Painting the Protectorate of Menoth

A month ago I bought the start 'Two Player Battle Box' for Warmachine. The box features two armies from the world of the Iron Kingdoms. I was over the moon with the content of the box and feel it offers surperb value for money. It's retail is £70 in the UK, I think it's $100 in the US, but if you shop around you will be able to pick it up for around £63.

The two factions that you get starter armies for are Khador (based on a Russian look) and that of the Protectorate of Menoth, a nation of religious zealots. Out of these I have decided to initially paint and develop the Menoth army. I thought that this would help me to develop my 'white' painting skills as I have always found this a tricky colour to paint in large areas.

The Menoth force in the Battle Box has three warjacks. A warjack is a steam powered robot with a basic brain that allows it to be given commands by a Warcaster, the forces leader. The warjacks all have a matching faction feel with does look good on the tabletop.

The Repenter is a light warjack, at nearly 3 metres (10 feet) tall and weighing a mere 4 1/4 ton. It is armed with a flame thrower type weapon and a war flail.  One of the benefits to his flame weapon is setting the enemy models on fire. Warmachine has a rule system where once on fire a model continues to burn from turn to turn, potential having a devastating effect on the bigger and tougher characters in the game.

A nice model looking like a heavy weight boxer walking up to an opponent. A limited palette of colours work well on the model highlighting the lines on the model.

The Crusader is all about combat. He is a large warjack being 12 feet tall weighing in at 8 tons. Moving 4 inches each turn (8 on a run, 7 on the charge) he is quite slow but comparable with similar size warjacks from other factions. 

I like the model but I am a little unsure about the look of the chain weapon. The chain appears that it is flying through the air however the arm holding it looks fairly sedentary.

The final heavy warjack is a Vanquisher 12 feet tall nearly 10 tons. This warjack has a mixture of a ranged weapon and a close combat weapon. The melee weapon has a 'thresher' attack that also negates shield wall bonuses in enemy models. The ranged weapon has a 4inch blast area and a ranged of 10 inches.  


The initial coats that I used on the white was bone-white from vallejo followed by stone wall grey in the recesses and Dead White for the highlights. The first model that I painted showed a few brush strokes but watering down the bone-white with multiple layers seemed to cure the problem. 


For the gold I used two of the new golds from citadel. Balthasar Gold as a base coat followed by a layer of Auric Armour Gold. To tone it down a little I used a sepia wash.


For purple I used a base layer of Hexed Lichen with a layer of Warlord purple both from the Game Colour range of Vallejo.

Which Witch Hunter?

The Easter Holiday has given me some extra time on the hobby, perfectly timed for the new Empire releases from GW on the 7th April 2012.

The finecast witch hunter is a great looking model with a huge amount of detail. There were some imperfections in the figure. Tiny air bubbles but on a miniature this detailed exaggerated any imperfection. 

I found the new Carroburg Crimson wash, or shade as they are now called, very intense but worked well when targeted into the folds of the miniatures cloak only. The new Khorne Red had an excellent coverage of the black undercoat. The Wazdakka red was the perfect compliment for the line highlights. I will get more as I need them rather than investing £333 in the whole range.

I've included some pictures below, I just wish I could do the model justice. 

I Ain't Afraid of No Ghost...

A pocket money raising project that I've had on the go for about a month is that of a starter army for the new Vampire Counts. I've also used the opportunity to film some painting tutorials in the 'Painting For Us Mere Mortals' series. Just the Corpse Cart to go. Here are some photos of the work so far.

Robot Wars - Steam Punk Style!

Following the arrival of the two player starter box last week I couldn't wait to try out the paint scheme for the the two factions.

I guessed that the Menoth, being white based, would be the trickiest to paint. The suggestions in the starter set use the P3 paint names but it is fairly straightforward to work out alternatives. My only suggestion would have been to show the models from front and back rather than the one picture of each stage. For someone who is new to Warmachine I wasn't sure how to paint the backs of the models. A very minor gripe I know and hardly worth mentioning.

I used elfic flesh for the off white colour and white for the highlights with ghost grey for the depth shading. The trouble I have with white is the brush strokes that are left behind. If you look close at the Canopy on the front of the model you will see some. To counter act this I watered down the white and then painted three layers. More time consuming but a much better finish. I have since ordered the Menoth base and highlight paints to see how an alternative paint brand covers the same area.

Next I moved onto Khador. Using Blood Red, many layers, I obtained a good covering with little evidence of brush strokes.

I recently bought some of Vallejo's alcohol based gold shown below. I find that the best metallics for painting are the Air paints. The 'flecks' in the paint are smoother and more realistic. The gold in this range is not gold though rather a slightly yellow tinted silver. On the models above I gave a coating of Brassy Brass' followed by a covering of this new gold. The outcome is shown on the models above.