10.15.2009

Hirts Arts Moulds and Mordheim Buildings part 2

The inn layout had originally only one floor and the roof floor. For the Mordheim building I added an extra floor to give it some height. Actually now it became 3 stories high.
I bought some water based paint and diluted the black down with water so it coveres the tiles nicely in all ridges cracks. This took some time and in two sessions I painted the entire piece nice and black.

If you look closely you can still see seems of white of the stones where the paint didn't cover but only so little. I hope this will be covered or out of sight when the stones are highlighted.
Which brings me to the next stage. The first highlight was applied with a dark grey. I'm using large brushes now (size 14 and up and also a large flat broad one). This was done realy quickly actually and a great result directly. I also wanted to apply a second highlight with a light grey to give the stones some depth and wear and tear look.
This was even quicker since only the windows and door and edges were concerned here. I added some more light grey to the flooring as well since that looked better.



The only things to do now is paint the beams dark brown and add flooring. The beams were a bit of a mistake to add directly in this building because painting became very difficult there. On the other hand it gives the building a nice and sound rigidity directly. WIth so high walls this was good to have already. I think for smaller buildings with less beams it wouldn't matter, but it is gooed to keep in mind.
The flooring I will build and fit but not yet glue in place. There painting will also be very difficult. Maybe the flooring will stay loose as an addon, so you can change here with the layout of a building, who knows. Add a couple of ladders and all. It will be good!
New small build projects now have started: small planters, a well, small wall sections, all moveable stuff to putt on the table and to fill our city of Mordheim.

10.10.2009

The Great Library

Last night it was carnage and mayhem in the City of Mordheim. The north east quarter of Mordheim housed once the Great Library. Under count Ignatius Steinhardt it grew to considerable size, containing knowledge unrivalled in Marienburg. Since the comet plummeted into the library, all the mystical and religious tomes, Deamonic and Necromantic lore was scattered through the ruins.
Yesterday night was a night to search through the ruins to look out for gold and long forgotten lore. A Slayer warband calling themselves TreasureDoom got word of activity in the area of the ruined Great Library. It was becoming a night to seek doom and gold (not particularly in that order!).
TreasureDoom consists of a Giant Slayer that once started seeking its doom in Mordheim. Two trollslayers already in Mordheim seeking larger creatures still (and the prospect of finding some glitter, gems and old golden artifacts) cought up with him. They hoped to attrackt greater greatures that will help settle their slayer oath. Eventually a large trollslayer with a huge doublehanded axe entered Mordheim seeking a mighty death and looking out for some lost rune weapons that supposably are buried under the ruins of Mordheim. He joined the venturing slayers and TreasureDoom was born. Since some gold to be gathered is always nice and finding your doom in the process can be seen as an added bonus.
TreasureDoom ventured Mordheim for some time and a dwarf clansman and his apprentice were the slayers in Mordheim. The dwarf was an old engineer seeking the old plans of ancient dwarf inventions stored in Mordheim before the comet fell. The two clansmen joined the slayers to complete TreasureDoom for now.

The warband ventured out to the ruins of the great library on this busy night. In the gloom the area sparked with loose magic of old tomes and shrapnel of weirdstone that mutated some old spells on scrolls. Other sounds could be heard in these ruins and the keen hearing of dwarfs quickly made out that also a band of orks, an incoherent bunch of undead, pirates that just boarded Mordheim, an other group of dwarfs (treasurehunters most likely) and some pesky fidly elves were also present.
After the first sounds of battle where some pirates started brawling the sky grew even more dim and a thick fog descended over Mordheim. Only inches of sight were there, with some clear spots when some wind parted the thick alien fog for a brief moment. This didn't bode well and it was going to be a long night.

After the racket of the pirates subsided the slayers made a carefull slow move into the ruins. Ueha Fiendcrusher started for the first floor of a nearby ruined building. With his rope and hook he directly succeeded in pulling himself up to the shoddy flooring. In a corner a could make out some old scrolls that might be worth checking out. His fellow slayers slowly advanced through the rubble deeper into the area of the old library buildings.
To their left sounds of bones and dragging zombies could be heard. According to the sense of the dwarfs also a vampire was present. they should be carefull with a bloodsucker around. The other dwarfs were also carefully venturing into the ruins and it looked to the slayers they were seeking out the undead warband. Might be a good idea for now to close in from the other side.
With the thick fog in place now al of a sudden a swarm of flies joined the already soupy air. This was not good at all, with elves also chittering through the rubble it was a very bad night indeed for the dwarfs. The orcs were causing the usually disturbance since they were even squabling amongs themselves and one of the pirates jumped into an old well apparantly. He found not only an ancient scroll but also a worthy opponent. The echoes of batllesounds resounded from the well adding to the dissorientation in the fog and flies ridden air.
In front of Alri Doomfate some shadows were seen in the mist. He charged directly for his axes were thirsty. The two young pirates got a fright but recovered quickly and with cunning, low pirate tricks and sheer luck they managed to evade the axes and get some thrusts with their cutlasses and daggers in. Maybe this bold charge wasn't that smart of the giant slayer, maybe his axe was too thirsty to pay attentioned to defense. His mighty dwarf axes didn't succeed in parrying the attacks and the slayer went to the ground directly. Threachereous Mordheim claims its victims directly and anonymous in the thick fog.
Ueha is in the building searching the scrolls and since it was not the place to thoroughly go through them he tucked them in his beard for later investigation.
The air was full of sounds of batlle. The vampire had difficulty keeping himself alive and went down after finding a scroll and triggering some stray magic. The undead managed even to make the foggy flie infested air worse by picking up a scroll that started a chaotic storm with acid rain to occurr.

One of the slayers was recovering from wounds of some foul liquid he got over him earlier when searching through some old barrels (maybe containing some beer). This acid rain was not doing him well, if not it was very bad as he went down as well. Already a quarter of the warband down so soon, the slayers gritted their teeth and were now more determined then ever to avange their comrades and seek their own doom.
All around the slayers other warbands were struggling to pick up scrolls that trigger all kinds of random events. Also some warbands ran into each other. This was more cause for mayhem and carnage then the scrolls themselves. You could see warband members with a scroll hastily making their retreat of the battlefield. The slayers however heard the elves in the distance and more nearby smelled the hatefull orcs. Time to charge those greenskinned savages. The orcs were way too organised until this point. Maybe the warpstone was effecting them in a positive way for once?
As the warbands thinned down, some fled the battlefield altogether. In the end it was far beyond midnight and the only remaining in these warpstone-gone-mad ruins were the slayers and the other dwarf warband (of course) and the greenskins. After some chopping with axes even the greenskins sort of routed although with the greatest loot of scrolls.
The slayers started looking for some loot and sold the scrolls directly. In the end they left with some hefty loot in gold, just as they like it. Some casualties that must rest out the next battle but nothing gold can't compensate.

10.05.2009

The two towers



Sometime ago I got the Warhammer watchtower as a present for my birthday (thanx to Emely and Arjen!). After the successful (re)construction of my Mordheim ruins, I wanted to use this tower as well. However, the tower in its 'normal' form is not very useful in a game of Mordheim. So I decided to open up the tower to make 'playing inside' possible.

The first option I considered was leaving one wall off or making it detachable. On inspecting the tower I found out that it's a lovely model, with lots of details and extra parts, that makes a great site/sight on the battlefield. Alas, no interior details or floors.

So I went out for some Balsa wood at the local 'Hobby Modelbouw' shop. For one reason or the other I never worked before with this material, but all construction work went perfectly smoothly.

And the best idea popped up during the construction: Instead of one tower, I made two tower, each consisting of two walls of the original one. Not only did I get a 'free' extra tower, but they're more 'playable' as well.

Friday they will hopefulle make their debut in Mordheim. I hope I'll find the time to place them on a base. Painting won't be ready, there's a lot of detail on these..

10.02.2009

Hirts Arts Moulds and Mordheim Buildings part 1

It's been a month vacation that caused nothing much for me to have produced in the modelling/gaming part and therefore no need for blog posts :) But I have ordered three moulds at Hirst Arts. I ordered the following ones:
#51 Dragon's Inn Mold
#201 Floor Tiles Various Sizes
#40 Basic Block Mold

My idea was to have enough bricks for builidings as well as arches for windows and doors. Floor tiles for flooring of course but also for building streets.

I started casting the moulds with modeling plaster. I found 2 brands: Knauf and Krone.

Knauf is found at the DIY store and Krone I found in a local arts and crafts shop. The Krone is almost half as cheap but they both are not that expensive: Knauf sells at EURO 6,00 per 2,5 kilo and the Krone at EURO 2,00 per 1 kilo or EURO 6,00 per 5 kilo.
I already casted the moulds about 8 times and it seems that is enough for making a tavern or something. Now some lasts casts are done, so I have enough stock to start building.
Of course the buildings will consist of more than plaster blocks alone. I went to the DIY store and got some lengths of 10x10 mm square and 5x20 mm flat pieces of wood. Almost 3 meters in length this should give enough beams and planks for roofs and doors and floors.
Also I got a piece of 4mm MDF that should act as a base for the building. Everything should be modular so I'm going to design 2 or 3 sizes of bases. These can have either a building or a piece of street, square or other scenery for the city of Mordheim that can be built with it. The first building will be the dragons Inn tavern from the Hirst Arts website. I'm going to alter it a bit so it's open to one side and it can be used in Mordheim for fighting in and around. SInce Mordheim is a thrashed and worn down city the buildings should resemble this. The roof will be crashed in, that kind of stuff.
When going out for buying the raw materials I also came acros my local games workshop store. It had a nice boxed set of trees.

I was looking for something like that, because the Mordheim buildings should have some grown over moss, plants and trees in them as well. This box with three large gnarly trees will be just right for the purpose. Also some chains, skulls and signs are in the kit that will fit perfactly in the Mordheim scenery I'm making.

For now some more casting and the building will start! Time for me to take out the saw and cut me some beams and create the MDF base plates.

More will follow in next posts, so keep reading!

8.27.2009

New Warband: Dwarf Slayers

New Warbands are always difficult. What to choose and when chosen a subject what will be the contents of the warband. I started playing a night goblin warband in Mordheim and I almost finished the last models for this warband. With these done I have a big set of gobbo's to create a warband and change a warband with. Final items are some bases for now.
So a new warband since we all had ideas of starting a new warband. First up for me were the dwarfs. Cool sturdy warband and something completely different then the unpredictive gobbo's. Exploring the possibilities of the dwarfs I found that the warband could contain a slayer. In a far away past I played a trollslayer in Warhammer Quest. So the slayer theme was born. Doing some investigation further I came across some sites of players that already made some experimental rules for a slayer warband. Eventueally the following rules for Slayers in Mordheim seem to fit the best.
So how will the slayer warband look like:

Giant Slayer with 2 dwarf axes
Troll Slayer 1 with 2 dwarf axes
Troll slayer 2 with a 2-handed Gromril axe
Troll slayer 3 with 1 dwarf axe
Clansman 1 with mace and shield
Clansman 2 with 2 pistols

I'm still figuring out how to equip the clansmen for this warband. I've been looking at adding only some slayers to this warband but for the story of the warband it seems better to have some followers in the form of some clansmen. In the future slayers can be added and maybe also a rememberer. Or maybe equipe the clansmen with some armour is also a nice option. Still not sure there. The SLayers also should have some tattoos and/or scars of course. With this list of dwarfs there is little gold left for that. Maybe down-equiping them and adding the tattoos might prove interesting slayers. Even thought of "scrificing" a Troll slayer for more tattoos/equipment.

The miniatures have been bought for this band: Garagrim Ironfist will be the Giant Slayer for the band and I bought the set of boxed troll slayers. Some longbeards will be the clansman and maybe a special character like the Dwarf Master Engineer with Brace of Pistols might be a nice clansman.

The bases for the dwarfs is a bit of dillema. For the gobbo's I followed the "rubble" base technique found on the web. I can't find the link again but it basically is putting some glue on the base, put stuff on it that you have lying around on your modelling area (cut of bits, sticks, etc.) put them in. Then I put them in some very fine sand and let them dry. A quick lick of black paint and highlight with graveyard earth and bleached bone for the good Mordheim city rouble street look and you're done.

For a painting schem I'm also still deliberating. We did some brainstorming on the color of the beards and crests of the slayers. I am doubting between black or the original orange. Maybe the orange will prevail and I have to come up with some cool scheme for the trousers. Still to get a more Mordheimy look and feel the dwarfs will get some more pouches and stuff (dead rats and frogs) and the odd eye patch. Some green stuff challanges there but good fun to create.

8.21.2009

Building projects in Mordheim

Inspired by the nice series of battle we played, I've started to (re)construct the Mordheim buildings I collected over the years. The first action was to give each of them a base. Hopefully this will mean they will become a little sturdier.



The results up till now can be found here. Next step will be to paint the bases and enhance them a little with details like gravestones & such ;-)
And last but not least: Find a suitable method to store and transport them...

8.03.2009

Paint Session Goblins (3)

It has been a while since the first stage of gobbo painting (Night gobbo painting that is). Of course I have been doing some painting in the mean time (I'm not that slow) but not always them gobbo's. The dwarf treasure hunter Morheim gang is taking shape and I found some gnoblar trappers that will do nice as cool base-additions to the existing gobbo's. Bases are still a poblem for me. I can't get the hang of finding a good theme and stick with it for the entire gang.

Anyway how are the gobbo's doing I posted earlier? My way of painting consists of doing one color at the time and if possible working it out entirely. Starting with the large surfices I work m way to the details. The large surfaces are also ideal for highlighting easy and these are the first things I did. With these night gobbo's I started with the green skin of the gobbo's and finishing it with severel highlights.
Next stage are the black clothing the night gobbo's hae. I reworked all black surfaces in a clean way. That means that I paint all items black with clean lines bordering other (future) color areas. In this way I don't have to keep reworking parts because other areas are "tainted" with the wrong color. I like clean lines here where possible. So black areas were done and I highlighted them towards a light bleue. First stage is a heavy regal blue highlight to give the night goblins the look of wearing midnight blue robes. Because wear and tear they are highlighted towards light blue and even light grey is used here.

Next up are the silver areas I started with boltgun metal painting the iron/silver parts. The iron parts will be worked upon with a black ink probably, leaving it a dark metally surface (like the pot of the night goblin shaman). The silver parts ( I like my night goblins to have lots of silvery jewelry) will be highlighted with chainmail metal (earrings, bracelets, etc.).
After this it is basically time for detailing the gobbo's This means picking out the bad moon symbols, mushrooms they are carrying, weapons, etc. I use bright colors for small items so they stand out. Also some skulls have to be done and they will be "bony" in look and feel. Starting with black dark browns, I then usually highlight them to bleached bone (in rare occasions even a final white highlight).