Howdy scummers! This week we’re taking a break from pacing up and down the hallways anxiously awaiting the release of Ash Wastes to look at the hobby project/gang of one of our authors.
What’s your background in the hobby?
My name is Zach (Bair on here usually), I got into the hobby when I was about 11 with the 40k 4th edition starter set and then the 7th Ed fantasy set when it came out a little after. I drifted away from it in my later teens when the local shops in the US shut down. I moved to the UK for university in 2013 and got back into it thanks to my housemate who was playing 40k…and man did I get back into it. I played a lot of 7th edition 40k at that time, Horus Heresy, then 8th edition 40k (some 9th lately), Age of Sigmar, Adeptus Titanicus (read Warlord Wednesdays on here it’s great I promise and I’m not biased), and Blood Bowl but didn’t really touch Necromunda until very recently.
Tell us about the project…
I’m really lucky that there’s a good local scene for just about any wargame, one perk of living close to London, and have a really good group to play more narrative styles of games with like recently starting a Crusade campaign. Right before the start of Covid we were planning on starting some Necromunda so I got myself a box of Cawdor and the ForgeWorld weapon upgrade pack and extra heads for more variety and just built models that I thought looked cool without really reading into anything or knowing what was “good”. Obviously we then didn’t actually start a campaign.
Jump to a couple months ago in 2022 and some locals wanted to start a campaign, few had really played before and everyone chose a different gang to each other, I was still using my Cawdor but picked up some Redemptionists and another box for more weapon variety with the new plastic upgrades and some bomb rats just for good measure. We started out at 1000 credits and I figured out which ones I needed to paint, used a name generator to give them appropriate names and plugged it all into yaktribe and joined the campaign. Yaktribe really has made it loads easier to get into this because of how daunting a game system it can be. I named my gang the Hallowed Pilgrims and the campaign includes: Palanite Enforcers, Delaque, Escher, Goliaths, and a bounty hunter gang.
I also converted up a Rogue Doc to fit the aesthetic of the gang but still stand out, using a redemptionist body and head and arms from the newer plastic Krieg sprue for medical bag and arms with cuffs at the end of the sleeves. I painted it up differently from my gang so he stood out and named him Doc Mordo.
You can view my gang at the link here, which will update as I update my gang!
https://yaktribe.games/underhive/print/gang/229120?i=0&r=0
How do you paint your Cawdor?
Like anything else I do I wanted a simple paint scheme that would look good at the distance of using it on a table and that I could knock out pretty quickly. Funny enough this ended up only using 1 contrast paint. I also want my Redemptionists to be different from the Cawdor so sort of reversed the schemes on them using more black and less blue.
For the standard Cawdor it’s:
Spray Grey Seer
Darkoath Flesh for skin
Macragge Blue robes
Corvus Black bindings/some robes
DarkStar Baroque for most metallics
Coopers/brasses of choice from DarkStar paints in smaller spots
Doombull Brown padded armour pieces
Hair is just a mix of different browns/greys
The bases are first given little sections of texture paint to add some rusty texture and then painted with leadbelcher all over.
I use the Dirty Down Rust for the rusty spots but to create different colours for brighter rust I first put down a little orange paint on the base, otherwise it’s just all very dark.
After the base colours are blocked in then it gets an all-over wash of ScaleColour’s Dark Stains from their soilwork line. I let this dry overnight before applying a matte varnish to the model.
Played any games yet?
Yes! I’ve been able to play 2 games so far for our campaign, the first more of an intro kind of game on a pretty flat board against Palanite Enforcers and it was a hell of a game, those guys really lay down a lot of fire and I didn’t start with any armour on my guys… but did manage to set 3 on fire with one blunderpole shot which was incredible and pulled it back from there, charging in a getting some lucky kills! Ended in a win for my Cawdor.
The second game was using the zone mortalis version of the game against a pretty meaty Goliath gang. Combat and template weapons were big winners here on both sides given the narrow corridors, and bomb rats were a lot of fun to be able to run around corners before blowing up! A pretty heavy loss for my Cawdor gang this time around but the absolute champion was my heavy crossbow ganger that stood up to 3 different goliath fighters in close combat and even headbutt one back hard enough to cause an injury.
After both of these I adjusted my gang as appropriate with damaged/killed fighters, adding new ones to my roster, giving the existing ones armour (always do this!) and giving those new fighters some new weapons like a long rifle so I can add in a little more reliable long-range shooting and a redemptionist with eviscerator for even more fire!
What do you want to add?
I picked up a Stig Shambler which I built with a heavy flamer, I know that it’s not optimal by any means but damn it seems like a load of fun to shamble around setting things on fire! I want to add that in next for sure as soon as I have enough credits, otherwise it would be cool to add in some more redemptionists, especially with a firepike.
I’ve also modelled 2 cherubs for my Redemptionist priest which I want to add in at some point for a little protection on him so he can just charge in headlong and smack things around with a nice flaming chainaxe. Otherwise just to get more gangers in! Really overwhelm with cheap guys with two handed axes, flails, reclaimed autoguns, stub guns, and a more expensive one with combi flamer and flail!
All in all I’ve put together 2 boxes of Cawdor gangers, 5 Redemptionists (since I converted the rogue doc) and between the forgeworld bits and the plastic upgrade sprue have managed to make all 20 of them entirely unique without even duplicate heads, which I’m really happy about since it’s such a narrative game each can feel really unique!
Where to follow progress?
I post just about everything that I paint on my instagram @bair_paints which will include some more necromunda, but also loads of things like Titanicus, a Black Templar project I’m working through, Age of Sigmar armies and very soon some Conquest by Para Bellum. I’m also really interested to see what (if anything) Ash Wastes will look like for my Cawdor!
Have any questions or feedback? Drop us a note in the comments below or email us at contact@goonhammer.com.
