Host of the Culchan Plains (aka "who's a pretty boy then")

Hi all,

This is an attempt to bring some sort of order and structure to my new project, my first Lizardman army.

I've just started this project at the advent of 8th edition having been thinking about it for a while. I don't however seem to be able to work on an army unless it is my own special take on it, with conversions and kitbashes galore!
(My Bretonnian army is Kislevite, my Wood Elves have all the Glade Guard converted Native American style). This project is to be no exception.

Now to begin with, I have always liked the Kroot models from 40k but have no real interest in playing that game of pew! pew! and tanks. So I had often been toying with the idea of using them for WFB. I have seen them used well as Beastmen, but I've played Beastmen and not hugely enjoyed it, so that was out.

The other option that I've come across (and seen done well) was for them to be used as Saurus. So with the new Lizardmen coming out it seemed like the perfect opportunity to go for a themed Lizardman army.

However, just having Kroot as Saurus was a bit of a half-arsed theme in my book and so I decided I wanted to do a bit more than that. I really like the weird crossover look between bird and lizard that the Kroot have and I wanted to run with the idea of the evolution of birds.

Reading up a bit on some Lizardman fluff I came across the snippets of info relating to Culchan.... What's that? Huge, carnivorous birds that roam around Lizardman territory and are sometimes used by skinks? That sounds brilliant and my early-bird theme was starting to take shape.

I loved the idea of Culchan being herded into battle by skinks (as opposed to being ridden by them or by Saurus) and it seemed that this would work brilliantly as Skrox, with the big birds standing in place of Kroxigor.

So, that was a couple of units working towards the theme, but I was a little bit stuck about how a Slann might fit into this until I came across references to (and some old 5/6ed rules for) Coatl.
Big, magical, feathered serpents? That sounds to me like a perfect stand-in Slann Mage Priest and the overall fluff started to come to me.

The Host of the Culchan Plains revere an ancient Coatl, Chuculcan, the Plumed One. Nesting deep in the vast plains of Culchan, its offspring are all around, from the Culchan birds that roam the grassland, to the evolved (some might argue mutated) warriors who defend its nesting sites.

So there you have it. I had some ideas about models and could felt I could defend my thematic choice without stretching the traditional Lizardman fluff too much (others might disagree and think this is an abomination. I respect that, but it's my army so )

Now I wanted the army to be visually similar to Lizardmen but not using Saurus models, so I decided on blue skin as a colour linked by many to Lizardmen. Having a look around at various blue coloured birds and at the Kroot models themselves it seemed clear to me that parrots of the macaw family would be ripe for plundering (hence the subtitle to this thread!). They also have a number of different 'flavours' that incorporate a number of different colours, allowing me scope to branch out for the more exotic units (ripperdactyls, my Coatl-Slann etc...)

So I ordered some bits, grabbed some glue and paintbrushes and have got to work. That's what this plog is all about and I hope I'm able to keep it updated (although it seems I'm rubbish at taking photos).

 

Re: Host of the Culchan Plains (aka "who's a pretty boy then

Awesome theme man,

Here's some companies I know of that have models like that..

https://www.reapermini.com/Miniatures/bird/latest

Warplock minitures has some "Death kiwis" that should fit the bill as well (pun intended)
(warploqueminiatures) no comercial site yet, just some kickstarters so far.


Ps. don't wory this site usualy resizes pics to fit the screen anyway.

 

Re: Host of the Culchan Plains (aka "who's a pretty boy then

So, my first post was some ramblings about what this plog was all about and some thoughts on my theme. I thought however that I should also post some images...

So without further ado, here are my Temple Guard (still missing shields which will follow soon).


The unit's musician beating his drum


One Temple Guard on his lonesome


I've gone for a blue-and-yellow macaw inspired theme for these guys, as I wanted them to stand out more from the standard Saurus Warrior-Kroot.

Only about 6 more to go and the unit will be complete (for the 2000pts force) I'll try and get some more individual shots up soon too.

 

Re: Host of the Culchan Plains (aka "who's a pretty boy then

Fantastic idea and theme you have here and your models and paint on them represents this well. Off to a good start and I'm looking forward to seeing more stuff from you.

 

Re: Host of the Culchan Plains (aka "who's a pretty boy then

Thanks for the feedback chaps.

@n810: Funny that you should mention finding miniatures that fit into the theme, I think they'll be a whole post/rant on this very topic coming up soon!

I've had my eye on the Axebeak as a potential Kroxigor stand-in, but I'm not wholly convinced that it's quite large enough, the pose means it won't rear above the skinks like I want them to and it's a little on the cartoony-side for my tastes.

The Death Kiwis from warploque do look pretty good, but as you say mostly they're part of a Kickstarter and unavailable to buy (bar one sculpt). They're definitely on my Kroxy-proxy list, but I've no idea when they'll come on general release.

 

Re: Host of the Culchan Plains (aka "who's a pretty boy then

Oh this one isn't half bad for a vinal model.
http://www.everythingdinosaur.com/review/product/list/id/891/category/34/


Oh this guy might make for a unique Carnasaur.

http://www.everythingdinosaur.com/carnegie-safari-therizinosaurus.html

 

Re: Host of the Culchan Plains (aka "who's a pretty boy then

This is a really great idea that i cannot wait to see developed. Am really curious to see what you do with the skinks Please carry on!

 

Re: Host of the Culchan Plains (aka "who's a pretty boy then

So I managed to get a bit more work done (but naughtily not on finishing off the TG... shame on me!)

Instead, I got sidetracked into finishing my Salamander conversion. As you'll probably see, it's based on an old plastic Cold One, with the addition of a large back fin (reminiscent of the older-style sallies) and a neck frill (to match the new ones), plus a bit of green stuffing to help the join.

The back fin is actually one half of the reins from the High Elf Dragon kit which required very little in the way of trimming to fit to be honest! The neck frill is (I think) some random part from the mortis engine/coven throne kit that found its way into my bits box.









(again picture quality isn't great but it's so much easier to take snaps with my phone than faff about with the digital camera and memory cards etc...)

I've got a few more of those old Cold One knocking around and so can convert some more up into Sallies/Razordons as time goes on.

So as you can see, not everything in the army is going to be full-on 'birded up'. There'll still be a place for scaly lizard-types too. This is for a few reasons, firstly it is help maintain the link between my conversions and the standard Lizardman army. Secondly, it's an inspiration thing. I've not been able to conceptualise how some of the units in the book might be converted to lizard/birds. This then links into the convenience thing. I do want to play with this army, and so having to shoehorn conversion ideas in just for the sake of it is not something I want to spend time doing.

To that end we've got the Sallie above (sure it's a conversion but I couldn't square it into being a bird/lizard thing at the moment). It also means that my skinks will be just the standard skink models. There' just too many of them to convert and I don't have a decent idea about how to change them to make them better than they already are. Fluff-wise I figured skinks get EVERYWHERE... even into the plains of Culchan, so there's no need from that perspective to convert them up.
Hopefully you won't be too disappointed by that Pizzasaurus!

and N810, thanks for the suggested models. the Gastornis looks pretty good for a plastic toy and I've added it to my Kroxy-proxy list too - looking at some measurements for it though, it looks like it might be too big... I might just take a punt and get one to see.

Hopefully I've got some time for painting this evening and I might get the TG finished off, and maybe finish off my Saurus Warrior test models.

All comments happily received (constructive or otherwise!)

 

Re: Host of the Culchan Plains (aka "who's a pretty boy then

Update time!

I've finally managed to finish my Temple Guard unit (just the movement tray to do now). I can't believe it took me so long to paint 30 shields, but it seemed to take all evening!

So here's some pics of it:

Head on shot


Front-right


Left


Right


Champion


Sample rank-and-file


I'm pretty happy with how this unit has come out in the end, but of course I'll happily receive comments and criticisms on how to improve it.


A word on basing
Obviously, being based on an army from the Culchan Plains, I wanted to go for a grassland/praire style look. I had some fairly light green flock (that I've probably had for about 20 years!) and with a basecoat and base edges painted with Desert Yellow it provided a nice base. The bases did, however, need something more to them to make them more interesting.

I had already bought some static grass tufts from eBay (seller ID: tajima1) and was very happy with them. I had gone for 'Wild Grass tufts' as it seemed a decent colour match for the sun-bleached high plain look I was going for. However I wanted to add some more tufts to give them impression of the army marching through lots of long grass and I wanted to go for a second grass colour.

As I was passing my local GW I dropped in and decided to buy some tufts there and then. I went for the Mordheim Turf, but frankly it was more like Mordheim Turd... The quality is nothing like as good as the tajima1 stuff I bought from eBay and the adhesive pads are as sticky as teflon. The ones I've used to date have to be superglued on which is a massive pain. The tufts themselves are markedly inferior and just don't look as good. Overall I was very disappointed.

Needless to say I'll be purchasing some more from tajima1 (who I can heartily recommend)

Another post to follow shortly with some samples for my Saurus Warriors and my take on a Ripperdactyl!

 

Re: Host of the Culchan Plains (aka "who's a pretty boy then

And now we move onto the test models for my Saurus Warriors.

Firstly I wanted them to have the same blue skin as my Temple Guard. I wanted there to be the visual link between the two 'Saurus' unit types in my army as well as to the classic Lizardman blue skin look.

However, I also wanted the Saurus warriors to look different to the Temple Guard to make it easier to tell the difference between them and the TG unit. I thought they should be less colourful and less well-equipped than the elite TG.
So I went back to my macaw source of inspiration and lo and behold we have the Hyacinth Macaw (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyacinth_Macaw)
A similar blue main colour with only small patches of yellow around the eyes. It seemed to be exactly what I was looking for. So I've trialled this scheme on a couple of test models.





Initially they had blue head quills as well, but it just didn't look quite right. Too much blue and not enough of a contrast from the eye patch colour. So rather than going with the vibrant yellow of the TG, I decided on white.

I've used goblin wicker shields instead of the golden ones of the TG to try and further differentiate them.

Has it worked do you think? Are they different enough from the TG?
(maybe a photo showing them next to each other might help...)

 

Re: Host of the Culchan Plains (aka "who's a pretty boy then

And finally, it's time for my take on a Ripperdactyl.

Given the bird them to the army, it would be crazy not to take some of the flying options available to the Lizardman army. Ripperdactyls are something of a tricky tool to use, failing more often than succeeding in their games so far, but I love the idea of them, the psychological impact they have on my opponent has massively outweighed their damage output, and I couldn't not use them...

So, what to do in terms of representing these frenzied killers in my army. Well it so happened that I had some spare Wood Elf Warhawks squirreled away somewhere. With a suitable paint job and some skink riders, they would be near perfect, I thought!

However, I did want to move them slightly towards my theme and so modelled on some claws to give them that proto-bird look (similar to the archaeopteryx).

In terms of painting, for something blood-spilling and frenzied a red scheme seemed appropriate and so I once again returned to the Macaw family. Once again this came up trumps and I have shamelessly ripped off the Scarlet Macaw (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scarlet_Macaw) this time!





It's only on looking at these photos that I can see that there are areas where the paint hasn't got into all the feather recesses, so a bit of touching up the paint will be required. However it shows you what the plan is for the rest of the Ripperdactyls.

I'll be working on the rider next to try and get him finished before moving on to the other two killer parrots!

And that brings everything up to date...

 

Re: Host of the Culchan Plains (aka "who's a pretty boy then

It's a really cool idea and I love your units so far

Slight complaint is that the underside of a scarlet macaws "blue" wing feathers are actually yellow, with a bit of blue showing through (my parents used to have one of the least friendly scarlet macaws ever inflicted on a 7 year old boy with a love of pretty things and a slow learning curve with respect to sharp and powerful beak)

 

Re: Host of the Culchan Plains (aka "who's a pretty boy then

Thanks hilburn (although I was expecting criticism to be about my painting or photography skills, not my slack ornithological research skills! )

When looking at the photos I was using to try and get the colour scheme fixed, it was never very clear what colour the underwing feathers actually were (they quite often looked oddly reddy/yellowy/grey). When painting up the next Ripperdactyl, I might try and do it to be more like a real life macaw, but then again I am only really using the macaws as inspiration rather than trying to make exact representations of them.

Hopefully will get some time to do a bit more painting tomorrow evening. The question is, however, what to work on? More Saurus Warriors? Some of the myriad skinks? The Ripper riders? Maybe even my Coatl-Slann?

The agony of choice...