Bas-Lag Mercs
The first time I read Perdido Street Station by China Mielville I was astounded appalled amazed at the fascinating and utterly different kind of fantasy horror steampunk aesthetic with deep social and political themes woven into the intricate world of Bas-Lag.
So: here's a trio of Bas-Lag inspired 'lets build a few quick models for painting practice' mercenaries that rapidly got out of control!!!
First up is Dyce the Axe-woman, once destined for an Inquisition warband. All I did was replace the pistol she was carrying with a human-sized rivebow, which is a crossbow that fires chakra (discs) instead of quarrels, for the non-Bas-Lag initiated. The bow was made from a Necromunda Delaque flechette carbine and the top of Sisters of Battle bolter/bow combi-rifle:
Next up came Byrn, to whom I replaced the brass strips supporting her flamers with greenstuff, and that was it:
Lastly, I had randomly bought some of the Callis and Toll models… so Lyssa Revenya became an archer. I cut away the existing arms and the rope, replacing them with the bow and some arms from the Daughters of Kaine Blood Stalkers. The quiver on her back was also from the Blood Stalkers with some added tech bits, and a strap of Tamiya Quick Type to mount it.
Lastly, the bases.
I took a press copy of Lyssa Revenya's cobbled brick base, rolled out some terracotta millput, and pressed myself some cobble sections. When these were dry, I jigsaw-puzzled them into a section about 3x2cm, and made another press-mold.
The display base was made from the lid of a Staminade tub that I smoothed the sides with the Dremel and a lot of sanding. I cut a circle of 5mm thick cork sheet and cut out the three circles for the bases, then glued the circle to the display base. The individual bases had a steel washer epoxied underneath, with corresponding magnets on the display base; this made the top of the cork and the bases the same height.
A sheet of terracotta milliput was rolled out over the entire surface of the display base and model bases (which were sitting securely in their magnetised cut-outs). I let it dry for about 30 minutes, then pressed the cobble-brick mold in relatively straight lines; due to the press-mold having to be lined up and pressed multiple times, the milliput did some random things but all in all, it worked!
I let it dry another 30 minutes, then used a wet xacto blade to slice around the model bases. When it was all rock-hard 24 hours later, I cleaned up the edges of the model bases and cut-outs, then added some small pipes and cut out some of the cobbles to make small puddles which I filled with resin (after painting). Added the three small lights cut off some old Warhammer terrain, and the bases were complete!
And so, onto painting...
Thanks for looking!
