Continuing from yesterday’s posting, let’s take a look at my thoughts about painting my armies in Warhammer Fantasy Battles. Things are surely more complicated here, for I had let this game lie dormant for a long, long time and the painting schemes I used to use are not what I want anymore… my current attitude is to not take things too earnest – still I want miniatures that look more “grim” than “gay” – at least in the original sense. I won’t mind gay characters and, honestly, I don’t care what my soldiers are doing back in the barracks, so to speak… as a result I already pickled all my old fantasy pewters (thereby increasing the stack of unpainted miniatures in my collection to quite an alarming level, mind you). In a way, everything is prepared for a fresh start, yet I still have little or no idea in what way I should paint… so let’s start summing up what I already know or want.
- Dark Elves: for my main army I already know what I want – but I am unsure how to achieve the effect. According to the background I developed for my army, it hails from the north of Naggaroth, from one of the watchtowers bordering the Chaos Wastes. As such, I would like to part from the usual violet/black combination in favor of a “dark” ice theme. I don’t want any clear white on my Elves – that would bring them too close to the look of the High Elves – but I intend to use colours like Space Wolves Grey, Ice Blue and the like. Still I am unsure how to come up with a painting scheme that is both “icy” and “evil” and cool…
- Lizardmen: here I am dithering between using the “normal” blueish painting scheme and settling for a rather brwonish/green scheme that would look more like a “real” lizard. I still remember the first army books of the lizardmen, where the blue scheme was just one possibility among many…
- Chaos Dwarves: ah, finally an “army” where I quite know what I want. The “normal” or official painting scheme is red and black, but that is not how I feel about this army. I want my Chaos Dwarves (few as they may be) to be painted in dark blue and gold – and fortunately, I have all those Mantic Dwarves to train…
- Skaven: this one is more difficult. I think I want my skaven to be even more like warped counterparts to the human empire and I think the colours should reflect that. Probably I will settle for bright colours, red or green and gold, but all tattered and dirty… the Plague Monks will definitely get brown habits, to make them appear even more as monks…
- Dwarves: well, those are a difficult case, as I am having this army primarily because I need some “good” and “happy” army I can show to those of my relatives who are sensible… so they really need a happy, bright appearance… I was thinking about some blue and white scheme, a bit bavarian, perhaps, but green and white might be just as well.
- Nightgoblins: well, this one is a fun army, so probably I just stick with the “official” painting scheme. I would like to experiment with an easier way of highlighting, though, such as painting the robes in a dark greyish tone or something and using black wash to get depth and shadow unto the miniatures.
And that’s all for now… really have to get seriously into painting again, developing the schemes I want…
