Whispers from the Crypt

Bought some mantic wraiths awhile back during a Maelstrom games sale. Figured it was about time I made my own spirit hosts for warhammer fantasy, so being inspired by Coldbane and his start on his fantasy army I decided to try and get back into some regular work on hobby. Especially with a tournament coming up earlier next month, no more night before marathons to get 3 colour minimum!

I went with mantic wraiths because you get 10 individual models in a box for just over NZ$25 (http://www.maelstromgames.co.uk/index.php?act=pro&pre=mtc_kow_und_inf_402_000) compared to the old old GW sculpts that currently retail for NZ$36 a base (http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?prodId=prod1460041a) in finecast, which I still haven't had the pleasure/misfortune to experience. I have a fair few mantic models now and I really like them.

I originally was going to put 2-3 individual models on a base and make 3-4 bases but I liked the look off all four together, was easier to construct, and they would make great wound counters with some magnetic love. The wraiths come with standard 20mm square bases, which when all lovingly green stuffed and glued together makes a nice 40mm square base.

Then I drilled some holes with a hand drill and fixed some magnets in.

Next I wanted to make some ethereal type basing. This was my first attempt which elicited a "Oh you made grass bases!" from my partner. It is exaclty what it looks like, I smeared green stuff all over the base and went to town with a craft knife. I could have probably taken a bit more time and made it rise higher in some places than others to a larger extent, but I'm happy with how it turned out compared to time invested.

Some adeptus battlegrey followed by a liberal blue wash and a few spots of green wash later, my ghostly dudes are ready to chase down warmachine crews and generally be annoying. There are still some bits to do like the hafts of the weapons and some highlighting, but fine to play with at the moment.

While waiting for all those washes to try on my ghostly buddies, I started working on one of my nightmares for my mounted vampires. I really wanted to make these guys stand out compared to their black knight escorts, so when with less ghostly colours but still not your average knightly steed look. The model is a gamezone mournful knight steed (http://www.maelstromgames.co.uk/index.php?act=pro&pre=gmz_gmz_vmp_cav_101_000), I have the standard bearer and another knight I use as a vampire lord (http://www.maelstromgames.co.uk/index.php?act=pro&pre=gmz_gmz_vmp_cav_111_000), I really like the minis (depsite being metal), except for one problem. The mournful knight standard bearers standard is really flimsly, I think I'm going to have to replace the entire pole it simply cannot support the weight of the banner (which is an awesome banner).

Finally the big new kid on the block, my terrorgheist/dragon. I like the zombie dragon head (and I may one day try him as one), so I build it as a zombie dragon but will use it with terrorgheist rules if he is not mounted. The rider is magnetised from his bum to the mount (you may recognise him in the above picture) and his elbow is magnetised to switch between lance and (magic) sword.

I must say that the GW zombie dragon/terrorgheist kit is perhaps my favourite model kit ever. Well sculpted, easy to put together, and I managed to make the big guy, the vampire (on either nightmare or actual dragon), and a strigoi ghoul king on a rock all from the same kit. There are still plenty of spare bits for unit fillers and terrain. I'm no GW fanboy but they got this one right.