Stargrave – The Talons of Solubris

The paint job started with a Halfords grey plastic primer spray. I hit the whole mini with a Nulin Oil wash to help pop out the details for me. Then the skin was a Morghast Bone base with a Wraithbone and an Apothecary White highlight.

The beak is Trollslayer Orange.

The red slouch hat top is Mephiston Red.

The air filter at his hip is Brown Violet with Deathguard Green highlight and more Mephiston Red for the central piece.

The webbing is Abaddon Black.

The yellow piping and cuffs on the uniform is Averland Sunset.

The blue trousers, canteen and cuff pieces are Macragge Blue.

The metal is all Leadbelcher and silver edging.

The sprue piece on the base is meant to be a bulkhead or door way of some description painted in Brown Violet.

The Captain has trodden in the gore of someone he has winged with an earlier shot and is following the bloody trail.

Trying to work out basing when the game could be played on almost any planet anywhere was proving awkward. I decided to go with an industrial flooring look that could hopefully be space station / shuttle flooring.

The texture is provided by polypropylene box strapping that you get on large boxes e.g. office printer paper, 5 ream boxes. I glued this down in cut strips and then cut them round the base once dried.

I have primed them black and will dry brush them silver and weather them heavily.

I was struggling with the fact that I really like the Solubrian droopy mouthed alien heads but knew that I didn’t want to buy an extra box just to get more of those heads. The warband needs to be coherent without the head binding them. The kepi slouch hats are from an extra purchase of a Perry Miniatures sprue, but I feel those 5 slouch hats will help bind the unit without needing to use the alien heads every time. The use of Skitarii robots will definitely make life easier, because I can use a paint scheme that ties their robes with the Captain’s great coat etc. I can use Skitarii Rangers for any lighter armoured soldier types and have plenty of options from my unbuilt Skitarii Kill Team sprues. There are also the Vanguard Skitarii heads that I can use for some of the heavier armoured soldier types as a distinction.

390 universal credits
Robot Sniper – Skitarii ranger sniper from GW Kill Team. – 100 uc

Robot Codebreaker – Skitarii ranger with rifle with a Stargrave Crew sprue “deck” at the hip. – 75 uc

Pathfinder – Les Grodnards body, grenade throwing arm and Stargrave Crew carbine arm and alien head. Perry Miniatures Kepi slouch hat. – 100 uc

Commando – Warlord Games Gates of Antares C3 Body and arms, Stargrave Crew alien head with alternative helmet. – 75 uc

Chiseller – North Star Stargrave Crew box body head, spanner, holster, pistol with Wargames Atlantic Les Grodnards sword arm and rifle support arm. The chain sword cut off and replaced with an Oathmark Heavy Dwarf Sword. – 20 uc

Hacker – North Star Stargrave Nickstarter metal hacker. – 20 uc

Runner – Gates of Antares Freeborn body and arms (pistol knife?) with Stargrave Crew alien head. – Free

Recruit – Stargrave Crew box body and human head. Perry Miniatures Kepi slouch hat. (pistol knife?) – free

I will probably use a predominantly grey uniform, with yellow and red accent colours and pale blue trousers as a nod to confederate rebel style uniforms. Obviously my lovely, unfortunate, and homeless Solubrians never condoned or engaged in slavery even when they had a home world, so the uniform and rebellious nature are the only connection.

Chiseler.
I am thinking of adding a piece of thin red sprue out of the end of the spanner to make it a bit more futuristic once part painted.
Les Grognards arms on a NorthStar Stargrave crew box body. The chain sword was removed and an Oathmark Heavy Dwarf sword added to make it more like a big knife. The head, spanner, pistol and holster are all from the crew sprue as well.

I made some powers cards with the free download from the Osprey Publishing website.

I printed off the quick reference guide and the solo rules and I laminated a crew sheet and started to look through the book.

I decided on the background of my crew and then set out to create my Captain and First Mate.

I decided that thematically both the Capt and 1st Mate should choose the “Veteran” character trope. Even though game wise I am sure you should mix up the classes and utilise all the fun abilities I thought I would stick to my narrative for now and didn’t want any jedi like powers initially in this crew. The only nod to this side of Sci-Fi is that. Some Solubrians have a natural healing skill. A type of telepathy that, by shear force of will and suggestive powers, that the target hearing the faint foreign clicking heals themselves and their own body reacts at a heightened regenerative rate.

Captain Vars has:

Command – Extra player in line of sight is able to activate in his phase.

Coordinated Fire – +1 shoot awarded to a crewman for the rest of the game.

Target Designation: Target mini has -2 Fight when defending a shoot attack.

Heal: 5 points of health restored on a target in 6″ range.

Regenerate: Vars recovers 3 points of lost health.

For his brother with one fewer power as First Mate I thought I would use up more of the remaining Veteran core powers and have him command the robots I am thinking of having in my list.

First Mate Vars has:

Energy Shield: 3 points of damage from shooting taken by the shield. Remains on until depleted.

Remote Firing: A target robot fires a +3 shoot attack over and above their activation.

Power Spike: Next shot gets a +3 damage mod.

Repair Robot: 5 points of health restored on a target in 6″ range

The backstory got my ideas flowing and the rules and the Crew NorthStar box arriving gave me chance to throw my first kitbashes together.

The Background

Captain Maughan Vars hates the technologically advanced evil Daktari Empire and their mercenary Pirate allies that eventually destroyed his homeworld Alpha-Solubris.
That said, after years of guerilla fighting he has realised that men don’t fight for causes any more. They fight for money and survival. The only way to get comfort in the sea of grief for his endangered race and his derelict planet is to snipe at Daktari power and Pirate dominance under the guise of contracted works for the last remaining pockets of civilization in the chaos.
That ship they scavenged last month happened to be a Daktari vessel. That outpost they raided for supplies last week happened to belong to a Daktari protectorate. This space station they are stealing from today is a known Pirate slave trading port. The war continues one contract and one heist at a time. The crew share the spoils, as Captain Vars gets his revenge one shrouded triumph after the next.
Oh and there’s his brother the first mate, but more on him once some paint goes down. ?

The captain has a pistol and pointing arm and body from the Les Grognards Wargames Atlantic range. I got a three body sprue from this set just for filling in the big annual wargames survey a couple of years ago. The head is from the NorthStar Stargrave crew box. The kepi slouch hat is from a Perry’s ACW sprue.

The First Mate is made from a Les Grognards body and the head and arms are from the Stargrave Crew NorthStar box.

There are also some additional items around the waist that are meant to denote the breathing filter, codebreaking “decks” that the First Mate has and the physical lock “picks” that the captain has.