Tiny Vermintide

I’ve painted up all the models I have, so a good time to pause and take stock. This isn’t a viable army for Warmaster, but I can quickly add in more units and Heroes. It is certainly a solid core, and has been a fun side project.

Things that went well – reigning back the level of detail painted. I wanted to deliberately focus on the bigger impact of lots 10mm models rather than getting bogged down with precise painting.

I’m quite happy with the colour scheme. It is a nightmare to photograph well, compounded by the smaller scale models, and that’s something I need to consider how to best approach I the future.

The basing is disappointing,  particularly on the rat swarms. I had an idea of a sentry looking out and scrubbing his eyes as the ground before them seemed to heave and churn, baffling him until the realisation that it was a swarm of rodents chittering in a great mass rushing forward. Reads great, but not a sensible idea for something this visual. I really fell foul of forgetting to consider the scale of the models vs the base material, so a good lesson learnt.

Sets of jezzails, ratling guns and warpfire throwers to accompany the engineer.

I decided that alternating painting clanrat units with something else was a sensible way to try and avoid too much of the same thing grinding down motivation.

Lots of detail on these rat ogres that I haven’t really done justice, but still happy with the overall look.

First hero finished, very clearly meant to be Lord Skrolk (even if he is holding everything in different hands).

A second lot of clanrats have also been painted.

These were quite fun and fast to paint. I concentrated mostly on painting the upper parts of the rats, leaving the bottom just in the grey primer. I liked the impression it gave of a mass of ratty bodies swarming along, with lots of self-shadowing.

First place to start was getting a block of clanrats painted up. There’s going to be a few of these, so no better place to start to make sure I’m not going to regret this project!

Basing required a bit of deliberation. Warmaster uses 20x40mm bases, whilst Fantastic Battles recommends 40x40mm. In the end I figured I can just double up two 20x40mm bases to have 40x40mm stands. The models also came with nice 20x40mm printed bases with an inset for the strips of models, which swayed me to adopt Warmaster basing conventions.

Last year seemed to be full of great looking 10mm Old World inspired ranges getting rolled out by various digital sculptors. Since I don’t have a 3D printer (and have no intention of getting one and picking up another hobby), I resigned myself to having to give this resurgence of 10mm fantasy a skip.

However, at the end of last year, I stumbled across various independent companies that do 3D printering on Etsy, which nudged the door back open.

Skaven were my first Warhammer army, so it was an easy choice to pick an army, and Ankylo Miniatures do a really characterful range. MGSMiniatures are a licensed merchant, so I took a punt and ordered in a starter army.

Soon a little pile of clanrats and rat swarms arrived, and I was impressed with the quality of the prints. A follow up order soon swelled my ratty horde, and I had a new project to start for the summer.