Masters of the Hunt - Venator Leader & Champion

Much in the same way with my Brat gang at the end of last year, this post is something of a full stop to my Venator gang, a project that has spanned two years. I have rounded out the original 6-strong plastic group to include the 4 Marauder Venators and a bunch of other converted figures. I was however missing a dedicated leader and heavy weapon for the group, something I've now rectified.

The Hunter in the Shadows - Venator Sniper

With a new Necromunda campaign due to start in about 2 weeks, I've had to acknowledge that I won't have time to get the Helmawr gang finished in time. They'll just have to sit on ice for a while, and instead I can add a handful of new figures to the Venators. I've worked out that with the Venator ogryn, I only really need another 3 figures to have a viable gang with plenty of options.

One of my favourite specialists in any gang is the long ranged shooter - that guy armed with the high powered rifle and a selection of scopes who can pick of opposing fighters at range.

The Biggest Axe - Venator Ogryn Brute

Most Necromunda gangs have access to one or more brutes - big muscular fighters that can be added to their crew. Venators don't have a gang-specific brute, but can field either of two universal brutes: an ambot or a servitor ogryn.

I quite fancied giving my Venators the option of having a big guy for the fun element (and the extra muscle of course). Given that I'm pretty far down the road of masked and hooded Venators, it seemed only fitting to follow the theme for their ogryn.

A strong hunting party of Venators enters the settlement, accompanied by a hulking ogryn.

Venators are Coming To Town

They're making a list.
They're checking it twice.
Gonna find out who's naughty or nice.

Nothing could be more seasonal than painting up a bearded man in a pointy hood, right? What about if the beard is sculpted onto a rather scary mask, and the hood is tied up with a noose? That will probably scare the children! And I guess that's the point of Venator gangs in Necromunda - they are sinister vigilantes hunting down the most dangerous of criminals.

A gaming opportunity arose to play some Necromunda with my good friend cheetor. After looking at my variety of Necromunda gangs, I decided that the best option would be to use the meet-up as motivation to paint up the remaining pair of Confrontation Venators from Marauder that had sat undercoated since I painted up the other figures back in January.

Like the previous two figures, these are Aly Morrison sculpts. They might have chunky details, but they really are a pleasure to paint.

Masked Hunters - Confrontation Venators

In an effort to catch up on stuff I painted in 2018, here's a second post in a row of 'stuff I painted some time ago'. Some time ago for these is somewhere around about July, when I ran game featuring Venators at Bring Out Your Lead 2018.

The Rites of the Hunt - Necromunda Venator Band

Back at the start of the year I was invited to create a Venator band for Necromunda. There was planned that the gang might be published in White Dwarf alongside the article on Venators in the May 2018 issue. Sadly the gang didn't get into print, although they were shown recently on Warhammer TV.

My approach to the gang was to try and recreate the look and feel of the classic Marauder Confrontation Venators - check out these wonderful painted examples by Asslessman over at Leadplague. The classic look includes hoods, masks and a prevalence of nooses - something I wanted to replicate using current plastic GW kits.

BOYL 2018 (Part 3) - DAiS & Bounty Hunting

Dracula's America in Space

Saturday at Bring Out Your Lead 2018 (BOYL) continued after lunch with a rather chaotic game of Dracula's America (in Space). Dracula's America is Osprey's excellent fantasy Western game. But you can add in spacemen and laser guns if you wish!

I pulled out a whole load of my scenery to create the settlement of Black Dust Gulch.