Mordheim

I’ve finally gotten around to painting my first two models since I grew up

Orc Warband Storyline:
I haven’t settled on a complete storyline for my Orc Warband yet, but these Orcs’ homeland has a odd, orange stone that when smashed into powder and rubbed on skin with water creates a great Orange Dye. This is why they have Orange warpaint all of themselves, kind of like Scottish Orcs with orange (instead of blue) woad… *stolen from Tom* I have yet to do the face painting, but I have decided that two orange stripes is this warbands signature.

I also wouldn’t normally take such up-close pictures, as it shows too many flaws ;}, but I’m still on a learning curve. =] Here’s a picture that isn’t too close:

And without further ado, Here’s the close-ups: Read the Rest of the Post >

When I based my two orcs, I used PVA glue to glue down the sand, wood, etc. What’s wrong with that?

Read the Rest of the Post >

Here is the progress on my first models I have painted in a long time. The pictures describe it best, so I’m not going to type much for this post:

First pictures is a very dark beginning coat of Green and Brown. At this stage, if you took these models out of the bright light, they would still look pitch black.

Then repetitive drybrushing of lighter and lighter colors. The teeth are extremely hard, which may be the result of cheap paint + cheap brushes:

Things left to do:

• Paint the Base (I probably should have done this before anything else.)
• Paint the metal (Sword, Bow tips, studs in the studded leather, etc.)
• Orange War painting
• Mouth and teeth
• Muscle Highlighting

I’m sure there’s more,
-Ashton Sanders

Since I acquired my latest piece of packing foam, I have been trying to figure out the most believable way to create this large section of elevation. I have decided to make all of the edges of the foam look like it was created with a wall of stone, like a retaining wall. Then the rest of the elevated section of ground can be dirt ground like a normal Mordheim board.

I grabbed a spare piece of packing foam as a test piece and through some ideas together. Let me know what you think:

First, I started with my piece of packing Styrofoam about 3.5″ tall:

Second, I spackled the left half of the foam (for testing purposes) and cut out 20 different-sized stones from a sheet of business-card-thickness card stock. I glued them to the wall:

Third, I painted everything black, and highlighted the rocks (goblin fanatic for scale):
(You can see in this picture how much better the side with the spackle (left side) turned out. I definitely recommend spackling/texturing Styrofoam before using.)

Finally, I took a thick-bristle brush with very little paint on it, and added some speckling and texture to the rocks. Since I was so sloppy painting the stones, I had to take paint over the black again with a thin paint brush:

“Voila!” (Or in the words of Ness: “Tadi-UMP!”) Instant Rock Wall.

I’m pretty happy with how it came out. I’ll update this if I come up with any other good ideas.
-Ashton Sanders

How to keep dice from getting stuck in a funnel

While creating my Mordheim Dice Tower, I ran into a small problem. Since I wanted my dice tower to look like a normal Mordheim Building, and not look like a dice tower, I had to make my Dice Tower’s exit hole the size of a normal 28mm door. This presented a problem, because only one dice at a time would be able to exit the dice tower at once.

You can see in the next picture the final ramp/funnel, and how thin it gets before dice “exit the building.”

After hours of testing and fiddling with my ramps, I came up with a very simple solution to keep dice from getting stuck in my dice tower. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get any good pictures of what I created, so I will demonstrate below. Read the Rest of the Post >

I got in a new computer the other day from Dell, and it came surrounded by two large sections of packing foam. Each section is 21″x18″x3.5″ and almost completely flat on 5 sides. These will act as a perfect raised part of Mordheim, and when placed on the (48″x48″) battlefield, they will take up less than 1/4th of the playing area.

(A couple Orcs and Goblins and my Collapsed Mordheim Tower for Scale)

These are perfect because they don’t take up too much of the playing field, but can add some great elevation to a Mordheim board. My plan is to cut four sets of stairs into each section of foam so any warband will be able to access the “high road”, and make the edges look like they were built with bricks and large stones. I will be texturing the top section, and then leaving it empty so each new battle can have different Mordheim buildings/terrain on it.

Hopefully more on this project soon,
-Ashton Sanders

The Terragenasis competition ended last night, and I just barely took home 2nd place.

1st place went to DragonFlies7033, who created a huge castle that doubled as a DM screen so he, as a Dungeon Master, can keep all his “tricks” hidden from the players. It came out amazingly.

I got 2nd Place, beating out 3rd place by 1 vote.

3rd place went to GeoLinna’s Clock/Dice Tower, which came out amazing.

On another note, I posted some pictures of my dice tower on Board Game Geek, and as of right now, I have three images on the home page! I don’t even believe it.

Thanks to everyone who voted for my dice tower in the competition and to those who thumbed my Dice Tower images on BGG.
-Ashton Sanders

I’ve done a lot of research on the Internet on basing, paint, modeling, etc. Here are some links to some great resources on these subjects:

• Tom’s Boring Mordheim Blog has lots of great tips and tricks for painting, as he is an amazing painter and artist.
• Games Workshop tutorial on Painting Models.
• Brushthralls’ Old Basing tutorial. (They have a new modeling tutorials here.)
• (I also got lots of ideas from Tom’s Boring Mordheim Forum and Witchhunter.net.)

My new Mordheim Warbands have officially been started.

Currently, Skaven is my favorite warband, so I decided to start the learning curve with some Orc Models I got from a Warhammer Box Set I got off of ebay. I have too many of each of these models, so if I end up destroying them, I’ll survive. This way I can perfect my basing/painting styles before starting into my Skaven warband.

With that said, I based these models with a layer of PVA glue and a layer of sand. I added a rock or a wooden plank to each base before putting the layer of sand (so they look like they are stuck in the sand.

I removed the two models from their frames and used a razor blade to smooth out the seams. I glued on their heads and glued them to their bases with a helping of rubber cement (for plastic models).

Then, after a base coat of black paint:

Now I need to come up with a good color scheme. I think I’m going to use Orange as a warpaint color.

-More to come,
–Ashton Sanders

To continue showing off where I started with my (badly painted) models (when I was 14 years old), here is my Orcs and Goblins Warband. Most of these models got a green base coat, and then black, brown and silver paint was applied where necessary. I took some extra time with the Troll, who would be looking really good right now if he wasn’t missing his head. I’ll need to get some green stuff and make a new one.

(NOTE: The sole purpose of this and the previous post is for posterity’s sake, and proof that everyone starts at the bottom and gets better with practice (or so I hope ;)).)

Without further ado, here is my Orc and Goblin warband (before):

Read the Rest of the Post >

When Mordheim first came out, I (literally) threw together a Skaven warband as quickly as possible so I could play. At the age of 14, I probably spent 4 hours painting the whole warband, so to say the least, I’m not extremely proud of them. Since I’ve completed my second large Mordheim building, I’ve decided to turn my attention to my warbands and modeling. I found a couple great tutorials about basing models that I have read thoroughly, and will definitely use when I get started making my new warband.

(NOTE: The sole purpose of this post is for posterity’s sake, and proof that everyone starts at the bottom and gets better with practice (or so I hope ;)).)

UPDATE: I have gotten around to painting a new Skaven Model.

Without further ado, here is my old Skaven warband:

Read the Rest of the Post >