Yet more Squats, a few Zoats, and Nurgle lurgy.

Another slightly later blog this week as I have been ill with the flu and, when not wondering around dazed at work, I have been asleep. I must have annoyed Nurgle somehow to feel this ill. :(

None of these factors have sadly been conducive to painting, or any other miniatures releated things.

I have however been continuing to spend my overtime money on e-bay collecting Squats and generally expanding the army of the Brighthelmstone Stronghold.  I have managed to add 5 bikes to the army, including 3 Exo-armoured Trikes with riders! In order to field an entire Warlord and Hearthguard I moved the 2 converted exo-trikes I already had, gave them spare Exo-Armoured riders I had, and now have a lovely squad of 5 Exo-Armoured Trikes.

To replace the Trikes in the other biker units, I had to get a couple more bikes, one of which is still caught up in the Xmas post at the moment. Apart from that I have bought odds and ends of Squat models, most for not a lot of money, but the odd one or two hovering around the £10 mark. In addition I have (again in the post!!) another Zoat which will complete the two Squads of 4 I have. I am looking forward to painting them finally.

As I mentioned in a previous blog post, I am buying up odds and ends of Squats for two main reasons:

 Firstly, I like them. Since painting the army at the start of this year I have really grown to like the models and the background, more so than I did in the 1980's. Indeed, I was never a fan of the Bob Olley Squat models, and used to blame them for the lack of success of the race/range. Now while I still think that this is true and may have influenced other peoples attitude to Squats, after painting mine I have grown to really appreciate them. For the record, I have always liked the Iron Claw Goblins :)

Secondly, I was never 100% happy with the finished look and compostion of my Squat army. The background I created worked, and the uniform colour worked too. However, the over look seemed too drab to me, and I felt that I had got the army 'done', rather than spent the time on it and it's finer details which it deserved.
Now I have a very bad habit of tinkering with armies, be it paint schemes or organisation, and is why my Catachan army is only part finished and a mess. I do however want to go back and lightly tiniker with the Squat army. This will involve re-basing them, painting up the new miniatures I have bought, lighting the uniform colour, adding a little more details and adding some green (what was Woodland Green) to the armour/helmets similar to the Mole Mortar crew shown later.

I want the Squats to be an on and off project. I'll paint a few as a break from other projects, rather than be an all encompassing thing. However as many people have found, the Squats can be a compulsive project.
Perversely, given the Squats fate in 40K, I have been really tempted to start collecting a new 40k edition Tyranid army! The models look very nice, and would be fun to paint, but it might be something for later next year.

Enjoy :) 

Five Exo-Armoured Trike riding Squats.

 Side view.

They are not glued together which is why the arms don't look right yet.

 

  Squat Mole Mortar, circa 1988. 

I want to combine some elements of this uniform with my current paint scheme.

 Test model, re-based, slightly lightened uniform, and with some 'Woodland Green' (now aka 'Warpstone Glow').

The base design is similar to the Skaven bases for my 3rd Edition Skaven army. I wanted to lighten the model and make them look slighly more 'Rogue Trader'.

Close up.

  Warlord and Hearthguard artwork. 

I always loved this picture, and so when I bought a spare Warlord model he had to have a Multi-Melta. Incedently I rolled on the Squat Heavy Weapons chart and actually rolled up a Multi Melta!

(I might need a legal bit, so the picture belongs to GW, or the artist, or someone, but not me. I only posted for educational purposes to compare with the miniature below).

 The converted Squat Warlord with a Chaos Renegade Multi-Melta and Eldar Armoured arms.

Rear view. 

I green stuffed the cloak to make it look more furry. I might add more later.

Squats on the workbench. 

I have lots of Squats to sort out!

Zoats.

I have 7 Zoats, and one spare torso. I do have a fantasy Zoat in the post so I can use its legs.

Something odd I found.

I had an old piece of white coral (I think it was a cast of some coral), so I painted it up the other night as a crazy looking alien plant. Painted purple, highlighted it green, and the orange. 

It was just something random. :) 

Hopefully I will be lurgy free by next week, and will have settled on a new project, or at least painted something.