Of HOTT Air Baloons and Strongholds

As I slog along with painting my goblins for HOTT, I've decided it was also time to start on some of the peripheral items needed by the HOTT army. Namely a "Barker Marker" and a Stronghold.

Up first is my Airship. During one of the town-wide garage sales I've attended in the past year, I found someone selling a bunch of Lego, which included some ships. After filing off all the nubs, I used cardstock planks for the deck.

The four centre "guy-lines" are paper wrapped wire from the dollar store. They support the balloon ball. The remainder of the wires is string washed with brown ink. Needless to say there was a lot of glue used to keep it all in place.

Even with using a sponge ball, the model was going to be top-heavy. So I had to use some real stones on the base to counter-balance it. The one issue that is currently bothering me as to its effectiveness in HOTT is that the base is deep - seriously deep at 18cm. One thing I always try to avoid is having bits extend beyond the base, as this has often  caused issues with units being in frontal contact as well as breakage of the extending bits.

I do have some goblin crew selected and they are sitting on the paint bench. The piece I used for the firepot is also I believe a piece of Lego, some sort of helmet. The ballast bags I made from greenstuff.

Next up was another Goblin Spear element. I have 1 more Spear Element to complete before I move onto the Blades. They are currently drying from the Army Painter Dip.

I have also completed my Stronghold for the Goblins. With the cornerstone being the GW plastic Shrine/Altar/Tent, the remainder was made from styrofoam boulders and a fence made from Sprue and Stir sticks.

As units don't occupy Strongholds in HOTT, I have left space for a 6cm x 6cm stand just in case I use this camp for other game systems. Here is a shot of the Spear Element in the camp.

Last for today is my "Barker Marker". I picked up a bag of Chtulhu figures from Fantasy Flight Games. I figured he would make a good topper for the Chaos that is about to befall our next campaign. The remainder of these will end up being used in Pulp / Skirmish games.

Thanks for taking the time to check them out.