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It's been a few months since our most recent Gorkamorka campaign ended, and most of our group has been doing Age of Sigmar stuff. I'm still in the process of trying to finish up the same unit I've been working on for the last 12 years (which I now need to switch over to round bases), so it'll still be a while before I get any progress on that posted. In the meantime, I decided that I'd start getting my warband ready for our upcoming Mordheim campaign. Which right now consists of only me.




This conversion has actually been a long time in the making. His arms are from the old metal Horrors of Tzeentch. I bought them from Games-Workshop back when you could still buy bitz directly from their website, which would mean that I started working on this guy back in...2007? I don't think it was the initial inspiration for this conversion, but it was certainly influenced along the way by Nordic's Eshin Sorcerer from his old DeviantArt account. As I recall, my original plan was to use a Plague Monk body, but I'm glad that I decided to go with the Empire Wizard instead.



I had to carefully cut and pin the Horror arms to get them to fit properly with the Wizard bitz that I was using for the body. This ended up being ridiculously hard, as the spindly little arms were only slightly larger than the wire I was using to pin them. It would have been a shame to have held onto those bitz for over a decade, only to end up ruining them in the process of trying to stick the whole thing together.



I left his right side unattached while I was building him, since there was a fair number of little fiddly bits inside his cloak that I would never be able to paint once he was completely assembled. I got the hood courtesy of Marvolork, which I elongated to fit the Skaven aesthetic.



The scythe is actually from one of the ornamental bits on the Vampire Counts Coven Throne, which worked rather nicely. I did have to carve out a slot for it between his arm and his shoulder, but once I did, it fit nice and tight. His base is cobbled together from a couple of chunks of rubble from the Assault Marine sprue, along with some greenstuff brickwork and the obligatory skull.



The cloak on the Empire Wizard looked much to starched and smooth for a Skaven that's been crawling around in the rubble of Mordheim for months, so I carved in some rips and tears and sculpted a few more folds and wrinkles to break up the smoother areas. I actually hollowed out the entire bottom of the body so that the feet and legs would go up inside the robes, not that you can really tell on the finished model much. All in all, I'm pretty satisfied with how this guy turned out. Definitely worth the twelve year wait. Now I just need to see if I can get another fifteen or so models finished in less than 180 years...

Great model! Always happy to see Mordheim being worked on.

Nice conversion there The Turnip Master.

Cheers,

CB

This is awesome! Kill KILL!

I'm super excited to see what you do here. I love the conversion work and hopefully we'll get to see them in action like with your Gorkamorka campaign!

Thanks, guys! Mordheim is the game that originally got me into the hobby, so it still holds a special place in my heart.

@facelyss Yeah, I hope so, too. Like I said, everyone in our group has kind of switched gears to other games at the moment, but I think I'm starting to generate a bit of excitement for Mordheim. Time to turn up the pressure, I guess...

So in that spirit, here's the leader of my little band of Skaven ninja:




Clan Eshin has always been a bit lacking in models, and since I was never a huge fan of the old metal Gutter Runners, I was pretty much stuck with just the Night Runner sprues that came in the Mordheim box for building all the characters in the warband (though to be fair, they were probably the most versatile models in the range at the time). Although I like the new Skaven plastics much better than the old, huge-fisted 90s models, none of the Eshin models have been updated, so they look even more out of place now. Fortunately, a couple of the models that were released with Spiteclaw's Swarm look very Eshiny with a few tweaks.

I know some people who do a lot of converting aren't a fan of the new snap-fit easy-to-build models, but I actually really like them for conversion work. It's true that you end up with a lot of weird pieces, like a head and an arm, or a partial torso, so simple head swaps are usually out of the question, but since I usually end up having to chop things apart and pin them to make them fit anyway, it's not a big deal to me. Plus, even with pieces sawed off, the models do still usually fit together so tightly that I probably could get away with not gluing them.



As you probably guessed, I used the Lurking Skaven as the base for my Adept. I had a pair of old 90s fighting claws that I've been saving for this conversion, but since he already came armed with a pair, I didn't have to do anything to his weapons.

I often used the capes from the Night Runners sprue to differentiate characters or Gutter Runners from the rank-and-file Night Runners, though they never really looked that great. They were a bit square and tended to stick straight out like someone had used too much starch on them. I experimented a lot with green stuff capes, but even using some wires for support, they were always a bit too flexible when they weren't draped over the hard plastic body and I could never quite get the sort of flowy shapes that I wanted for a character that's leaping forward like this. I needed to use something that was rigid and had plenty of detail.



In the end, I went with the lower half of a Myrmourn Banshee, another excellent snap-fit kit. The only downside is that the part that attaches to the torso is pretty thick, so I had to file it down until it was a shape that would fit over my Adept's shoulders. I also bent the cape a bit using a heat gun so that it didn't stick straight up and make the model like five inches tall.




I found a plastic clanrat sporting a cowl and sawed off his head to replace the more armored one from the Lurking Skaven. I then connected the cape to the hood with some green stuff. I also added some keys to his belt, because everyone in Mordheim carries keys. I probably should have also had him carrying a fish, some candles, and a marionette or two, but I guess I'll have to save those for some other models.

I tried to give him a more pale, sickly skin tone than my other Skaven, as well as kind of a grimy look to show that he'd been lurking around the ruins of Mordheim for quite a bit longer than most of the members of the warband. In general I think it worked pretty well, though the contrast between the pale highlights and the dark grime that settled more in the recesses might make the shadows look a bit stark. Still, he turned out pretty well, and much better than anything that I could have managed a few years ago before the Warhammer Underworlds and Nighthaunt models came out. Now Games-Workshop just needs to release some actual Eshin models and we'll see what I can really do.

That is one fierce looking rodent. Solid conversion work and a cool paintjob. This is going to be a seriously cool warband.

Very cool work so far. You'll have some nice unique figures.

Love seeing a bit of Mordheim about

The next member of my little band of Skaven Ninjas is finally finished:





Since the background fluff for Clan Eshin is that they learned to be sneaky assassins by watching actual human ninjas, I wanted my Mordheim warband to actually use as many traditional Japanese, Chinese, and Indian weapons as possible, instead of the mostly European weapons that come in the kits. So here is the first of my two Black Skaven, armed with a Kusarigama, which will count as a sword and buckler. Conveniently, the rules for sword and buckler in Mordheim are actually quite well suited to a Kusarigama, as the double parry is a pretty good way of representing the use of the chain to distract and entangle your opponent.



In keeping with my theme of pinning ridiculously tiny bits together, I decided that I needed to pin the blade of the kama onto the handle, just in case. I don't think it was quite as bad as trying to pin the Horror arms, but the bit I was pinning was so small that you can actually see the pin through the thin layer of plastic that was left after I drilled it out.





The body of this guy is actually from one of the original plastic Night Runners that came in the Mordheim box. I liked the little row of throwing stars on the bandolier across his chest and by sticking the Night Runner body on the newer Clanrat legs, it gave him a bit more of an upright posture, which I wanted for his pose of raising the kama above his head.

The chain was definitely the most difficult part of this conversion. I wanted to make it as solid and stable as possible, which I sort of achieved. The chain is cobbled together from a number of different lengths of chain, mostly from Dark Eldar bits, as I recall. The main chain going from the handle to his left hand is made up of at least two shorter lengths of chain, but I have it kind of tucked below his head, so that it's hopefully not in a position where it could get caught on something or that the model could fall and land on this bit. The last little bit of chain with the weight is a bit more flimsy, and I definitely broke it off a few times and had to re-glue it to the model. In retrospect, I probably should have tried to find a longer bit of chain that would have allowed me to rest it on the ground, but if it breaks off in the middle of a game, I may end up doing that anyway. The cape comes from one of the Blood Bowl Skaven models, though I hacked at it a bit to make it look a bit more distressed, though this fellow definitely has one of the better kept capes in the warband. I made some cobblestones from green stuff to try and match the basing on the other models and of course, the obligatory skull.

I also realized that it's now been slightly over a year since I started working on this guy, which is kind of sad, but at least that's a marked improvement from the twelve years it took me to finally finish my Sorcerer.

Hopefully the rest of the warband will be coming along soon!

Skaven ninja looks great. Very dynamic pose, nice weapons and the flowing, ripped cape turned out great.

I'm not as familiar with the Skaven kits, but it is surprising that they don't already come with more esoteric Eastern inspired weaponry. Excellent job with the conversion! That chain can't have been easy...

Thanks, everyone.

@facelyss Yeah, finding the right bits of chain that matched was quite a task in itself. In the end, I think I went with the chain from the Dark Eldar Wyches sprue because it had that extra little bit that I was able to bend into that extra loop of chain in his hands. That way the chain would look long enough to actually be useful in combat, while not forcing me to have an excessively long and fragile bit of chain extending off one end, or have it sagging down loosely between his hands. I think the bit between his hands is just two lengths of chain glued in the middle, which is about the maximum I would have dared connect.

As anyone who's seen any of my previous conversions can attest, I'm a bit overcautious when it comes to pinning bits and securing as much as possible to the base. While this does take me twice as long as it probably would otherwise, it does pay off sometimes. Over the weekend, my girlfriend's cat somehow managed to get all the way up onto my shelf and knocked about half my models onto the floor. Fortunately, the only casualty was the blade of my Gutter Runner's kama (which has since been repaired) and the entire chain managed to get through the incident completely intact. The little plastic mice are now getting moved to a higher shelf.

So there you have it. My paranoia has given me a surprisingly durable collection of models. Now if only I was that concerned about where I leave them sitting about...

My second Black Skaven is now finished.



I gave this one a naginata, which will simply count as a spear in Mordheim. As with the other Black Skaven, I decided to make his cowl green to give a bit of color to my black-clad Eshins, as well as to give something to differentiate them from my Adept and Night Runners (which I have yet to make). Green is also the color of my Skaven army, so if I ever manage to actually finish it, this will help to tie my Gutter Runners into the rest of the army.



The base for this model was the Festering Skaven from Spiteclaw's Swarm. This one has the most dramatic pose by far, so I really wanted to make use of him (and I'm tempted to think of a way to use him again). I like that they actually modeled another character using tail-fighting skills, but I thought that the dagger as well as the end of his tail were a bit thin and flimsy looking, especially in contrast to Snikch's tail, which looks thick and muscular and is wrapped around his blade several times. By comparison, the Festering Skaven's blade looks like it's tied to a thin piece of string and floating gently in the air. So as much as I like the idea of a tail weapon, I decided to remove it from this model. Maybe I'll try to make my own later.



Like my Assassin Adept, I used a Myrmourn Banshee to make his long, tattered cape. Since his arm is sweeping out to the side with his naginata, I wanted his cape to look like it had been tossed across to his other shoulder, hence using the smaller, thicker banshee bit. As usual, I tried to add some Mordheim imagery to the model, such as keys and skulls.




Again, I didn't want my Gutter Runners to be quite as pale as my Adept, so this guy got a slightly darker, healthier skin tone. I ended up adding a lot of very pale highlights in the end, but I think the final result turned out rather well.

Another spectacular Skaven. How many more members will there be?

I need to make two Night Runners to round out the last of my heroes, and then I think I only need a handful of Verminkin to make a proper starting army. A maxed out Eshin Warband, however, can have 20 models in it, so ideally it would be nice to have a dozen or so Verminkin right at the start, since Skaven can max out their roster in just a handful of games.

Awesome work mate, good use of the easy build kits.

Been a big pick up recently of Mordheim.

Got stalled in the middle of working on my first night runner, but managed to get a group shot of the first four heroes.

After real life completely wrecking me for several months, I finally managed to get back to my Eshin warband. First up is one of my two Night Runners.



I decided that someone in the warband has to carry all the gear and loot and it didn't seem like the sort of job you would entrust to your bumbling henchmen, so it seemed like a good job for the bottom-rung heroes of the party. As such, both of my Night Runners are wearing overladen packs. I probably went a bit overboard, but you can accumulate a fairly decent pile of weapons, trinkets, and other things over the course of a campaign, so it works.



This model is based off of the Blood Bowl Gutter Runner. I removed the cape and the head, repositioned the tail, and gave her a head from the Plague Monk sprue. I think one of the arms is from a Clanrat spear and the other is the arm from the Warp Lightning Cannon crew that holds the telescope. The rest of the telescope can be seen strapped to the pack.



I did a fair amount of experimenting on this model. I've always had trouble with greenstuff cloaks being to soft and bendy to work unless they're pressed tightly against the model. For my Night Runners, I tried mixing in some Milliput in order to get some rigidity. It actually worked quite well. The Milliput cured fairly hard, but the green stuff prevented it from being super brittle and crumbly, which often happens with small, exposed details. It also dramatically increased the curing time, which was a bit of a mixed blessing. It was workable for hours, which was handy, but it didn't fully cure for over a day, which is a problem when you're adding more layers of putty on top of it.



As I've often mentioned, I'm pretty obsessive when it comes to pinning on fiddly bits on my models, but for some reason, I decided that I didn't want to go through the trouble of pinning the kama to the tiny handles. This ended up being a big mistake, as I ended up breaking them off at least two or three times before I actually got the model painted, so in the end, I was forced to pin them after all.





I'm pretty happy with the end result. I definitely made this one much more complicated than it needed to be, though I did actually simplify it a lot from my original concept. Guess I'll have to spread some of those ideas around to other models.

Stunning work! Really good work with the greenstuff.
Especially loving the black skaven with naginata.

I'm new to Mordheim, which seems to be pretty rare these days. At least all the players I know started ages ago.
I got an opportunity to play test a new campaign book that will be released somewhere in the future. So far I'm loving the game and the atmosphere of the world. Really wish I would have had the opportunity to try the game earlier.

Great work on the Night Runner, he’s barely recognisable from the original model!

Thanks guys.

@Ezki Yeah, Mordheim was the game that first got me into Warhammer, back in the late 90s early 2000s, though in all that time I never got around to making a proper warband. It's definitely my favorite setting of Warhammer Fantasy. Glad you're enjoying it so far!

My second Night Runner is all ready to go, which means that I finally have all six Skaven heroes finished.




Like my other Night Runner, this guy got stuck carrying the baggage for the rest of the group. He's in charge of carrying the loot that the warband acquires, though he seems to be more concerned with grisly souvenirs and trophies than items of any actual value. I decided to arm him with a pair of hook swords, which seemed to go well with his vicious appearance.




Definitely got a thing for bones.

This model is converted from a standard Clanrat. I straightened out his posture a bit to make him stand out from the Verminkin, which I'm also converting from Clanrats. Combined with his oversized pack, he ended up looking like a hulking figure next to some of the other models, despite actually being the exact same size.



I guess he does have pretty beefy arms for a Skaven. I got them from one of the Beastman sprues.

The hook swords were fairly complicated constructions. The main part of the blade came from one of the Clanrat spears, but the rest of it had to be built from plasticard. The crescent blades on the hand guards were particularly difficult. I ended up making them using a standard hole punch, then filing them to give them an edge. I had to punch a million little partial holes in that sheet of plasticard before I was actually able to get two of the right size that matched.



Got a nice assortment of skulls and bones from a variety of different models. I especially like the ork jaw that he strapped to the top of his pack.

I used the same Milliput and green stuff blend that I used on the other Night Runner to make his cloak. I think it might have turned out even better on this one, not that much of it is visible with his huge pack. Since there were already plenty of skulls on this model, I decided to decorate his base with a bit of fence from the Banshees sprue.



My two Runners turned out a bit different than I had originally imagined, but I'm pretty happy with them. I'll probably just use them as Gutter Runners in a normal game, though they might stand out a bit from the rest of the unit.

Now that my heroes are all finished, it's nothing but Verminkin from here on out. And since a Skaven warband doesn't max out until it hits twenty members, this is going to take me a while...

Those are the toughest looking Night Runners I have ever seen. Great models!

These look great, the conversions look really natural once you've painted them up. If only GW would release some updated Eshin stuff!

I love your work, especially on the ones with the myrmourn banshee cloaks.

Also, I 100% agree with your point that easy-build kits are great for conversion. They actually require conversion, like the golden olden days of metal models, instead of just mixing up bits from different kits. Nothing wrong with that, but it is kit-bashing, not converting.

Thanks, everyone!

@youwashock Yeah, one of the weird quirks of the Eshin warband is that the heroes are Black Skaven and Night Runners, rather than Black Skaven and Gutter Runners, so if I ever make enough of them to actually field in a normal game of Warhammer, these guys will count as Gutter Runners while my Verminkin will count as Night Runners.

Also, at this rate, that's going to be a very eclectic looking unit of Gutter Runners.

Loving this so far.
So much character and a nice unique style to them.
Just a shame GW doesn’t produce models to this standard.

Any thoughts on a ninja rat ogre at all?

Those night runners are sweet. Brimming with cool details and conversions. Nice greenstuff work. Keep up the good work.

This thread is just so full of win. Excellent models. Mordheim seems like an awesome source of inspiration. I know basically nothing about it, but I seem to love every Mordheim project I come across!

Some absolutely amazing miniatures here, inspired conversion choices. Real shame Eshin never got models of this quality!

@Jackal90 I'm sure I'll end up making one at some point, though I'm not sure how I'll go about it. I'm not sure how a group of sneaky assassins would equip a big, dumb, battering ram. The old Eshin rat ogre was fairly simple compared to the normal rat ogres of the time, without any Skryre enhancements or Mouldery mutations. So I'll probably keep it simple. Maybe I'll have them staple a cloak to him to make him stand out less. Or maybe I'll just have them cover him in black paint.

@Da Boss Well, it's at least a shame that we haven't got more than the 2-3 Eshiny characters that came out in Spiteclaw's Swarm. I could live with a slow trickle of a few awesome models every year or so. A few awesome models every 25 years doesn't quite cut it for me.