Yes, I know we are Aztec Lizards who Ride Dinosaurs, but apparently, this is a thing. An old gaming buddy of mine mentioned it in passing (possibly to derail my train of thought - I have ADD so I get sidetracked easily). In essence, the Skavenblight Challenge goes as follows: 1: Almost every gamer who has played WFB, 40K, or AoS, has purchased or somehow otherwise obtained at least ONE Skaven miniature at some point. The core concept behind the Challenge is to get those minis out of your bitz boxes and actually do something with them. The goal is to make a 1000 point army. 2: Scoring. You start with 0 points. +1 point per Wound for every miniature you can dig out of your bitz boxes and use. -1 point for every dollar you have to spend to reach 1000 points. Do not count the purchase of bases or paint, as these are accessories and not actual miniatures. You don't have to PAINT the minis, just see if you can make an army out of them, using the current Skavenblight AoS book. So being prone to getting sidetracked, I got sidetracked. Digging through my bins and miniatures case, I turned up a bunch of stuff I bought to use with my 40K Renegades and Heretics army back during previous editions of the game. These are minis that, for whatever reason, I can no longer use or want to use. I dug up: 32 Giant Rats, 2 Rat Ogres, 1 (old metal) Daemon of the Horned Rat, Throt the Grotesque (old Clan Moulder special character sculpt - missing a hand, but I can make it work), one metal Packmaster (again, missing a weapon), 6 off-sculpt Flesh Hounds (the metal ones from the late 90's/early 2000's that had all the horns and no neck frills), one Reaper "Giant Wererat," and a bunch of bits. Enough bits that I could cobble three Packmasters up using Gutter Runner bodies and Grot Runtherd whips and man-catchers. I also cobbled together two Rat Swarm bases using not-so-giant rats from various sets and sprue bits. While I could use the Gutter Runner bits to do some Clan Eshin stuff, I had no Clanrats or Stormvermin. This kind of forced me to go with Clan Moulder, using the Rat Ogres and Giant Rats as my Battleline units. Using the Reaper mini and the Daemon of the Horned Rat as Rat Ogres, that gave me: 30 Giant Rats, 5 Skaven Wolf-Rats, 4 Rat Ogres, 3 Packmasters, 2 Master Moulders, and 2 Rat Swarm bases. Oh, and two Giant Rats extra for later. 0 + 72 wounds = 72 points base. I could actually make my 1000 points right there by taking the Fleshmeld Menagerie Battallion, if I wanted to. Instead, I spent $42 on a box of Rat Ogres/Giant Rats/Packmasters. 72 points - $42 = 30 points. I'm okay with this. It gives me a decent 1000 point army, and if I want to use the Battallion I can drop a few things to take it. I have: 2 Master Moulders, 2 units of 3 Packmasters, 6 Rat Ogres (which I may split into two units - have to see how they play), 40 Giant Rats in one BIG pack for bonuses, 5 Wolf-Rats, and 2 Rat Swarm bases. 980 points. Flesh-hounds turned Wolf-Rats aren't in the picture because I'm still working on how to base them. They use 75mm oval bases, so there's a LOT of 'black space' on the bases I need to fill... Also big box of Giant Rats: Anyone else up for the challenge? Yes, I know this kind of favors people who already HAVE Skaven armies. The whole idea behind the challenge was to get people to dredge stuff out of their bitz bins and see what they could do with everything...
Oh - if anyone wonders, the Master Moulder with Therrot on the base is an old Throt the Grotesque sculpt, missing one hand. I gave him an open hand from a plastic Catachan soldier, then added a ball taken from the head of a Clanrat drummer's mallet. I'm going to paint it red and tell my opponent he's making the Wolf-Rats play Fetch.
Interesting question. Answer is: I don't know. The whole concept behind the challenge was to get people to dig unused minis out of storage and make an army with them, but in my book if you already have a fully painted army, then you a: don't NEED the Skavenblight Challenge, and b: technically you've already won. Three times over, from the sound of it... Seriously, I've been digging since my friend mentioned it, and I can't find any kind of official website or information on it beyond what he told me. Near as I can tell, there's no prizes for winning or getting the most points. It is just an exercise in digging out minis you don't use and making use of them.