First skavens arrived!

Since these days I found myself spending more and more time in ebay and trading groups in facebook than any other internet activity, I thought I would go ahead and share it here as well!

The first skavens have started to arrive and a small army is quickly forming up!
I have picked up old figures from ebay in different countries (Spain, UK and Germany so far) as well as facebook trading group. I have to say that the experience so far has been highly positive and I have nothing bad to report.

Here are some pictures of what I have so far and an updated checklist.

You can see that some miniatures are painted to a very nice standard but unfortunately I will have to strip the paint of all as I want to achieve a consistent result which I can only get if all figures have the same painting style.
Maybe some of the figures I will keep painted and just use it as a basecoat...

Army picture

Skrolk (nicely painted!) and verminlord (general)

Plague censers

Huge unit of giant rats

Lots of plague monks, these figures are great! Only two models left to have a full collection

Packmasters, including Throt the Unclean

War machines of madness! One wheel, one bell and one jezzail (for now)

Unit of clanrats with command

While I was writing this post I got my claws on some other miniatures for which I do not have pictures yet.
This is the updated wishlist. If you have some items of the following list please let me know!

• 1 unit of clanrats
• 1 unit of clanrats
• 2 warpfire throwers
• 4 poison wind globadiers
• 1 unit of slaves
• 1 unit of stormvermin
• 1 unit of gutter runners
• 1 unit of plague monks with censor bearers
• 2 rat ogres
• 2 rat ogres
• 1 unit of giant rats
• doomwheel
• giant bell
• 1 jezzail
• 1 jezzail
• 1 jezzail
• 1 jezzail

Skaven army list

I plan to collect the Skaven based on the army I wanted to play rather than collecting a small army and then growing it from there, which is usually the case.
I am going to make a rough sketch of the army list and then let's see how do we go from there.

The Fantasy edition I am going to base the army on is 4th, since it is the one I usually enjoy the most when playing.

As already posted, my original inspiration for the army comes from a White Dwarf article by Andy Chambers, here is the original army composition for 3rd edition.

I want to keep in mind some ideas while building the army:

• fun to collect
• fun to paint
• use mainly miniatures I could get at the time of the original article was published
• collect based on "feeling" rather than army usefulness
• try not to spend too much money!

That basically limits some of the choices I can make.

I will not get any of the latest plastic miniatures and I should get the things I will enjoy painting. For example although the original Andy Chambers' army does not contain a Doomwheel, my army most certainly will! As it is a model I have always wanted to paint.
It is also very important to avoid most of the new miniatures since I do not like how they look, as I think they have lost the look n' feel of the old rats sculpted by Jes Goodwin or Colin Dixon.
In order to avoid spending too much I will try to hunt down most of the figures on ebay and trading my dwarfs for them on the oldhammer trading group.

To sum up, the rough sketch of the army consists of:

• 2 units of clanrats
• 2 warpfire throwers
• 4 poison wind globadiers
• 1 unit of slaves
• 1 unit of stormvermin
• 1 unit of gutter runners
• 1 unit of plague monks with censor bearers
• 4 rat ogres
• 1 unit of giant rats
• doomwheel
• giant bell
• 4 jezzails

Most probably this will be modified based on what I find or what I enjoy painting, nevertheless I will give an update when I have enough miniatures to show, as some already started coming end of last month!

Taking into account this rough sketch I have tried to create an army list based on 4th edition. I see that I was too ambitious as I was not able to fit all into a 2000 points army but anyway that was not my intention.
It seems I will need to play with the army a little until I get a hold on the usefulness of some units and equipment. It just seems that my last 4th edition game happened a long time ago...

• 1 Skaven Warlord General 284 pts
• Magic heavy armour TSE 4+
• Pistol
• Fellblade
• 1 Battle Standard 182
• Sacred Standard of the Horned Rat
• Heavy Armour
• Pistol
• 28 Clanrats 235
• Spears, standard bearer, musician
• 2x Wind Globadiers
  
  
• 1 Chieftain 114
• Skaven Brew
• 29 Clanrats 295
• Spears, standard bearer, musician
• 1x Warpfire thrower
• 1x Assassin
  
  
• Grey Seer 650
• Warpstone armour
• Seer Stone
• Dispell Scroll
• Screaming Bell
• 20 Stormvermin 345
• Halbers, shields, standard bearer, musician
• 1x Warpfire Thrower

• 30 Slaves 90
• Spears
  
  
• 20 Plague Monks 244
• 2 hand combat weapons, standard bearer, musician
• 6x Plague Censer
• 1 Warlock Engineer 81
• 1 dispell scroll
  
  
• 14 Gutter Runners 212
• 2 hand combat weapons
• 1x Assassin
  
  
• 4 Jezzails 120
• Doomwheel 150
  
  
• 30 Giant Rats 95
• 2 packmasters
• 4 Rat Ogres 192
• 2 packmasters

Total: 3289 points

Let's see when I start preparing the first miniatures and hopefully put them to test, soon.

Inspiration for the Skaven

Disclaimer: This post and all about oldhammer is going to be posted in english.

I have always wanted to have a Skaven Army. I even read about it as already mentioned in previous posts, in my previous site, roughly in 2000, I was already mentioning that "I have always wanted a Skaven Army", so it is something I kind of owed to myself, at least to my 15 year old self.

Although the 4th ed. book was released in 1993 I do not think I read it until late '94 or so. I know I still have a photocopied copy in black & white of this book as it was not until several years later when I bought my own copy. I remember quite clearly how I used to read over and over the famous Andy Chambers article and drool over the images of the Army book.

Andy Chambers´ original article as appeared in the UK White Dwarf, although I actually read it in the spanish edition. Uploaded by Orlygg

Finally in 2014 I decided to collect a Skaven army based only on the 3th - 4th edition miniatures that are mainly shown in the 4th edition Army Book and in Andy Chambers´ army. The Oldhammer Community on facebook and blogspot helped me a lot into convincing myself.

4th Edition Skaven Army Book

I am already buying and trading miniatures over Oldhammer trading company, ebay and other sources and my main focus are the old ones sculpted by Jes Goodwin. I plan to tell you about my findings here.
The goal will be to collect and paint them following the idea behind Andy Chambers article. Using an "army approach" rather than heroic one, which is helpful since I will need to paint 150 miniatures at least. The idea is that the army should look nice as an army, all together, although each miniature individually might not be painted that well.
Another key concept is the hand made banners. This is something I have always enjoyed, as in my old Orc Army I also painted all banners. I am going to base these ones on the original Jes Goodwin banners and drawings from the Army Book.

Let's have a look at the miniatures I will try to hunt down. All catalog pictures are taken from Stuff of Legends.
There is an excellent miniature database in this post in warseer. Found it thanks to the Oldhammer Community on Facebook.

Rat Ogres

I really like these ones as opposed to the current bulky ones.

Link to catalog

Skaven command

My favourite is the commander with warplock musket, that for some reason seems to be very difficult to find.

Link to catalog

Skavens
Pay attention to the poisoned wind globbers, plague censer bearers and plague monks, I think they are excellent.

Link to catalog

Link to catalog

Link to catalog

Special Characters
I do not plan to collect all, most probably only Skrolk and Snikch.

Link to catalog

Resources for Inspiration

• Nico's amazing Skavens that follow the same inspiration from Andy Chambers' army. I guess I am not that original.
• Rob S army
• 24 cigarettes blog
• Snickit's blog
• Rise of the Horned Rat - skaven origin, by Tristram Evans

Just to show how deeply the Andy Chambers army inspired some of these projects, I am going to show a comparison of a unit. I would say that Nico's Skavens are better painted though.

Original Andy Chambers unit

Nico's version of the same unit

Please let me know if you know of more fellow bloggers who post their Skaven armies as I would like to have a look as well.

Legión demoníaca de Khorne

Siempre había jugado un poco con la idea de hacerme un ejército del caos y en concreto quería hacerme un ejército temático de Khorne, pero nunca encontré el momento ni la motivación adecuada.
Pero en el año 2004 GW lanzó la campaña para sexta edición de Warhammer Fantasy de La Tormenta del Caos.

Este libro incluía reglas para jugar algunos ejércitos bastante especiales:

• horda de Archaon
• legiones demoníacas
• enanos matadores de Karak Kadrin
• humanos de Middenland
• orcos de Grimgor
• culto de Slaanesh
• ejército de Sylvania
• skavens de clan Eshin
• patrulla marina de altos elfos

Esta era la ocasión perfecta, ya que con la nueva campaña la gente del club Atalaya Vigía se animó bastante a participar, probando nuevos ejércitos y jugando a menudo. Por lo que me decidí a coleccionar un ejército demoníaco de Khorne.
Es un poco locura hacerlo temático de un dios tan dificil de manejar como Khorne, pero eso resultó secundario a cambio de la diversión de pintarlo, conversionarlo y jugarlo ocasionalmente. Creo que puedo contar con los dedos de una mano las partidas que he ganado con este ejército.
Todo el ejército fue coleccionado y pintado entre los años 2004 y 2005.

Portada del libro de campaña

El ejército todavía lo conservo en su totalidad y no tengo intención de venderlo, la verdad que me gusta bastante aunque todo el ejército tiene furia asesina por lo que es prácticamente injugable. Simplemente lo pones en la mesa y se lanzan como locos a la carga.
Para elegir la lista lo tuve fácil ya que al ser temático tenía que comprar todas las opciones de Khorne para poder plantar una lista mínimamente decente.
Básicamente se reduce a dos unidades de desangradores, dos de mastines, una de juggernauts, un carro y personajes. No hay mucho mas donde rascar. Con eso tienes para 2000 puntos de aquella edición.

Por cierto que esta lista ya no es oficial. En una jugada muy rara de Games Workshop decidió hacer no oficiales todas las listas de la campaña por lo que todo el mundo que se había comprado un ejército como yo se quedó con un palmo de narices...

Devorador de Almas

Esta es mi miniatura favorita del ejército y a la que dediqué mas tiempo. No es una maravilla pero estoy contento con el resultado final.

Mastines de Khorne

Como lleva dos unidades de mastines, para no repetir tanta miniatura, una de las unidades utiliza mastines del caos genéricos pintados de rojo. Al ser mas "bestiales" que los mastines de Khorne normales quedan bien con los hombres bestia transformados, además son miniaturas que siempre quise tener.

Desangradores

No me gustaban nada -y siguen sin hacerlo- las miniaturas de desangradores de sexta, que es la tropa básica, por lo que tuve que buscar alternativas. Si en aquella época hubiera tenido el mismo acceso que tengo ahora a ebay probablemente hubiera buscado los desangradores de otra edición, pero como no sabía cómo hacerlo, tuve que improvisar. Decidí transformar hombres bestia en desangradores y la verdad que no me arrepiento. Las miniaturas de hombres bestia siempre me han encantado y la caja de regimiento resultó ser muy versátil.

Este lo usaba o bien como campeón o bien como héroe de Khorne a pie

Las combinaciones de armas que puse hacen casi imposible colocarlos en formación

Juggernauts

Todos los juggernauts del ejército son de los antiguos de plomo ya que no existían de plástico en aquel momento. Tuve que conversionar todos los jinetes y la verdad que estoy bastante satisfecho del resultado final, incluyendo el gigantesco carruaje de Khorne con dos juggernauts. En estas fotos se pueden ver sin peana y con peana porque no estaba seguro si ponerlas, aunque al final por coherencia con el resto del ejército les puse peanas.

El músico de la unidad, por eso del cuerno que lleva a un lado

Portaestandarte. No se ve bien pero lleva un hombre medio descompuesto

Paladín de la unidad, este juggernaut está bastante transformado para cambiarle la postura, al ser macizo de plomo de no resultó fácil.

Carro de Khorne

Esta bestia de carro es imposible de jugar por el ancho de peana que tiene, pero es divertido si consigue llegar a cargar. Pesa una tonelada eso si, con los dos juggernauts. Para hacer la caja utilicé una puerta de la fortaleza de Warhammer, una pala excavadora de Chimera y símbolos caóticos varios, la mayoría sacados de la caja de restos.

Como último dato, este ejército fue la primera vez que intenté hacer peanas un poco mas interesantes que simplemente césped y arena. Probé a ponerles nieve y desde entonces utilizo la misma receta, bicarbonato y cola blanca. La verdad que sigue estando prácticamente igual que el primer día, no han amarilleado ni se ha caído la nieve. Esta misma receta la utilicé para mi ejército de Warmachine y alguna otra miniatura suelta y me sigue gustando como queda.

Aquí unas fotos de los componentes y un primer plano de la peana texturizada.

Atentos al movil nokia viejuno de la foto. No hace falta insistir en el año en que fue tomada.

Da un aspecto bastante esponjoso