To think that I did Part 1 over a month ago. I had always planned to get this next part out in December, and completing the Spearhead by the end of the year was always my goal. A goal I’m happy to say I succeeded in. Now to tell how I did the rest.
The core colours of the army were worked out in the first part. Though I had not yet painted the Hobgrot (hobgoblin) carrying the big gong yet as I was looking for a pale green called Orruk flesh to arrive. Using the same green wash I did for the army I added a bit of shade to that so I could have the green skin done. As for its clothes I didn’t want to use the same black I used for the Chaos Dwarfs, so instead I went for some browns namely steel Legion Drab and an Eshin Grey for the hood. Outside of him though the rest of the cohorts were all the same work from before. I did want to put a nice symbol on the banner. I have avoided using transfers for so long, but a friend was very nice and did that for me.
With the Cohorts now finished, it was onto all the big stuff from the box, namely the two war machines and the character model. I went with the Dominator Engine first. Looking at its two profiles I found the Immolation Cannons the best option, they are also the ones used in the Spearhead… but even without that its better than the melee version (plus most people don’t care if the model is equipped the same way in the Spearhead, you still use the Spearhead rules, not what’s shown on the model. I decided looking at the model that it would be safe to fully assemble before painting. It was open enough that I could get everywhere needed when painting as such the only part of the model that wasn’t glued in when I was painting was the base. I continued the brick look from the last time but now on a larger base.
The Domination Engine was by design entirely metallic, it is a machine after all. But there was one big exception to this, the flames and smoke. While I could paint the machinery much as I painted the Chaos Dwarfs armour The Furnace was Demonic Power, so I was going to use the same reds I had on the cores of the Cohorts weapons, easier said than done. Getting a bright, yet light red into the recesses of the flames was one thing, then making the edges look dark enough from the flame and smoke took a good number of dry brushing of Abaddon Black, usually followed by more recess painting. To make the parts hiding in the furnace stand out, rather than paint them Retributor Gold like normal, I went with the darker Balthasar Gold, which when used with Earthshade give a brass look, I like to think they used all the fancy looking stuff on the outside but this is the inner workings, they have more of a practicality over aesthetics in there. Finally I put red into the inner lines of the Engine’s head, watering it down helped it get into the recess easier and clean up if I messed up. This is a centrepiece model, it needed to look good.
The second War Machine, and the one with the largest base was the Tormentor Bombard. It could be built as a Deathshrieker Rocket Battery but like the Domination Engine, I saw the profiles for the two, and found the cannon was going to be more useful to me… unless I end up fighting giants, but I only have one friend who has them…. Looking at the model I could tell this one did need to be painted in parts, not just the cannon separate from the crew, but the cannon itself needed to be painted in parts.
So I assembled that into two, the main barrel, and the outer frame. After building the outframe, I concluded If I did another one, I’d leave the wheels off till they are painted. Everything I used for painting the Engine I used for painting the Bombard even down to the demonic furnace, though rather than mixing a while into the red, I decided to try and use Trollslayer Orange in the recesses instead, it will be up to others to decide which looked better. When the main metals were done, I would use some iron hands steel as edging on the gold. I tried using a lighter metallic shade, but the silvers never work for me coming out too watery. The outer parts of the wheels were painted black and the only non furnace part that was not metallic in the end.
For the 3 crew members, by this point I drew from how I did the Cohorts and the Hobgrot, though I did have to change some bits realizing some of them were wearing more cloth robes than metal armour.
This only now left the general of the army, the War Despot. He should be simple, a small single model with few parts and mono pose, BUT I can never make things easy on myself! You see when I got the Battletome (army book, the AoS equivalent to the codex) there is this brilliant feature in the back called the Anvil of Apotheosis. This is a feature on how to make rules for your own character. I LOVE making characters, something I always loved when starting Warhammer back in fantasy battles 5th edition. While recent games have been more basic on characters, this lets you go nuts with customization but with set rules and points on how much they can me.
A section on the Chaos Dwarfs was for Non Priests, letting them work as a sort of Pseudo Priest, and this set my mind blazing, what if my War Despot, did have a bit of religious element to him? And the model for the Sorcerer could also be made as a Priest for the Army, duel kit, meant spare parts.
One part is a book, what if my Despot often brought into battle with him a Tome about his god? So I waited for the model to come into Cycle Orkney as someone had bought up A LOT of the Chaos Dwarfs stuff the moment they came in. But once I had it , the construction began. All the parts of the normal War Despot were used, but his hand. Instead I removed the arm from the regular Sorcerer model equipped with the book and after cutting and filing it down to fit, glued that in place instead. One downside I found is the book is normally on a stand, but that didn’t fit with my plan, so rather than gluing that, I took some green stuff and rolled it into a ball to make a bit of Demonic Energy Orb built into the book. I still have the problem the book is kind of hovering as he opens pages… eh Chaos magic, who cares.
Once again the core colour scheme was used, but there were a few differences and I had learned from this all the other times by now which helped as he was essentially built as an evolution of the Cohorts design, everything they had he had but better. Bigger horns for example.
Using a watered down red I could get into the symbols on the tome and on the weapon, but also use the Troll Slayer Orange instead of a mix of white and red into the Demonic Energy. One tricky difference is that the War Despot stands on what is called a Tactical Rock. A structure, almost always a rock, built into the model for giving him more a pose. I hate this in 40k since I often go for very artificial looking areas like cities or industrial landscapes. For AoS normally I’m not too bothered as it’s much easier to build into, but my Dwarfs are fighting in cities, BUT I had learned a get around that should work a bit into this. Taking texture paint I painted it along the edge of the rock, this helped the rock look more like rubble rather than just a rock that’s in the middle of brick roads.
With him done, that is the Spearhead finished. I can look back on this box I got back at the end of September and see that in just over 2 months I had it all built, and taking into account I had some busy days in those two months and other projects that needed to be finished first, I consider that quite the achievement.
Well what next? nothing big till the start of a new year of course, an 11th edition of 40k is looming round the horizon too. I started this short diary as a bit of a test for those larger workers. I hope you enjoyed it. Shall I start the next one in the new year to cover one of my other armies I wish to expand on? Do I wait till 11th and join in friends writing about what army we wish to push forward each into the new edition? For now, just some smaller works as a bit of fun for the year to close by.
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