Rodentia Ex Machina
I just completed my massive Skaven Renegade & Heretic army in time for the Astronomicon tourny in Toronto this weekend!
I’ve been wanting to make this army since imperial armour 13 dropped with the R&H army list, and I knew Skaven were going to be my go to because I think they’re such a great and characterful range of models (also I already have a guard army, and I didn’t want to repeat myself!). With the way the R&H (and the Vraks horde list in particular) can respawn, this is truly the epitome of an endless ravening horde of evil minions (backed up by some colossus stompy robots)!
I started collecting parts for assembly about a year ago, grabbing bits off ebay. The Skaven Clanrats were perfect to buy in bulk, coming in around only .50cents per model, but then I also needed to stock up on Dark Eldar arms for pistols and melee weapons. The DE arms are a perfect fit and aesthetic, but I had to do a -lot- of shaving off clanrat left arms (shield arms) to add pistol/weapon combos to the majority of the infantry.
Painting the chaff was geared purely for production line efficiency. They’re 3 point models, so they only need to look good ‘en masse. Primed brown, basecolour grey/red/metal, a quick dip in Army Painter Strong Tone, sprayed with Dullcoat, pick out eyes/teeth/rivets and base with copious amounts of blood. The majority of the 100 or so infantry models were painted in about a month, on and off.
The army consists of 6x 15 man infantry squads (that respawn on a 2+), 3 Helbrutes, 3 Soul Grinders, 3 Rapiers, and assorted support/command infantry.
The Vermin Lord, who’s difficult to photograph because of his hunchy pose.
Some officers and banner/sigil bearers to keep the scum in line. The Stormvermin kit is great, and helps to bring the horde up to a more human sized height.
A few flamer carriers (each squad has 2). The flamers are cut down Kroot Rifles, Cadian flamer packs, and some wire for the hose.
Lascannon Disciple team. They come with the Lord, but they snipe things pretty well.
Laser Destroyer Rapier Battery cobbled together from some Manic Forgefather tracks and a bunch of random bits. I know they’re supposed to have quad lascannons, but I could’nt figure out a way to make that look good. So they just have magic dragon heads that gives them extra powa’.
