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Hi been slowly getting into the hobby for a while now, still not too heavily involved in the competitive scene, but I do get sucked into the collecting and painting aspects.

Always loved orks since Dawn of War, especially with so many cool looking units like the Flash-Gitz, Squiggoth, Mega-Nobz, etc. I kind of liked the concept of mercenary orks and was toying with the idea of a combined Ork/Kroot/Dark-Eldar/Renegade(Chaos) army, but it seemed a little too fan-fictiony, so I've settled for Freebooter Orks with plundered gak and a contingent of Kroot Kommando Merenercies.

I bought the Flash-Gitz a while back as a treat and coated them with way too much paint, which I later removed with dettol, I'm now giving them another pass.
I don't have a before and after unfortunately look better than they did, still have to finish off the rest of their squad, but I'm pleased with how they're turning out.
I still layer the paint on a little thick as I keep editing the highlighting, decals and such.




I mentioned that I liked the squiggoth a lot, so I when I saw one going for "relatively" cheap I grabbed it. To be honest it's likely a recast as it gave off a pretty strong smell when I sawed the joints that were a little misshapen, but o'well.
That was about 6-9 months ago, and in the few games that I played I noticed my squiggoth was getting focused down, and with less cash I wasn't going to spend £60+ on another squiggoth, so I grabbed a cheap arachnarork that I'm converting into a squiggoth.
They're about the same size, the only real pain is in making a decent carrying-platform on the thing, I've used the sprue frame and some hard plastics with a off-brand kannon to start to piece it together. It could really use with some bolts, and chains to tie it to the beast though.



I had my eye on the little goblin shaman that came with it, and using some greenstuff I'm in the process of converting him to a free-booter mascot parrot. I got this idea from the pirate warhammer ogre with a snotling pet.
And on the subject of parrots, I got some kroot and am converting them into little green psychos. I like to imagine they eat too much ork-freebooter flesh and gone native.
The little drone I've was a conversion I wanted to do from the get go, it uses a nob-slugga, chaos chain-sword and a rokkit-launcher, I may change it's checkered pattern to cyan to tie it in and make it pop.



Back to gretchin, I have a lot of work to do, there's some I'm happy with though below.
I'm using a fantasy goblin as a wierd-boy, I may want to add a cybork body guard or something on his base to justify his wounds and attack. I'm pretty pleased with his cloak though.






With my Elites, I was a little unsure what I wanted, the kommandos were cool but as I was going for quite a dakka focused army, so I ended up grabbing some Tank-Bustas and Nobz.
The latter you can see below alongside a banner nob, with a kustom-shoota/banner/big-choppa hybrid that I'm pretty happy with.
Initially with the nobs I really wanted to go for a bunch of kustom shootas, and have them as less-flash-gitz, now they are pretty much nobz with shootas and big choppas.
As with most units I'm still converting and painting up more models, I'm hoping to have two squads of 6 with ammo runts to go in the squiggoths.



For those tankbustas I mentioned, I've been converting a Dark-Eldar Raider as their trukk, the wheels look a little small though and I need some more, plus some more gak to decorate the sides.
There's also a Dark-Eldar that I'm converting with a fantasy Flagellant into a mascot ammo-runt, need to swap the head out, if it doesn't work it doesn't work



Lastly I have my dakkajet I got for cheap and cleaned up, I still need to do the underside and add my tail-fins but I'm liking the vibe of it.
The eyes are a bit too much though, I'm thinking of bringing the flames to front main body, but I kind of like having the red body divide the paint scheme so ehh... not sure.


So that's it so far, I have a lot of Boyz that are only base coated, and I'm converting some with pirate ork kits, and hacked off tricorn hats, so we'll see how that goes.
I'm interested in maybe converting some of my boyz into stormboyz, but the bodies really don't work too well without some kind of strap or frame securing it to their back, I don't really fancy paying out the nose for my stormboyz, we'll see.

I'll try to keep this updated, sorry if I've gone a little ott with the info, let me know your thoughts.

Mate I absolutely love the colour scheme you have going here, you have really captured the vibrant colours of the earlier Ork artwork whilst still maintaining the look of a cohesive force.

I think the Squiggoth is my favourite example of this but that could be because i really want one for my Snakebites. I love the raider konversion as well but you must have been sick of painting checks afterwards!

Thanks Kroem, yeah I took a lot of inspiration from the old freebooters and rogue-trader schemes. Humies need to know who they're being shot at -and missed- by.
There's definitely a couple of layers of warped checkers painted onto most of the models lol, it's something I graze on and neaten up between minis still haven't got the touch with a brush right.

The squiggoth is a cool model, plays okay, finger's crossed Snakebites get some supporting rules for (and against) monsters.
I will say the 10 ork carrying capacity seems a little optimistic given the model's size though, but then that's the same story for most transports.

An idea I've been considering is taking some bonesplitterz on as sluggas, would definitely be tempted if I were doing Snakebites, as Freebooters I was hoping their exposed torsos were detached so I could mount them onto pinstriped Boy legs, alas seems like a saw-job I'm not up for.
Might still be worth it for a bit of head and choppa variety though.



They look a little pants right now, they're not getting a lot of attention poor gitz, but you can see some of the conversions and paint schemes carrying over hopefully.
Here's some paint on my modified goblin spider priest

Love these guys!

Kapn Badrukk looks awesome especially - he's not easy to paint imo

I actually like the eyes on the Dakajet

On man! I just love your style right here. These orks are right up my street! Love it all!

Nice to see colourfull old school orks. Good paint job and i love that converted spider!

Fantasy is just perfekt for count as Snakebites.

Looking at that maw crusha for a while now but have no idea yet what to do with it.
Maybe a giant Blastoise with 2 big ass cannons. Yeah, that would certainly work.

Cheers for the lovely comments, been slowly doing a little more work on my freebooters, I've had some other little projects and distractions so it's been slow.
Really been trying to get hold of the old Ork Flash Git with Targeting Squig and the ammo-runtz from Badrukks Flashgitz -cough- or a recast -cough- otherwise I'm not really after any more units.
I've bought some spellcrow pirate bitz, my only complaint is they're bulky and the jaws don't really look the same. Have some ogre swords that I'm hoping to use as big-choppas for my nobz that I think will look fairly cool

Got a chain for spider, gave a rough paint job on the platform, bits have been falling off of my platform, so I need to get a decent glue and some more plasticard (thicker too).
I'm not too happy with the cannon blast-shield I've glued on, so I might replace that with some more plasticard, I'll do the little bolts once the design is finished I hope.


Trying to bring purple into my orks, the stripey tops aren't doing anything for me, and a lot of the torsos are covered in plates and other stuff.
So going forward I'm thinking only trousers will have the stripes, and I'm going to use purple&brown for hats&tops.
I've also used some green-stuff for my bandanas, this has worked quite well.




Started to paintup some tankbustas, like the rokkit-pistols/hammer models, so I might field them as normal rokkit-launchers
I've painted up my trukk, it could maybe use with some more wheels, the plate overlay for the wheels I've detached to paint separately .



Been looking at the Ork Glyphs, had no idea they had meaning, so I'll try to incorporate them going forward.
I like the idea of using the Glyphs for my Kroot Kommandos, with a shaper with a banner that reads "Orky - Alien", subtitled "Boss - Friend" maybe.
I've tried to add a more feather like texture on the kroot with greenstuff and some more clothing and slings, once it's coloured up it should look a lot better, I'd like to add some hats too.



Hope everyone is-having/has-had a great halloween, all the best!

Ha! I do exactly that on my thumb nail too! Keep up the excellent work, always a pleasure to see.

Thanks bud, I tend to move slowly with my personal projects :(, but I need to get the force on the table this year.

Adjusted my Raider to look a little more Ramshackle, recently bought some industrial super-glue, and it's made sticking random plastic and resin so much easier.
I also wanted to have a "wrecking-ball", so going with the pirate theme I've added an Anchor on the end.

I've been having some problems with the Dark-Eldar Sail, i'd cut away and added greenstuff to it, but it just hasn't done it for me, so I may go for a more traditional square sail.
What would really be cool is a "crow's nest" on said sail, that I could swap for either a big-shoota or rokkit-launcher, that might look a bit much for a lowly trukk though, will have to see.

I've also stared my big-trukk, that'll double as a trukk, I'm using an eldar Falcon as the base, and adding a flakk-turret to the top.

Unsurprisingly it looks a little too unstable, I'm hoping to add some guns on the underbelly, and some fat wheels on the back to help support it. It'll hopefully end up looking a bit like the Batmobile.

Sadly the Kaptain and his flash-gits were lost at sea, by which I mean a tub of dettol. I've been getting a little better at painting details and the poor sods had too much paint on them.
They're kind of a central part of my army so I'm giving them a real go, I've removed their arms and guns to get at the detail. Their guns are going to take a while to complete, they have a lot of detail I want to do justice.




You can see a Runt there with an eldar pistol and empire/guildsman hat, and my space marine runt. Longer term have managed to acquire some oop models of Badrakk's runtz (or at least casts of those models idk) so I'm looking forward to having them painted up.
I've also modified some Fantasy goblins to work as fodder, you can see my flag-bearer (how anel opponents figure line-of-sight will works will dictate usage). I'm thinking of having some of them retain their shields since they're just going to be holding up troops for the gitz to shoot at.

My boyz and gretchin are just a mess of ebay filler, however I've got a bunch of different shootas and body-parts from bitz manufactures, so I'm trying to give my relatively small squads of boys the same feel.
The pin-stipping of their trousers is probably the longest process, and I'm thinking I'll have to just base coat the lot of them, and work on that later so I can actually play a few games.
I'll post some images of them an my nobz when I have more to show.

In terms of making the army generally, I'd like to have some kannons, I feel that's pretty piratey, some rusty old cannons using ball and harpoon, idk. I also think my whole army would benefit from 2nd warboss focused on melee so I've ordered this...

Mostly for his hook, I may just chop it off and use it on another ork, or I might just swap the head for a nice freebooter one.

Will post more once I make more progress.

Nice conversions. Definitely going to follow this. Love the green skins myself. The painting looks good to. Can’t wait to see what other craziness you come up with.

Cheers, always loved orks since I found 40k through Dawn of War, especially the images online of others minis

Got my first lot of shoota boyz done, using some odd maxmini and kromlech bitz, really haven't made a much of a dent in what I need.

Going to do another 10 shootas before I move onto my slugga boys

Here is my Runtherder, I might combine it with an ork, the small 25mm base makes it a bit hard to pose though.


Since I've got the superglue, I'm readjusting the platform, using some spitfire sprue and some savage orc stuff


Will update again when I have more done

The shoota boyz and other models look great and you have excellent taste in books.

Cheers, I must confess the majority of the books are my sister's though.

So I got a Warboss to give the army a melee option for a warboss,

It bought a metal model with an attack squig that I had to hack the gun and squig from

I recomposed the model with a kromlech great-coat arm and the hook I showed from the orc pit-fighter, I fitted this together with green stuff.

I also tried to give him a great coat...


I've painted him up and he's looking alright, I'm not going to be too fussy with him, but he really needed a good sanding, there's a little too much texture you can catch in the wrong-light



I want to give him some weight on his back, so I'm likely going to chop off a waagh banner and glue that on, I'll also likely pose a squig somewhere on his model since it's free wargear.
I've gotten a fine detail brush so I'm likely going to add some black flames on the gold alongside the cyan+white checker stripes.

Here's some other bits too.
Deathounter

I am the Waagh!

Most of da Krew

There's better lighting with some more details done. I need to figure out a good way to mount the metal gun to the kromlech resin arm. May need to learn to pin the the model together.

Will probably do nicer something with the shoulder pads, I've ordered a crossbone banner for this git, I may also use some spare flashgit glyphs to beef up his armor and greatcoat, if only to make him look less front heavy.

Painting some more grots using a Yellow base-coat with a green wash, liking the result, I find I tend to take a long time and apply too much paint to my models, I've gone with a little purple on their noses as I've been doing to the ork lips.
Only problem is I now need to dettol a bunch of grots to keep them all looking consistent. Inversely you might see I've tried to make adjustments to the guns (the crossbow and blunderbuss), I'm hoping to make more adjustments by kitbashing the grots with some gnoblars.


I bought a sprue of Lootaz a while back, I'm not sure I'll ever use them competitively, and I'm not sure if they really fit the theme, I like the idea of giving them modified big-shootas with scopes instead of their current gear, to show that they're long range gitz.


For my Kannons, I've forgone the blast shields on the Kromlech Howitzers, and I've found this makes them look much more Age-of-Sail looking...

I'll probably run my Kromlech Howitzers, as kustom-mega-kannons since they're the hot stuff right now. I'd like to maybe make some adjustments to my other two kannons, having a uniform ramshakle look is odd :p
Hoping to have some more finished soon, and need to get their krews base coated and washed. I like my barrels on these Kannons, I went for a burnt iron look by starting from a dark metallic grey to metallic bronze to purple to a black with a light wash of purple.

People say how fun the Bubble-Chukka is so I bought the bulbous head on ebay and glued it onto this cheap Mantic cannon

For normal kannons I think it might be cool to have 2-3 of these (see below), attached to 1 large base, acting as 1 Kannon (still cheaper than the official model lol), plus maybe a AofS great-cannon, not quite sure though :p


My friend stated that I should probably use bigger bases on my nobz/boyz, I might do this since I only play at a 3rd party store. I'm not digging the look of my bases currently though.
What I think might look nice is having Jungle foliage on the bases, honestly though I may just go back to plain bases.

That's all so far, really need to get my transports, tankbustas and slugga boyz sorted, will probably get rid of my squiggoth and just use the arachnarok, but I'll see how I feel once everything is painted.

Some nice greenskin action here, particularly liking the raider buggy and the goblin 'parrot'.

Thanks! The parrot was something I really wanted for my freebooters after I saw the Ogre-Maneater Pirate. From a distance it looks cool, but I've not quite got the feel for greenstuff just yet, always feels a bit sticky and hard to smooth.
However as mentioned though I've picked up some gnoblars to add a bit of variety, and I noticed this little dude had a cool looking nose I can use...

To be honest though, I'm not sure I want to cock it up. To my mild annoyance I've stumbled upon this miniature ...

Like holy-gak where was this before lol, thinking if I do get it I could trim off the ends of the wings and have him duel wield pistols (though it looks cool as is).


The wagon I still haven't painted since I modified it, want to get on it, but feeling a little put off the trukk atm, the wrekin-ball/anchor really didn't impress me in-game, and it's one of those units I need to get a few of, all whilst the chinnork is looking more and more attractive. In hindsight magnetizing the wheels and wrekin-ball would have been a solid move, swap the wheels for a flying base and some thrusters, and the wrekin-ball with a dakkagun, cheap chinnork, lesson learned though, Raiders can go for pretty cheap so may get 3 and work out how I want to go about the modifications. Big project though.

Just an update on the BubbleChukka paintjob and a Spanner/Mek Boy...


Also the warboss...

The Warboss has been a bit of a nightmare, the combination of Pewter/Plastic/Greenstuff and having to saw through pewter, nightmare. His greatcoat is made of greenstuff, and part of a kromlech greatcoat arm, and this has been very hard to proportion, Thus for his shoulders I simply resorted to gluing on layers of armour (deathwatch shoulder pad and a couple of boys plates). If I were doing it again I would have to use stick to resin/plastic, and get some proper sculpting tools.