The Bonelords of Khorne Project
Hello everyone! I have started sharing this progress bog on a couple of other forums, so there are quite a few posts already in the other threads. I will be adding them to this plog each day until I've caught up, so expect quite a bit of content to start showing up over the next few days. I could just point you to the other sites, but I don't want to force anyone who's interested in seeing the rest to head off to other forums to see everything.
A note on the upcoming posts. They are full of text and pictures. Far more text than the latter. That's because I'm using these plogs to share the thought process I do through when building, converting and painting. I want to encourage others to try their hand at converting their armies and push their own limits while I push my own. I hope you enjoy reading my thoughts as I build this Bloodborne project.
The Bonelords of Khorne are Born
I've assembled the majority of my two Bloodbound starter sets for Age of Sigmar, and may I say that these are some of the best chaos models that Games Workshop has ever put out. The only starter models that even come close are the the 40k Chaos Chosen and Chaos Cultists that came with the Dark Vengeance set.
For now, I'm just going to talk about the Blood Warriors. I'll be writing another article covering my thoughts on the Bloodreavers, and another on some of the other models later. The sculpting on the Khorne Blood Warrior models have all of the exaggerated depth of detail and sharp lines that I've come to expect from Games Workshop, and personally I find that to be one of my favorite parts of their model lines. One of the major failings that I've seen when working with miniatures from some other companies (especially younger companies) is their details are sculpted without enough depth to really stand out from the rest of the miniature. To be certain, most companies have very talented sculptors who understand the unique differences in small scale sculpting opposed to sculpting in larger scales, but Games Workshop has continued to do a great job of keeping an over-exaggerated style of sculpting in each of their new releases. This style of sculpting allows painting techniques like washes and drybrushing to really stand out in a paintjob.
[url=http://www.dakkadakka.com/gallery/843479-Blood%20Warriors.html]http://images.dakkadakka.com/gallery...20Warriors.png[/url]
I'm going to go a bit off track for a second because I want to address something that is closely related to my thoughts on the Blood Warriors. As a hobby focused player I find the idea of duplicate models to be annoying. I feel strongly that each miniature in an army needs to be unique from the rest of the army in some way. One area of sculpting that Games Workshop has really improved on in the past few years is how active their miniatures' poses appear, but the changes they have introduced to make those improvements has caused some other issues. Namely, duplicate models, especially in units with larger than standard unit sizes. The single greatest change that has allowed for these kinds of poses has been the use of the single-pose plastic model. If you compare these new kits to the multi-pose models that have been GW's standard in the past, you can see how they've had to change how they have approached creating their newer models. Single-pose models allow sculptors a degree of freedom that multi-pose models do not. Of course, in order to achieve this freedom they have had to largely abandon the flexibility that the multi-pose models allow players. Multi-pose models allow for far more poses to reduce the chances of duplicates because each part can be placed in a different position. The poses given to the Blood Warrior models are wonderfully dynamic and visually interesting. Each one feels like it's in the middle of combat getting ready to take it's next skull, and where would be a better place to find the devotees of Khorne than in the depth of a pitched battle? Games Workshop's choice to give players single-pose models in their starters has allowed them to produce some very dynamic looking miniatures, but it definitely presents an issue with duplicate models when units made up of minis from multiple starter kits are used. This is certainly nothing new for Games Workshop's starter boxes
Getting back on track, it took me a long time to decide on a color scheme for the whole warband. I'm really tired of painting red as I play Word Bearers for my 40k army, so I didn't want to another mostly red army. I settled on a dark bone for the main color of my Bloodbound. I can't completely paint a Khorne army without some kind of red to honor the god of slaughter and blood, so I'm using red as a spot color for the Khorne symbols. I'm still not sure what color I want to paint their skin. I've thought of painting the skin as lighter tones with hints of blue and purple to contrast against the warm tone of the armor, but I've also been thinking of doing darker skin tones to contrast with the lighter colors of the bone colored armor. I'm also playing around with the idea of painting all of the skin with Blood for the Blood God or Tamia Clear Red so it looks like they are all covered in fresh blood. What to do, what to do.
Here's what the beginning of the color scheme looks like on the Lord of Khorne on foot and the Bloodsecrator.
Lord of Khorne on Foot
[url=http://www.dakkadakka.com/gallery/843493-Khorne%20Lord%20on%20Foot%20front.html]http://images.dakkadakka.com/gallery...ot%20front.png[/url]
Bloodsecrator
[url=http://www.dakkadakka.com/gallery/843478-Bloodsecrator%20front.html]http://images.dakkadakka.com/gallery...or%20front.png[/url]
[url=http://www.dakkadakka.com/gallery/843477-Bloodsecrator%20back.html]http://images.dakkadakka.com/gallery...tor%20back.png[/url]
I also grabbed a box of the non-push fit Blood Warriors to see what that kit is like. In short, it's pretty amazing. There are tons of extra bits and some really great sculpts in this box. I'll be assembling these guys with twin Goreaxes and the leader with a Goreglaive rather than the Goreaxe and Gorefist.
Thanks for reading!
