Warcry: Red Harvest – a self motivational project blog

After a long period of little to no physical hobby progress, the arrival of my prize ‘Warcry: Red Harvest’ box prompts me to (hopefully) get some hobby ‘mojo’ back.

My initial thoughts prior to opening were to begin with small objectives, work on some of the scenery and then work my way up to the minis themselves – my eyesight and hand control not being what it used to be 🙂

However, despite the relatively low model count, I am greeted with a plethora of plastic content…..

The plan will still be to focus on getting the terrain together first – I’m intending to go with a relatively dark palette for most of the scenery, similar to the GW scheme. But there are a lot more parts than I thought – so, the first baby steps will be snipping and cleaning the parts for assembly.

With the new edition coming out, I’m not sure how much of the card content will still be usable, so for now that can remain sealed in the box – to possibly see daylight as painting guides even if they aren’t to be used.

Not sure about anyone else, but I found the included graphic novel to be lacking in plot and character development……..

Well, maybe not a thousand terrain pieces, but there certainly are a lot of pieces in this box.

So, armed with my trusty snippers, a sharp knife, file, sanding board and glue I begin my journey….

19 snips later, and after sanding down and gluing, the first small terrain piece is assembled.

I forgot how long these stages can take, but I know I will get faster as I build more.

For some of the flat base pieces I like to use the sanding board,  to ensure a consistent flat surface over the larger area.  Sometimes when using a file on a larger flat surface you can end up not getting a truly flat finish.  Although, for terrain pieces it is likely not as important.

Since this set has a number of similar terrain pieces, made up of quite a few very similar components, I prefer to work on just one terrain piece at a time.

Snipping out just those parts needed for this specific piece,  and laying them out as per the build diagram to avoid mixing them up when cleaning and assembling.

After a seemingly not insignificant period, my alloted hobby time is at an end (and the dining table needs clearing up).

It’s only some basic terrain pieces put together,  but it is six more pieces than I had at the start ?

Progress is progress…..

Well, its been a pretty good start, considering how little hobby progress I have made recently.

Short update today  – another six terrain pieces snipped, cleaned and assembled.

Two terrain sprues down 🙂

To be honest, I am surprised that I have been able to carry out some hobby each day since starting this blog – I guess that means that, so far, it is achieving the objective.

Based on this, I recommend that if you are someone also struggling with achieving hobby progress,  consider starting a blog to aid motivation.  Or at least consider setting yourself some small, and more importantly achievable,  goals.

Perhaps break down a larger project into smaller chunks to make them both physically and mentally easier to cope with.

This evenings progress is two more structures.

These ones however were a lot more elaborate than those I had put together up to this point.

And certainly more impressive.

They also came with somewhat more prominent mold lines.  Application of the back edge of the craft knife soon saw most of them reduced to an acceptable level

Another two scenery sprues down, three to go.

…..and it’s almost time for the weekender!

I thought I would try to tackle just one sprue during my hobby time after work today.

Turns out this was to be a somewhat more fiddly build.

The Varanite Syphon 

Still a few prominent mold lines, but cleaning was required on all parts, so it is all part of the build.

The wheel, although seemingly simple was rather deceptive.

I laid all the pieces out, but during cleaning I inverted some….

After a few minutes, checking the connection lugs etc the dry fit worked – and I then glued the pieces in sequence.

After adding some more components the syphon neared completion.

I must say that Games Workshop have done a very good job of designing the connection points and jointing areas on these kits. The instructions are pretty basic, but diagrams are clear. With the connections only working one way it really helps.

So, after 1hr 45 mins, and some delicate connection areas (that chain!) the Varanite Syphon is done.

We are looking after our nephew and niece this afternoon and evening – but since motivation is still high I thought I would sneak in some more terrain construction in the morning.

This time it’s the Pit Dredger

Due to time constraints, I forgot to get any early pics.

The initial stages went pretty smoothly,  continuing to clean all the cut points and mold lines.

Attaching some of the skeleton parts to the ‘work wheel’ got a bit tight for my old fingers, so out came the tweezers to help place some components.

But, I got there  ?

Then came some more easy bits….

But….. I next encountered the bucket chain.

It seems easy enough on the diagrams, however – I don’t have four hands, and I think that is what’s needed here ?

I found that the buckets that go on the chains have a little ‘play’ due to the flexibility of the chains. So I concentrated on getting the others in place first.

That gave me the ability to then fit the remaining ones without having to hold all six at the same time.

A few more basic bits, and the Pit Dredger is done ?

Just one terrain sprue to go…..

(Plus all the painting too, of course)

Six days straight with hobby carried out – don’t know the last time that happened!

I know I won’t be able to do the same in the future, and I don’t want to put pressure on myself to do so, as that would likely have a negative impact – but its still been good progress, from my perspective.

I could probably have gotten through the scenery quicker if I hadn’t cleaned the cut points and mold lines. But I knew they would frustrate me when I come to drybrush them.

Onto the final scenery sprue.

I have been following the order in the guide booklet. This final sprue is actually the easiest of the lot.

Still scraping those mold lines though ?

Only three of the terrain pieces on this last sprue needed any assembly, and it was mainly just attaching skeletons to the barricades.

Soon they were complete.

As it says above, the scenery set is finished ?

I spent a bit of time debating whether to assemble the warbands next, or paint the scenery.

With the (much needed) drizzle ending I decided I would make a start on priming the scenery.

Busy week next week, but hoping to squeeze in what hobby I can.

Not sure when my next post will be, or whether it will be scenery or warband stuff, just have to see what time will allow.

Not much of an update today.

Just had enough time to apply some brown to the scenery.

I wanted to keep some of the black there as shade, so applied a dusting of army painter brown at an angle, to hopefully maintain the black prime in the recesses.

The spray went a little ‘spitty’ part way through (can see it on the parts front middle).

Once that happened I inverted the can, sprayed to clear and wiped the nozzle clean. This allowed me to continue – and i also found that if I depressed the nozzle about 3/4 it gave a more even spray.

That’s it for now though.

Next step here will be some washes to bring back the shade in those places where a little too much brown went down.

A friend also recommended using slightly different shades on some of the planks to add variety – this reminded me of what fx artists do on space ship models, so I think I’ll try it out ?

Don’t have my painting area clear yet, so I was going to leave things….. but then I decided I would put together some of the Darkoath minis.

I put a fresh blade on my knife for this, as the other one was getting a little blunt – and using a slightly blunt blade can be more dangerous sometimes, as you may apply a little more force and can slip.

Looking over the sprue, I noticed that the part numbering is a bit ‘all over the place’.  So begins the quest for the correct parts.

I started with the two claw guy, as there weren’t alternate components for him.

Then onto the witch/shaman. I chose the hand holding the eye, as it reminds me of an old Greek myth film.

Then finally the boss!

I built him without weapon first,  as I wasn’t sure which would be best.  In the end I decided to go with the axe as I think it looks cooler.

For friendly games we can always use the other stats if we want to.

Third time trying to update my project today….

Filled it out twice and published, only to find nothing showing 🙁

I haven’t posted for a few days, but I have managed to get in some hobby each day still though.

I have now ‘built’ all of the Darkoath Savagers.  Just need to sort out what weapons I want to give the currently unarmed ones.

The Conan looking one is going to have a great sword, and quite a few of the others will likely have paired weapons.

Then it was onto the scenery.

I decided to go for a pale colour and drybrush on, to hopefully make it look like sun bleached wood.

While drybrushing I found that the dusting of brown that I applied was in some places just that – a layer of brown dust! As I drybrushed, the brown was just brushing right off…

I decided not to let this get me down, and chose to think of it as variations in the undertones.

For some pieces I did add a drybrysh of bestial brown first, for a little more variety.

And the scenery so far….

(The spike barricades are upstairs awaiting work)

Next up maybe adding weapons to the barbarians, or, if I can face it, working on the metal on the terrain….

Had an hour or so to spare today, so I thought I would see how many pieces of terrain I could basecoat the metal on.

I started with one of the large platforms,  and 1 hour 45 mins later I had managed to base coat the metals on one large platform…. yep, that was it, just the one I started on 🙁

To be honest I found it rather soul destroying, and I’m not looking forward to the rest.

However, I do take some solace in the fact that I chose one of the largest pieces to start with. And that I know roughly how long the next one will take, when I can face it…

Plus, the smaller pieces should be quicker ✅

Still have to paint the stone, skeletons and rocks, then apply some washes to bring it all together.

Not sure when that will be though, this session took its toll on me…

Well, Darkoath Savagers getting ready anyway.

I dithered around on what to arm the rest with, concerned about making the wrong choices (having never played).

In the end I went with the ones that seemed best fit.

Mostly paired weapons as it turns out!

So that’s all 10 armed now.

As a final thought on it, I figured that since I will only be playing friendly club games (not going to events) then I could perhaps mark some of the minis with the spare components if I decided to try a different load out on some of them – as in the image below.

A glory seeker with paired weapons, marked to be ‘proxy’ as armed with shield instead.

It’s now September 3rd 2022.

I have been managing to get in at least some hobby each day still – sometimes just 30-45 mins, but it’s all still going in the right direction.

I will likely just post up now when I either complete a part of the project or when a week has passed, and show how things are going.

The majority of the work has been painting terrain – pretty much exclusively the seemingly never ending metal strapping!

Still not enjoying it tbh, but working through ?

Yep ?

On a couple of evenings I didn’t have much time, so I chose to work on building the Tarantulos Brood gang.

Same issue about deciding on the weapons though. Speaking with a friend of mine, he reminded me I should actually look at the points cost ?.

The Darkoath I have built come in at 985 points (target 1000pts). If I build the Brood as specified it comes to 1000 exactly.

However, I am debating converting two of the scythe and claw chaps to have Sai (there are spare). Doing this would mean I would have to drop one of the broodkin, and create a new spider swarm. Luckily there are some small spiders on the sprue to go on as base adornment  – I will use these,  and see if I can find an old spider from warhammer quest or suchlike.

I am on standby for work (alongside normal working week) for a week now – so will fit in some hobby if I can.

Cheers all ?

Sept 12th 2022.

Been quiet on the posts, but I have again managed to get in at least 30 mins of hobby each day – meaning things have continued to progress.

The main focus (after finishing base coat on all the metal straps etc) has been on painting the stone parts on the terrain, and then working on the skulls and skeletons

The stone parts were hit first with the old foundation paint ‘Deneb Stone’, then I drybrushed some parts and highlighted others with a basic white.

Then I finished off the last of the metal straps with a base coat of leadbelcher.

Then next I worked on all the skulls and skeletons, including on the spiked barricades.

I picked these out with white, where possible trying to leave the brown in the ribs, eye sockets etc for shading.

Then I hit them with a thinned skeleton horde contrast, wiping some of it away as I went. Lastly I went over them with a drybrush and highlighted the skulls.

And I have been working on the last bits of scatter too.

Looks like I have a lot of rope to get working on….

18th September.

I have continued to get in a bit of hobby each day, so this project/log has definitely been a motivational help.

So, from last post I carried on with the scatter terrain pieces, painting lots and lots of small ropes.  Hard work on my old eyes at times, but I think that once done it really helped the pieces to ‘pop’

Next up I decided to add a bit of weathering.  My intention with this was to try to ‘tie-in’ some colours to that of the base board.  So, looking at that and then going through my paints I ended up choosing an old GW Terracotta paint.

To endeavour to add some realism, I applied a drybrush of this on to the lower parts of all of the terrain pieces, slightly heavier at the very bottom.

Pretty happy with how it came out (Some pics a little washed out)

With that weathering done, next up was a liberal application of good old Nuln Oil, doing its stuff ?

Once this was dry I went back in and drybrushed some chain mail silver on the various gargoyle heads, certain strap junctions,  chains, gears and such like. Plus some copper rails on the gate type ducting parts.

I wasn’t really sure how to handle the Varanite, and after some tests with reds and yellows I ended up going with a gold base tone. This may change in the future,  but for now I’m calling the terrain done.

And of course I then had to lay it all out on the base board to see how it looked

7th October 2022

Been a while ?

My wife and I had a short break to North Wales, but before and since I have still been getting in small amounts of hobby time, almost every day.

This work has been on the Darkoath Savagers warband.

I started off by applying some basing paste (Agrellan) to make a cracked earth effect.

Then it was onto spraying undercoat for them.

I started off with Wraithbone, as I intended to use a mix of contrast paints and regular paints on them.

I followed this up with a spray of Vallejo white through my airbrush (still a novice user) from directly overhead.

I hoped that this would add to the contrast effect (but I’m not sure that it made much difference really – probably would have been more impactful if over a grey)

Next it was on to getting some paint down – I started off with the (aptly named) Darkoath Flesh contrast.

I found this a little too heavy initially, so added medium to it when I rolled it out across the warband.

Following this I proceeded to pick out a few key colours for use on the warband, and picked a base colour.

I went with Terracotta for the bases (since I used this to weather the scenery pieces, I was hoping it would tie in well).

For the gang I went for various leather tones (created using mixes of pure snakebite upto pure Wildwood, plus some greys and blacks), golds and silvers for the metallics, and red for the tabards.

The base Blood angles red contrast was a little too vibrant for what I wanted. So for the couple I had already applied it on, I took it back a little by giving it an agrax earthshade wash.

For the rest I mixed a little wildwood into the red to take the edge off it.

So, at this point, I had ten models all part done ?

I decided next to focus on smaller groups, aiming to pick out some more details, add a little shading and highlighting and getting them to a point I call as ‘ready for the table top’……

My eyesight combined with my hand control is no longer good enough to paint eyes on the minis – so I tend to just put a shade into the eye socket and hope for the best ?

I may treat myself to a new fine brush to see if that will help with the situation a little.

So here are five of the gang ready to see some action:

9th October 2022

Thanks to the fact that I had initially been working on all 10 models at the same time, I have been able to crack on with finishing off the last 5 over the past few days.

So, it was just really a case of ‘more of the same’ with regards to painting straps, skulls, doing hair, picking out details etc.

I also decided to add a little face paint to a couple of them.

Still can’t get the pupils in, so they may look a bit ‘starey’

I left the boss and the witch until last, for a couple of reasons. Firstly, I wanted to spend a bit more time on the boss, and secondly I just wasn’t feeling the witch.

So, for the boss I did things like extra highlight stages on the hairbraid, and a fancy gem hanging from his belt.

The final mini was the witch.

As I said, I wasn’t really feeling it, but pushed through it.

Struggled a bit for a focus, so I ended up giving a Crimson wash over part of the face to change it up a little, then tidied up the rest, made all the bones neat etc, and the final thing was painting the eyeball she is holding.

Pretty happy with how it came out in the end, with little blood vessels added to it.

17th October 2022

Another week passes…. The project is still continuing, but there were a couple of days where I didn’t manage to get any hobby in – however, I am not going to let that bother me too much, as I am still getting more hobby time in (by far) than I was prior to starting this project.

With the Darkoath band completed, it was back to the Tarantulos Brood.

Of the ten warriors and three spider swarms, I only had the boss and the spiders fully built so far – due to still deciding on weapon options.

Two of the models only had a choice between Net/Trident and Flail/Goad, so I decided just to build one of each of these.

For the Broodkin I preferred the two blade basic version over the two sai version -so built the four that I could as two blade Broodkin.

One of these four sculpts comes with a hand throwing a javelin rather than a second blade. I like the look of if, but for practicality I decided not to use it – since the javelin sticks out 40mm from the base edge, and I could see it being a pain to fit in a carry case, a pain to work around on the tabletop, and a high likelihood of breakage. Instead I decided to use one of the spare Sai hands in its place, for convenience.

The remaining three Broodkin only had the Scythe and Spider claw build option though.

And since the weapon options were ‘arm and weapon’ as opposed to the spare sai that were ‘hand and weapon’ I thought I had to go with the ‘as planned’ build option.

After building these I looked at the rules again, and didn’t really like the way that they worked. Checking the points, and the spare components on the sprue I worked out that I could build an extra spider swarm (although they aren’t very good now either) from some of the small spiders provided. This would mean that I could drop one of the scythe/claw Broodkin from the list, and then have the other two replaced with standard Broodkin.

To facilitate this, and due to the fact that the spare sais didn’t have arms with them (just hands attached) I needed to cut off the scythe arms at the hands for two of them.

I carefully sliced through with a sharp blade, then I cut a notch in the new stump so that the sai hand would marry up to them correctly.

I left them with the claw hand, and kept the Scythes, just in case a rules change makes this weapon choice more useful in the future (If I can be bothered to change them back).

For now, when I come to play, I will ensure my opponent knows what they represent (Currently all the Broodkin with be basic two weapon Broodkin).

With them all built now, it was onto the basing and undercoating.

I again used Agrellan Earth technical paint to make the cracked earth basing, applying a thin coat of PVA glue to ensure the cracked flakes didn’t come off during the drybrushing stage later.

Next it was an undercoat black, and an attempt at zenithal priming with a grey spray from above and approx. 45 degrees, followed by a pure white spray from above only.

I may have to take some of the brightness back, and enhance other places, but that will be once painting is underway – hopefully get into that this coming week.

This past week I did have a little blip in motivation when looking to start on the Tarantulos Brood minis. I was struggling to come up with a scheme that I wanted to do on them, and also a little daunted by all the fiddly web/straps on their arms and legs.

I decided to crack on and put a base coat on all the bases (to match the Darkoath), as that could still be progress but without too much thinking. I knew I wanted to do a dark colour for their cloaks etc, but not black. I knew I also wanted a spot colour to ‘pop’, and quite like the existing GW scheme with yellow as the spot colour. Having primed them with a zenithal spray I also wanted to use some contrast or thin coats on the clothing to take advantage of the zenithal prime. So I went ahead and mixed some blue contrast with black in different ratios, testing it on the spray stick I had used to undercoat them.

Once I had a colour I liked, and had tested it on one of the fighters, I used an old mixing pot to make enough for the whole band (with spare for the inevitable touch ups I would require ?)

At this point I also decided that I wanted to go for a skin tone that looked a little ‘otherworldly’, so I mixed up some contrast white and contrast magos purple (comes out quite pink) and applied this to the test model too.

Following this, I decided to roll out more of the scheme onto the test model, as overall the scheme was seeming a little drab at this point – I was hopeful that the spot colour would boost them visually and give me a bit more confidence in the colour palette. With yellow being a pretty thin colour I used a pale beige colour to go over the parts intended to be yellow as the blacks of the zenithal prime don’t work for me when using bright colours.

I have some friends from our local gaming club that I keep in touch with via messenger, and lately I have been sending them pics of my work in progress – they are pretty supportive, and will give feedback and encouragement which can be very useful when having a ‘blip’. It definitely helped in this instance; as did realising that I had received a Golden Button for October (but missed it initially ? ) and being contacted by Sundancer who let me know that the project had been visited by the ‘Unofficial Hobby Hangout’ too. It certainly put a smile on my face.

The web straps on the test model (and bandages in some places) weren’t showing up overly well against the pale skin. To rectify this, I went ahead and used contrast black to ‘blackline’ all of the web strap areas on the models, and later on went over these with white; where possible using the edge of the brush to apply it (to help aid my accuracy). I used contrast black rather than normal black paint as I find it flows easier, allowing me to guide it to where needed. The reduced coverage on the high points didn’t matter in this case, as I was going to be going over that – it was just getting that black at the edges that was important.

From this stage I chose to work on just the seven Broodkin models, as they had very similar design and features on each of them. So, setting aside the spider swarms and the elite models, the yellow was rolled out across the Broodkin on their sashes, faces and ‘head limbs’.

Then it was on to making the bandages a little tidier, and trying to make them stand out a touch more. Further work on the weapons, picking out facial details (where I could), adding gloss varnish to the ‘head limb claws’ and painting in the dark red gems on all of their belt badge things. I am actually pretty happy with the way the gems have come out on these chaps, and with how the yellow spot colour works in the overall scheme.

Next up will be the elite fighters, and I will be finishing off the spiders in between.

See you next time ?

29th October 2022

I cracked on with the remaining elite fighters and the spider swarms this week.

Doing a bit more detail on the fighters, but not much more though.

I again used a pale beige to undercoat for the yellow, for better coverage.

I wasn’t quite sure what to do with the spiders, so I did a bit of research on the old Internet. In the end I chose to stick with black overall and give them red ‘knees’.

With that chosen, I then finished off the elite fighters.

(Pics are a little washed out due to my lighting)

So, that’s both warbands completed to an acceptable level for myself.

Up next, I hope to get in a game with these and post up a short summary of how it went, and maybe finish off with a few thoughts on how the project went overall.