Chaos Comes

I've probably mentioned my big old undivided chaos force for a while, its one of my major projects sort of like my ever growing pool of post apocalyptica. The idea is just to have a large selection of models for skirmish games, for basically whichever systems that tickle my fancy.

However one thing that has held me back a little bit is how to resolve the matter of basing. With a group so diverse its important to have some sort of unifying basing. And my recent forays have been less than stellar, with my Bog Crone and her followers basically having a black base with some flocking on, and my black goblins having some reddish ground. Both didn't quite work for various reasons (1 being awful, 2 using washes doesn't give the same depth as starting with a darker colour as base).

And this problem hinted at the bigger issue I hadn't quite addressed: Where do my chaos beings make their home? Are we talking barren frozen plains, deep dark woods, or maybe the endless sewers beneath the empires of man? To me I wanted the chaos homeland to feel like an ancient, volatile and primordial place. Luckily a tour of the internet gave me some good images for nailing the aesthetic.

First stop on our tour-de-chaos is the concept art of the Blasted Lands from World of Warcraft. Its barren, inhospitable, and there is a looming feeling that something terrible happened there once (hint: it did). To me a lot of the appeal from chaos in fantasy is the notion that man is small and infantile, and ultimately powerless against the greater forces that be. You could say its sort of a cosmic horror take, although I feel no need for a great cosmos or eldritch beings, but I'd rather paint the world itself as this cataclysmically powerful thing that the a place that mankind in their hubris tries to tame in their arrogance.

And speaking of cataclysmic, this takes us to the second picture on our tour. This is concept art of Vvardenfell in the Elder Scrolls Online. A volcanic island in the lands of Morrowwind. There the moutain they lived on erupted and tore their lands asunder. But as a really interesting counter-point to the destruction is the variety of weird creatures and plants that grew in fertile ashen soil now. And this to me nails another core tenant of chaos. That nothing is permanent, chaos isn't just about destruction but about change, radical change, but change none the less. Its about the folly of believing you can make something eternal, and acknowledging how fleeting things may be.

The final picture I sadly haven't been able to track down the source of, as its on various pages with wallpapers. But again we have a dark and foreboding nature, which for a biology lover like me is super important. Chaos is change, and that means biodiversity, as even nature becomes a canvas where this constant push and pull is enacted. 

Anyhow that was a long intro just to talk about basing. Sadly I didn't have most of these thoughts during the basing process, but rather they came to me with a happy little accident. You see I was planning on contrasting the hideousness of my beastmen, demons and whatnot by having their bases being green fields with a few flowers, but the brown paint I had picked out was a burnt ocre, and seeing some of the results I kinda wanted to go back to the idea of the chaos wastes.

This is step one of what will likely be a long and involved process, one that will involve some more shading on the basing, some tufts of weird foliage and some more movement trays. The above shot is of a collection of lads, but there are quite a few extras out of frame. What was really important for me in making these groups is the lack of uniformity, I mean there are some black goblins, skavens and beastmen around in there, but I'd rather not arrange them all in specific clusters.

Realising I had quite a horde, and about 5 additional infantry stands in the works I reached out and got myself a copy of Of Armies and Hordes by Ganesha Games. I've always sort of wanted to take part in the splendor of larger scale wargames, but have never had the patience to paint a bunch of lads in matching uniforms. But this broken mess of never-do-wells is much more approachable to me, so lets go over who is present and accounted for.

Here are my three infantry groups, I have deliberately made them very motley because I feel like that fits the spirit of chaos very well. However along the line I may assort them according to equipment a bit more, so that there'll be a group in heavy armour, one with big weapons, one with paired weapons and maybe even some infiltrators, we'll see.

I shouldn't play favorites, but my lord do I adore this group of ranged attackers. They're not all gunners, and I kinda love that hodge podge effect of having a warplock jezzail next to a tzeetch sorcerer with a familiar, and a skaven speaker of the word. You just know all kinds of magical pain is coming your way from these guys.

Here is another favorite and old-timer, Skragg the two-headed mutant warlord, he'll likely serve as some sort of hero in the army - slinging spells, insults and crossbow bolts.

Another favorite of mine, and genuine kitbash, a bullcentaur given a new bestial lower section with even more tusks. He is 100% gonna be another monsterous hero, tearing through enemies in ravenous fire-belching charges.

And another two-for-one-deal, my dark goblin witch given a ride on the back of my massive rat ogre mount, she'll probably be the general for now, calling out commands and flinging hexes at her foes as old bonebreaker will keep her safe.

Stats aren't quite a thing yet, but it will happen once I give Of Armies and Hordes a proper read and from there who knows what will happen, there is certainly another wave of reinforcements coming from Knightmare Games soon as well as hopefully some of the beautiful weirdos made by Eureka Miniatuers. All in all today is a good day to be worshipping the dark gods!