Anton's Army of the Eight Peaks

A very simple technique. Black undercoat, heavy Khorne Red drybrush -> lighter Orange drybrush -> even lighter Screaming Skull drybrush.

Meet Da Bosses Part 3:

Jax The Axe


I had been thinking about making a Big Boss out of the plastic Fanatics kit, so when Characters was chosen as topic for the 13th Da Warpath Conversion Competition, it was an ideal opportunity to make one. It's a simple conversion that took just a little bit of sculpting to replace the chain with a wooden haft and a suitably large axe from the Minotaurs kit. The head is from the Arachnarok crew.

What I was most happy about is how its dynamics changed completely when I altered the pose by cutting off the tab (it was meant to stand on the tip of its toe).

Skarsnik says: No one knowz who Jax killed to get dat axe, but no uvver Goblin can even lift it (many tried -- while Jax was sleeping o' course). After 'e 'ad da shamans call down ol' Gork's blessing on it, it cuts fro' beard and bone like nuffin'.

Falloff


I also entered Falloff in the competition, although his only conversion is his bent arm and possibly his basing. But since I was painting him anyway as second in command of the Big Red Bouncy Brigade, I thought I might as well enter him too. The details didn't come out as sharp as expected but it was a repainted model so maybe that was the reason.

I managed to pick up the pace and paint all 23 Herders this week, so I finished my Squig contingent.


Squig Herd 1.


Top view.


Squig Herd 2.

I used a lot of command models as Herders. I have more actual Herders but I didn't want to use multiple Squigpipes/Cymbals in the same unit, and those models will make great alternative musicians in other units.


I thought I should take a picture with all the squiggly things together (Spongebob Squigboss and the Big Red Bouncy Brigade), but as I look at it now I realise I forgot to include the Manglers.

As of yesterday, there are 8 weeks left to the battle. I won't have time to paint everything I had planned (or all the Night Goblins I have 'accidentally' acquired) but I want to paint as much as I possibly can.

As always, thank you for all your kind comments. They help me to keep going.

Epic Squiggage ftw!

Is the colossal squig on an Arachnarok base?

I really like the FW squig boss. He looks great with your guys

SO MUCH AWESOME IN ONE PICTURE!!!

Speed is now of the essence. Luckily I managed to finish this pair in 3 days.

The last couple of weeks have been very hectic. I haven't had the time to update the blog with the War Machines, Pump Wagons and Fanatics I painted but rest assured they will appear here soon. First, however, I have to write down the report from the battle while it is still fresh in my memory.

The Battle For Karak Eight Peaks
We arrived at the venue just before 8 AM and started to set up the table. This took quite some time as the four tables at our disposal were not of the same height and we needed to make sure we ended up with a stable battlefield. This took the better part of an hour. Laying out the terrain was obviously faster and then it was time for the Belegar's defenders of the keep to set up.

Deployment

This is how the battle was laid out after (almost) all models had been deployed. The three grey board sections in the centre are the High Road -- units on it can triple their move when marching.

At the far end -- the south -- are the Dwarf defenders of my father, acting as King Belegar. To the left -- the east -- is Queek Headtaker's elite Skaven force. On the near edge -- the north -- is the relief force of High King Thorgrim Grudgebearer, who has yet to appear himself as Skarsnik's sneaky schemes delayed the High King himself along with his honour guard of Hammerers. To the right, finally, is Skarsnik's Crooked Moon Night Goblins. 700 strong, they outnumber all the other armies combined.

Objectives
For our big games, we always have a few general objectives and some secret ones for each player. The secret objectives are often something you don't want to tell your ally about.

The general objectives were:

[*]Control each of the three towers at the end of the game (1 VP per tower).
[*]Attackers: Get units into the 'courtyard' (the central board section in the Dwarf deployment zone to the south) (3 VP)
[*]Defenders: Get Dwarf infantry from the relief force in contact with Dwarf infantry from the keep. (3 VP)
[*]Kill the opposing generals. (1 VP per general)

I (Skarsnik) also received four secret objectives:

[*]Kill Belegar (1 VP, or 3 VP if Gobbla kills him)
[*]Accidentally wipe out a whole Skaven unit (2 VP)
[*]Queek must die (1 VP)
[*]If there are only Goblin units on the High Road at the end of the game.

I knew my chances of killing Belegar at all were small; he was on the wrong side of their deployment zone. Killing him with Gobbla would be sweet, but Belegar is far too tangerous to Skarsnik to try it. I did have 19 Fanatics and two monsters who might charge friendly units in the right circumstances, so I hoped that an opportunity to arrange a tragic accident for my allies would occur. There wasn't much I could do about Queek, but he was bound to be fighting challenges with runed-up Dwarfs so maybe the Dwarfs could arrange that for me. The High Road was pretty huge so that objective would be hard as well, but maybe if the other armies were all but wiped out, and focusing on the Keep, I would have a chance.

Turn 1: Alliance
The Alliance won first turn. We were using the rules for a Fragile Alliance, but on the first turn we passed; Skaven and Goblin apparently still trusted one another. I took 1 Stupidity and 12 Animosity tests without any major mishaps. Then we took one look at the number of Dwarf war machines preparing to fire and moved forward boldly.

Rocky, the Great Idol of Gork, leads the attack on the Dwarf relief force with Snotmug’s Gigamob and several other mobs, pumpwagons and Mother, the Troll Hag, close behind him.


The Skaven army lacked the numbers to send so many against the relief force, and only diverted some Clanrats, a pair of Doomwheels and a Hell Pit Abomination to delay those Dwarfs while the main part of their army went straight for the defending Dwarfs.
The first Magic Phase showed that magic would be a problem for the Dwarfs later on. While the Night Goblins had only Duffskull (level 3 Great Shaman) and a few level 1 Shamans, the Skaven had Thanquol, a Verminlord Warbringer and a Grey Seer on a Screaming Bell; three formidable level 4 Wizards. Sure enough, the Dwarfs expended a Rune of Spellbreaking already on the first turn, and then the Vermin Lord cast Howling Warpgale with Irresistable Force, grounding all Gyrocopters and imposing a -1 to hit penalty on all shooting. The Miscast inflicted a S6 hits on all our casters, which amounted to 8 wounds total when the dust had settled.

The most effective shooting came from my Doom Diver battery, which decimated the Ironbreaker unit at the head of the relief force. The Rock Lobba battery fared less well in their assigned task of counter-battery fire, failing to hit any of the Dwarf War machines.


There was a single combat in the first turn as the Watchtower was occupied by a group of Slayers, and I was eager to get them out of there before they triggered too many Fanatics – one unit had already wasted theirs because of those Slayers. Luckily the Slayers were few in number, so a Squig Herd charge was perfect to deal with them. Sure enough, the Squigs killed them all and swarmed into the tower, also relieving the Dwarfs of an objective.

Turn 1: Dwarfs

To reduce the Dwarf firepower, Queek ordered the Storm Banner activated. There was nothing the Dwarfs could do about it, but Belegar must have panicked as he started moving units out of and into the towers, leading his Hammerers into the eastern one closest to the Skaven. To make room for him, the Longbeards previously occupying it had to exit on the wrong side of the wall, dangerously close to the Verminlord. On the far end of the table, Thorgrim lead his gold-armoured bodyguard of 50 Hammerers onto the High Road, the Old Guard of Karaz-a-Karak to their right to reinforce that flank against the Night Goblins. On Thorgrim’s left flank, his Rangers completed a 13” charge against a Doomwheel, breaking it but failing to catch it.

In the magic phase, the Runelord of Thorgrim’s army struck each of his runes with 6 dice, and managed to cast Wrath and Ruin on a Mangler Squig. It perished in a flash of light so bright that the Great Idol of Gork (or possibly Mork) panicked, fleeing back through the ranks of Night Goblins and into the centre of the army. Fortunately, the mobs he ran through were those of Warboss Snotmug and the fearsome Big Boss Destigobbo, so they held.


Due to the tightly packed Night Goblins, Rocky ended up over 20” from his previous position, right in the middle of Skarsnik’s army. Quite dangerous for a monster that might charge friendly units if there are no enemies at hand.