From SamuliS: Amazons and Turnips (Cybertron) (115 points)

This week I have a double whammy for you guys with fairly varied subjects. 

First up a new Bloodbowl team for our clubs league that starts next weekend. These are actually some of the first minis that I started for the challenge, but after rushing them to a level with all surfaces having some paint on them I played a few practice games with them and they got left in a carry case for a while. Now with the league start looming it was time to paint all the highlights and do some proper bases for them.

The team is from Greebo Games and was released through their Kickstarter a couple of years back. Great sculpts and what I especially like is that there are varied body types and not just the "hot bikini blonde" archetype that seems to be fairly common with Amazon models. They also made several extra sets that fit into the theme and allow you to expand the same team to play Norse and Human teams as well which is really nice. Let's see if I get around to painting some of them still during this challenge.

 

 

Pretty standard starter team setup with the maximum Blitzers and 7 linewomen to back them up. I painted up one extra linewoman to add to the team later and to act as a substitute if one of the positionals gets hurt early in the league. Also a couple of markers for the team to count as reroll and turn markers. Especially the little dragon hoarding his Bloodbowl balls is just adorable.

 

 

My next entry takes me to planet Cybertron with some Perry plastics experiencing a transformation into something totally different. I present you the first unit for my coming Turnip28 warband. The world of Turnip hasn't been very actively showcased here (yet), but it is basically Weird Napoleonics with the world having succumbed to worshipping various root vegetables and going at it while covered in mud and all sorts of plant life growing on the battered soldiers. Extremely bizarre and very heavily inspired by the Blanchitsu style.

https://www.patreon.com/Turnip28

My first warband is actually going to be fairly clean compared to the "official" Turnip lore with example models having grass growing on them etc. Technically they would probably be a better match for another new game in a similar style called Sludge. Still I wanted to keep this more as an exercise for making funky looking kitbashes to have what I'd consider great exotic uniforms. My next units will be more modified, but kicking off with a unit of Chaff (or skirmishers) I figured they would be more lightly equipped to be able to move through the mud at a quicker pace.

I've always loved Zouave uniforms, but never really had a suitable project where to paint them as I'm not too interested in any of the periods where they actually appear. So Turnip provided an excellent opportunity to use the Perry ACW Zouave box as a basis for my units. The skirmishers here have weapon arms from the Perry Afgan kit and heads from some of the medieval kits. The jezzails give a really nice archaic feel to them and the helmeted heads really reinforce the idea. For the paint scheme I decided to go with actually a fairly bright uniform as I think that is one of the main appeals of Napoleonics and Weird Napoleonics shouldn't be any different! Though the colours are slightly muted as I did a zenithal basecoat with a sepia ink preshading and painted with very thin layers to allow the undercoat to shine through a little. The next units will see a bit darker overall look as they will have more rusty armor to offset the colourful uniform underneath.

 

The Amazons will provide me with a ticket to Lady Sarah's Star Yacht that will take me to the middle circle after visiting 4 destinations on the outer one. The Turnip soldiers should fit nicely in on planet Cybertron with the transformation theme. With 19 28mm minis (counting the tokens in) and a new planet conquered it should net me 115 more points to my tally bringing me close to my goal of 500 points! I didn't really expect to be able to paint this much at the start of the challenge so it's a pleasant surprise. But the challenge really has got my painting mojo going again and it's really been a joy to put paint on models once again!

I'm always heartened to hear how the Challenge inspires us to Get Stuff Done. Nice basing on both these projects. The red headgear accents on your Zouaves really go well with the pants. Great work on the 'zons! Their Blitzers are hard to put down, but the team can be a little slow. Don't hesitate to up your points target! It's a long bow for Cybertron, but I'll allow it.

Barks