Welcome, to our very first modeling post! Modeling is such a big part of tabletop gaming, and while a lot of people seem to feel that its a bit of a burden, I enjoy it almost as much as getting the models on a table. In fact, my very favorite part is coming up with a paint scheme for my forces. Currently, I have two armies, my Mardi Gras themed Gator force, which uses the purple green and gold of the festival to bring a Cajun feel to the models, and my Interdiction of the Dawn Protectorate of Menoth force, which uses purple, red and grey to invoke the image of the dawn. It takes the studio paint job of maroon, white and gold, and gives it a little twist!
Privateer Press has an amazing line of models to work with. The attention to detail is really extraordinary. My Idrian Skirmishers, for example, are practically covered in animal skins, totems, feathers, ammo belts (which are modeled to actually have about 10 little tiny bullets in them), medallions, and the like. Some of them are even pretty funny, like the Trollkin that is carrying a little piggy for a post battle snack! There are very few models in the line that I don't like, and luckily, I don't play those factions, woot! I have a priority list of the different types of models I like working on. At the very VERY bottom of the list are Warjacks... God, I HATE painting them!!! Luckily for me, DTB doesn't mind, so we have a bit of a deal worked out. He paints my 'jacks, and I paint... whatever he doesn't want to paint. I enjoy it, because get a chance to paint a lot of things that I otherwise wouldn't get to. So far, I've done some Legion of Everblight, the buffaloes for the Trollkin Long Riders, some pirate Mercs, and a few things for some different games, as well. Next on the list of painting preference, units. I wouldn't mind doing units, except that by the eighth model I get a little tired of them, haha! I have a minimum unit of Deliverers that I painted up...
A little while later, a friend of mine gave me another four so I could field a maximum unit, but I still haven't brought myself to paint up the last four! Next up, Battle Engines. I love battle engines. They're interesting, well designed, and just gosh darn fun to paint. Almost all of them are just beautiful when finished, too. I have two, the Gatorman Sacral Vault, and the Vessel of Judgment for the Protectorate. The Sacral Vault took me about two months to paint. Now, I know that seems like a long time, but my little polliwogs keep me from having any long painting time. I can sneak in a couple of hours on Sundays during nap time, so painting time is a precious, extremely limited, commodity. The Vessel is currently a WIP, the priest and the Idrian pulling the Vessel are complete, and now I'm just working on the Vessel itself. And finally, at the very top of my list, are solos / Warcasters. These models I find the most visually interesting, and since there is only one of them, unlike units, I feel like I can really take my time with them, to make them very special. And really, since the Warcaster/ Warlock is the main point of any Warmachine/ Hordes army, it's not a bad idea to really make them pop! Which brings us to our model for today! Both of my lists for the tournament in October are almost complete. This is very important, as with out tourney, there are some pretty stiff penalties for having unpainted models. While it is acceptable to play with unpainted models, someone who fields them will automatically lose their starting roll for the game. If two people on a team have unfinished models, then the team automatically loses the team roll and forfeits the right to decide match ups! Yikes! So, best to have all models finished. I already know my teammates are at full paint status, so it was up to me to finish up. My final model that needed work was the linchpin of all my plans, Reznik, the Wrath of Ages!!!
There he is! This is a beast of a model, being both a 'caster and a chariot. With horses. And three wracks. Man! This is gonna take a while. In order to make things easier, I left off the right and left wracks from the back of the chariot, or else painting them would be almost impossible! Then, I primed everything with white primer. Currently I'm using, and I kid you not, "Mr. Surface White 1000." Hahahahahaha! Every time I use it, I can't help thinking of the movie Spaceballs! When I first started painting, so, so many years ago, I used black primer for almost everything, but I have realized a couple of things. If your plan for the models is dark, then black primer is great, but white primer makes colors really pop! And also, white primer makes it sooooo much easier to see all the little details that PP has on their models. Otherwise, I get stuck holding a model, looking at a part of it thinking, "What the heck IS that?" White. Easy to see. Period. And with my paint scheme for my Protectorate forces using some bright colors, it's the way to go!
First things first, I had to come up with an idea of what I wanted the finished model to look like. Wracks are some of my favorite models to use with Reznik. Who were they before Reznik found them on his lists? What did they do to deserve the attention of the High Executioner? So, I decided that I wanted to explore those thoughts in this model. Time to order a few extra bits from the PP site!
I picked up a Khador Iron Fang Kovnik shield and a Cygnar Precursor Knight shield. I happened to have an extra Exemplar Knights Errant shield from building my Errant unit, so I threw that in there too, and boom! Three wracked heritics. I actually like the idea of adding one from the Protectorate to remind everyone that NO ONE IS SAFE from disrespecting the Creator of Man. What's that, you say? Those little troll hands? Well, I clipped them off of a Trollkin Stone Bearer. I needed the kriel stone he was carrying for a different project I'm working on. I couldn't just throw them away, so I came up with a brilliant idea! More on that later! The shields will go on the back of the wracks, around the legs of the poor souls hanging from them, demoralizing their former comrades with their suffering.
Next, base coating. This is the important time to get your painting plan set. Luckily for me, since the vast portion of my army collection is done, I already know pretty much how everything is going to work out. When I first moved to Japan, I had to buy all of my modeling stuff from on line, since I didn't know any good gaming stores. Luckily, I found Neal at the Warstore, and he has been my go to guy since then for all things. I decided the best way to go about my paints was to just buy one of the big collections. Not knowing anything about the differences between one set and another, I chose the Valejo Game Color Suitcase, which came with 72 colors and three brushes. Like I said, I'm not really sure about other makers, but I rather like the Valejo. No complaints from me. I do really want to try the Privateer Press P3 paints line, but that will have to wait. So, here we go! For the cloth, I use Hexed Lychen, Cold Grey on the right horse, who will end up being white, and Coal Black for the left horse, who will, obviously, be black. The metal plates of the armor on Reznik used Hammered Copper, and his little flappy cloth strips used Gory Red.
Choosing the color scheme for the metal bits of the chariot were a little more difficult than on Reznik or the horses... I never know what to do to break up the monotony of color. For this model, I decided to try my hand at non-metalic metals... in this case, since purple is the main color for the army, that's what I decided to go with. Also, it's a pretty good match with the gold. I knew I wanted the largest portions of the wracks to end up bronze/ gold, so I decided to use silver to break up the large portions of bronze and purple. For the basecoat, I chose Gunmetal Grey, since it's a good mid range silver. Hammered Copper went on where the gold will be, and we finished up with Bronze Flesh on the poor saps stuck on the wracks. (Oh yeah, the masks are going to be gold. The weight just adds to the suffering, I guess).
Horsey armor time! To keep from totally messing all the hard work, I'm basing all of the armor before I do any more work on the horses. Much like the chariot, it's going to be a mixture of silver and gold, so it was just a matter of deciding where to place each color. And with that, base coating is finished!
Next, highlighting number 1! I like to put on my first layer of highlight, and then do the shading mostly with inks and washes. I don't know if that's lazy or not, but hey, that's how I do it! The purple areas got a highlight of 1:1 Hexed Lychin and Bone White. Once that was finished, I put on a coat of purple ink, to blend it together and bring out the shadows.The bronze sections received a highlight of Brassy Brass, Bloody Red on the strips. Chainmail silver went over the gunmetal, and all the metal got a wash of black ink. Once it was dry, I brushed up the bronze areas with a thin layer of Brassy Brass, and the silver portions with Shining Silver. That left me with the little horses and the poor schmucks up on their wracks.
The soon to be white horse was touched up with Cold Grey, and the black horse used a 1:1 Coal Black and Cold Grey. As for the wracks, they got a wash of smokey ink to bring out all the great detain in their tortured bodies. I decided to go ahead and do their loin cloths. To push the idea of their different origins, I thought it might be fun if their loincloths had been torn off of their previous uniforms... so the Khadoran got outfitted in red, while the Cygnaran is swaddled in blue, and the fallen knight in the middle will be in white. Since the Protectorate is set in the desert, when I use white with them I like to have a yellowish cast to it. Kind of makes me think of sand, and the harsh environment of the holy land. To achieve this, I base the white parts in Bad Moon Yellow. Then I throw on a coat of Cold Grey, followed by a highlight of Dry Bone, and at long last, a final highlight of Bone White.
Poor, tortured souls. We can only hope their suffering keeps Reznik safe as he rides into battle!
Time for the armor. I already based it while I was finishing up the fabric and the wracks. For the silver, I use several different shades and brushes to randomize the look of the silver. It gives it kind of a weathered feel... I like it! For the gold, I have already laid down a base coat of Hammered Copper. A first highlight of Brassy Brass went on, and then a wash of black ink. Once that was dry, another coat of Brassy Brass went down, and then a final highlight of Polished Gold to finish the armor plates.
Woooo, shiny! Here is a man full of righteous wrath! A few final touches, and the model will be ready for basing! One of the last things I like to take care of is the red touches. I don't like to use a lot of it, because too much will draw away from the main effect of the paint scheme. The menofixes and the haft of the spear will be red(along with Reznik's prayer strips that I already mentioned), that should be enough! A base of gory red is a good place to start, with a highlight of Blood Red, and BAM!!!! beautiful red! Chains and such were next... bronze chains with the horses and the wracks, silver chains wrapped around Reznik, along with the incense burners that dangle from him. And at long last.... at long last... it was finished!
The final step for every model, basing! All of my Protectorate models are based to look like they are on the stone floor of a temple, or gathered in the courtyard in front of one. Some days I have a very ambitious plan to make a diorama with my forces, but let's be honest... that's probably not gonna happen anytime soon, haha! The base starts with Somber Grey. Next, I make the stone shapes with a 1:1 mixture of Somber Grey and Cold Grey. Next, with only Cold Grey, I fill in the stone shapes, leaving an outline of the previous color. And finally, I use Stonewall Grey and drybrush a little texture onto the stones. It adds some interest, and also blends together the two colors of the stones. Lastly, for Warmachine, all models need to have arc markings. We need to mark a 180 degree arc to show the facing for the front and back halves of the model. This can be anything, even just a slash of color, but, I like to do something a little different. On my Protectorate army, I use Menofixes to denote the front facing (i.e., where the model is looking) and both of the two marks for the 180 degree arc. I do the marks by hand, which is always tricky... sometimes they come out a little lopsided, but overall I think it really adds to the feel of the army.
With that done, the model is officially finished! Now, to customize! First of all, the shields that I had prepared go on the back of the wracks! I kind of like how it turned out! It's easy to see the effect I was going for, that these victims who protect Reznik come from all over the Iron Kingdoms. Now... for the final touch!
Boom! Hahahahaha! Where did those Trollkin hands from before get to? Why, there they are, being crushed beneath the wheels of the chariot! And what are crushed hands without a little pool of blood beneath them? I can't wait for DTB to see this!
Well, there you are! Reznik is ready for the table, in all his shiny glory! Ride forth, Wrath of Ages, and smite the wicked in Menoth's name!
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