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Hi Guys,

Long time lurker on the forums but first time poster, and I've finally got a question i really want your guys opinion on.

First, a little context (read at your own peril). I started collecting Orks over a year ago and really liked modelling them, but due to Uni and life I've always been slow on the painting front. I've recently decided to really get through the ever building backlog of models to paint, but I keep doubting myself on how to paint my Orks.

I wanted my Ork Boss to be the Warlord of a Warhorde, that is a leader of a force of many warbands which could equate to several thousand orks or more, though not a Waaagh. Fluff wise I wanted my Warlord to have united some warring ork tribes on some planet and now leads them into imperial space. I want to emphasise that it's not a waaagh, cause in my mind a waaagh is a combination of large ork warhordes and warbands of varying size and origin, meaning you're undoubtedly going to find various army colours throughout it. I want my force to look like a single warhorde under one rule.

I came up with ideas for several tribes to include in my warhorde, each with a specific theme/obsession that attracts like minded orks, which unintentionally closely matched that of some of the common ork clans, so I decided that make it so that these tribes are usually dominated by orks from a particular clan, though there may be other clans present.

Thus, I had my fluff and onto the painting. Now I wanted my Ork warhorde to look like one force on the table, by that I mean it looks like it is one army and maybe has some sort of 'allegiance'. This is mainly because I personally don't particularly like the look of armies which look like someones just bought a bunch of different half arsed painted models of ebay, all with varying schemes and paint quality, resulting in a force which looks a mess. Therefore I wanted a unifying aspect, and I went for the colour orange, which is justified in my fluff but I won't go into.

However, I still wanted to reflect that my force is actually a mix of tribes and clans which have all been conquered by my warlord, such that when you looked at the force as a whole, you can clearly see its a single ork force. However if you looked a little closer, you can actually see and distinquish between different tribes and clans. The way I intended to do this is with themes and colours. To distinguish the tribes, each tribes orks are actually a slightly different shade of green. On top of this, each tribe has a different quirk which attracts like minded orks, so orks of a particular unit type (stormboyz, speed freeks etc) tend to be found together, so the tribes/warbands can also be distinguished by the other orks around them as well as the type of ork which leads them.

Now for my issue: I'm not totally sure how to represent the different clans within my force as well. I was thinking of including clan colours and icons within the relevant units, but still keeping the dominant colour of the model orange. But I'm weary that this may make the models too chaotic/clashing to the eye, having, for example, bright green (for skin), orange (for force colours) and yellow (for clan colours). Especially so if the colours are close like orange and yellow or red. Just to clarify I know what models/units would be from what clan, but I don't really know how to represent this to someone without having to tell them. I want them to be able to see orks from different clans and tribes by the schemes and themes of the various warbands in my horde.

So my questions are these:
1. Do you guys tend to collect armies of one colour, and if so do you theme your army around a single clans colours or just a scheme you like?
2. Do you guys tend to incorporate the clan colours into your force (if it is not a clan themed scheme), and if so how? Are they the dominant colours of the model or subtle additions?
3. What do you think of having a force that looks like a single scheme for large ork collection? Do you feel this is a bit 'unorky' and that it should look like a rag tag bunch of clans, tribes and colours?
4. How would you incorporate clan colours in my situation? Do you think occassional icons, warpaint and colours would work or be too messy and I should keep things simple?

I'd like to think my warlord wants to be feared throughout the galaxy and his hordes recognised in an instant, hence why he forces his boys to paint their armour orange as no clan (that i know of) is orange. However I'm not sure whether this make sense for orks (though when does anything? ).

I appreciate your comments and thoughts, and look forward to hearing how you guys choose your colours for your forces and how you incorporate clan colours into this!

For the different clans I see 3 main options. Using different skin tones for each clan, which they do not have to be types of green, looking at other depictions of orcs like ones from LOTR or any Blizzard game they have been green, brown, blue/grey, and even red. Muted cool colors and neutrals are the ones I think work best though.

The second option is to have a different pattern using the same color scheme for each tribe, i.e. black and orange stripes on one but black and orange chevrons on another.

The last option of using clan colors that you touched on would work best if they were close to complimentary colors so orange/blue and orange/green or something similar.

Realized another as I was typing, you could use slightly different iconography for each like military units, maybe one is skulls and another ravens or some orky equivalent.

I agree it's nice for all the models in an ork army to look part of the same force and in some way indicate their allegiance to the Warlord, but orks don't really understand conformity and are too disorganised to ever look as consistent as e.g. a marine army.

One approach I really liked was in the LotR movies, where Saruman's (I think) army of orcs and goblins showed their allegiance with a white hand symbol. There was no consistency in how the hand symbol was applied (carved, carefully painted, sewn onto a banner, daubed on with a hand dipped in paint) or where (on arms, helmets, weapons, whatever), and the hand itself wasn't consistent (just recognisably a hand) so it looked very anarchic, yet the shared symbol still made it obvious that they were all the same army.

You mention orange as an army colour - I like that, but I'd apply it subtly, e.g. some orks would have an orange helmet, others would paint an orange stripe on equipment or vehicles, others would have an orange banner or armband, or whatever. And the shade of orange wouldn't be consistent either - they'd use the first orange paint or fabric they could find. The warlord himself and his retinue would have more orange.

Underneath the orange, they'd still wear their previous colours and styles (Goffs preferring black, Speedfreeks using red to go faster, Snakebites in natural colours, etc).

Hey guys, thanks for your responses!

@Riverrat88 I really like that idea of using different patterns/iconography for tribes, might have to experiment! If I was good enough at painting I would totally do different iconography for mobs/paint the clan icons on each mob somehow, but alas I'm not :/ I'm thinking of using the clan banners you get in nob kits for certain mobs nobz though, so I'm thinking that'll keep the orange scheme on the boyz but from the nobz banner you can tell what clan they aired from. That also might stop the clashing colours occurring too much

@Clang: Yeah the 'unorkiness' of 'unity' was worrying me a bit. I'm thinking for the orange of including it fairly generously, but like you suggest having different tribes and mobs include it in different ways, like the boss just went up to them and yelled "paint it orange" and each mob kinda took a different approach to it, like some will have orange armour, helmets, some with shirts or trousers, some only with banners etc. I agree with your LoTR comment. I do want to keep that anarchic feel to my boys, and I'm hoping throwing a bunch of variety into where I apply the orange will help that (as well as varying other colours etc).

I'll have to experiment with applying the orange more subtly, it's probably gonna have to be a careful balance of orange, clan colours and other colours to make it not TOO random that it looks a complete mess. On my test models I took the approach of "what's the focus' when looking at my models?" to which my response was "the orange and skin". So most other things are darker, duller colours so not to take the eye away from those key focuses. I'm thinking of subtly introduce clan colours to trinkets, belts etc might also work, which is kind of like you said about still wearing previous colours.

I also really like your idea of various oranges. I'd considered this before, but the issue was I actually realised painting orange is a pain in the ass and often requires many layers which, when I'm planning to have several hundred orks, is too much time and hassle for me, so finding multiple oranges was out of the question. But I recently a technique that worked; using a multi-wash approach (washing a white surface with orange multiple times). I liked the outcome and it's dead easy to do cause you just wash and leave it, little effort in terms of edging, lighting etc for an unskilled painter like myself. However you've made me realise I could always to the first wash of the clans colours, then several washes of orange over. This might (need to test) give the look that it was once painted/stained the old colour, and the new colours just been put on top. Also applying a different number of washes will affect the orange, so I'm stealing that idea Thanks a bunch!

Hey,

So if I was building a army of orks I would personally differentiate each clan by painting on war paint or tattoos. For instance maybe one clan has stripe across one eye and on another maybe having the whole face painted like a skull. You could do up the shoulder as well maybe adding a x or something simple if free hand is not your forte. I personally would like to try and keep the colour scheme the same for the most part but maybe switching up where the main colours are painted to give the army a unique orky feel. Hope this Gaels and good luck.

Cheers!

It's a predicament that many Ork collectors/gamers have come up against, myself included. I actually find deciding on paint schemes is the part of the hobby that gives me the most difficulties.

When I first came back to my Orks, I was 100% determined to paint my boyz up at the meanest, no-nonsense Goffs I could. I painted perhaps a dozen like this before I decided that actually, that colour scheme was a bit boring and I wanted my models to have more areas of interest.

Since then I've developed a kind of make-it-up-as-I-go-along process of adding different patterns/glyphs/spot colours whenever I fancy. I reckon this approach actually helps to recreate the ramshackle horde look a real Waaagh! would probably have. Plus, it means I get boyz 'finished' to a decent level within a reasonable time frame, knowing I'm gonna come back to them later and add in more details like checkers/dags etc.

Well,did my Orks in dark red/bronze and it fits nice for a contrast with the green skin.
I only got some of the "old" orks thou ..you know
Lots of chopters and fgitz, and the bronz/copper color is a friend of every drybrusher. well at lest in my case

The great thing about Orks is that there really is no "right way" to do things. A ragtag mob (like a Waagggh!) makes as much sense as a uniform army (like an army made up of one clan).

That said, even with an army of different styled Orks, it's important to have some uniformity somewhere that ties them all together. You could definitely use the orange that you want as a main colour to make them look like a whole, then use the different clan colours and iconography to make each unit stand apart. Use bull-horned helmets and checks for Goffs, black or red flame motifs on top of the orange for Evil Suns, etc. Just whatever you do…make sure you have fun!