, reams of bollocks punctuated with the odd picture! I hope you enjoued the small tour of the burgeoning Schwartzweald, heres hoping I can keep the ball rolling. I dont wamt to outline too much of my plan, I'm hoping to let it evolve naturally, but there will be a post in the hopefully near future detailing the orc raiding party thats been causing all sorts of trouble lately. Thanks for reading! 

Here we go again!

Yup, I'm doing a blog post! As usual, I've been busy painting, but not blogging. The time it takes to write a post can be used to paint more and that always wins out.

Anyway, lets get my latest fleeting idea set in stone to be disregarded on a whim!

First of all, I'd suggest you read this:

Done? Sound.

Whiskey has this awful knack of doing blog posts that really get my brain firing, models get dug out, sprayed and about half get painted before he goes and does another one and my focus changes again. But this one has stuck with me like few others. I came to the realisation last year that I'm pretty much done with large scale games, warband(ish) sized projects are much more attractive at this stage and much more forgiving of my tiny attention span, so, as usual, I read the post, dug out the models, sprayed and painted and here we are:

I'm planning on building a narrative around a small fantasy village in the deep dark woods of the warhammer world, these lads are the beginnings of the village militia. Why a small fantasy village in the middle of the woods? Well, because the deep dark woods is where the monsters live, and heres the first group the militia will have to deal with

Proper skeevy little bastard orcs, accompanied by a lightly converted Guthrum Mane from an old scenario pack to add some muscle (and bravery) to the warband.

Now, I'm planning to expand on the background a fair bit as this goes on, maybe even playing some small solo games to build a narrative. The setting should provide enough opportunities to add all sorts of varied beasties and boggarts fornthe doughty militia to defend against, but for now, I'll thank you for reading and hopefully be back in less than a year for another post! Cheers!

What's that smell?

Hello!
Now before yis start, I know, the Mongols, but after doing the first unit I hit a bit of a wall with regard to the heavy cavalry and colours, so rather than just sit and mull it over, and waste painting time, I went for a root around to see if anything caught my eye. And I found these lads in a box.

Now I've loads of other stuff I should be doing, but I also needed to kick start my enthusiasm again, so I set aside a couple of evenings this week, and here's the results:

Smelly boys on tour

The more attentive among you may have noticed there's plague marines in the top photo, but none painted yet, that's cos I'm saving them for a bit later, I've loads of other stuff that's higher priority so I don't want to bog down on these just yet until I've fulfilled my other duties but they have been a great mojo booster and that's what's important  right? 

Anyway, that's enough outta me for now, as always thanks for looking and I'll catch you all again in the hopefully near future!

The White Tent Rises

Hello and happy new year!

Now this post is a departure from the normal oldhammer flavoured posts on the blog, but hopefully you'll find it worth a look anyway, and if you don't, balls to ye, cos I like em!
I don't have a wide interest in historical stuff for the most part, I've always been much more comfortable with dragons and reanimated skeletons and the like, but I do have a keen interest in two particular subjects  Romans and The Mongol khanates,and thanks to Christmas and a lovely (and long suffering) wife, I now have a small mongol force to paint.

And here's the first unit

I received the "24 point lion rampant starter" from the fantastic 1st Corps Miniatures, and set straight to work cleaning and basing the lovely, lovely models. The first six, horse archers (of course), will be expanded to a full arban of ten, along with the rest of the units in the army, but for now I'm just going to work through what's here and look at expanding once they're all done. Future plans aren't set in stone, but I'll go into more detail in future posts. As for now, thanks for looking and hopefully catch you all again soon!

Raise the Black Banner

They are coming

Da future is Green

Hello! Back again to regale you all with more bollocks and some pics of old models, you lucky people! The subject of today's ramble is an army that has always been close to my heart, but has taken nearly twenty years to get anything done with. The archetypal antagonist of the 40k universe, the Orks!
I've always wanted an ork army, when me and my little brother bought the 2nd edition 40k boxed set, it was the orks I wanted. Those plastic Goffs and gretchin served me (fairly) well for the first year or so of my gaming life, before the chaos codex came along and stole me away. Thinking about it, the main reason I moved away from the greenskins was my budget at the time, you needed a lot of boots on the ground with an ork army, whereas a chaos army was a lot more compact, and therefore affordable for a young teenager on a pocket money budget. But I always hankered after an all conquering green tide, and resolved to one day own one. That day is coming my friends, and I like to think I've made a good start, have a look and judge for yourselves :

So far, this is what I've got done

This is Da Gaffer, built from a goff nob with the addition of the arms from a nob biker. He took quite a while to get finished, mainly because I didn't really have a plan other than to build a cool Warlord, and you know I think I pulled it off! 

 The start of the nob Council, nothing spectacular here, but that cybork is one of my favourite miniatures, so was a must have for the project

Da big mob. Just your bog standard rogue trader ork raiders. Ten for now, I'll see what I have left over after I've added the support squads, like this one:

More orks raiders, backed up with a heavy flamer. They're not gonna last long on the battlefield but as long as they go down swinging their job is done!

And the start of my favourite mob in the army, da Ballz Öwt madboyz! I love the madboy models, but I can't help look at them and think they're dancing, so where better to put them than as a mobile mosh pit for my own orky metal maestros Ballz Öwt? I have another five models to add to this unit, and they're currently on the painting table, so they should be along very soon! 

So that's a wrap for another indeterminate period, as always thanks for looking! 

The saga of Lord Boddicker and that bastard tail

Another month whipped by and the cobwebs are needing to be blown off again! As always, I've been busy, mostly melting under this heat we're "enjoying", but managing to get some paint applied when it's not drying on the brush before I can use it!
Today's post was planned to be about my orks, but sitting at the painting table yesterday, I spied something at the back, looking  at me accusingly, unfinished and unloved for months...
I've always loved the old citadel chaos steeds, and have managed to collect four over the years,but I've never been overly enamoured with the knights that sit on them. They're nice and all, but I think they're not impressive enough to be on those magnificent horses,especially compared to the warriors on foot. A few years ago, I first saw Nicos magnificent chaos knights. That was the seed planted,and the hunt was on for the steeds. A while later, Whiskey over at The Leadpile converted a fantastic leader for his chaos marauder warband, which you can see here, got the seed sprouting. I actually ended up using the same marauder for my conversion, because I loved the pose of it on the horse.
So, the steed and donor model were put on the table, and then promptly ignored in favour of something else. Along came my good mate Ned with the final nail in the coffin. That was it, the model was finally happening!
So after chopping, trimming, press molding and calling the model a prick on more than one occasion, I was left with a piece that was almost there, but it needed a head. Not just any head, but a head that only a warrior of chaos could have, something impractical but dangerous(ish) looking, something to make him stand out. And yet again the project foundered as I lost my patience looking.

And then, I remembered Airbornegroves homage to Tim Prow. Of course he should have an animal head, because Chaos. An old Judge Dredd Klegg was duly hunted and decapitated before I spent a leisurely time slapping the model about with the auld hairy stick. I was quite chuffed with the results, and showed the rest of the Combat Burgers, who duly pointed out that the steeds tail looked like trouble, and so was born the back story........

The hero of the Gods held his position along with his warband in the gorge, awaiting their prey. His reptilian eyes blinked slowly as he lost himself in increasingly faint memories, Lord Clarence Boddicker, scourge of the bandits that infested the forests of Ostermark. He dimly remembered the honours heaped upon him by the small folk, and the songs sung in his praise in taverns across the province. 
He also remembered the priest that had arrived with his witch hunters, and recalled with unusual clarity the bite of his axe through the priests chest after he found the burnt carcass of his wi- " Claaaareeence, come on, let's get the bastards!!"
Lord Boddicker swung his arm backwards with a savage growl, feeling his blow connect with a crack of iron on bone. "You absolute shit! You're here to do a job you scaly prick, get on with it!!"
Not for the first time, Lord Boddicker closed his eyes and expelled a long low breath, trying to calm himself. His career in service of the gods had been a steady rise until he'd killed that sorcerer. He'd snapped the tzeentch creatures spine like a twig, and left his faithful steed, grown massive on a diet of meat and blood to feed on the carcass. He'd awoken the next morning to find a thick, plated tail sprouting from its rump, a dripping maw at the end screaming obscenities at him. He'd crushed it almost immediately  but it grew back within hours, and had done in the uncountable times he'd done it since. He'd even killed the horse once, although it galled him to do so, but he was driven to it by that damned tail shrieking with laughter at the reptilian horror his head had become. He'd torn the horses throat out in one massive bite, but the next morning he was woken by that bastard mouth shrieking at him again.
" snap out of it you bastard, they're nearly here, and I'm huuuunnngryyyyy!"
God's damn that creature, he'd been distracted to the point that he'd almost missed his chance! He directed his warband with short curt gestures, as impressive as his crocodilian head was in battle, it made normal speech nearly impossible. They moved quietly into position as the patrol got closer, and Boddicker unstrapped his shield, ready to sow carnage amongs- "CHAAAAAARGE!!! KILL THEM AAAAALLL"
Boddicker roared in frustration as that accursed mouth ruined yet another ambush. Nothing for it now but to reap a harvest and count the cost in the aftermath. He was going to kill that fucking tail once this was done. Again.

Thanks for reading that wall of text folks, see you at some other time with some other project!