Chaos Dwarf Sorcerer Lord on Mighty Lammasu!

Wow, now here's a blast from the past... a Games Workshop Chaos Dwarf Sorcerer mounted on a mighty Lammasu! My first big "army" project - nearly 25 years ago - was a Chaos Dwarf army for Warhammer Fantasy Battle.  

Affectionately known to the Conscripts as the "Big Hats", the Chaos Dwarfs were kin to the Dwarfs of the Old World, albeit twisted and mutated by the Chaos Gods. Having migrated thousands of years ago from the southern lands to the Mountains of Mourn, their empire spans a vast plain known as Zorn Uzkul, or the Great Skull Land. The Chaos Dwarfs have turned the skull plain into an industrial hellscape, crowded with vast factories, open pit mines, and mammoth red-hot forges echoing with the cacophony of pounding hammers and the screams of tortured slaves. 

The change wrought by Chaos upon the Dwarfs opened them to the influence of magic, and the leaders of the Chaos Dwarfs are great and powerful sorcerers. The race worships the Chaos bull-god Hashut, Father of Darkness, and consider their magical affinities to be their dark gift from Hashut.

However, the influence of magic on Dwarf physiology invokes a dark curse. As Chaos Dwarf sorcerers grow older and more powerful, their bodies gradually become more stone-like and immobile - gradually turning the sorcerer into a living stone statue. The main avenue of their capital city, the obsidian ziggurat of Zharr-Naggrund, is flanked by ranks of stone statues - all that remains of great and powerful Chaos Dwarf sorcerers.

Sorcerers sometimes ride into battle astride a mighty Lammasu, believed to be a mutation of a Great Taurus, itself a massive winged fire-breathing red bull. The Lammasu is possessed of a keen intelligence and breathes not air, but the Winds of Magic itself! 

Mutated Chaos Dwarf? You can see the resemblance...

Sorcerer getting ready to do his thing.

So this model has a long history of sitting primed in a drawer! I think I got my Chaos Dwarf army in a huge mail trade back in 1997 or so (I traded a load of Mutant Chronicles models for it and got more Chaos Dwarf models than I'd ever need). The Sorcerer Lord on Mighty Lammasu came in its box and while I assembled and primed it, it had never been painted... until now. Hopefully it won't take 20 more years to get it onto the table, but the way things are going, you never know.

From the Challenge: Great Unclean One, Greater Daemon of Nurgle

I painted this model for the "Lair of the Great Beast" room in the Chamber of Challenges... and if this doesn't qualify as a "great beast" I'm not sure what would... it's Forge World's absolutely magnificent Great Unclean One, Greater Daemon of Nurgle. It's a massive resin casting that I picked up at a swap meet/bring and buy thing locally, likely about five years ago.

The detail on the model is great, and by great I mean disgusting...

Unfortunately someone's gotten to the GUO's backbone, or maybe he's just cracked apart back there...

So many open sores... no way this dude is getting in a hotel swimming pool.

The right hand and sword with tongue wrap were a separate resin casting. It assembled very slickly.

Had to apply some gloss varnish to his guts.

It's a pretty large model, sure to be the centrepiece of my Nurgle Chaos Space Marines force, if we ever get to have a game again...!

He was remarkably straightforward to paint, the base colour is my special "Nurgle mix" of Castellan Green overbrushed with Death World Forest and a skosh of Steel Legion Drab for that sickly brownish cast. Horns are Rakarth Flesh highlighted up to Pallid Wych Flesh, and the stringy bits are similarly done with PWF.

Stay safe everyone!

Ye Olde Trip to Nottingham

No painting to show off in this post (well, no painting of my own anyway) but I wanted to put up a few pictures taken on our recent trip to the UK. Needless to say, it was awesome, and started off with a few days in Nottingham, the spiritual and temporal home of British wargaming.

I do have a very loving and indulgent wife but wanting to keep it this way, I planned only two serious wargaming stops here - the first of course being Warhammer World. We'd visited here before, on our first trip to the UK in 2009, but that was before the big makeover and expansion of the WHW museum. Fortunately Pam told me she was happy to sit in Bugman's Bar with her book and coffee while I explored the expansive new museum space.

 Outside of course is the M113 made up to look like an Ultramarines Rhino... cool...

 We arrived bright and early, just before the 10am opening time. Not excited or anything...

 In we go!!

On the way up to the museum space, the infamous Golden Daemon Slayer Sword!

And right away, you get a dose of Warhammer history. I love the nostalgia factor of this stuff, takes me right back to my own beginnings in the hobby as well.

The dioramas are just great too. If memory serves this one's by John Blanche his own self.

Dave Andrews contributed this excellent piece depicting a Bretonnian tournament scene. Please excuse the reflection - you'll be seeing a few of those.
 

Another diorama just full of old-school detail.

Had to take a couple pics of Mike McVey's iconic depiction of the death of Sanguinius and the final confrontation between the Emperor and Horus. EPIC!!

What I wouldn't give for a cast of the figures in this piece, or even a conversion recipe. Although the current Forge World Primarch models are no doubt amazing, I love these ur-depictions of the characters we've known for 30 years as part of the Heresy mythos.

We'll come back to some old stuff soon, but the newer dioramas were most impressive as well. Here's one featuring World Eaters mustering for campaign.

Models in this one were straight-up Forge World pieces.

Mixing it up... a scratch-built Thunderbolt fighter by Dave Andrews, Golden Daemon winner.

Yes, the Squats still exist at Warhammer World. Good to see GW embracing this controversial part of its past :-)

Another giant dio featuring over 300 specially-cast Cadians on parade. Pretty impressive.

"My ships may lay at anchor, but my foes know full well that BIG GUNS NEVER TIRE" (or something)

The burning of Prospero - Space Wolves vs. Thousand Sons - with terrain completely bespoke for the diorama.

How about that - even Space Wolves can look cool ;-)

The centrepiece of the museum had to be the "Battle for Angelus Prime."

Over 5,500 models, parts from 1,200 scenery kits, 23 feet long, 12 feet wide and over 20 feet high... wow.

Back to reality for a sec... some of the original 40K models in this case. The museum space was chock-a-block with painted armies from Warhammer Fantasy Battle (R.I.P.), Warhammer 40,000, and Age of Sigmar - too much to photograph, but I got one more pic:

BIG HATS! My first WHFB army - Chaos Dwarfs. Still have 'em, and these guys are fantastic.

McVey contributed another classic diorama.

Forge World's big boys were well-represented too.

Love the weapons on their platforms! Honestly, there was so much cool stuff to see in the museum, I could have (and did) stay for hours... I think I nearly ran the camera out of memory I took so many photos.

Back out in the gaming hall a school tournament was in progress. Good to see the future of the hobby here. Of course there's also lots of opportunity at WHW to partake in some retail therapy... plus, models are eligible for VAT refund if you have the retailer fill out the correct forms for you, and remember to claim it back before you leave the UK. I did the first thing, but not the second... boo. In any event, I have a nice Adeptus Titanicus battlegroup and some great modelling books to remember my visit by.

I'd mentioned above that we made two wargaming stops in the area. The second was just outside the village of East Stoke...  

A bit off the beaten track but WELL worth the visit, Wargames Foundry HQ sits in a cute little farm complex.

Inside, a lovely gaming table and even more lovely racks upon racks of wargames models. Kid, meet candy shop...

One cool thing was the display cabinets all about the place, each rammed full of beautifully painted Foundry and Citadel models. I had to get some close-up shots...

 Genestealer Magos and friends.

Some of the original Chaos Warriors.

Titans from the original Adeptus Titanicus.

New obsession: the second Barons' War. I picked up the new Osprey on Lewes and Evesham 1264-65 while in the UK and a visit to Lewes Castle and the ruined Priory did not help matters...

Gotta have a close-up of those knights. Sweet! Of course the credit card was exercised here a bit as well, another great thing about Foundry HQ is that standard packs are only 10 pounds instead of 12 by mail order. Can't afford NOT to indulge!

Oh, and we did some other stuff in the area as well, including having a drink in (what's claimed to be) the oldest public house in Britain, "Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem", 1189. Pretty awesome. Can't wait to go back!