Quarter 2 Week 4 Update: The Dawi-Zharr Don’t Exist

Hi gang, welcome back to week 4 of quarter 2 of year 2 of Hammer the Backlog, Mr. Michael J. Leonard’s attempt to paint his thousand year backlog of warhammer minis before the inevitable robot revolution. I had a lovely, fun week here at Hammer the Backlog central, with some very enjoyable models to paint and the time to do them some degree of justice. Even though the Dwarfs of the Old World may claim that the Dawi Zharr don’t exist, they are here!

SCORECARD

Another week fully in the green this week! There were no real issues to report to be honest. I got a solid start on Saturday, prepping, undercoating and base coating this week’s five models, had most of the main colours laid down by Sunday night and then spent a few hours over the rest of the week picking out details and finishing things off at lunch breaks and in the evenings. 

Things got a little bit tight on Wednesday, but a little bit of bedtime revenge procrastination (aka going to bed at 12:30 am) sorted that out. The main reason for this almost hiccough was, I think, learning these new models and this colour scheme.

THIS WEEK’S MODELS

This week’s models were 5 more of Fabelzel’s absolutely fabulous Evil Dwarfs, including two rank and file dwarfs with great axes and a full command group of champion, standard bearer and musician. They were all painted in the same basic colour scheme as last week’s models, so please take a look at last week’s blog if you would like a bit more detail on that.

Since the command group has slightly different beards from the rank and file I was ever so slightly tempted to paint them in different colours. But I think this whole little army is going to look better if everyone has exactly the same hair colour and skin tone. It’s definitely not something I would do for the more natural, healthy looking Regular Dwarfs, but I think it will work here.

I was particularly pleased with this shield, which was incredibly easy to do. Over a base coat of corax white, I applied a layer of Iyanden Yellow contrast. Before that was dry, I applied Nazdreg yellow over the bottom 75% and blended them together, still wet. I then applied Orange over the bottom 50%, Blood Angels red over the bottom 25% and Flesh Tearers red at the very bottom. I thought it might turn out messy and muddy, but I was actually very pleased with the result.

I’m starting to regret slightly that I used the same black for the beards and the black clothing. It might have looked better if the clothing was a cold, blueish black and the beards were a neutral grey black, but I am not going to change now and I’m not going to restart. Time to stick to my guns!

I might do a little bit more variation on the black when I get to the sorcerer and the lord, towards the end of the quarter.

With 8 models painted, they already look like a great little 4th edition appropriate unit. My only criticism of the Fabelzel models at this point is that the standard bearers banner pole is too short for the wonderful paper banners from the Chaos Dwarf 4th edition army book. That might be something I come back and take a look at later in the project.

As busy and fun as the painting was this week, there is therefore very little else to report on! What a relief! 

Thanks for reading this far, see you next week for the last two Chaos Dwarf Warriors and the start of the Blunderbuss unit!

Good eggs!