So some of you may know that I am a MAHOOSIVE K-47 fan and have several fully painted armies, but when the new edition landed in 2025 I knew I had to do a winter Axis Army set on the Eastern Front… This would need to be an army I could complete quickly, speed paint if you’d like due to lack of hobby time at the time and so the Sturm Division 312 marched into existence!
The core of a Konflikt ’47 army is the Assault Platoon, the boots on the ground and you must select 2 advanced or specialist units as it’s backbone, the weird in the WWII. I chose to focus on Stahltruppen and Shrekwulfen!
Next up is your choice of Platoons, I went with an Armoured Walker Platoon comprising of a Panzer IV-X “Panzerlaufer” Command Vehicle and 2 Vogelspinne.
Following this up I added an Artillery Platoon comprising of a Schwertruppen command team and Panzershreck decked out in mki power armour, a Schwerfeld Projector & a Super Heavy Anti Tank Gun both with a tow for repositioning.
Last up I added an armoured platoon compromising of a King Tiger with Super Heavy Rail Gun & a Puma-X
As you can see I’ve gone for a heavy weathered look, with whitewashed armour. I achieved this with the use of heavy chipping medium over their original tricolour pattern. Once dried, I applied an off-white over the entirety of model and then removed areas of the white once dry. When this had settled I softly airbrushed off-white over these exposed areas to simulate areas of the whitewash thinning over time. AK Dioramas Dark Earth, Ice Sprinkles and Snow were added at the final stage.
I wanted to add the impression of the Vogelspinne being nimble and pouncing, a stark opposite to the lumbering Panzerlaufer. To aid in this storytelling I posed the Vogelspinne’s accordingly and on the Panzerlaufer I added stowage and begleit riders.
Hope you like my new edition/new army, I have a new one planned for 2026 and additions to this one so keep checking back for more updates – 𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕴𝖗𝖔𝖓 𝕵𝖆𝖗𝖑
So most of you will have heard of the game Warhammer 40,000, or 40k for short, but do you know the story of the blood crazed lunatic with butchers nails in his head that the Chaos god of War & Slaughter took a liking to? Well Angron, Primarch of the World Eaters Legion, was transformed by Khorne into a Daemon Primarch of Khorne, his Avatar of Destruction!
Moving forward from the ashes of the Horus Heresy and recently he has emerged once more to wreak havoc upon the Imperium of Man, the Red Angel is here…
A Dream Commission
𝕊𝕋𝕌𝔻𝕀𝕆 ℂ𝕆𝕄𝕄𝕀𝕊𝕊𝕀𝕆ℕ 𝗠𝗔𝗡𝗨𝗙𝗔𝗖𝗧𝗨𝗥𝗘𝗥: Games Workshop 𝗚𝗔𝗠𝗘: Warhammer 40,000 (40k) 𝗔𝗥𝗠𝗬: World Eaters 𝗧𝗜𝗧𝗟𝗘: Angron, Daemon Primarch of Khorne 𝗣𝗔𝗜𝗡𝗧𝗘𝗗 𝗕𝗬: The Iron Jarl Ironskull Gaming Studios
A couple of years ago I had the pleasure of painting my first Primarch Miniature for Warhammer 40,000 having only previously painted these venerable leaders of the Emperor’s Legions for Horus Heresy and I loved it! The scale of these miniatures are awesome but I’d only dreamt of painting a Daemon Primarch, the biggest and baddest of all Primarchs… That is until recently when the Angriest of Daemon Primarchs arrived as a commission!
This mini is truly stunning and a joy to paint… Even if there are a gazzilion skulls to paint! Previously I painted a Bloodthirster and a Daemon Prince of Khorne for the same client so shouldn’t have been surprised to receive this commission but I truly am astonished every time someone chooses my services for such epic minis! Well enough babble from me, may I present to you Angron “The Red Angel”, Daemon Primarch of Khorne!
So the cat is out of the bag, the Cruel Overlords and True Masters of The Void have Dominated my painting desk… Which is apt really as that’s what they do to the Denizens of the Void, The Nightstalkers!
So rewind to this time last year and I set out on a journey into Kings of War by Mantic Games choosing to work on an Ambush Army of Nightstalkers… Little did I know that roughly 1 year later I’d be getting ready to unveil their Masters, The Twilight Kin!
A massive thank you goes out to Mantic Games for sending me the new kits ahead of their general release date so I could work on them, it is such an honour to be chosen to show off my take on these stunning kits!
So the Miniatures are hard plastic and the detail is truly phenomenal! The kits go together really well, but if like me you have sausage fingers I’d highly recommend using a pair of good tweezers as some of the parts are small and can be a little fiddly.
I decided I was going to build these with a view to making a story driven set of Multibases and as such the units are not full model count, in fact they are well below the PMC suggested but I always go by the rule of cool and try and make sure the bases still look full!
I decided I was going to build a Regiment of Corsair Voidwalkers and then I realised I had a few spare which I could combine with a leftover sprue of Reapers/Tormentors from my Nightstalkers project to make a Regiment of Corsair Wranglers (I chose to use the Reapers as I’d seen the unit that Mantic advertised, however after reading the rules I now believe that it should have been Tormentors but it still looks cool).
The Best Of Both Worlds
The best thing about having these Twilight Kin units is that I can bolster it into a full army with the addition of some units, heroes and Monsters from my Nightstalkers army! So I’ll need to grab hold of an Ambush Starter & the Characters Set and then I’ll have a 2300pts Twilight Kin Army!
With the same mantra in mind I built a Regiment of Void-Skiffs, putting 2 of the models on the Multibase this would leave one which I then decided I’d build as a Captain on Void-Skiff. The conversion was an easy one with just a head and an arm swap which both came from the Corsair Voidwalkers/Fleetwardens/Wranglers Sprue.
Not sure it will be the most competitive list but should be fun and a nice addition to the growing collection of forces of Pannithor! Check out the rest of the Twilight Kin range HERE!
Fickle Dice Games (FDG) is a little known 3D file creator for wargaming. As far as I can tell they are concerned with creating content based around their own game and thus are busily beavering away creating content for their Gloom Trench 1926.
Gloom Trench 1926 is a weird world war style game set in the unending despair that is World War One…if it never ended. In this gloom ridden foggy world of despair, the main participants of world war one are continuing the war with a range of new experimental and conventional weaponry. This opens up a wide possibility of the imagination for different unit types and weapons, with the progression into the demonic. It is worth noting that the rules are experimental and are available on their website for FREE (at the time of writing this).
Fickle Dice Games asked the Ironskull Gaming Team if we were willing to do a review of their new upcoming kickstarter Gloom Trench 1926, more specifically their new trench system. As, out of the all collaborating channels in the Ironskull Gaming Team, here at Wargamingoldguys I have the most experience with 3D printers and so I volunteered to do the printing and review these STL’s. The Gloom Trench 1926 Trench system goes live on kickstarter 12th July 2023.
Now I am not a novice at 3D printing but up until recently (<12months) I was just using an Ender 3Pro, but for this I will be using my resin printer.
Before we start getting into the nitty gritty of the stl’s I would like to say that to do these prints I am using an Anycubic Photon Mono 4k, so it’s a resin printer on the relatively cheaper end of the market. I am using the stock settings as that has produced some very nice results for me and I use a layer height of 0.04mm as I have tried 0.02mm in the past but I haven’t really noticed enough of a difference to warrant the extra build time and wear on the FEP sheet. I thought this would be good to get out there to start with as to highlight that I haven’t done anything special to get these prints completed.
The slicing software I am using is Chitubox version 1.9.4
So now that’s all sorted lets jump into the files. In the download you will get the following
6 pre-supported files
11 unsupported files
NB/Now since actually downloading the files, printing the terrain pieces, and writing this blog (it only took about 1 week) FDG have come back to me and said they have now got all the files as pre-supported files
With these building blocks, it should be enough to build a nice trench system the size and scale is only limited to your imagination, available print time and the resin available. The modular bits contained within the file are: 1 Long Section 2 short sections 1 90° bend 1 small 30° bend 1 reverse 45° bend 1 45° bend 2 end pieces Small set of sand bag Trench ladder
Now by this stage I am chomping at the bit to get some gcodes produced and get the resin flowing.
So I started with the unsupported small straight. I did this at 20° to the build plate and used the auto generated supports. No I know what you are thinking “why use the auto generated supports” well it comes down to it that I haven’t had much issue with the auto generated supports before and it does save a bit of time.
Now from the first print there was a slight warp front to back of the print. Now the obvious reason for this is the supports not being substantial enough for such a big component. So I repeated the print of the same component using the pre-supported file supplied.
Now as the name suggests these come with the supports already generated and the supports vary in thickness throughout the STL, so it looks like it has actually been thought about. The small straight came out fine. The larger straight still warped slightly but not massively and all the other parts came out like the small straight, so I am more inclined that it’s the fine tuning of the printer settings rather than the provided files.
The pre-supported files print very well and if you are a complete novice (or veteran alike) and you just want to get some cool looking trenches on the table to battle over then that is all you need. The supports on the pre-supported files look like they could be optimised a little bit but it’s all down to effort over value added. I wouldn’t bother mucking around with them just to save 5ml of resin here and there as the results that I achieved were very good for very little effort.
Now, one of the things I really like about the files provided is that all of the pre-supported files have near enough hollow sandbag mounds. This saves a relatively large amount of resin over solid components. I think that you would want to print a few sets of these to have an imposing trench system to fight over, so this saves you a hefty chunk of material in the long run.
A couple of the smaller angle components are solid resin. I did redo the smaller angle with the hollow function with appropriate drain holes. This did not affect the form or print quality of the components.
Once I got how I was going to print them sorted I went about optimising the build plate to maximise the productivity and reducing the print time. I found that the majority of the time I could fit two components on the build plate without too much issue.
As shown by the printed components below the detail on the individual modules is quite nice and the guys over at FDG have got just the right amount of detail into the terrain to give them the feel they need. It is worth noting that printing all the components once took approximately 80% of the 1kg tub of resin used.
As a side note this set is meant to be able to be printed on a FDM printer so I did a trial of the short length and overall I am really pleased with how it came out. I used my stock Ender 3 Pro and apart from a slight adhesion issues the print turned out nicely. There was some layer lines at the top where the step change was more noticeable. I used 0.16mm layer height as that’s what I print most of my terrain at to keep the print time down but if you were willing to reduce your layer height and increase your print time these would become less noticeable.
So what are my critiques??
One thing I did notice is that there are 11 different unsupported components and only 6 supported files. Some of the small angles, the sandbags, and ladder are not included as a pre-supported stl files. Though they are not that difficult to generate supports for, so its not a show stopper. As noted earlier this changed right before publishing this blog. So now all of the files come pre-suppported which is great.( i kept this in here to show progression and how the guys at FDG are continuously thinking about these type of things).
There are only 9 different sections to the modular trench system. Depending on your plan and amount you are going to print of the trench system, will depend if the trenches start to have that same look. I don’t know what the guys at FDG are planning, if they are planning for an expansion pack for additional sections to allow a bit more variation.
The two angled sections that are solid could have the stl updated to reduce the amount of resin used in the print (i.e. hollow)
Overall the details are crisp and pack just the right amount of detail for terrain on a busy battlefield. The advantages of using this trench system for terrain out ways the critiques raised earlier on and would add a very nice feel to any battle field. I know they are designed to have a WW1 look to them but they are scaled to match 28mm-32mm scale. Below are some different manufactures models to scale against. There are some Warlord Games, Mantic, and GW.
While the trench system fits better with the historical and the grim dark sci-fi there is nothing stopping you from using the trench system in any historic era after and inc WW1 right all the way through to the high-tech future.
I would recommend this kickstarter if you are into your 3D printing and looking into a trench system for your board as things like this always do better with economies of scale, and no one ever wants a small trench system to fight over. It might also be worth going to check out their other 3D printing offerings to fill the trenches with some great looking fighting men also from their Gloom Trench 1926 range.
The Finished Product
Here’s some painted examples with miniatures from a Weird World War II game for scale and to show how the Kickstarter will lend itself to fans of other weird world war, trench based and grimdark games…
Click Here to be notified on the Kickstarter Campaign Launch!
That’s right, we want all The Damned Range…that’s The Damned by Wargames Atlantic & MiniWargaming which as of today (30/5/23) is live as a campaign on Gamefound.
The Damned is a new range of highly detailed, multi-part, hard plastic Post Apocalyptic sci-fi miniatures! These awesome miniatures are 28mm heroic scale to be used in your favourite tabletop games.
We were so privileged to be sent a Preproduction Brute Miniature from the upcoming range to paint up and woah were we blown away! I was tasked with painting this super cool miniature and have to say the detail captured in the sculpts is absolutely stunning and as such it was an absolute dream to paint! Choosing to break away from the Promo/Studio colour scheme of red and metallics, which lean towards the Khorne Cultist/Renegade Guard vibe, I opted for Blues and Yellow/Browns for a nod towards another Chaos Deity and their Renegade Militia the Tzeentch Cult of Change.
This range has vibes that make them perfect alternative models for those found in Warhammer 40k Lore, they also make perfect miniatures for any Trench or Grim Dark setting sci-fi game! Check out our video below:
The Gamefound Campaign
They hope that, with your help, they can bring a total of eight highly detailed and versatile hard plastic kits to life.
If successful this campaign will first unlock four new hard plastic sets for The Damned: Infantry, Weapons Teams, Brutes, and Command. A series of stretch goals will unlock a load of additional hard plastic frames and full sets including textured bases in a variety of sizes, Outriders, Hounds, Artillery, and a full multi-sprue plastic vehicle! As a backer there is an impressive list of freebies you can get if the Campaign reaches certain stretch goals, these only get better the more your pledge is for…hence the title of this article, check out the below graphic from Gamefound…
So in short, this is an awesome new range of miniatures that will work for a wide range of Sci-Fi, Near Future, Apocalypse game settings. so what are you waiting for? Click the image below to get all of The Damned miniatures…you know you want to!
So I had the pleasure to build and paint the new Nightstalkers products for Kings of War by Mantic Games. These are truly stunning miniatures that deserves to be praised as some of the best sculpts and casts Mantic Games’ has ever done. I set about painting then in my army colours and have to mention that I used 1 of the new Butchers as a unit champion in a PVC Butchers Horde, the other 2 off the sprue I assembled as Ravagers. I added a resin and a PVC Reaper to the regiment of Reapers which is still under PMC but the base looks full so that is all that matters!
An impressive and exciting year lies ahead for Kings of War! With hard plastics and resin replacing the old PVC miniatures, fleshing out of army lists with new units and reworking old units based on feedback it truly is a new age for Kings of War and so now it falls to you to hear the rallying call and to take the plunge into this awesome Fantasy rank and flank game! Check out the rules preview attached below…
Having received a nightmarish delivery, I sat down with the new hard plastic Butchers/Ravagers & Reapers/Tormentors sprues as well as the new resin Void Lurker kit and did a little showcase/review.
As an avid Wargamer and commission painter I see a lot of kits from a lot of different companies and even though I am a fan of the Mantic Games offering I can still be honest and critical as I can’t help but compare products to those from other companies. Because of this when I say these kits are phenomenal, I mean they are PHENOMENAL! The plastic sprues are clean and the details are crisp. The parts are clearly labelled for easier assembly and they even include scenic pieces to help decorate your Multibases! The resin, as with the plastics, are crisp casts which really showcases the details of this incredible miniature!
We are a commission studio and if you are a MiniWarGaming Silver Vault Member you can get 10% off your commissions by using the discount coupon in your members section.
So after a couple of months of frantic building and painting the miniatures that I chose from the awesome array available in the Nightstalkers Faction I can happily say I have a fully painted and based 995pts Nightstalkers Army for Ambush!
The Colour Palette
So as you will see in the showcase video attached in the blog post I have moved away from the standard Nightstalkers colour scheme and chosen to go with a very pale white for the most part and the mystic energy is a magenta and black. This method was achieved quite easily and the recipe is as follows:
Base sprayed with a black primer
Zenithal highlight with white
The white areas were given a liberal coat of Contrast Paint: Apothecary White
The white is then highlighted with pure white
The magenta areas are painted using the Base Paint: Screamer Pink from Games Workshop (leave an area of white where you want to achieve a blend between these colours)
Using a mix of the Contrast Paint: Volopus Pink and the Contrast Mixing medium (1:1) blend the area between the white and magenta
The Magenta Energy is then finished by applying Black paint to the tips
The Basing Style
I decided to go with a dark, dingy/swampy graveyard for the basic aesthetic. This was achieved by using a variety of products as listed below:
Gravestones – I used a mix of Renedra Gravestones and items found in the paintedlegions eBay store
Rocky areas – these were created using cork bark pieces available from hobbycraft here in the UK
Trees – these are from the Mantic Games Terrain Crate range
The groundwork – I made a texture paste from burnt umber paint, PVA glue, ready mixed pollyfilla and bird sand. This was then applied liberally across the open areas of the base and used to blend the elements that formed the multi bases. This was then highlighted by drybrushing it with a grey paint, 3 types of tufts (varying lengths and colours) were then applied. The edges were then painted Matt Black. Rocky areas were painted a light grey and washed twice with Athonian Camo Shade from Games Workshop. The trees were drybrushed Dryad Bark forward by a light drybrush of Gorthor Brown which are both available from Games Workshop.
Hope you’ve enjoyed this look at the Nightstalkers project, think we may have to escalate this army in the future! – The Iron Jarl
So 2023 is shaping up to be a year of Mantic Games inspired hobby for our Studio 💀’s! Hot of the heals of the past couple of months of building and painting Kings of War Ambush Armies in a Tale of Six Gamers Project we will be taking our newly formed Demo Team to the Burton Sci-Fi and Fantasy Con 2023 to help promote our local sponsored gaming club (The Tabletop Warriors) and gaming venue Books and Banter. After then the 4 Core Members of the Skulls Studio Team/Demo Team will be tackling a series of projects such as expanding our Ambush Armies to 2300pts Kings of War Armies, Starting a Deadzone Strike Team, expanding on the Strike Team to make a 1000pts Strike Force for Firefight, etc. But back on course let’s talk The Tale of Six Gamers…
So who are the artists and what armies were worked on? Well here’s a list of the artists and their project armies…
We have been recording our progress on our YouTube channel in a series of Vlogs…if you’d like to find out reasons behind our choices and how we tackled painting and basing then check out our Kings of War Playlist!
In the next blog post I will showcase my Nightstalkers Ambush Army so watch out for that hitting this page.
Thank you for reading and hope you look forward to our year of Mantic Content – The Iron Jarl
