Mega-Mordheim

Posted in Custom Workstation

Within the framework of a game using the GW Mordheim rules ans setting, a couple of guys in the Skirmish Wargames group are moving Mordheim up-scale to 1/18, having done it in 1/32nd (54mm).

I have some of the 3 Musketeer and Cardinal's Guard Papo figures from an aborted 3M project that I wanted to find a use for so I'm crossing genres and bringing into the Mordheim world some Cardinal's Blades from the Pierre Pevel books, ‘The Cardinal’s Blades’, ‘The Alchemist in the Shadows’, and ‘The Dragon Arcarna’. They are IMHO excellent - plenty of swash and buckle, deeds of derring do, handsome and world-weary heroes, feisty heroines, wicked villains etc - and highly recommended. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Cardinals-Blade ... 0575084391 Think Dumas' 3 Musketeers rewritten in a more modern style (more like the films) with the added fun of dragons (which do not over-intrude at all) - what’s not to like.

Planned are some Cardinal’s Blades and some of their named opponents, including some ‘dracs’. The Blades are the elite of the Cardinal’s Guard, the crème de la crème, used on top secret specially dangerous missions. ‘Drac’s are dragon-headed man-like creatures who wear clothes and wield weapons line men, created by the dragons to be their PBI but now independent and mercenaries.

When on covert duty, the Blades do not wear the tabard of the Guards – I have some Pirates of the Caribbean & Hobbit figures to convert for them therefore. I will do the half dozen main Blade's characters, who include a woman (who dresses like a man!) and a ‘half-blood’ (human-dragon – not to be confused with the dracs, something quite different.

As I have the 3M figures and some CGs in tabards anyway , I thought I’d do them as the ‘Black Guards of Saint Georges’, ‘...one of the kingdom’s most prestigious light cavalry companies. The king financed them from his own private purse, although they did not belong to his military household, and he appointed their officers. These hand-picked gentlemen served the ‘Sisters of Saint Georges’, the famous ‘Chatelaines’. They formed the military guard for these nuns whose mysterious rituals... had been successful in defending... against the dragons. in their black uniforms, they protected the Sisters, escorted them and, occasionally, carried out perilous missions on their behalf.’

There will have to be a Chatelaine (from the founder of the order, Saint Marie de Chastel) too, of course, Soeur Beatrice. She is one of the ‘louves’, or she-wolves, ‘solitary and merciless huntresses’ who had a special papal dispensation to wield magic to fight the draconic menace. Tall, beautiful and solemn, not yet 30 years of age, dressed in white, with a veil, her attire ‘...looked as much like a young horseman’s as that of a nun. The heavy cloth of her immaculate robe concealed sturdy knee-boots and she had a leather belt cinched around he waist. She even carried a rapier at her side.’

Papo do a dragon headed man figure which I will convert into dracs. It is a bit medieval rather than 17th C, so need knee-boots and floppy hat – dracs wore ‘...gloves and boots... dressed like hired swordsmen. Wide leather belts... about their waists and they carried solid rapiers at their sides.’

I am looking for a figure for the dracs ‘sorcerer/priest’ called a ‘saaskir’ ‘...’pale scales, the colour of dirty bone’ wearing ‘stinking, filthy rags encrusted with what looked like dried blood’, with a ‘large carved ceremonial staff hung with small fetishes’ of feathers, tiny bones, old scales, teeth and coloured beads. ‘He was very old, missing some teeth and his back was bent, but his yellow eyes gleamed with a lively spark and a particularly virulent and baleful aura emanated from him’. Rode bareback on a giant salamander whose belly grazed the black ground-hugging mist which accompanied them all.

There are other human villains but I figure we will have enough ‘enemy’ not to need to worry about these.

Any suggestions for visual inspiration, suitable figures and 17th C type weapons (I have posted another thread about the latter) welcome .

I'll put up WIP photos as it moves along.