Flight of the Walküre...

Progress of the Red Orcs has been steady but slow this week with 'Real World' work impacting time available to paint, however this does give me the opportunity to show off something I finished off earlier this year for the Dwarf army.

I've never been a great fan of GW's Dwarf mythos, for a race that worship tradition and abhor change they sure seem to develop some technological marvels! Top of my hate list is the gyrocopter. I don't know why, I just don't like the concept or the models GW have released over the years.

With this in mind it is somewhat hypocritical of me to replace the gyrocopter with Dwarf rocketeers but I tell myself that for an army with gunpowder, rockets are a much smaller tech leap than a steam-powered helicopter! :-)

Whatever, the models are conversions of the old Dwarf plastics, which whilst not as good as the current ones do have loads more conversion potential. The rocket packs are dragon-head standards from the set, winged helmets used to allow for changes of direction, the only new bits added being some sticks of dynamite from the Miners box set.

The idea was pinched from the excellent Dwarf forum Bugman's Brewery and whilst the models are individually based on 20mm x 20mm bases I have made a 40mm square sabot base for the two rocketeers so they can be used as a gyrocopter proxy by Saul if he fancies using his Dwarves down the local GW.

Painting Conundrums...

I hit a bit of a painting conundrum recently with regards to my Orcs. Back in the Eighties I painted the Citadel/GW Orcs and Goblins green. Not the luminous Goblin Green from GW but Humbrol French Artillery Green, a more olive green colour that looked more natural. However for the Nick Lund Chronicle Orcs I went with a terracotta flesh washed with sepia brown oil.

The problems in trying to recreate the particular looks has proven varied to say the least. I thought the French Artillery Green would be the most problematical until I discovered how Napoleon's artillery crews made it in the field (mix yellow and black and et voila!). The Chronicle brown though has been a problem.

I've tried a few experiments over the last couple of weeks and settled on a slightly darker and redder look than previous, but one I like and has a link to the old Red Goblins that existed in early Warhammer lore before being erased from history by the GW Design Studio.

The three Orcs here (all Grenadier IIRC) are painted slightly differently (Vallejo Red Black, Burnt Cad. Red and Flat Brown over a black undercoat) but the end result is similar enough and one I am pleased with so it's now full steam ahead on a unit of 21 Nick Lund Red Orcs.

Wagons Ho!

Whilst I continue my experiments on what colour to paint the Nick Lund Orcs I dug out these photos of the Dwarves Mining Wagons which have been painted up to use in a Wagon Train/Ambush game.

They are variants of the model that came with the 7th Edition Skull Pass set which I believe are found in the current Dwarf Miners box (I'm not 100% sure as Saul won the sprues in a luck dip at the local GW a few years back).

I made some slight tweaks to the models to ensure they weren't all identical, the major addition being the inclusion of contents in the wagons. I dropped a small piece of plastic card in them and piled some wall filler on top before adding some sand and small rocks which I painted to represent unrefined gold ore (I have no idea what gold ore is supposed to look like so drybrushed black over gold which allowed for flecks of gold to shine out).

I love the little Goblin prisoner in the cage, a wonderful little touch amongst the plethora of extra odds and sods on the sprues. GW may do many things wrong these days, but sometimes they still get it right... :-)