Verminlord Skrax's Lair - Display Board

With my custom army project I have going on, it definitely needs a unique display board to convey what I am trying to achieve with this army. Verminlord Skrax runs his whole operation on a dead imperial world. First initial ideas were in a set of ruins and my initial sketches for a display board were pretty standard. A square board, with a backing, maybe a 1" level on it, some machinery in the background, etc. It was frankly pretty standard.

Then my brother, Jarom, sketched up an idea which got me really excited. A cutaway of a sewer system. Mainly a large sewer pipe that runs into the underground and that's where his lair is. I wondered how to do it, but he suggested a big 5 gallon bucket cut in half. So after some discussion we came up with this sketch:

The idea is a cutaway of a large sewer system you would find on an imperial world. So there is one giant pipe running deep, and 2 smaller pipes going out from it. With a lot of dirt and grime accumulation over years, it will be filled with dirt that will make up the ground of the system. Some other smaller pipes are draining into it as well. Also I liked the idea of the Venoms hovering in the pipeway instead of on their normal flying bases. But that will depend on how cramped things are.

So I cut out what i needed and got a basic idea of the shaping of it all. The bucket is one of those orange home depot buckets. Instead of cutting it completely in half, I kept the bottom intact so I have a more stable platform to mount everything. Then I have the 2 pipe holes on the sides. Those 2 pipes are made from a smaller bucket, which is actually one of those underground sprinkler valve boxes.

I cut down the foam core and glued the bucket down using gorilla glue and some of my 'heavier' books from my collection. I am really glad I kept the bottom of the bucket on for this.

Here it is glued down. The side pipes are checked again for fit. Now to get them glued to the foam and bucket.

I really think this is going to turn out to be something cool when it is all built and painted.

The Coven of Verminlord Skrax - WIP Haemonculus w/ Webway Portal

The last bits of my Haemonculus Covens army are the haemonculi. There will be 3 of them because one is needed for the Dark Artisan formation (which will be my warlord, Verminlord Skrax) and the 2 needed for the Covenite Coterie detachment. When Signourax was evolving the rats on the world he was stranded on, some turned into monstrous creatures, and others became smarter and more creative. Some of these became his assistants and lieutenants. This is Warplord Tich, and the large coil on his back represents him carrying a Webway Portal. This is the same coil on the backs of the grotesques. Sigcourax does not have the technology for the webway, so he and his rat assistants have developed a simple form of teleportation.

The base model is a Mantic Veer'myn hero model (forgot what it was called). The conversions are the coil on its back, and replacing the large drill with a warpstone piece from some Skaven bits I ordered (this one in particular is a Warp Lightning gun from the Doomwheel kit). And of course a Dark Eldar splinter pistol on its other arm. Finally the head is one of the brain-rats from the Stormfiends kit. The smarter rats are the smaller ones, hence the pilots of their vehicles, and since this one needs to be in the front lines to escort the grotesques, Sigcourax created for him an augmented body suit.

The Holy Grail of Terrain Building!

I have found the best spray paint for terrain builders. It's affordable (About $5 a can), it does a nice even coat, and best of all:

IT DOES NOT MELT FOAM!

I couldn't believe it either. Rustoleum Flat Primer is what I have been searching for. I stumbled on the discovery when I was testing spray on primers for my Zone Mortalis tiles. They have foam parts, and I worried about the spray paint eating into them, and weakening my whole project. So I ran a few tests. I got a couple brands of craft acrylics and painted a coat on some pieces of foam, and used a spray paint I already had, Krylon brand, and this is what I got:

It ate right through the acrylic coat and into the foam. I figured I would need to do a couple more coats of the craft acrylics and test again, but I was running low on spray paint anyway. So I got into home depot and found the Rustoleum, thought I'd give it a try. Then I did the same test again, and got this:

This one looked much better. Then I noticed that it wasn't eating through the places where I didn't get the acrylic undercoat. So I got 2 pieces of foam (one pink and one blue) without paint on them and tried the spray:

I could not believe it. This is the stuff I have wanted all along. This makes my job so much easier. I was worried that I would need to paint in all the nooks and crannies of the tiles to get the foam, potentially covering up some of the details of the plaster bits with the thick acrylics. Now I don't need to. I took that can and sprayed about 5 tiles before it ran out.

They look so much better even just primed. Naturally I bought 5 more cans of this stuff then next time I found myself in Home Depot.

The Coven of Verminlord Skrax - WIP Cronos

Also in the Dark Artisan formation will be this armies lone Cronos, or as it will be called: the Swarm Nexus. The idea is this is a blinded powerful giant floating rat filled to the brim with energy stones that the Haemonculus uses to control his minions, and give them added vitality. A majority of this model will be painted with a warpstone glowing effect.

As per the Talos, the base model is the Skaven Stormfiend. The flying rod is similar to what I used for my floating bases, so this will be painted black to hopefully keep the attention on the main model itself, while still giving me a very strong floating base.

Zone Mortalis Tiles Project - 16 down, 2 to go

Here is my completed 4x4 Zone Mortalis board. I just now have to get started soon on the insurmountable task of painting it all.

The last tile I made has this pit in it, and this will be for several uses.

Just a pit, to restrict movement, but not block LoS. The control panels on the corners can be used to call an elevator if the scenario demands it.

The pit can also house an objective or asset depending on your narrative or scenario. I have my Riptide in here to show scale, but the true reason for this pit will be revealed in a later post.

I built this spire specifically for the pit, and it is meant to have control panels on it. This could be an objective or just something to provide cover in an otherwise LoS-free tile. If this is to be an objective, I would rule that a model's base needs to be touching it to activate/control. The reason for this is the control panels on the corners of the pit....

...are used to extend the walkways to get to the objective. Or these could already be there for ease.

And I did say I would be done when I made 16 tiles, but I lied. I realized when I got these 16 done, that if I made just 2 more, then I could still do either a single 4x4 table, or I could do two 3x3 tables, which is something that would be ideal if I ran some sort of event or campaign. So I have laid out plans for 2 more unique tiles, because I already have 2 of each Forgeworld tile designes. These 2 new ones will be different and add some variety to my tiles.

When all these tiles are painted, I will do a little featurette on the details and designs of each tile.