Cat's Marauders

Ohh, yes!
Next wonderful mini

I really like the axe modification. It's great so see you putting so much love into your models. Excellent!

Another small update. Sorry for dark pics.




Next time I'll be adding sleeves on his upper arms, belts/baldricks and shoulder pads . Then furs after that has all dried.

Then I'll have 3 models built for the warband... Oh well, it's still better than no progress.

Wow! Looking good, Catferret. The axe is brilliant, and the chainmail sculpting is fantastic. Is it really tedious to do? I ask because I know I'll have to do it with my own Marauder conversions, when I get to them, and perhaps for a couple of other models that I have planned.

Wow. It's really amazing, I mean both chainmail and axe. Awesome work, your marauders look great.

Hawkeye: It's only tedious if you have to do a lot of it. Small areas are fine. I had to work on this guy in stages or I'd end up putting my fingers in the stuff I'd already done. Break chainmail up into sections. I did his chest, his back, the left coat part and then finally the right coat section.

Further tips include not gluing the arms on until the chainmail is done. Makes it easier to get to his sides. I got too impatient and attached the arms first this time...

Skavenblight: Thanks. Hopefully the rest of the warband will turn out well.

Amazing work as allways.

I'm gonna have a go at some chainmail soon, so this is great for reference!

VERY NICE!

The long chain mail tunic is spectacular, AND the extended Axe REALLY looks good. I like the helmeted head; it makes him look Thrud-like, which, to moi, is a plus. WELL DONE!

Unwanted: Glad it'll be some help.

Deafnala: Yay Thrudd! He's pretty iconic.

Well, we have an update! Champion is nearly finished now. Just have to decide if he's getting furs after all. I'm kinda liking the cloak at the moment. What do folk think?




Still have some general tidying to do on the cloak around his shoulders/neck. Plus maybe still adding some sleeves. Kinda liking the bare arms though. Gives him more movement for swinging the axe.

Gorgeous. There is a certain...gritty and oily efficiency about him. You can almost hear the calm, but heavy breathing echoing from within his heavy, iron helm. And you can almost taste the metallic blood and warm sweat coming from the friction of his chainmail. His wristbands creak ever so slightly as his massive forearms of braided muscle tighten. No bling, no shiny, showey bits, nothing. Just the stark reality that there is a determined killer coming for you and OH MY GOD THERE HE....SPLAT!!!

Thanks Toby. Sounds like I got the pose right then.

Catferret - thanks for the tips on the chainmail, and can I just say - that Marauder is brilliant! The cloak is absolutely fantastic. Beautifully sculpted. And the bare arms look great - sleeves would only get in the way!

Excellent work!

wow! awesome man! I love the cloak! and please keep the arms like this, with sleeves he'd look a lot less fierce

could you, by any chance, give me some advice on making such an awesome cloak (or maybe write a little tut for it ?)

Keep it up!

Hawkeye: Cheers. Good luck with the chainmail. It's not as hard as it looks and impresses folk.

Matt: I'm no good at tutorials, and that was my first go at a cloak, but I'll give you a quick run through of what I did.

1. Get a clean tile or similar smooth surface and slightly dampen it by spreading a thin film of water over it with your finger.
2. Mix up a ball of GS (cut 6mm or so off a standard yellow/blue strip) making sure to remove the central couple of mm where the yellow and blue meet. It is part hardened and will end up causing a lump if you leave it in.
3. Spread the ball out on the damp tile with your finger then roll it into a flat rectangle with a pen or similar tube. Stop when you have it 1mm thick, hopefully the rectangle will also be slightly larger than the size of cloak you want.
4. Set it somewhere safe and do something else for around 2-3 hours.
5. After this time, take a sharp modelling knife and cut out the shape of the cloak (trapezium, basically a rectangle that's narrower at the top) and very carefully peel it off the tile.
6. Before attaching it to the model, put a few folds in it. Having another model handy as reference for the folds will help.
7. Attach the cloak around the model's shoulders then position the rest as you wish.
8. Add more GS to finish off the area around the shoulders.
9. Mock everybody else for not having cool cloaked models.

Hope that helped.

That's an excellent guide, Catferret. I'm going to try it at some point soon, and if it works, I'm going to be putting cloaks on ALL my conversions!

Really fabulous stuff. This warband is really coming together, and it's going to look cool. No question about it!

I ALSO like the furless cloak, for whatever that's worth . The belt & shoulder harness ROCK. VERY WELL DONE! Now paint him up & avoid all my forthcoming whining.

Hmmm. I suppose I could paint up these two before starting work on converting the next lot.

We'll see what transpires over the next couple of days, eh?

I've been waiting for it... And I'm really glad to see your "almost finished" work
It's very, very "chaotic" mini. I can't find anything that I don't like.

Amazing stuff!
Everything is perfect, the mail, the belt, and even the coin pouch. Great work.
I'm not sure where you could fit fur on this model, beside the top of the cape, but what do I know, it could look great.

Skavenblight: Thanks. Glad you like him.

Unwanted: Furs were going to go round the collar but I'm abandoning that idea now. Just going to leave him as he is.

I slightly reworked the neck portion of the cloak as I wasn't 100% happy with it. I'm still not but it'll do I think.

In other news I have just done some GS work on bases for the most recent two guys plus the Chieftain (his old base was temporary). Pics to follow later when I've added more stuff to them.

catferret wrote:

Skavenblight: Thanks. Glad you like him.

Unwanted: Furs were going to go round the collar but I'm abandoning that idea now. Just going to leave him as he is.

I think your forum-fu is fading, I never said anything about fur, It was soeone else

Yeah, I meant Underbheit. It started with a "Un" damn it. :p

I'm almost finished making the bases. Pics shall be taken when the glue dries.

Bases are done. Although it doesn't show well in the pics, the black areas have some PVA glue to give the appearance of mud/water in the puddles and gutter.



And here are the heroes standing proudly atop the bases. They aren't glued in place yet, just pins holding them up just now.





Painting will commence soon!

Wow, those bases came out great! I'm actually happy to see you rebase the Chieftain too as I feel uncomfortable seeing round bases on Mordheim models.

And the Condemned is really cool. Awesome conversion work. As a bonus, since Marauders can also earn the Mutation "skill" you might be able to use this model as a Champion with a claw mutation for when your Condemned is dead (this happened twice to me in my last campaign).

I do have to point out something, though: Marauders of Chaos are meant for the Northern Wastes setting, not for the ruined city. You might get in trouble trying to justify them being in the middle of the Empire. Therefore I would choose bases fitting the BTB/Wastes setting for the marauders. Don't get me wrong, I totally love your work on them but I don't think they fit the warband so well. It's like Lizardmen - they are from a different setting as well.

Alright, didn't mean to be too negative. I do look forward to your next marauder conversion cause these look absolutely great so far!

Ah, but maybe my forthcoming campaign is set in Wolfenburg post Storm of Chaos.

1. Whole place is ruined
2. Plenty of different races loitering around
3. Plenty artefacts buried in the rubble
4. Modern timeline justifies the house rules changes to armour and blackpowder costs and rules