Grendel’s Warband for Conquest Last Argument of Kings #PathOfConquest

So boring Sunday ended with me finishing off my Shaman base.

I’m pleased with it, the stones also get to act like wound markers on the base, saving sticking a dice next to it.

Of course now i need to think of things to add to Grendels base as tokens….bum.

Obviously i could get loads done with lockdown looming….unfortunately i’m a teacher so that’s not a thing.

I will however get a better photo.

As an aside with lockdown looming, take care of yourselves.

So i decided i need a command base for my shaman. Because i haven’t got anything else to paint…..

To that end standing stones. Tescos car park provided the slate and then a basic drybrush, you all know how, to get it looking right.

Glued to spare bases so they can easily slot into a standard Conquest base.

Add some snow pva mix to make it look pretty like.

Next up was adding some runes and decoration. As much as i could have gone full nordic rune on it, but that’s the realms of historical wargaming (which i do, no snide comments here).

So i watched over the sea the other day. That’s where the face came from, a painting of one of the ‘gods’. Its painted sideways as the stone has fallen over.

The second one is a set of runes, with some of the symbols from the Blooded mini added along with some of the triangles that are on the Stalkers. It ended up looking a bit like a dragon. I imagine the Shaman drew it after seeing it in the void beyond the ice in the north.

I really like how stories come out of projects 🙂

Next images are a demo of what it will look like once i get a base to work on. Obviously i still have a slot to fill and i have to decide what that will be.

Again, this is only a proof of concept, rather than the final piece.

So i’ve run out of mini’s to paint, well i have a Morax and Hero someone 3d printed for me, but im out of Conquest figures and its pay day tommorrow….so this may be the last blog entry for a bit unless i start making the standing stones for the shaman’s command base.

So colours wise i used the same scheme as Grendel. This was to tie the two together, however i used a lot more white in the colours to give him a worn and old feel.

the skin tone was flat flesh and electric blue, pulled up with white and flat flesh to give the appearance of old cold flesh.

The beard was specifically done in flames, to give an odd appearance. i wanted to give a feel of unnatural. With the flesh and the beard i think that has worked out that way.

So as he is the leader of the raiders and Ulfhednar i think that the colour schemes for them will be greens and reds.

Right phase 1 done, i’m proud of that.

So to get the stalkers done i went with quick and dirty in the end.

The base coast were done in 50:50 flow improver and paint. Basically its contrast paint.

After that there were some basic highlights and tattoos added and the snazzy snow bases.

Lessons learned:

*less colours if you want to get them done at a decent speed. As they are Grendel’s buds, they have all the same colours as him. Going forwards i think, other than on characters, i’m going to limit the pallet and stick to two main colours. I’m yet to decide what the through colour will be, but it wont be blue as that will just disappear into the bases. For the Ulf and the raiders attached to the Shaman i think red will be the primary colour for them with green. Reasoning being that they will stand out as different, but maintain a cohesion with the rest of the army.

*less ambition if i want to keep up with the Path of Conquest. fundamentally this is miniatures inktober and i need to readjust my expectations for that. Spend time on units and characters that are special or need to stand out, rather than trying to kill myself with rank and file.

What next?

Next is:

1 Shaman
3 stands of raiders
3 Stands of Ulfhednar with leader, banner and savage.

So i’m looking forward to this. I think other than the tattoos im not going to put the shoulder pads on the Ulfhednar, i also have a lot of stalker heads to go on them.
I’m really looking forward to this one.

Also the Shaman is getting a scenic command base, i think he will have at least one standing stone and either an apprentice or a bodyguard. Rule of cool and all that jazz as it were.
Payday friday and i’ll put the order in then so that i can start work first weekend of November.

So i finished the command base. What did i do?

Added a 50:50 green ink and flow improver wash over all the white and blue to theme with the greens and blues on the mini.

Gloss varnish to the ice.

50:50 mix of army painter snow and pva glue applied more liberally than a Waitrose Christmas advert.

One finished command base, ta da!

Obviously i will be adding this to all my other bases going forward.

A small update. The stand for Grendel is coming along. I need some gloss varnish and some snow, but you can see vaugley how it will turn out in the picture.

So been a bit silent for a while. This is mainly because its the end of term and as a teacher i have a lot of paper work, also my Rabbits has been sick, and then my exhaust fell off…..and then the car blew up after it was fixed…….So as you can imagine i have been a little behind and anytime i have come to get some painting done i have mainly not.

So where am I? Well i’m getting Grendels base done. I need to blend the texture in and then colour match the colours.

Which reminds me, my other half is sat next to me scraping mould lines off her super dungeon explore minis and she immediately asked why there are no snow clumps of gloss varnish involved in this project. She is of course right, i need to put gloss varnish down on the ice and then stick snow clumps on…..apparently we are going paint shopping on Monday \o/ so that’s sorted.

Next up i finally got the whole of the stalkers washed and basecoated. I’m still not leaving them like that, cause pride and stuff. However they do look natty with the basecoat and you could get away with that for ‘battle ready’.

I’m going to go at them the same way i did the other figures. non metallic metal, high contrasts and an old hammer vibe paint scheme. What i will have to do is sort out some short cuts so i don’t end up screaming into the void and finishing them somewhere around 2367. At the moment i think the short cut will be when highlighting it will be 3 tonal shifts from the initial colour and brutally ignoring stuff that wont be seen or is very obviously in shade…..i mean i wont, i’ll do the whole thing like a masochist, but at least the intent is there!

And the last thing was I picked up a Shaman which is the start of my second wave of units to cheer myself up. The sculpt is gorgeous, and like the rest of their resin, almost no clean up to do. I’m really pleased with him. Although i have had a sudden thought about Para-Bellum and a lack of female miniatures that i will share when i get to my next stage.

So couple of photos. First of all the first lick of paint on the tree for Grendel’s base. looks okay, once its on the base i can blend the snow in to the miniatures base and add texture.

The second one is a Stalker with ink wash over the acrylic base coats. I could leave it, its table top fine. But obviously i wont because i want a fancy looking army.