Ghost dwarves: army showcase

I've recently taken my ghost dwarf army up to 2000 points, so in this post I'm going to run through the army and show off a bunch of photos. I've previously blogged about the concept, theme and colour scheme, and lore of the army, so go and look at those posts for more details of how the army came about.

I'm incredibly happy with how the army has ended up, I've done more to make it my own than with any of my previous Age of Sigmar armies, and the army I've ended up with is very close to what I had in mind when I came up with the original concept for it.

Quick lore recap

Back in the Age of Myth, the duardin of the Zhalgrad Hold waged war against the Sylvaneth of Rhweandryn Thicket in the Realm of Ghyran. A duardin host marched up the hill into the thicket at the heart of the Wildroot forest, and none of them ever came back. For many, many moons, nothing stirred in Rhweandryn Thicket. The duardin remaining in the hold moved away and scattered, and the forest was quiet. 

Then, in the Age of Sigmar, the forces of Nurgle crept into the forest. But as they neared the thicket, the ghosts of Rhweandryn Thicket rose up to meet them, duardin and Sylvaneth united in death by their shared desire to purge the forest of corruption and preserve the peace of their final resting place.

The finished army

I'm going to run the army using the Living City rules from the Cities of Sigmar battletome, which lets me include some Sylvaneth units.

Duardin warriors

The duardin host that marched to Rhweandryn Thicket was made up of the finest of the hold's warriors: wise Longbeards, valiant Ironbreakers and stout Irondrakes. While all were eventually cut down by the Sylvaneth, their axes hewed many a branch and limb before they fell. Now, risen up to fight once more, their armour may be old and rusting, but their souls are stalwart and ready for another battle.

For these units I kept the kits pretty much unchanged, but accessorised them with various plants and leaves growing out of the empty suits of armour. I also drilled the eyes and noses of the unhelmeted dwarves to make them look more like they were dead.

Ancient heroes

The duardin host are led by Kargadd Zharrson. Zharrson was already an old warrior when he led his force into Rhweandryn Thicket, and he never expected that he would survive the battle. Now he has a new lease of life (or unlife), his vigour renewed to that of his youth as he prepares for yet another fight.

The other hero is my Runelord, which I kitbashed from the undead dwarf Bloodbowl player kit. That kit was released when I was midway through the army, and it felt rude not to use it!

Kurnoth Hunters

The bulk of the Sylvaneth the duardin warriors faced in Rhweandryn Thicket were Kurnoth Hunters. After being cut down by duardin axes, they emerged rejuvenated from the soul pod at the heart of the thicket to face the Nurgle threat. Some of them still bear the scars of their earlier battle, with duardin axes embedded in their limbs.

Beechbough and the steam tank

The ancient treelord Beechbough and the duardin steam tank fought each other to mutual destruction. Beechbough was able to rip off the tank's gun and rip the crew's bodies apart with strangling vines, but not before receiving a mortal wound that left one side of her body burnt and scarred. Enemies in life, they fight alongside one another in death.

Celestial Hurricanum and endless spell

The duardin host that marched to Rhweandryn Thicket were accompanied by a celestial hurricanum they had hired to support them. It's now accompanied by a Sylvaneth mage, harnessing the arcane powers to turn the ground itself into a weapon.

I had the idea very early on of using a Black Coach for a Celestial Hurricanum conversion, the main challenge was that the coach comes on a much bigger base so I had reduce the number of horses pulling it in order to make it fit. The Gravetide endless spell doesn't really have a tactical role to play in the army, but I had it lying around and I thought it would go well with the army theme, so I painted it up.

Objective markers

I also made these little objective markers for the army, for some extra theming.

What next?

I'm very excited to get the army on the tabletop and play some games with it, once it's safe to do so. 

I'm not planning on adding a huge amount more to the army, but I do want to convert a custom hero or two that I could use with the Anvil of Apotheosis rules. If you've read the full lore for the army you'll have seen there's a duardin named Rhugar Forrinson who plays a key part and who I don't have a model for yet, so I'd like to make a model for him.

I'd also like to have some terrain that I can use to represent Rhweandryn Thicket on the tabletop, and maybe also use for a display board for the army. I don't have a plan for how I'm going to do this yet, but hopefully I'll get round to it at some stage.