The Laboratory [Necrarch Soulblight]

[The Brotherhood of Necros]

Hey!

This will be a Soulblight army themed around my favourite bloodline from The World That Was, reimagined for Age of Sigmar — the Necrarchs. I'm obsessed with this bloodline — I think they're so characterful, I love that they wear their heart on their sleeve (often literally...) in terms of actually looking horrifying and embracing their dark gift, and I can really relate to the desire to squirrel themselves away in tall towers away from civilisation and read/study/sleep!

(If you're interested, you can read some fiction and lore I'm writing about them in the Chronicles of Death.)

I'm aiming for a 2,500 point collection, to begin with. The cornerstone of the army will be the vampires themselves, represented by a Vampire Lord on Zombie Dragon, a couple of Coven Thrones and a Vampire Lord (Winged Horror). Supporting them will be their retinues, whether those are the risen dead, their many experiments or their own dark acolytes.

This is a brand new project for #newyearnewarmy and I can't wait to get stuck in!

My focus for 2020 is on:

1. Completing the army! I'm trying to set a monthly target to keep the pace going. (The 'Tales of Instahammer' group on Instagram will hopefully keep me on the straight and narrow!)

2. Painting to a better quality. I was into this amazing hobby for much of my childhood/adolescence but have only recently come back to it in the past year or so and want to 'brush up' on my painting skills (groan...)

3. Posting more WIPs as well as finished models. One noticeable difference from the hobby now compared to back then is the incredible online community that's sprung up around it! I'm really looking forward to sharing my progress on here, as well as over at @brotherhoodofnecros on Instagram.

I haven’t painted anything yet (save one Fell Bat) but here is my WIP general – the Ancient One – and the first Fell Bat:

 

[robtion]

Oh nice. Looking good so far. Great choice of models. I look forward to seeing your army grow

 

[The Brotherhood of Necros]

Cheers, robtion! I'm hoping to get some hobby time this weekend. Think it makes sense to continue with the Fell Bats for now!

 

[The Brotherhood of Necros]

Calling it a night now — it's my first full week back at work tomorrow after the Christmas hols (booo) — but I wanted to leave you with a first look at my Necrarch-themed Blood Knights:

 

[The Brotherhood of Necros]

A few more tweaks to make but pretty much calling these guys done!

My Blood-Fat Bats, hurling themselves on ragged mainsails through amethystine skies.

 

[The Brotherhood of Necros]

"Tell me a story, Abel."

One sandalled foot on the marble steps, my brother stops.

"A story, Teacher?"

"That is what I said."

He tugs at the sleeves of his robes, eyes unblinking, and I almost imagine I can see them playing out behind those glassy orbs: a hundred tales, a thousand sagas retold in the recesses of his mind. They say the dead don’t dream, but I have tasted Abel and know better, know that in the dusty aisles of his compliant head, an imagination like no other gluts itself on a centuries-long banquet of literature and lore. Grimoires. Codices. Maps, books of maths and legislature, litanies and more fill his brain. Another once described his sort as books of blood. If so, I am his sole translator.Dark Awakening, Ch. 2

For month one of Tales of Instahammer, we've been asked to complete a regiment and a character. So in addition to the Fell Bats (see above), I've decided to tackle a counts-as Coven Throne. I've started with one of the vampire 'handmaidens'.

Befitting my Necrarch theme, I've imagined the Coven Throne as a kind of chariot/platform from where Abel and his get recite their litanies. A priest of Necros, Abel the Unwritten spends much of his time in the library. A shadow of their progenitor, his get are similarly obsessed. As a coven, they're never far from one of their books. To represent this on the Throne, this acolyte will be reading studiously from a necromantic tome, muttering the word-perfect incantation that you can see manifesting from his outstretched hand.

 

[The Brotherhood of Necros]

A little work on his father, Abel:

“Necromancy, a written art, its secrets consecrated in blood, His Word made flesh. For the longest time, that was all I saw; runes and languages that sought to confound me even as I learned them. Never did I stop to study that on which they were written.

"Their medium: human skin, gut for binding, and flesh of a different kind, sprouted from the fecund earth, grown into great forests before being hewn and pulped. That flesh is silent now, but in fair Ghyran, it still sings, the very wind whispering with untold secrets, a shiver down my spine. So I walk that land, and beneath those trees I read again, my fingers teasing stories from the throats of sylphs, my tongue the sorrow that defines their tales.

"What more could the undying ask for than that: Nature, a book that never ends! Such a shame that they won’t stop screaming. How is one supposed to read, surrounded by such a racket?” — Abel, Dark Awakening

http://instagr.am/p/B7a7zrYnGDA/