Sunday 6 November 2016

The architecture of Mancunius Dome

Hab-block 22S

It looks like I've got distracted from y work on Silver Tower. Thing is, with all the talks about 40k going on on the inter-web, me and Warboss Kurgan have been planning a return to Mancunius Dome, our own location in the Necromunda Underhive. We've decided to run a campaign in it once our current AoS campaign, Hallow'd Ground, is over. After our first chat my eyes fell upon a piece of scenery that Warboss Kurgan had started a couples of year ago. It was supposed to be a house for our Mordheim table, reminiscent of the York Shambles, but then he never got around finishing it. That's how it looked.


I knew he wouldn't mind, so I took to it and removed all the medieval-looking bits like wooden beams, planks, sloped roof and so on. Then set about to 40k-fy it by adding ramparts walls similar to the Aegis Defence Line and by gluing around vehicle and building parts from my bits box, cocktail straws, cuts of electric cabling and some pieces of wire mesh.


Then, I stippled Liquid Green Stuff on all the walls. This creates a fine texture and I use this technique on all my buildings. This time it also served to fix in place those bits of papers that did not completely come off the foam board when I removed everything that Warboss Kurgan had glued on it. For the base, I just glued sea sand on it.


Panting it was great fun. After a black undercoat, I stippled Mechanicus Standard Grey and Dawnstone on the walls, then glazed them with my own slop. This is a pot of Flesh Wash from the 1990s in which I keep pouring the water with which I rinse paint pots before throwing them away. At the moment, it has a greenish tint which is perfect to simulate the effect of humidity on limestone. Once the slop glaze was dry, a further stiplled layer of Administratum Grey finished off the walls.


The exhaust pipes (the body of the old Dark Eldar Raider) were also stiplled with Bugman's Glow, Zamesi Desert, Troll Slayer Orange and Leadbelcher, my favourite technique for rusted metal.


Stippling, however, doesn't work well on small details and would have also ruined the soft plastic of the cocktail straws. So, for the smaller metal details I went for a Warplock Bronze base, drybrushed with Ironbreaker and aged with Typhus Corrosion and Ryza Rust.


The screens on the control panels and the glass on the lamps, rather than getting Typhus Corrosion and Ryza Rust, received a wash of Biel-tan Green and Drakenhof Nightshade. The sand on the base was drybrushed Mournfang and Balor Brown.


And finally, Warboss Kurgan had built the house with a cut corner. It reminded me of the kind of place were in my hometown people build niches for saint statues (yes...they keep doing it!) and since I had a panel with an Imperial Saint I glued it there and detailed a bit more than the rest of the walls. A simple Karak Stone drybrush on the Saint itself, Wazdakka Red, Ushabti Bone and Agrax Earthshade for the purity seals and it was done.


I can just imagine the devoted Imperial citizens stopping by, kissing the skulls at the Saint's feet and going off feeling so much better.
I can't wait to have our first game with Hab-block 22S in it!

2 comments:

  1. This looks so good Viktor! A brilliant reimagining.

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    Replies
    1. Thanks! Now it's a matter of doing a bit more pieces to cover a full board.

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