Dreadfleet Heldenhammer

Just to show that I've not stopped completely, here are a couple of poor shots of the Heldenhammer, approaching completion.

The sails are really tough - beyond my skill

Perhaps I need a bigger magnifier?

However, I have made one discovery which I should have made, years ago.

I now use two pots of water while I'm painting and wash my brushes in the first, wipe off the surplus water, then rinse again to rid the brush of any remaining paint.

It seems to be effective in preventing my brushes from speedily loosing their point and spreading out.

I can see a big advantage in working alongside others as they might have suggested it years ago!

Here's John's mini cliff complete with moss and a little grass.

John tells me that it's an exact copy of Ayer's Rock apart from the height, width, depth, shape, colour and composition though, on this latter point, he cannot be certain without checking that Ayer's Rock isn't entirely made of polystyrene.

Well done John.

I particularly like the cave and wonder who or what dwells there.

I look forward to eventually seeing the full size piece.

Another view with models to provide a hint of the scale.

Dreadfleet - Bloody Reaver

At last I'm done with the bloody Bloody Reaver which has been quite a headache.

It was tricky to paint and to put together and then, when I thought I was nearly home and dry, the damn thing wouldn't fit in the base correctly.

I scraped and filed at all the places where I thought the problem was and it still wouldn't seat down.

All the time I was doing this I was afraid of breaking a mast or something and I was covering the thing with plastic filings. 

Not ideal.

Finally, I glued it in, as best I could, with a slight list to port.

The cause of the problem may be the fact that there are three joins in the hull not just the one.

Cliff 1

That excellent brewer of tea, bearer of tea cosies, and teller of tall tales (and occasionally long, thin ones), John Curtis, has kindly volunteered to tackle one of my more recent cunning plans.

I'm thinning out some books which will leave at least one shelf bare.

An ideal spot to display troops.

However, they do tend to get in each others way so that the spotty ones in the back row cannot be seen.

So I thought of a cliff face with troops in front of it, others high on a plateau and a further rank higher still, on the top of the cliff.

John has constructed and painted an excellent initial mock up, as shown here, measuring about 8 inches square.

The eventual cliff will be about 1 foot 9 inches, in old money, and about 5 or six inches high.

But isn't it good!

(What have you written on the back John?)

Swordfish 4

 At last I've located the three remaining bases giving me an excuse to put something on the blog despite so little progress being made.



The allotment and The Ashes are my excuse now but I think I'm close to completing The Bloody Reaver.

Then just one more to go and I can look at playing the game.



Where are you Lewis?

The Bloody Reaver

To show progress is being made on The Bloody Reaver.

This is the most complex of all the ships with an inner and outer hull.

It also has these odd 'locking' ends to the masts.

I can see no need for them, in fact they make life difficult as you have to put sails and masts in place before fixing the inner hull together and encasing it in the outer hull.

I intend cutting them away so that the masts can go in last, as in all the other ships.

Dreadfleet - Swordfish 3

A few shots of the completed Swordfish with the tide well and truly out.

(I still haven't located the bases for these final three ships.

As you can see, the painting on the sails is very mit and hiss - beyond me, I'm afraid.

However, OK for the tabletop.

Again, a really fine model with no problems apart from the painter's eyes.

(Why the skeleton with the dual purpose garden forks and egg whisks is wearing a bow tie I've no idea)

Dreadfleet - Swordfish 2

Nearly done on the hull and, with the sails all but finished, a clear hour of painting should launch the Swordfish.

Trouble is, with all the putting away and fetching out again, when we have guests, I cannot find the last three bases!

Swordfish sails

These sails were beyond my skill level and it shows.

How do these guys do it?

I tried dry-brushing, painting all over black and filling in the white with a fine brush, leaving it white and working the black in among it.

Nothing worked for me!

As well as them being messy, they are all black/white where to photos in the rules and magazines show various colours for the different components.

There should be metal in there and green

This I noticed when they were almost finished and I'm NOT doing them again.

Only the one sail is completely finished. The ropes are painted and the mast attached. I again found that that gap filling super glue most useful. More so than liquid green stuff. Thanks John.

Dreadfleet - 3 ships

The remaining 3 ships are The Swordfish, the Bloody Reaver and The Heldenhammer.

All three a challenge, particularly the latter two, both for assembly and for painting.

Heldenhammer's sails being red with gold insignia, I went for the Mephiston Red that I used to base the recent wargs with.

The other two have white insignia so I used white spray for the front hoping to fill in the sail colour round it leaving the white showing.

The Swordfish has black sails so it was OK to spray the back of its sails black.

The Bloody Reaver has purple sails so red should give me a good base.

We shall see how all this turns out.

Dreadfleet scenery 5

Just the wind gauge, whirlpool and rulers.

Photos taken in the light of the new desk light (Birthday present from Heather and co).

Perhaps it's not quite bright enough for modelling but, as it's LED, it gives a fairly white light.


The whirlpool is the other side of the wind gauge. Cheapskates!

Dreadfleet scenery 4

I revisited the Giant as I realised he was not surrounded by water.

While there, I darkened the lower area with Kabalite green and the lowest with Ork Flesh Wash.

I also gave it a light dry brush with white.

The Leech Wyrm and Bone Hydra were fun to paint with plenty of detail if you want to go that far with scenery.

I've experimented with various washes on these two including Guilliman Blue and  Drakenhof Nightshade over the white undercoat.

I think I'll give that ripped sail a bit more shading and highlighting.

Dreadfleet Scenery 3

As you can see, I've been busy.

Why GW give you these two identical pieces, I've no idea.

Perhaps it's buried  in the rules, somewhere but I've tried to make them look a little different anyway.

I even considered cutting one down the middle and green-stuffing a new part for each half but decided to wait till I've got into the game before doing so.


The blue/green look is supposed to go with the supernatural theme of the game though I don't think Thraka Green on Fenrisian Grey is up to the mark

Not really much to say on the rest of these except that I think that the Thraka Green wash with a little Mournfang Brown in it looks OK for bleached and well salted wooden wrecks.

I like the Dark Angel Green for the castle here and the green roofs better than the red ones on previous post.

I think they suggested Dark Angels Green for the large castle in the previous batch.

I might get around to it.

The rusting wreck is a dwarven one, the sea giant also shows that the technical paint, Waystone Green, which blobs and congeals, could also do with some help and the dragon is one of the dirigibles.

Next up, The Bone Hydra and the Leech Wyrm, the dwarf dirigible and the four other small sailing craft.


Lastly, the three larger and more complex ships; The Heldenhammer, The Swordfish and The Bloody Reaver.


That's the next three weeks taken care of!

Flaming Scimitar colours

I've added a PS to the Flaming Scimitar post as I thought about it afterwards and realised an error in the colours I listed. The base colour on the sail is Vomit Brown but that only shows in he sail recesses. The body of the sail was then painted with a Vomit Brown/Bleached Bone mix with Bleached Bone highlights.

Dreadfleet scenery 2

 Again, just showing a little progress.

Photos taken late in the day with the sun about to set and dust from the Sahara high above.

Thus you might notice a pinkish hue.

He was previously known as Red Hue but his politics have  moved to the right.

Dreadfleet scenery

To show that something is happening, despite birthdays and various invasions by little people, here's a start on the Dreadfleet scenery - one volcanic island.

Photo taken late in the day so not much to see.

I decided against 'dappling' the cliffs with the same colour grey that they were painted in (as suggested by WD).

Instead, I mixed plaster filler with a second coat of grey and when that was dry, gave it another coat to stop the filler rubbing off (perhaps mixing in glue might have helped)

Result is a rough surface that takes to dry brushing well.

Dreadfleet - odds and ends

Work in the shipyards has to stop as Miriam Karlin has blown her whistle again.

The kids are arriving soon so all the paint pots, brushes, glues and kits have to hide like the shoemaker's elves.

Just to show I've made a little progress alongside The Flaming Scimitar, here are some of the  measuring sticks (rather better than the cruddy red junk you get in most of their games!) weather gauges etc.

John's Bag End

John's Bag End which must surely be complete now.

An excellent job John.

All made out of Ticky Tacky!

That down pipe is a lovely touch made from a bendy plastic straw and a small piece of medical kit.

All John's work is made from odds and ends which would be called junk in another's hands.

Is this before the door was painted green or is that yet to come?

Just needs a wood pile in that out shed or perhaps some garden tools.



Terrific work.


Not GW but too good to be hidden away in Magna Carta or where ever it is you live.

Dreadfleet - The Flaming Scimitar

This has been the most complex of these Dreadfleet models, so far, and it really is a beauty.

I've painted it as well as I can manage yet it deserves better.

Games Workshop gives you  plenty to complain about nowadays but there are no complaints here.

It's an imaginatively sculptured delicate little craft.

Too delicate to take part in games, perhaps?

I've kept close to the colours suggested in White Dwarf 382 but simplified things a little.

Some of the washes seemed pointless and one actually spoiled the look and required a dash to the wash basin to get rid of it, smartish.

It's captained by 'the self styled Sultan of the seas, the Golden Magus', according to the rule book and is aided by elementals, djinns released from shattered jars when they are needed.

Here, she is carried through the waters by spirits of the deep as her sails billow with the breath of a Tempest djinn and the two headed fire efreet (close cousin to the Balrog?) wields its flaming scimitars and awaits enemy craft.

I am surprised at how good the main colour of the sails looks as it's 'Vomit Brown'.***

Purple and gold go well together too.

The detail on the sails deserved better than I could manage.

One problem I had was that the holes for the masts needed drilling out or filing a little.










*** Thought about it afterwards. The base colour is Vomit Brown but that only shows in he sail recesses. The main colour is Vomit Brown/Bleached Bone mix with Bleached Bone highlights.

I'll now do a few of the game tokens and scenery pieces before going back to Middle Earth.

Warg Riders again

I just like these rocks, fresh off the drive.    

A couple of 'wasteland' tufts used too.




Blue and purple..

And it was the spearmen whose back-packs are a puzzle.






              TO THE BOATS !