The Snakemen of the Moon Goddess.

I have had a very successful week painting. I have managed to paint one regiment of ten Snakemen, some Harpies, and a couple of random Snakemen. However, this blog update will focus just on just the unit of Snakemen, as I want to save the other stuff, namely the Harpies, for a more in-depth update of their own.

The Snakeman regiment I painted is a unit of ten Snakemen, designed to be used as proxy Chaos Warriors in a Chaos Ally Contingent, as per the Warhammer Armies lists. Unlike the Snakemen of the main Snakeman army, I have decided to paint them all as a coherent unit, with the same flesh colour, armour, and largely the same equipment. I have done this so the represent a tribe of allied Snakemen, cousins of the main army from a different settlement.

I painted their armour silver rather than gold, and used a palette of blue shields, and green-grey flesh, to give a colder look, as opposed to the more colourful varied look of the main army, to make them look different from the main army.
When I was painting them I decided I needed a bit of a backstory to give them an identity. In spirituality and many religons, gold is often representative of the Sun, and silver the Moon, and so I decided to give these Snakemen the identity of a tribe who followed a (Chaos) Moon deity. As the Moon is also often represented by a Goddess, they became the Snakemen of the Moon Goddess. I also painted their standard with an image of the Moon through the trees I saw in a picture to finish off the idea. 

Enjoy :)

 The Snakemen of the Moon Goddess. 

I went for a paint scheme of grey-green flesh, orange eyes, blue shields, and silver armour.  By painting them in a uniform set of colours, they were a lot quicker to paint than ten more individual Snakemen from the main army.

To give a little individuality I painted some of the axe shafts and bags differing colours. I did keep most of the clothing and fur the same colours to keep the uniformity, and painted them in natural browns to suggest a more Native American looking feel. 

I also used a mix of miniatures, using all of the five different sculpts of Snakemen. In gaming terms they will be equiped with heavy armour, shield, hand weapon, and double handed weapon.

 The regimental leader, S'lonLife Smasher.

 He had a miscast shield which is a common fault with this miniature, and so I added an old Marauder Miniatures Dark Elf shield of the top of it. Being concave and hollow at the back it fitted over the top nicely.

 A converted broken Saranth Elf Mangler, converted to be a standard bearer. Sometimes the casting of the halberd top of this miniature can be weak, and sometimes breaks, leading to me using three of this miniature in the army as converted standard bearers.

I positioned the standard at an angle because when I first converted it I releaised you could'nt actually see the standard front due to the angle!

The standard is based on a picture of the Moon in a piece of artwork I saw in a shop. I also added some runic lettering on the standard to give a little more detail. I chose the name 'Luna' as the name of the Moon Goddess. Looking straight-on at the standard 'Luna' is written on the left in Dark Elf runes from the Warhammer Forces of Fantasy book. On the right, it is written in Dark Tongue from The Lost and the Damned book.  

 S'lararet Splintered Fang.

I painted his shield with a similar look to the standard.

 The first of four S'Sirron Fangthrane.

 I painted the axe shafts different to add a little individuality.

 The second pair of S'Sirron Fangthrane's.

 A pair of Higgat Dwarf Slicer's.

Finally, last but not least, another S'lonLife Smasher, without a miscast shield. 

Next update I will be focusing on the Harpies I have also painted. I bought six more Bob Olley Iron Claw Harpies from e-bay, and painted stripped them and the one I already had, and painted them.

Painting wise I am getting very close to finishing the army. :)