The NAF have again asked me to paint up a team for the GT in 2017. A slight complication is that rather than being in mid-late May like previous years, this time it is the last weekend of April. A further complication is that I will be moving cities and starting a new job in early 2017 which will make planning my painting schedule tricky and I'll have less free time.

With just 5 months to do the team I won’t be able to make something as ambitious such as the heavily converted Slann, Norse Dwarfs or Khemri. But the likes of Lizardmen and High Elves were ideas I had planned for ages and had already acquired most of the bits for.

With the new boxed set out yesterday I had to get that and the skaven (stupidly missed out on the dice by not pre-ordering first thing). So it makes sense to use one of those 3 teams. The trouble is each team is just 2 spruces of 3 linemen and 1 of each positional. This means they are missing the extra 2 blitzers for humans/orcs and the extra 2 black orcs and gutter runners (humans can get by fine with 2 catchers so less of an issue). I assume GW will be releasing an upgrade kit, but they may focus on new teams first or it won't be out in time.

I probably won't be able to do a full team of 16, plus stars and display base unless I avoid any difficult conversions.

Humans/Norse
I like the thrower and catcher for these guys and the linemen are decent, but am really not a fan of the blitzers as they look too similar to the linemen.
I already have a full 2nd and 5th edition human team and they do have 3 star players on my outstanding list (Griff, Zug and Helmut) that I can use standard models for. But I would struggle to add variety to the team and convert the extra 4 blitzers so I probably won't go for them. One thing the team does have going for it is that they would be an excellent source for spare parts...

I had been planning on making a Norse team from the plastic Bloodreavers with Wulfen as Ulfwereners and character models as the Berserkers. I've seen quite a few people do this, but their were just weapon snips and I'd want to do head and limb swaps as well as adding more Blood Bowl kit.


This is a test lineman, I might just go with a single shoulder pad for him and reduce the chaosy bits.

The advantage of this team is that they have 2 stars on my to do list that I have already got and undercoated (Helmut and Icepelt). I even have a colour scheme sorted as I painted up Wilhelm Chaney over the summer and think his kit would look good on a full team as a nice break from blue and red.


The difficult thing is that would be 19 models (18 to paint) and I'd need to do some work to ensure the runners and throwers stood out from the linemen.

Orcs
I like this team more than the humans and the positionals are all pretty easy to differentiate. These are certainly my emergency option as I could easily paint up 12 of them with no conversions in a month. Of course that would be a bit of a rubbish team with only 2 black orcs and blitzers.
I do have plenty of Orc and Ork bitz lying about and it shouldn't be too hard to make a full squad of 16 and avoid any models being identical. They'd just need some head and limb swaps.

This brute would quite easily be good to be combined with the black orc to make the other 2 and some Ork Nobz could be used for the other 2 blitzers.

The downside of this is that I have already painted up 3 Orc teams and I doubt I could top the Savage Orcs I did a few years back. I have also done all the Orc stars at least once already and wouldn't want to do them again unless a new model comes out for Varage. This is both good and bad as it saves time.

Skaven
Like the humans the Skaven thrower and gutter and great, the linemen decent and the blitzer not really special enough. The players do look to have been based on the plastic clanrat warriors and stormvermin which means it shouldn't be too hard to convert them.

One idea I have had for a while is to do a Clan Skyre steampunk skaven team inspired by the BB2 skaven thrower. I bought a whole load of the 40K Skitarii models as they are filled with bionic parts. Rat Ogres would be easy as the plastic Island of Blood set has one with a whole load of mechanical bits on him. A Stormfiend would be the ideal starting points for a Headslitter conversion too.


The legs on this gutter are a bit long and would need to be trimmed down, but this gives the idea of what I'd like to do for the gutters. The new plastic set has lots of great arms and heads I can use with the Adeptus Mechanicus Sicarian Ruststalkers torsos and legs.

Whilst I think this team is worthy of the GT, sadly they are probably more of a 9-12 month task, especially if I want to do themed stars.

The other possibility is to do a generic skaven team, with some small conversions to avoid duplicates and adding the extra 2 gutters along with a couple more linerats. There are 5 skaven stars and I already have models ready to be painted for Fezglitch, Glart and Hakflem. I have an idea for Headsplitter but that would probably be too much work.



I have the colour scheme sorted for this team. As mentioned in my last post I had chosen Skitter Stab-stab for the Waterbowl Legacy team and converted him from a Warhammer Quest Skaven Deathrunner.

His flesh was done similar to a humans, but started with a brown and highlighted up to mid-flesh tones. His fur was painted black with grey highlights.
The colour scheme for this team was based on the Cleveland Browns American football team; orange, dark brown and white. I already had some orange paints but they were either a bit pale or on the thin side and I wanted more of a dirty orange, more fitting for skaven. So I got a gorgeous honey brown to use as a base coat. I mixed this with the pale orange and added bone for highlights, to dirty it up a bit I also gave it some light brown washes. I had planned on adding dents and chips to the armour pieces but was so happy with the colour that I left it as it was.
His robes and straps were painted dark brown and then highlighted up with the addition of a mid brown before the final highlights of that same honey brown used with the orange. I’d used this technique before on things like boots for my high elves and always liked how it turned out.
Originally I had considered adding white marking to the orange armour, but didn’t think this would look as good. So Instead I painted the straps on his tail, waist and wrists white, along with a white star on his shoulder pad. I started with black then added light grey leaving the gaps between these straps black and then highlighted up to almost pure white. I liked the contrast of this cold white straps and grey fur with the warmer brown, orange and skin tone on the rest of the model.
His base is left blank as I assume this will allow all the legacy team to be based at the same time whilst looking consistent. With him completed that just leaves 20 of the 56 stars still to paint.





It is a lot of fun to paint up a single star player as it gives me more freedom. Even when painting them up for a specific team you have more leeway with stars since they play for multiple teams and are flashy show offs. Extra decoration or modifications to the colour scheme are encouraged.
I think he is some of my best work, though I was also proud of Ugroth, Wilhelm Chaney and J Earlice.



Does anyone have any preferences or suggestions for which option I could go for?