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As part of my "Clearing the Painting Desk" push that I've been on for the past few months, I'm also including "Renovations" as valid. Turning old models that have been sitting unused in cases for years into models that I'm once again happy enough with to display or game with is something that really feels worthwhile. Sometimes it just takes a rebasing, other times it also requires touching up, and other times it requires a significant repaint of parts of the model. These two date from at least 1988, as they were both part of those waves of models released in conjunction with Realm of Chaos: Slaves to Darkness, the tome dealing with Khorne and Slaanesh. Both were originally released simply as Beastmen, but they're clearly a cut above most of their compatriots from those releases in terms of fancy-pants gear, and so I've always considered them to be Beastman Champions of their respective deities. I originally painted both of these two many years ago, and aside from the rebasing (the Khornate champion receiving a new 32mm base due to his size), both also needed some repainting. The Khornate beastman, a Kev Adams sculpt from memory had a few pieces of gear that were originally painted green (because contrast) were redone in cadmium red, the webbed ruff was reddened, the (badly sculpted) shoulder spikes were redone in black from their original "aged horn" look and the armour and metal parts were redone, with a bit more done to highlight and shade. Painting in the gems across his crown was the final bit of updating. I never liked this Khornate sculpt, but the rebasing and removal of the garish greens have turned my opinion a little. It feels like a solidly ok figure now. Still nothing great, but decent. The Slaaneshi beastman, which I believe is a Jes Goodwin model had much more of a repaint. Back in the day I thought that "Slaanesh" meant "lots of garish colours" apparently. The leather legging (originally a pale, bright blue) was repainted to match the corset. The grinning face shoulder pad was originally pink, and repainted a dark gold/brass to match the sword's furniture and foot guard on the legging - which also features a grinning face. The leather straps were changed from a deep blue to a Deep Purple(!) to better match the tone of the figure set by the corset and legging, and the bag - which was originally a horrid garish yellow was also turned into a Deep Purple. The studs on the leather strapping and legging were also changed to a pale, pastel yellow to match those originally on the corset. I deepened and highlighted the yellow-green of his fishy head-crest to define it a little more, and highlighted his pale skin further, though it's a little washed out in the images here. The sword was originally a deep, dirty metallic blue, which I turned into a brighter metallic green. As with the Khornate, the brass was highlighted a little. The red crab-claw remains untouched, as does the pink panel on his right breast. I'd have repainted that one, but I decided to leave the freehand Slaaneshi rune untouched. A fair bit more work, but it's turned this figure from what I've always thought of as a "trash model" into something I really quite like. These guys will eventually be included in armies for Kings of War, but exactly which armies remains to be seen. My Beastmen (Herd) army will be much more of a "Bestigor"-type army, while these two (and many of the others that are part of my renovations of my older models) are deeply Realm of Chaos-style Beastmen rather than the more feral Bestigor-style.

Here we have some Realm of Chaos figures that have recently been released from the Purgatory of a storage case and revived. These were some of the early figures I got. Bloodletters of Khorne from the original Slaves to Darkness volume of Realm of Chaos. Painted back in the day and touched up several times over the years. Pulled out of a storage case a couple of weeks ago to be rebased and lightly touched up again. The middle guy looks a bit odd in the front-on photo, but the Conga-line profile shot helps him to make more sense. These early figures might not have been the greatest of sculpts, but they had a twisted physiology that made them work really well as Daemons. I'm glad that GW has returned to a design close to the original with the recent plastics after their iterations as cosplaying budybuilders and spiky beastmen in the interim. I never had many of the original Bloodletters, and still don't. Getting them up to an even 8 (or 10, or 12) is "on the list" but they're not cheap or easily found on eBay. Back in the day, a Night Horror Demon (I guess he could be a gargoyle, but the trident is telling) got roped into the gang and has been a part of the small unit ever since. I somehow ended up with a broken Bloodletter torso, and so ended up grafting it to a spare pair of Chaos Warrior legs I had lying around after an uninspired Bear Centaur conversion. The arm is off an early Jugger rider. At some point these guys will hit the table again. I'll use Abyssal rules for KoW, though it's doubtful that I'll run a full daemonic army, and instead ally them with "The Herd" (Beastmen) and whatever Non De Plume that Warriors of Chaos end up with. They might be willing to ally with Nurgle, but not with the hated Slannesh or the duplicitous Magicians of Nurgle. I'm sure they'll also end up on a 40k table, after I get some more forces up to scratch and work out which version or combination of the rules my group will play with.