Necromunda’s just been re-rereleased, and there’s a piece of art floating around in White Dwarf and Warhammer Community that doesn’t correspond to any of the miniatures released yet, but is a lovely call back to a couple of 1980s classics.

Necromunda Mauretania makes all her decisions on the hoof.

The hoofed mad-haired Amazon in stockings is a leitmotif Games Workshop trot out occasionally – much like female miniatures.  Let’s chart a quick family tree.

John Blanche’s Amazonia Gothique on the cover of White Dwarf 79 (July 1986).

This piece of art was made into the LE15 Kinky Chaosette miniature released a couple of months afterwards.  The version on the left was a conversion by John Blanche himself, rather than a commercially available miniature.  I’d love to know where the gun component came from.

White Dwarf 82 Amazonia Gothique miniatures (October 1986).

The Amazon with a gun concept did appear as a commercially available miniature a couple of years later, sporting a paint scheme very similar to the John Blanche conversion.  She’s an Amazon, but she’s in space.

RT601 Space Amazon Adventurers, White Dwarf 99 (March 1988).

This Space Amazon turns up in those exact same colours, zebra stripe, leopard spots, piebald cow blobs in the John Blanche art compilation a year later.  Sto’Knor Macekiller has painted his copy to match this, right down to the polka dot neckerbow.

Space Amazon by John Blanche, from Ratspike (1989).

Flashing forward to 2017, past some other possible miniature incarnations of the Amazon, and the cheeky nostalgia monkeys at Games Workshop re-relaunch Necromunda with this character popping up in the promotional art teasers.

Interestingly, I think the yellow patterns on her armour are meant to evoke the shape of the shield from the original Amazonia Gothique.  I hope we see a miniature based on the this concept!  Until then, I have painted the Rogue Trader incarnation based on the new (and the original) artwork.

Mauretania and the Claw Nebula pirates in the Jericho Ironworks on Necromunda.

The next episode of Choose Your Own Adventurers will be brought to you be sho3box.

CYAO Episode 13 – Phineas, the Navigator (axiom)

CYAO Episode 12 – Doug Orewell, Squat Miner (sho3box)

CYOA Episode 11 – Indiana Jones, Xenoarchaeologist (Curis)

CYAO Episode 10 – Rico “Snakey” Vitovitch, Pilot for Hire (axiom)

CYAO Episode 9 – Erica James, Sister of Silence (sho3box)

CYOA Episode 8 – Steppenwolf, Mutant Outlander (Curis)

CYAO Episode 7 – Cinereal Jeannie, Inquisitional Psyker (axiom)

CYAO Episode 6 – Joan Grace, Null Maiden (sho3box)

CYOA Episode 5 – Nebuli Tsar, Ventolin Pirate (Curis)

CYAO Episode 4 – Short Jern Silvo, Ratling Cook (axiom)

CYAO Episode 3 – Garnier Wangst, Eldar Trader (sho3box)

CYOA Episode 2 – Paradox Zeeman, Pirate Captain (Curis)

CYOA Episode 1 – Obi-Wan Sherlock Clousseau, Inquisitor (axiom)

Warhammer 40,000 and archaeology.  My two hobbies melded together.  There’s not been this much combination of leisure pursuits since the notorious Inquisitor Bingedrink.

“1988 Rogue Trader Citadel miniature?  That belongs in a museum.”

You might wonder what Indy is doing in the forty-first millennium, but seems Games Workshop had a serious thing for the archeologist producing not one but THREE homages to the character.

Left to right:  “Idaho Smith” from the Gothic Horror range;  “Archaeologist” from the Talisman Timescape expansion; and “Bandit” from the Rogue Trader Adventurers range.

I decided to paint this figure straight up as Indy rather than do any clever reimagining.  Painting him in a grimdark scheme is something axiom or sho3box may attempt (good luck lads).  The only thing actually placing this miniature in the forty-millennium is the Eldar laspistol.  (At least I assume it’s an Eldar design, as it appears exclusively on the Eldar range, though oddly it pops up again in the Adventurers range on the Punk.)

I’d like to get some more displaced 20th century archaeologists to accompany Indy on his field trips.  The Citadel Gothic Horror range has both a Vicar and a Reverend that would work well as antiquarians, and a couple of Kathleen Kenyon lookalikes.   The possibilities are endless when you’re hunting for something as mundane as a civilian in slightly muddy clothing.

Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.
Indiana Jones and the Great Crusade.

The Chaos Temple

All this recent blogging and photography has highlighted the main terrain I have is cardboard Space Crusade pieces.  To remedy this I picked through my storage crates and unearthed a polystyrene Chaos temple.  Teenage Curis went through a Slaanesh phase and badly repainted the flagged flooring in a veiny purple marble.  It looked awful and was hidden away for decades.  I borrowed insipration and techniques from cheetor’s recent Age of Sigmar pieces.

Stone Temple Bandit.

The result is fairly plain, and I feel I need to pick out the odd brick in different colours – but it was gloriously quick to spray and drybrush.  Most of the work was adding extra sand and rubble texture to cover the old factory-applied bright green static grass and damaged areas.  It’s given me the confidence to tackle more terrain, perhaps the Battle Masters tower next.

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.

Episode 12 of this Rogue Trader group project will be brought to you you by sho3box. Here’s links to the previous episodes:

CYAO Episode 10 – Rico “Snakey” Vitovitch, Pilot for Hire (axiom)

CYAO Episode 9 – Erica James, Sister of Silence (sho3box)

CYOA Episode 8 – Steppenwolf, Mutant Outlander (Curis)

CYAO Episode 7 – Cinereal Jeannie, Inquisitional Psyker (axiom)

CYAO Episode 6 – Joan Grace, Null Maiden (sho3box)

CYOA Episode 5 – Nebuli Tsar, Ventolin Pirate (Curis)

CYAO Episode 4 – Short Jern Silvo, Ratling Cook (axiom)

CYAO Episode 3 – Garnier Wangst, Eldar Trader (sho3box)

CYOA Episode 2 – Paradox Zeeman, Pirate Captain (Curis)

CYOA Episode 1 – Obi-Wan Sherlock Clousseau, Inquisitor (axiom)

Over at the Emporium of Rogue Dreams, Mark Elster organised a summer competition to model and paint a Rogue Trader mutant, judged by Warhammer 40,000 supremo Andy Chambers himself.  Seeing other people get their entries together (like axiom’s and asslessman’s) inspired me to make my own mutant. Presenting Steppenwolf, Mutant Outlander.

“I am a man wolf.  I am a wolf man.”

In my trades and trawls I’d picked up a duplicate Inquisitor from the Adventurers range.  One had his right arm with its chainsword/shotgun/railgun badly chopped away by the previous owner.  I couldn’t save the arm at all, so removed it up to the shoulder.

The notorious Inquisitor Sixty Pence.  He’s gonna party like it’s your birthday.

Then I went chop-happy and removed the head, saving the stetson for a future project.  Wanting to keep the conversion components Rogue Trader 1980s I found a spare wolf from the original Leman Russ.  At least, I think it was spare, I definitely have three and I hope it’s the duplicate I decapitated.  I then added the tail peeping out the back of the trenchcoat.  A wolf in a trenchcoat has a pleasing Shadowrun vibe.

“I have half a canine mind.  I have half the mind of man.”

Mutation-wise, Steppenwolf has a “bestial face”, which the Rogue Trader rulebook describes as:

“The mutation changes the facial structure so that it resembles that of a beast.  It is extremely common amongst mutated humans and has spawned the sub-race of Beastmen.  Apart from leaving its victim in a state of sickening ugliness this mutation is neither harmful nor beneficial.”

Rogue Trader describes space pirates as particularly prone to mutation, so Steppenwolf will slot right into my Claw Nebula force.  He will be a member of an Outlander squad, so I gave him a new arm with a bolt pistol to keep him compliant with the Book of the Astronomican army list.

Nebula Claw Pirates with the remnants of Squad Hawkwind.

Since I was listening to Hawkwind’s Steppenwolf while converting this figure, it seems only right to photograph him alongside the Imperial Army figures named after Hawkwind members in White Dwarf advertisements.  Above you can see troopers Powell, Turner, Langton and Bainbridge.  I hope to track down the other Hawkwind members to go full-on 1980s space rock.

Thanks to Steve at Eldritch Epistles for hooking me up with some more signature orange lichen recently.

Episode 9 will be brought to you you by sho3box.  Here’s links to the previous episodes:

CYAO Episode 7 – Cinereal Jeannie, Inquisitional Psyker (axiom)

CYAO Episode 6 – Joan Grace, Null Maiden (sho3box)

CYOA Episode 5 – Nebuli Tsar, Ventolin Pirate (Curis)

CYAO Episode 4 – Short Jern Silvo, Ratling Cook (axiom)

CYAO Episode 3 – Garnier Wangst, Eldar Trader (sho3box)

CYOA Episode 2 – Paradox Zeeman, Pirate Captain (Curis)

CYOA Episode 1 – Obi-Wan Sherlock Clousseau, Inquisitor (axiom)

My second model in this group painting project is the Ventolin Pirate – the one figure I actually had when I started this project!

Nebuli Tsar with a Squat boarding party.

The Adventurer range is full of a great many concepts that weren’t developed further in Warhammer 40,000.  The Ventolin Pirate has two pieces of background written about him. The first is “Ventolin”. The second is “Pirate”. Let’s explore each of these in turn.

“Ventolin” is a brand of asthma medication that’s been on sale in England since 1969. However, out of context it does look like the name of a planet / alien species / Imperial Army regiment / pirate warband. Presumably Tim Pollard slipped in the name as a joke as the model has a rebreather helmet. I like to think that Ventolin is actually a conehead alien race, and if I get a second figure I may convert it without its helmet on. There was a lot of scope in the early days of Rogue Trader for this type of humanoid alien race with brightly coloured skin and prosthetic rubber foreheads – just take a look at the Ironclaw Pirate range.

If you go with the “space is an ocean” concept, it must have pirates. Instead of being on boats, these Space Pirates are on board spaceships.  Instead of being in sailor garb, they’re in astronaut suits. The model has vacuum-sealed cuffs where armour panels join on his arms and legs. I’ve avoided the stripey trews for this model, and instead he’s painted to match the Furnace Valley Squats for reasons that will become more apparent in future episodes of Choose Your Own Adventurers.

The vacuum-sealed cuffs, rebreather helmet, backpack and studded shoulderpad are reminiscent of the early Rogue Trader Space Marines. I’ve got a theory that this miniature was one of the dozen-or-so rejected Space Marine design attempts that Bob Naismith sculpted before he and Bryan Ansell settled on the LE02 Space Marine.

LE02 Space Marine and Ventolin Pirate.

To evoke a Rogue Trader vibe I added a freehand “GET VENT” on the shoulder pad.  The phrase was AJ’s suggestion; others I considered were:

• VENT THIS
• VENTI VIDI VICI
• VENT OUTTA SHAPE
• VENT YOUR ANGER
• VIVE LE VENT

I kept the other shoulderpad free for a Claw Nebula Pirate symbol in the future.

Here’s a list of the other episodes in the group project:

CYAO Episode 4 – Short Jern Silvo, Ratling Cook (axiom)

CYAO Episode 3 – Garnier Wangst, Eldar Trader (sho3box)

CYOA Episode 2 – Paradox Zeeman, Pirate Captain (Curis)

CYOA Episode 1 – Obi-Wan Sherlock Clousseau, Inquisitor (axiom)

“Let’s all paint Adventurers!” cried sho3box. “I have almost all thirty-two of those rare expensive miniatures!”

“Yeah!” axiom responded. “I have all of that overly-fetishised and as such difficult-to-collect range.”

“Yay!” Curis said, getting caught up in the enthusiasm of the group project. “I have … er … maybe … one?  But I’ll do a cool retro-mimic logo!”

To reiterate from axiom’s post, our rules are:

1. Paint a Rogue Trader Adventurer
2. Valid miniatures are ones marketed as “Adventurer” in a Mail Order flier, Citadel catalogue or White Dwarf
3. Let the other two bloggers have a turn, then paint another miniature.

As I had practically no Adventurers, sho3box generously jump-started my collection with the donation of a Pirate Captain.

Teenage-era sho3box had modified the Captain by adding an uzi-style magazine to the pistol and a pouch to the thigh.  He’d also removed the sword, as the lumpen sculpting and lead’s tendency to droop made it “look like a floppy dildo”.  This did give me the opportunity to do some conversion work to ham up the pirate angle – a hook hand.

The first attempt at a replacement was a “split hook” prostheses, made from two paperclips filed to points and bent into curves.  It didn’t sit well with the chunky 1980s sculpting, so I added a big goofy Lego claw.

“Hello.  I like money.”

The other pirate cliche I went with was stripey trews.  Disappointingly I realised after I’d painted Zeeman that the Studio paintjob also had stripey trews, so I wasn’t doing anything new or edgy.

A lot of the early Rogue Trader figures incorporate anachronistic fantasy elements (either as a deliberate juxtaposition with the science fiction setting, or sculptors falling back on their established bags of tricks) – leather pouches, medieval boots, landsknecht sleeves, et cetera.  It’s interesting that the Pirate Captain’s boots are anachronistic, but aren’t the cliché thigh-high pirate boots of your 17th Century Caribbean pirate; no no no, instead, they’re boring ankle-high medieval boots.  Makes me wonder if he was sculpted as a generic 40K guy and later designated a pirate.  But anyway, to get the boots away from the medieval leather look I painted them gleaming ice-white, imagining Paradox Zeeman as a space-chav displaying his wealth with immaculate footwear.  (I may have also been thinking of the glorious Spacego cover.)

“Oi, innit blud.  Hit the legs, this is well waffle.”

I am thinking about adding freehand insignia to the back of his jacket, possibly the Crab Claw Nebula symbol.  It’d tie in nicely with his claw.  But that’s a finishing touch for another day, when I’ve collected the other Space Pirates in the range and rounded them out to a little trio/squad/army/formation/Apocalypse detachment.

“Feds have landed up, wiv me in charge. You’re merked.”

Next up in Choose Your Own Adventurers – sho3box!

If you missed it, axiom’s excellent first episode is here!