The slithering serpent tribe

 

Much like Necromunda Mordheim also have its band of warrior girls, two no less! Since our usual setting is the steaming jungles of Lustria I decided to go with a 3D printed tribe of amazons; that also gave an oportunity to try my hand at painting tattoos, a little seen feature on minis that would give an exotic touch to these fearsome handmaidens of the gods.

Priestess Chel is the leader of the gang. A member of the ruling sisterhood of Rigg, she is equipped with an ancient sunstaff, a weapon of the Old Ones capable of firing a beam of pure enrgy. In the slithering serpent tribe tattoos are a mark of status, so a powerful noble like her is covered head to foot in them!

Zuma is one of the tribe's bersekers, specialist warriors that enter into a frenzy before battle and launch themselves at the foe without fear. To increase her damage output I gave her a Claw of the Old Ones, a lightsaber sword capable of cutting through armour like it's hot butter, it will certainly prove useful against the up-armoured saurus of my father's warband

Akna is the first of two champions, capable warriors that excel at both ranged and hand to hand combat, she is armed with a buckler and a maul

Lepoard print was a must for these girls, but it ended looking to much like their skin

The Coatl is a powerful symbol for the amazons, that like to wear their feathers for luck and tattoo its figure on their skin to get some of their legendary speed and grace

Eztli is the second berseker, armed with claw and buckler too

Snakes are the totem animal of the tribe, and Sotek is revered next to Rigg as god of war and vengeance. In fact whenever a member of the tribe comes of age they ink up his holy serpent on their bodies as part of the rites of passage, and there is at least one on all members of the warband

The fianl heroine of the band is Xoco, armed also with macana (maul) and buckler

Colel is the first of the henchwomen, equipped for hand to hand also

However the main armament of the baseline troops is the bow, an effective weapon in the constant rain of Lustria that is both cheap and long ranged

The white roses that I painted on her were obscured by the ink wash so I'll stick with yellow/red/purple/pink ones in the future

Yolotli is another henchwoman armed with a bow, she is quite young so she hasn't got many tattoos yet, but her aim with the bow however is still as good as that of her sisters

Being dwellers of the jungle vegetal patterns like roses, plants, and geometric leaves are quite popular amongst the amazon tribes of Lustria

Payaan is the warband's scout, ranging ahead of the tribe and hiding herself in the jungle before striking unexpectedly. She is also a great model for the amazon (kislevite) ranger we like to hire in our games

Finally Itzae is the last fighter of the band, with a look inspired on ivy Valentine from Soul Calibur

Yearly Recap

Hi all, this year has been arguably the best in the history of this blog. An unparalleled number of visits, followers and new settings such as Star Wars and Lepanto have been the highlights of 2021, together with the first Vauban style siege.

The year began with a new project, Star Wars Legion, that brought to the field the armies and navies of the Republic and the Separatist Alliance.

I spent the first months of the year painting the starter set and some other goodies to bring both forces to the standard size of 800 points, and added some flavor in the shape of the Deathwatch and of course Ahsoka Tano. The first games were space battles while I finished the ground troops, and after a brief Titanicus interlude the land campaign began in march with a fight over the Kuat shipyards. Both systems were then merged into one with a new campaign system that combined both ground and space battles based on the Empire at War videogame that I’ll be sure to retry next year.

In may Mordheim made a comeback with another Lustrian campaign. While nowadays I’m mostly disconnected from the fantasy/AoS scene this little skirmish game has always had a place in my heart. Besides, thanks to the low model count you can get a game without having to spend too much.

July marked in a way the return of the blog to historical wargaming, with a new star fortress and a campaign that recreated the most famous sieges of 1808-1809 at the start of the Peninsular War.

The release of the excellent and long awaited redemptionists in June steered me back towards Necromunda during the summer. In september Klovis and his zealots brought faith and fury to the Underhive, were they purged some heretical eschers and cultists or their unspeakable sins, praise be!

The celebration of 450 years of the epic battle of Lepanto finally made me jump into the pond of modern galley gaming, and I brought together two fleets that battled it out in mid-october. Thank God, as in 1571 the day was won by Don Juan’s Holy League. My father rather liked the system so we’ll be sure to game some more encounters like Preveza o Los Gleves.

Not satisfied with the many BFG games we had played during the year I scheduled an Eye of Terror campaign in novemeber, pushed of course by the excellent Armada 2, a videogame that has single handedly performed the miracle of resurrecting this much defunct game all over the world.

As always the last month of the year was a rush to play all those forgotten games that were gathering dust in the shelves, with a desperate refight of the battle of Asculum taking place this afternoon.

For the next year I’ll begin repainting most of my marines into Black Templars, a chapter that I had liked since reading the Tankred comic, and that hasn’t got a proper codex since the Master of Mankind walked among men (2005). Then I will get two more armies of rebels and imperials for Star Wars.

In the game scene we’ll begin with another lustrian campaign while I repaint the templars, then a combined BFG-40k campaign set in the Cadian Gate and after that we’ll start the rebels vs empire bash around mid march. Austerlitz and Necromunda are scheduled somewhere late in 2022.

Ok enough bore, time for 2021's top ten:

1: Kuat Finale

Unsurprisingly the most viewed post of the year has been a Star Wars Legion battle, during the campaign I built up both armies from a small 500 points force to a full fledged army. The week by week porgress increased interest exponentially, leading to a peak on the last battle, were all models made it to the table.

2: Mordheim naval

Ship battles have always been popular in this blog and Mordheim is no exception, the eastern coast of Lustria is pretty much the Caribbean after all! I tend to combine both jungle and sea fights to spice things up and change the setting, much like the ash wastes games that we played in Necromunda with cars and dust storms

3: More Legion

In July I went to Oriol's house for a mix of LoTR (Moria) and Star Wars games, and this encounter proved to be quite popular. Fortunately he has got a big house with plenty of secenery, so games at his place tend to be more spectacular.

4: Kuat showdown

Yet another campaign ending, this time with a separatist attack on the capital that was foiled by best girl Ahsoka and her clone buddies

5: Grievous

Everyone's favourite coughing droid was the only character to enter the top ten. In the game he may be trash and die to Kenobi everytime, but  in my humbe opinion he is still the best baddie from the prequels, besides he was very easy and quick to paint.

6: Wagram

The previous game, Aspern Essling, had produced tons of hate in TMP, so everyone flocked to this post eager for more. Oddly enough I had just changed my computer and it deleted all photos save one, which made the hatewave peter out into nothing quickly enough.

7: Roses

Our first siege got an understandable level of attention after all the hype of the fortress's construction. As ever my dad was soundly beaten, and the imperial eagle flew proudly over the rebel citadel after a long and gruelling fight. This was also the first playtest of the siege system, increasingly refined over the following games.

8: Blackwater

This little map was the one we used for our necromunda campaign, a desolate island in the middle of the slag sea. I had hoped for some car fights but all games took place on the industrialized east coast. For our next setting we'll go full Ash Wastes in a westernesque Slag Coast setting with new buildings and the settlement system of the latest supplement.

9: SW maps

My campaign maps appear to be quite popular over a range of forums and boards, getting tons of visits despite being simple photoshop edits... ok if that's what you want I'll do tons of maps this next year, I still need one for the Eye of Terror after all

10: Maul's Mandos 

Mandalorians have been one of the best parts of Star Wars. Their unwavering creed, awesome looks, abilities and tragic history making them into a quite likable people. The red tinted supercommandos from the Clone Wars final season made it just to the list, and are ready to fight the malevolent Galactic Empire in any upcoming Legion games.

Well, wish you all a happy new year and best luck for all your projects/resolutions/pile of shame, this year will be the first without unpainted minis and you know it!