Bastards in Bascinets

 

Here's a little palette cleanser ! I'm going to a gaming con next week end and some folks have mentionned the opportunity to play Batards in Bascinets so I had to check on it !

You can find the rules HERE and to sum things up, it's a quick little game where knights fight one another in the most dishonourable ways, think Monty Pythons' Holy Grail and that sort of stuff.

Le Chevalier Ermite de Malmont

Hey all ! So today I'm bringing you one special model !

The chevalier Ermite de Malmont is one of those hobby grails (no pun, almost) for many, an iconic sculpt, not easy to source and therefore quite desirable. "Stop bragging JB, you got one, OK don't rub it into our face !"

Not quite.

The model has been sent to me by a nice friend for me to paint as payment for some models. I would argue that painting a beauty like that is a reward in itself but so was the deal. Of course, with the million projects in progress in my head and on my desk, it took me quite a while to get onto it but since I launched a paintig contest focused on the work of Gary Morley this month on the Oldhammer facebook page, I thought I'd use the opportunity to paint it !

A knightly Shelter

Alright people, now here's something a little different. A few years back, I claimed I wanted to use the imperial knight kit to make something fun out of it. Well as slow as I am, I can also be a stubborn one sometimes and the idea never really left my mind.
If you don't know what I'm talking about just take a look at that brilliant picture from White Dwarf #133 :

Cocorico pour la Bresse ! - The proud bretonnian Rooster knight

Ok, I finally took the time to give this model the attention it diserved.

You may remember how this project started on the old hammer forum from my will to make a regional knight to represent the diversity of the community. I started this oroject here and followed here.

I decided to make a bretonnian since I have a bretonnian army and that I love them. I decided to take my region mascot being the "bresse" white rooster.

I won't rephrase everything but you can see the little story behind my bretonnian army here, which explains a bit my choices for this project (you can also see that every detail counts in this project).

Hugues-Edouard de l'Ain, Baron de Bresse in all his glory

Here are some shots from different angles and with the optionnal arms available since the right shoulder has a rare earth magnet which enables me to change its gear as I will.

 I have to say though I began this project with very naive intentions, but now I can't look away from all the innuendos and possible jokes about such a concept. Knowing that some people might be looking for some huge cock on the net and get dragged here (Google stats proved this happened more than once...), I don't want to fool anyone so here are some "in situ" shots of Hugues-Edouard in his every day life so you can see our knight here is nothing else but virtue made flesh...

Hugues-Edouard, a true Gentleman :

Hugues-Edouard is always prone to helping ladies in thge most honorable way, he insists on escorting all the ladies of the court when they go in the woods.

"- Oh please mesdemoiselles, rest assured and don't be afraid, as true as I have a huge cock between my legs, I'll take good care of you and won't let you be harmed whatsoever !
-...
- Come on mesdemoiselles, what are you afraid of?"

Hugues-Edouard hunting :

Hugues-Edouard insists on training his men for the hunt.

"- See ! Look at how my cock is standing firm ! This is how you hunt and how you win battles, always stand proud. You understand ?

- ...

- Alain ! As my squire I would like to know why you're hidingyour face in the palm of your hand? Is there something you'd like to tell me?"

Hugues-Edouard against Evil :

Hugues-Edouard is always taking the side of the weak and he will always lend a hand when his people are in danger.

" Ahaha my poor Tristan, when you said "Monsters" I thought you meant REAL monsters like dragons or wyverns ! I see no monsters here, some corrupted and lost creatures at best. Come on, let's show them how great the lady of the lake is with some well-placed sword hits ! EN AVANT!

Hugues-Edouard fights eviler :

 "- Oh I'm afraid you're misinformed about my mother Mr Black ! And I don't see why on earth I would let you mess with my organs as you said.

- (some horrible curses in a mix of old worlder and dark tongue I can't write here)

- Well, if you want blood for your blood god, that's a thing but I don't see how on earth this sordid idea of yours about your axe and my anus is relevant. Prepare yourself to fight for your honor ! I challenge you !"

and so on and so on...

You see, I already like him a lot...

Oh and Happy new year to you all, guess what I did on my new year's eve? Yep, blue-tack kitbashing for my venators (heads to be changed)...

Cocoricooo Messire ! (plus some other silly things) - Bretonnia Part 4

OK, last time I told you about the "knight project" I started on the oldhammer forum (no longer Blood forum) and told you to have a look at Axiom's very good blog and involvment in that project. I feel being the initiator of that projects implies I should not get too late on the others, it's why I tried to make some progress on this.

If you remember previous posts, I decided to mount my Knight on a rooster for it is the symbol of my Region on France (Bresse). I found a perfectly fitting model here and found out the scale was exactly what I was looking for. These are made in some kind of hard rubber or soft plastic with paint on top. 

I tried to remove the paint with a 3 weeks Dettol bathbut couldn't remove any paint from it. I decided to dip a part of it in acetone to see the result and the paint immediately began to fall off. It just took a few dips in acetone to remove the paint with a toothbrush (I would not recommend a long bath of acetone since it seems the rubber/plastic melts slowly in it).

Next step was to remove the silly details at the feet (this is mainly grass and branches sculpted next to the legs to make them more sturdy since the rubber is not rigid enough) removing these made the model fall apart so I just pinned in the legs and added some wire and now it stands proudly on its 2 feet. I will have to sculpt back the legs properly with GS but no big deal here.

The giant rooster waiting for a rider

 As you can see, the sculpt is quite good fro a rubber touy and I hope the paintjob will make it look convincing.

Now, for the rider part, I chose the easy way over the oldschool way and ordered a plastic pegasus knight to ride the bird. As the legs come in 2 parts , this enabled me to glue them a little wider than normal to fit exactly to the chicken body. The upper part of the model has then just been glued slightly orientated to the left and I put a "Louen Leoncoeur" on top of it. I'm considering adding magnets to the right arm to be able to choose from magic sword, lance or even the arm holding an eagle.

Some decoration wil come after that in the form of a blanket and some treasures in his back. I will also add a saddle with leather straps to attach it to the chicken. Maybe some decoration in the feathers could do the thing but I will sort that out as it takes shape.

Oh and the total cost for the parts is 3.5£ for the rooster, 2.5£ for the knight parts and 0.5£ for the base which mlake it a very cheap project for once ;).

So here is the Rooster knight for the time being...

Another thing that got my attention recently was the stripping and basing of some old eldar pirates. A few Ebay purchases here and there, got me to get some of the models I didn't already have.

Amongst them is the eldar captain with a demon mask. This is one very interesting model. It's actually built from the more classic captain you can see on the left in the picture below. But if you look at the cpatain on the right carefully you can actually see that all the details have been added on top of the other details. You can see the soulstone under the left horn and you can even see the remnants of the left holster under the bag with a face. Seeing models with common parts is no surprise in these ranges but I was more used to seeing parts used for several models. This time it's just the same model but with lots of things on top (plus an arm swap).

 

 

Rogue trader eldar Captain (sculpted then converted by Jes Goodwin)

 

But what to do with that particular model. For some reason I want this army to be compatible with both Rogue trader rules and 6th ed and I wanted a normal leader. This means an autarch for the 6th ed rules. I remembered reading about autarchs in the compilation book so I gave a quick look yesterday but couldn't find anything. It does say some exarchs can change aspects and wear gear from multiple aspects but I couldn't find the actual word "autarch" in the book. Maybe I dreamt of it, I'll have another look. If any of you know if it's actually really in there, please tell me. Another things is I want to equip the guy as the model is but couldn't understand the true advantage of an autarch in 6th ed (if anybody knows please tell me, what's a good use for an autarch equipped like this guy?).

If I don't find a use for him as an autarch he will make a perfect dire avenger exarch.

Anyway, I decided to put this little fella on a nice base with some shale I looted from my hollidays hunt (remember this post). These shale pieces proved worthy since you can easily break them with bare hands to the shape you want and they can be drilled with no effort. I even believe drilling is essential because I think just gluing them means it'll break in no time.

BUT, pinning a mini to its base means cutting off its tab and You know this is 1st class heresy right?

Eldar captain on base

 I found a way to concile both the hobbyist and the archiver in me : I just cut the tab off but glued it under the base to keep it as a souvenir :

Now I still have the model and its tab to remember this model is just 6 years younger than myself...

On the painting range, the Khornish boys are very close to being finished, the final details awaiting a bit because I decided unexpectedly to add freehand on some of them to make them more sexy. Here's the bunch as they were yesterday night and next time you're seeing them , it's gonna be party time with varnish and complete basing !

Kaleb's on his way - battle chaos part 22

OK, this is the end of the first step. Modelling and building are complete., There may remain a single detail being the helmet. I believe a skull would be more than appropriate instead of the sun on his forehead? I've been thinking about it since I wanted to paint the sun as a wind rose with black and white halves.

The helmet is made of an elf shadow warrior helmet with wings taken form a bat I git with the Avatars of War female vampire (very good mini BTW). I've been a total douche by not anticipating the issue of the big shoulder pad which makes the helmet hard to place. If I had thought of that before, I would have placed the bat wings slightly more on top of the helmet and it would have been perfect. In real life he would be unable to turn his head or to ben it on the sides.

If you compare this version with the previous one, you can see I changed the shield to have a big demonic skull instead of the multiple eyes, this will allow me to add Malal's design more easily and it reminds in a distant way of the original concept for the shield.

You can see I finished the awe by adding some teeth on the lower jaw to close the mouth.

The base has benefited form addings in the form of shell pieces and sculpted mushrooms. I wanted to give a less regular look and more twisted feeling to the base. I want this one to truly look like he's in the middle of the chaos wastes looking for champions to slay.

The on foot version is pretty much the same as before, the only difference being I added a malestone eye like on the original concept.

And here's the undead version of him, he has lost some hair and his rotting skin makes his face look bigger (the first case I see where an old model has a bigger scale than a recent one...)

As you may have started to realize, I always feel compelled to working on a ridiculous amount of minis at the same time. As I found some parts in the dettol box, I found an old friend of mine n the form of a power armoured chaos squat. The lad had been cut in two and the upper part is not usable anymore. I took the lower half and decided to cast ressurect on it. Here is what came out of it :

It may be hard to see but the helmet is a space marine one glued to a dwarf head for the beard. The torso is a chaos space marine but backwards (up is down and front is back). The problem is the arms are far too long for this lil'chap. I may consider something else but I don't know what for the time being... I really like his mechanical torso (the back for the marine coming in the rhino sprue)

To finish this on a happy note, the khorne champions are nearly on their way and should be finished soon. Her's a pic of the most advanced one, he just needs some freehand to make him a little bit more vibrant/funky and he's good to go.

Honneur et Bravoure, pour la Bresse ! - Battle Brettonia Part 3

The work on the khorne champions is reaching the end of the tunnel now and a few unexpected guests have made their way to the painting range so for now, I'm going to shar e with you some of the brettonian knights I've down.

If you don't remember, I've chosen blue as the army overall colour since it's the colour depicted on the Bresse Flag (Bresse being the french region where I was born :

 The blue colour is thus reserved for the henchman and peasants whor are the duke's property and for the charcater who are part of the duke's family, he is the only allowed to bear his country's colours in his coat of arms.

This means that each knigt in this army bears is personnal colours with a little blue flag and blue caparison to show his allegiance. The standard bearers obviously bear the colour of their duke and region rather than their own.

Since the knights errant and the knights of the realm are made from the same plastic kit, I decided to make them stand from each other. Knights errant being young and rather poor (they most certainly don't own land), they carry bare wood lances and simple helmets. Their poses are the standard pose because I believe they want to look serious in front of the ladies and their elders. I know this doesn't match the rules which impy Knights errant are wild and all that but I prefer things this way.

Knights errants

 Knights of the realm on another side are richer and possess some land, they have coloured lances to represent the fact they break them less and their helmets are more elaborate. I also chose to give alternative and more dynmaic poses to enhance the fact they are used to war and battle and thus feel more confident and a bit more intimidating. Some bear golden touches to show their wealth as well.

Knights of the realm

Questing Knights were an absolute pleasure to paint, they are really charcaterfull and remain amongst some of my favourite recent miniatures. Any of them can be taken inidvidually to represent a paladin or any knight for roleplay for they have all their gear with them. I especially like the one with the lyr and the one rubbing his moustache.

Questing knights

 The dukle himself, I was really lucky this model has a lion on its shields because that's exactly what I needed to represent my country's arms. I remember the paintjob was the best I had ever done at the time and I still consider it pleasant (although there are few mistakes I wouldn't do now especially on metals). It reaaly is a nice mini to maint and I wish I had known rare earth magnets before. I would have loved to lake his head and hand changeable for alternatives.

Duke of Bresse on Hypogriff

This army is done for I have no room left in my arm box. Maybe I will continue it if nex releases appear but that seems puched back to a distant future.

I have one project though which would bring some new blood to the army, You'll see part of it in little time. Oh and I still have got to show you the ladies of the army (the best for the end as they say)

Oh and by the way, please help Laughing ferret reach 300 followers. You won't regret it. You'll only find regular and very enjoyable posts on hobby, with excellent Blood bowl teams and insane Genestealer cult conversions amongst many other greats things !

Bring out your dead ! Battle Undead part 2

Trying to paint 2 armies at the same time can get tricky. Trying to paint 4 is just a proof you're going insane. Anyway, since painting takes time, i sometimes enjoy converting stuff from another army when I'm in the middle of a big rank-and-file unit, just let my brushes and brains rest a little.

During the painting of my ongoing Chaos army, I had the idea of converting vampire knights, I mean CHEAP VAMPIRE KNIGHTS.
At the time being, the undead seemed very attractive but the latest black riders had'nt been released yet. My idea wad to use skeletton horses with empire army armour with Dark elves cold one riders to have a vampire touch.

The result is quite good enough and sufficiently close to what I was aiming for, the only thing I think is needed is rotten cloak coming from underneath the armour parts of the horses but I guess that would have been easier to do before finising the rest...

I have to say this conversion proved to be reasonably easy for a simple reason :  the old undead horses end the old empire horses are built on the very same design, they have the same poses et their size correspond almost perfectly ! Finding scratch parts on other models is a usual thing but I wouldn't have expected these two batches to match so well...

Oh and I also think sculpting flames coming out form the nose and eyes of the steeds could be quite appropriate, what do you think?

As I had almost finished building up these lads (and ladies), I found a lead creature waiting fo some love : a plague cart.

I converted it just a little to give the rider a face from the new plague cart to link both in my armies. The old version will most likely be inserted in a skeletton unit to add 8 bases at once....(I've seen the trick used and it can either be splendid or stupid)

The other thing I added was a Yoke I sculpted in 2mm plastic card and scrapped with a blade to give it a wooden aspect. All of those who have this miniature know what a pain it is to assemble it and that was my answer to the problem.

By the way, you can see a brilliantly painted version of it here with the use of a lepper mini (I used mine to make a brettonian bowman).

At the dawn of an army - Battle Bretonnia part1

Today is gonna be the presentation of how I began my Bretonnian army.

Bretonnia is the only army I've ever collected that can be considered in the "good guys" box. There will be Eldar in some time but I don't really consider them good but more on the "I don't give a shit, I do what I want" style like Honey badgers.
So why Bretonnians?
- Well because they have plenty of knightys and we all agree that Knights are cool,
- because they have hot chicks and that can be considered cool too
- because they rely a lot on medieval France and though I'm no nationalist, I kinda like the idea to relate them to real places.
- last but not least, I had had an idea of doing a "holy grail" themed army for a time.

As I said, Bretonnia is strongly linked to France and most of its name come from real french places.
It's with this idea in mind I began my army.
Since I come from a great region called "Bresse"


I decided I would have this region as a start for my army. With a bit of imagination you could place my region in the vicinity of Quenelles :

Bretonnian map

And as you may or may not know, Quenelles (in french)  just happen to be a special recipe of my region :

Quenelles are a delicious specialty - They feel so right in my mouth gaaawd

I believe this is no coincidence since you can find many easter eggs like this one in all the Bretonnian fluff.

But let's get to point, I mean minis !

Just like I do as usual, I always pick up a Champion or a hero to get the feeling I want for my army.
But just before that I had to choose a device for my army and I obviously chose that of my region : Bresse to fit the purpose:

The device is perfect fo me since it's a common one for which you can easily find decals and it's the one on Louen Leoncoeur's shield and gear. But since I had no will to paint a lion on all the minis, I decided that blue would be the color given to the Duke to all his knights with his own device and that the white lion on blue device would only be carried by him, his heroes and unit leaders (you'll undestand better with the pics).

And there came this guy :

I guess you can all feel the good "holy grail" vibe from him...
I had the idea to do the whole army like this and then a whole unit and then I realised I would go lacking different minis to do it easily and I just decided this guy would be a champion.

Since no Brettonian army can exist without a hero and a great banner bearer I made these :

The standard bearer is supposed to have the armory from Normandy (where my wife comes from) and I did from the memory I had of it.

EPIC FAIL, .... BIG TIME


The lions on the shield are facing THE OTHER WAY MORON.
Like in here :

Too bad for me, guess I'll just have to hide this one from all my friends in Normandy and to all of my step family...