#BloodBowl #ArmiesOnParade Mega bowl or Death Bowl pitch - TO DONE!

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity I've been working on my #ArmiesOnParade2023 board. This year is all about showcasing 4 of my Blood Bowl teams. The 'best of the rest' category is always quite small and I wanted to showcase it doesn't have to be 40k or 30k [and not a cynical attempt to reduce the odds]. Mega bowl is way of playing Blood Bowl  with 4 teams and I wanted a 7's pitch so that it would fit in a 2'x2' square. However, 7's pitches are 21 spaces long and you may note this is one square short... Nevermind, it's not like I'm going to limit it to seven players on the pitch either. Anyway, I created the grid, the 3x3 corners will be space for reserves and the inner square is the 'no-man's' land that teams start outside of.

Next up - tile spacers to create tangible squares. Superglued in place, although the glue was a little temperamental sometimes. It was quite the challenge to make sure the crosses were all aligned neatly while 'floating' on this cushion of superglue. Using a couple of scalpels to press it in place was the easiest way to do it. 

The whole thing got a PVA and sand covering, then primed with Halfords Red Oxide car primer, then I think matt black car spray. Lots of Burnt Umber brown, but the bottom quarter will be my Nurgle tar pit, so I mixed talcum powder with PVA to create an effect similar to my Gloss Black 3d Texture paint. The tile spacers were still a little too plasticky, so I added some Valejo Red Oxid texture paste on all of them. 

I started mixing in some Latte [cream] art acrylic into the Burnt Umber for highlights in each player square.

And yet more highlights, creating a much paler board than I had expected.

I added a bit of shading around each tile spacer and then picked each one out in white so they're clearly defined.

I then added the rest of the pitch markings, so now we can begin to understand the layout a bit more. Now, we know where Nurgle is going, but the Humans and Halflings are on grass, while the Orcs are barren earth, which is what we currently have. So who else goes where?

This is a Photoshop mock-up as I had always envisaged the grass splitting the pitch.

Halflings opposite the Humans.

But I suddenly wondered if dividing it diagonally might make more sense.

With 'good' on one side and bad encroaching from the other.

So I used the mock-ups to poll on a Blood Bowl group and they all suggested splitting the pitch was the better option. I'm not sure why but this is where we got to with the flocking, some small flowers in the Halfling reserve area [I swapped the human halfling sides] and gloss varnished the tar pit. The grass was much less green than my renderings but other than that it came out OK.

So, next was picking out the endzones, which was pretty straight forward and fun to do.

And lastly the BB double skull logo in the centre. In 7's 2 balls fit in 2 of the 4 centre squares [so actually if it had have been 21x21 squares it wouldn't have worked]. So the skull is a nice touch to help show where that is and harks back to the Astrogranite™ original. I printed an outline stencil, cut it out and stippled white. The a second stencil for the black outline, which I then tidied up freehand.

So that pretty much TO DONE! and as it was done quite a few months back now it actually gets the last GREAT Big RUSTY Stamp of Approval. 

So, as far as I'm concerned my AoP is now ready. The only thing I feel I could add is a backdrop, but I'm not sure I have the wherewithal at the moment to fit that in alongside my other hobby projects. We'll see after #DreadTober as our in-store parade is earmarked for 18th November... 

#BloodBowl - Nurgle player and Tree Sprites - TO DONE!

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity I've been #PaintingWarhammer some additional bit for Blood Bowl. This includes a spare Nurgle Rotter and a couple of tree sprites.

I believe there's a rule in the Nurgle team that if you kill an opposing player there's a chance they come back as a Rotter. I don't know if that still exists or not but just in case I had a suitable Poxwalker and spare helmet that I could make a less-armoured reserve player.

Not that I ever play or need one, but it was a quick conversion and been sitting around for a while so I finished it off.

Thankfully he fits in with the rest of the team too, not much difference at all.

So I'm going to give this the first Bloody Great Big Bloody Minor Stamp of Bloody Approval 

The Kurnoth Hunters come with a variety of additional tree sprites, most of which I didn't use, but three come with little bits of tree stump that I though I could do something with, but settled on just these two.

Naturally I painted the tree stump as Silver Birch and positioned these BB balls on top - so they could be use as balls for the team.

Now these balls are in fact original 2nd Edition balls, I've a few floating around that I thought fitted the purpose perfectly.

I painted the sprites themselves in the same way I did them for my Y'lthari's Guardian sprites.

Starting with Iyanden Yellow contrast paint, then some sepia shading and  VGC Sun Yellow highlights.

Eyes were dotted black, white highlight and a spot of gloss varnish - little Pikachu's

Alternatively, I think either of them could be proxied as Akhorne the Squirrel - they look cool on my flock test base. A lot of fun and some extra bits to add for my Armies On Parade board.

And this gets the second Bloody Great Big Bloody Minor Stamp of Bloody Approval or should it be two of them?

#BloodBowl - Halfling Team - Kurnoth Hunter Treemen - TO DONE!

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity I've been #PaintingWarhammer my Kurnoth Hunters to be used as Treemen in my Halfling Blood Bowl Team. Here we go - grass on the pitch

Really pleased with the final result.

And they work great with the Halflings.

I can't wait to see the finished Mega Bowl board with all of the teams on.

I know it's only supposed to be 7 a side but with full squads and just a few in the corner dug outs it will look so cool.

I'm so pleased with how the came out, that grass does so much just to lift them.

The poses are so easy to do, they just look like Blood Bowl players in the end.

I mean the pink and yellow is a little garish with all the Silver Birch elements but it's exactly what I wanted to do.

Go team!

This guy in full flow.

This one would be Deeproot Strongbranch - the star player, because he's just OTT.

And the most basic pose but it still came out alright.

Bits and bobs

Now I think all I need is that Star Player on the ram, but not for AoP.

As much as I love them, Y'lthari's Guardians still beat them hands down. With a much more controlled colour palette. It's a shame they couldn't quite follow that scheme too, but nevermind.

And is this the last GREAT Big RUSTY Stamp of Approval?