Painting Journal #1: Tomb Scorpion

After some severe hobby doldrums, I finally finished my first miniature of the year and, let me tell you, just getting something finished has really energised me. So, the Tomb Kings Tomb Scorpion, one of my favourite models ever. I remember when I first got into Warhammer there was no model I wanted more, unfortunately the army just didn't grab me back then but here we are now and here he is...

Ease of Building

I cannot imagine the nightmare this would have been in metal. For all of Finecast's deservedly awful reputation (and I did have to bend a couple of legs back into shape) I don't know how anyone could stand a body that large on legs that small in metal and not have it collapse every five minutes.

As it was, working with the Finecast version of the kit, the only issue was that the legs don't really offer any obvious contact points for the gluing the Scorpion to the base. In the end I just had to hold the model down on the base and dribble superglue over the ends its feet. It isn't elegant and it is a bit visually obvious but it was the only way to go.

Ease of Painting

There are these two round... objects on the back of the model, wedged between the mummified Liche Priest and the stone body of the construct. No one seems to know what they are and no official photograph is at a angle for you to see what 'Eavy Metal did with them. So my friend Dave and I decided they were canoptic jars and I painted them as earthenware. I think that makes sense and if it doesn't then someone should have said something in an official source.

Aside from that small philosophical issue the kit is actually pretty easy to paint, being comprised of the four basic Tomb Kings materials: bone, stone, bandages and gold. Of these the biggest challenge is deciding what sort of stone to paint, the other techniques being pretty basic ones that most painters have preferred methods to achieve anyway.

Be warned, there are a lot of little chips in the stone and bone sections, as well as some hard to reach sections in the hole the Liche Priest is lying in so you might have to go over your base coat a few times.

Self-Critique

Not much to say here. The bone is the same basic technique I've used on all the bone in the army and that's most of the model. My quest for a decent gold method continues. This is Balthasar Gold washed Agrax and drybrushed Golden Griffon which is duller and “older” looking than the one from the painting guide but somehow not deep enough for my purposes. Eh, further experimentation ahead and perhaps it'll look better on smaller details with my infantry.

My crappy pictures (new house = new photography set-up = LEARNING EVERYTHING AGAIN!) doesn't show the Dark Reaper drybrush on the black stone but it looks quite cool in person, trust me. Please?

Anyway, I'm happy with how the mummified Liche Priest turned out, especially the bandages, which makes this a good test case for the Tomb Guard I'm building right now.

Overall, I think I did well.