Topic: **Updated** Araby themed DoW *pic heavy*

[xerasi]

First of all I didn't realy know where to put this, Promised Warlord a long time ago that I would thow up a couple of pics of my DoW army themed over Araby. Not having a Cam, not ready to post and so on and so forth have made it several months... Im sorry about the delay Warlord, but here it is:

It's all WIP as you soon will find out, some more than others, but no basing etc. I'll finnish it all up when I'm done with the big chunks of the army.

I'll just start up with my army list for those interested, It's worked out at 2250 points exactly, as I'm planning on attending the Quake City Rumble in SF in April.

Sultan Al-Akhamed:
Merchanery General with Heavy armor, lance and enchanted shield
mounted on a Pegasus, 162 pts

Sakhar:
Hireling Wizard lvl 2 and with two scrolls, 145 pts

Ehkmed:
Hireling Wizard lvl 2 and with a scroll, 120 pts

Al-Wasa
Paymaster with Heavy armor and shield, 61 pts

8 Duelists with pistols, 72 pts
8 Duelists with add. handweapon, 56 pts
8 Duelists with shield, 48 pts

21 Pikemen carrying a standard, 220 pts

10 Crossbowmen, 80 pts

5 Heavy Cavalry, 95 pts
5 Heavy Cavalry, 95 pts

5 Light Cavalry, 55 pts
5 Light Cavalry, 55 pts

21 Dwarfs with Heavy armor and Shield, carrying a standard, 199 pts

15 Norse Marauders with Flail and carrying a banner, 130 pts

16 Paymasters Bodyguards carrying a Banner, 154 pts

3 DoW Ogres with Greatweapon and a Champion, 133 pts

Giant, 205 pts

Bronzino's Galloper Gun, 165 pts

As the list didn't look like this to start of with, some of the units might be a couple of models short, just so you know.

My general on his ever faithful... Pegasus?







My two mages



My paymaster





Two of the 3 regiments of duelists (the third was added to get up to 2250 pts from 2150, and without legs etc they are still in progress)





My pikemen:



My 2 units of heavy cav:





and a pic from the back, so you can actually see the lepard skin



Norse Marauders



Paymasters bodyguards





Dog of War Ogres



Canon



Any kind of feedback is welcome,

[Warlord]

I feel priviledged to be the first to view this (and I even got a mention  )

It looks really good.
Things I love -
Flying Carpet
The trident
Your Paymaster and his key
His huge chest in the unit being pulled by slaves
Genies
Use of HE archer legs and DE torsos
Use of Marauders as slaves

Things I wonder?
How did you make the puffy pants?
How did you make the flying carpet?
How did you make the wispy Genie 'tails'?
How much Greenstuff did you use 
What are the Dwarfs going to be?

Still feel undecided about the Winged Lancers, but when finished I think they will be co-hesive with the rest of the force.
The pike'man' on the side closest to the camera in the third rank is wearing a DE women's breastplate. Does this mean there are women in this force? Or an accident?

Overall, I love it. You have not disappointed at all, and the ideas are excellently executed. Just curious though, games wise, doesn't the General stand out a bit (get hurt a bit being on the carpet)?

[xerasi]

Things I wonder?
How did you make the puffy pants?
How did you make the flying carpet?
How did you make the wispy Genie 'tails'?
How much Greenstuff did you use 
What are the Dwarfs going to be?

The pike'man' on the side closest to the camera in the third rank is wearing a DE women's breastplate. Does this mean there are women in this force? Or an accident?

Overall, I love it. You have not disappointed at all, and the ideas are excellently executed. Just curious though, games wise, doesn't the General stand out a bit (get hurt a bit being on the carpet)?

Thanks for the comment. To answer your questions:

I've used 2 packs of millita as the backbone, and it's there the puffy pants come from. In some cases i remade everything but shoes, other times I simply redid the lower leg. A small 'staff' of greenstuff wraped around the lower part of a leg, tuged it in to the shoe, and then push remaining GS up along the leg. Simply and works fine.

The carpets are also very simple. A suitable piece of plastic, that is thin but not to bendable, cut in the desired shape, and then play a bit around with fire. At a good distance it dosn't take damage at all, but just gets bendable. end it by using a thin long piece of GS pushed into each side and then cut all the strings from the carpet. It's realy easy, but don't use the plastic I did I primed it at least 5 times before paint could stick on to it.

The Genies are also realy simple. I used Fimo Clay (if it translates like that, it's a kind of clay that can be burned at around 400 degrees F, so is burnable in a normal oven). I made a long snake of it, pointy in one end, and took half an ogre (cut up as you probably would have guessed), and just twisted it into the shape that you see. Took it off the ogre and into the oven, and eventually made a belt of GS...

I've not used to much GS on it... Im on my 3rd pack now (actually this one is Brownstuff)... In total I'd say about 5 of those things you get two of every time you buy GS from GW....

As for the dwarfs, here is my current stage. Maybe a bit more details, and a shield of some sort.



And for your last point on the General, nope, he is a brilliant add on. He is used as a mobile, supporting unit, that adds leadership where needed. I don't expose him, either he is behind my troops with a few holes to see through, or he's behind enemy lines, slowing them down, and readying a charge.

Cheers Xerasi

[Midaski]

That Paymaster looks like my long lost twin brother. 

I love the ogre genies - brilliant.

I can't see any Al Mukhtar models - I would have thought they would have fitted in brilliantly somewhere.
You called the lancers heavy cavalry? They are on ordinary horses - are you planning some form of barding?

[catbarf]

Awww, I was hoping for camel cavalry.  Oh well.

Trivia: Horses are terrified of camels, so when they fight, the horses run 

[lonearcher]

I got a kick out of the Genie/Ogres too! I bet the guy in the middle sounds like Robin Williams.

[patsy02]

For the heavy cavalry I would switch the unbarded horses with bretonnia horses, and cover the cloth with GS scalemail.
Al muktar's desert dogs would make excellent cavalry(light or heavy). You can also consider the old imperial guard tallarn rough riders.
The first duellist group have some skinny caucatian models, and some steroid powered arab looking ones. It looks kind of weird. The second unit looks like ku-klux klan ninjas, not very arabic-ish.
Norse marauders look excellent, but I would shave off the chaos stars 
Brilliant looking cannon(where did you get it??), the cart looks a bit flimsy, and I'd move the gun further to the back.
The right wizard looks great(awesome mydas the mean), but the left one looks like some random peasant about to panic.
General looks sweet.
The genia ogres are totally awesome. Maybe paint them blue?

[Warlord]

Don't forget guys that this is a DoW army, and as such Heavy Cavalry have the barding option as an upgrade..

I do agree about Al Muktar's desert dogs. One excellent figure which is unavailable anymore (but I am bless to have) is Sulliman le Saracen. Double handed scitmar, looks quite good. I do agree though, IF you decide to bard them, Bretonnian Warhorses would be the choice pick, probably the old 5th ed ones too...

[Rufas the Eccentric]

Good work.  Has anyone noticed the new Araby warmaster mini's in the U.S. White Dwarf.  Is this an indication of an upcomming release for WFB?

[xerasi]

Thx for your comments.

As warlord said I'll not be using barding on my heavy cav, so no bretonnian horses for me...

But I already have the desert dogs, they just need a tiny bit of conversion (removing shield holder from mini as I don't use them with shields). It'll also include Suliman Le Saracen, the old bret special char for Araby.

As for camels... I made dem, but they look really bad, so I've decided not to use 'em... I will get some real camel (minis;)) some day, but I want it to be 'turnamentable' as soon as possible as I'm of for the Quake city rumble in mid april.

As for the cannon, I disliked/didn't want to use the money on one, so I made one. The wheels and the barrelhead was plastics, everything else is GS built up around a skeleton of the rough form (I found some plastic that was in roughly the right shape.

I'm satisfied with the kkk as you call them, for me they are religious fanatics, but I have heard the comment before

I also don't mind the mixing of the small caucasians, and the big afro-like ones. I'm just having a bit of fun about the "black men are bigger" (though I know it's not that way it is interpreted). It also looks more natural when the whole army is placed together.

Xerasi

[Captain Tineal]

Love the Flying Carpet and the Genies, very original, and very well done. 

[Dendo Star]

Freaking awesome.

[W.R. Hall]

Very nice flying carpet.

[Brunger]

You've really done well with your ideas! incredible work! the ogre genie idea is brilliant. I also really like the general on flying carpet, the duelists and the pikemen champion (especially the pikemen Champion!).

I was just wondering which torsos you used for your paymasters bodyguard? they almost look like they're wearing suits but it fits in with the rest of the army well.

anyways great work and keep the pictures coming

[patsy02]

It looks like he GS'ed them, but I might be wrong.

[General Helstrom]

That's a mighty cool looking army! As said, the "ogres" are a real eye-catcher, and the overall theme is very well executed.

[xerasi]

thx again to all your replyes and kindness...

The Paymasters bodyguards are made out of millitia, the... piraty one. I reduced the length of the two 'side flaps', and cut/filed the inner clothing away. GS'ed the boarder on the coat and the inner shirt. They are based on a couple of mameluk/mamluke/mameluke pictures I found on the net (depending on how you spell it you get different pics).

I've completed the conversions of the last duelist regiment, including a new favoured mini (even before painted I can say this). I'll post an update in a couple of days when they are painted, along with my Gunner crew and Bronzino. The later two are both... Very different...

Xerasi

[patsy02]

The halberdies ave all the same torsos? You must have bought a lot of militia.

[Donnachaidh]

Fantastic - very nicely done...!

[gorenut]

I think you have great ideas and have great conversion skills.  The only small gripe I'd have is perhaps paying attention to little details like the paint job and making sure all the spears/pikes are straight.  Other than that.. this is awesome!

[Count Christian]

Nice work, are you using Al Muktars desert dogs for LC ?

A less converting person might just have used LOTR Haradrim


Have you considered using 40k Tallarn desert raiders ?
http://uk.games-workshop.com/storefront/store.uk?do=List_Models&code=301319&orignav=301117

[General Von Lettow]

Although it might work, the only problem with using LOTR Haradrim is obviously the scale 

[Warlord]

I thought of this, and attempted it, and the scale is definitely a problem. Unless you say that the people of Araby are just shorter - but it still doesn't quite fit right... And you can't really convert much infantry with them because of the scale.

You can get a nice unit of spears / pikes, use the ones with tridents as Halberdiers, and plenty of archers though

[xerasi]

A day or two before the next update... Had a major paint accident... (droping half a bottle of Bestial brown on the gray carpet took some time to get off (and there are still some orange marks)... Anyone else noticed that an accident never comes alone? Droped the paint on a chair, tried to grab it in the air which failed (I usually have pretty good reflexes, but not this time it seemed) and my attempt caused it to not only make stains on the carpet, but I also managed to get quite some paint on my door and a wall (both several feet away from where the paintbottle droped)... of well...

First of all I've not answered a couple of questions so it's about time I think...

About the female torsos. They don't have beards and there are several, so it's no coincidence. I also have multiple DE warrior boxes (from my DE army) so I would have enough to fill them out. But it aint gonna happen at least not at the time. The fluff behind the army is somewhat along renegades or outcasts, that roam the desert. The fluff I'll be writting (when I have time) will be a letter from a merchant, probably from the empire, writing to an official in either the administration or church about how he was assaulted, and the newly purchased slaves overwellemed him and his men, along with some desert brothers (I've really not given it too much thought yet, but I want it ot reflect a bitter man, more concerned about his money then anything else, trying to convince the church or officials that it was chaos it selvf that stroke against him, and thus must be hunted down). This also gives the reason too the chaos symbols.

After I started reading a series about the roman army of Simon Scarrow, I got more into the idea, that it's the men that brings message of what is on the battlefield, and not the generals own eyes that see it. Thus my elephant (or the one I used as a giant) is double the size of what it should be. Why? Something big, and never encountered looks even bigger and more terrifying than it actually is. This I'm sort of trying to show with my army. Not acustomed to the black men (not sure how to express it, not wanting to affend anyone), they are bigger and look more fierce than their lighter counterparts.

Everything is of course not thought into this, but in the general lines this is what I wanted to express.

I'll post a couple of pics saturday, I should be almost finnished with my gladiators, along with the gallopper gun. The latter is probably the least serious part of the army (though if I should say so, it looks mighty great)

Xerasi

[Lachieo]

groovy army, never would of guessed you used fimo how do you attach it to the model?