“In evil’s millennium, the squad-fate fell to Schiltron Toothcutter. The Rökthane’s commands combined metal and mettle so that worlds were won by iron arms and iron wills.”

– Hreddi Falsetooth, the Nethyrtruth Edda

I’ve taken to Kickstarter to produce a small range of resin cast 28mm scale Space Dwarf miniatures for collectors, modellers, painters, roleplayers and tabletop wargamers.  This Kickstarter will enable the figures to be professionally moulded for production, and vacuum-cast in high quality resin.

I’ve got a deep passion for the science fiction concept of squat and indomitable warriors heading out into the stars with an arsenal of hi-tech weapons.  I wanted to distill the essence of techno-fantasy metal mysticism into miniature form, and do it with an iconically 1990s twist.

Rökthane Schiltron Toothcutter

Schiltron Toothcutter, Rökthane of the Naudor Thronesworn, is a leader who has earned the respect of his troopers a dozen times over.  His far-sighted view of the battlefield gives his squad a significant tactical advantage – and many battles have been won by the relentless advance or unbreakable defence he inspires.  Famously Schiltron and his warriors defended the Nethyr Edge for 13 cycles, saving countless lives.  

Schiltron is armed with a customised binar-blaster, enscribed on the casing with his runic S initial, and clad in diamond-flak armour. 

Röknaut Trooper with Wyrmboltr Rifle

Each Röknaut Trooper is a hero in their own right, respected throughout the galaxies as bloody-minded and unyielding in the face of any enemy. Not only are Röknauts experts in combat, but void travel, toxic environs survival and hardware maintenance.  Their extreme technical aptitude lets them operate where other forces have been destroyed by mechanical realities – and their adamantine-hard will lets them fight even longer still.

Armed with the iconic Wyrmboltr Rifle, and clad in diamond-flak, the Trooper is a bold icon of the Röknaut Thronesworn’s might.

Röknaut Trooper with Helstrom Autocannon

Those Röknauts with distinguished marksmanship are assigned heavy weaponry from the Röknaut armouries to support their squads. Capable of hefting a weapon on their squat shoulders that a human would need a tripod and a loader to operate as efficiently, these warriors are a redoubt on the battlefield, and many legendary figures from Röknaut folklore are famous for their excessive weaponry.

The Röknaut is armed with the deadly dual-barrelled Helstrom Autocannon, capable of obliterating opposing hordes with sustained fire, or rending a hole in the side of a battletank with a tightly focussed salvo. 

Classic 28mm Scale

Designed to fit in with the miniatures of your youth, the Röknauts  are sculpted as a love letter to the 1990s, when miniatures were characterful chunks of awesome.  The miniatures are scaled to fit with classic 28mm humans – the Trooper with Wymboltr Rifle measuring 18mm from boot sole to eyeball.  

What you will Get

Pledging to this project will get you a complete squad of five Röknauts vacuum-cast in high quality resin.  Supplied unpainted and unassembled. 

I love painting miniatures – it’s the primary way I engage with the whole collecting/painting/gaming hobby.  When the first Röknaut prototype arrived, I completely flipped out, whacked on some Savage Garden and entered a fugue state, only to emerge some hours later with the Rökthane fully painted.  I’m extremely biased when I say these miniatures are a joy to paint, so to triangulate if they’re fun-with-brushes I sent a set of advance castings to Oldhammer blogging supremo Jean-Baptiste.  He absolutely ripped through painting a whole squad of them in a magnificent weathered industrial yellow scheme.  Here’s his photos…

You can visit the project here.

Rök on!

It was competition time again over at the Oldhammer Community. The friendly neighbourhood Jeany-Bap-Baps challenged hobbyists to paint miniatures sculpted by the great Bob Olley, and have them judged by the Lord our Bob himself. I couldn’t resist, and so I created this mini-diorama.

Bob Olley was one of the key contibutors to the nascent Warhammer 40,000 range, and he sculpted a huge portion of the Squat range that I’ve loved collecting, painting and gaming with through the years.

The Squat Berserker isn’t actually one of those original Rogue Trader miniatures, but a hyper-limited edition that Bob sculpted for a tiny indie manufacturer that’s since disappeared. I was hoping its extreme rarity would mean everyone who saw my painted casting would HAVE THEIR MINDS BLOWN with the novelty.

Only not. The first bloke I showed mine to simply said, “Yeah whatevs, looks like the one I did.” Screw you, Paul. Screw. You.

Not only that, but turns out his blogpost features loads of other cool indie manufacturers’ Squat miniatures that he also painted before I did mine. Sho3box is exactly the kind of person that turns up to cool parties wearing the same Decepticon logo shirt as you. And with the girl you were hoping to ask out already on his arm.

So I had to push further to ensure novelty, and modelled the Slayer standing over another Olley sculpt – an original Citadel Miniatures Genestealer Patriarch. I sawed that huge lead torso diagonally in half, and chopped apart and resculpted the limbs until I was satisfied the Patriarch was looking sufficiently collapsed, defeated, and bleeding out into the cold metal grille of the base.

It’s also the second Genestealer model I’ve painted recently, the first being a Locus for a wet-blended purple cloth tutorial for Patreon supporters. Check it out here!

Over forty people made it to the finishing line in the Oldhammer Community‘s Olley competition, and we wait with baited breath to see who Bob judges the best. (If it’s sho3box, I’ll explode.)

Though Warpath is still a way off, I’ve been painting Forge Fathers in anticipation. These fellas are the elite infantry of the Space Dwarf fighting forces – the Stormrage veterans.

As my squads so far each have matching helmets, I swapped heads on two of these minis (the Hailstorm Autocannons) using the hot-water-sharp-knife trick. Even with their heads quite set into their torsos, this was really easy – and the heads I’ve removed are perfectly usable in future conversions. The Thane is uncoverted, though his base gives him height as is apt for a Warpath unit leader.