Skarsnik and Gobbla

"Make sure you tell all those humies, humie, make sure you tell 'em good, make sure you tell 'em about the king in da mountain. Tell 'em all about me, Skarsnik, tell 'em all about my life, leave nuffink out." — Skarsnik to captured playwright Jeremiah von Bickenstadt

I read the Warhammer novel Skarsnik by Guy Haley a couple of months ago and loved it, and so I checked Etsy to see if there were any Skarsnik proxies for sale. Lo and behold I found this one, and what's better is that it's a complete rip-off off the official Games Workshop 4th Edition model!

Both the minis were easy to paint and I knocked them out over a weekend.

I kicked off with Gobbla, who's Skarsnik's pet squig and bodyguard, famous for eating anything that might even slightly endanger its master. After priming him black I gave him a couple of coats of Khorne Red as a basecoat. After that it was just a case of highlighting it with Mephiston Red, Evil Sunz Scarlet and Troll Slayer Orange. 

With his skin done I based all his teeth and horns with Chocolate Brown and then gave them a once-over with Bonewhite and Ivory. While I was at it, I glued a bunch of human skulls and a couple of orc skulls to toothpicks and painted them the same way.

The only change I made to his teeth was to give them a very thinned touch of Nazdreg Yellow so they'd have a nice decaying look. You can't tell from my crappy photo but his eyes are dotted with Moot Green.

Skarsnik was even easier to paint given I did a whole Night Goblin army back in 2023. After priming him black I painted his robes with Black Templar contrast to deepen the shade and then highlighted it with drybrushes of German and Neutral greys. Easy.

His skin is just Waagh Flesh shaded with Athonian Camoshade and then highlighted it with Death Guard Green. Each of his eyes were dotted with Evil Sunz Scarlet and bugger me, I forgot to paint his teeth. Honestly, I'm a disaster.

As Skarsnik is the leader of the Crooked Moon Tribe and undisputed King of Karak Eight Peaks, I couldn't just leave his robes plain black. I ended up painting a ribbon of Titanium White all the way around the bottom of the robes, filled it with Averland Sunset, and then painted in the flame pattern (at least it's supposed to be a flame pattern) with Black. I did the edges of his collars the same way.

The horns sticking out of his cowl are painted red just so I didn't have to paint more bloody bone shades. I finished him off by painting his staff Black, Stormhost Silver and Retribution Armour, and then his sword with Iron Warriors and Nuln Oil. 

I based both minis together on an oval base. I stuck some cork to the base and put another smaller piece on top so Skarsnik can stand above all the other gobbos. The minis were superglued in place and the cork painted with my usual Mod Podge/black craft paint mix. Once dry I slathered the whole base with regular Mod Podge and covered it with sand. After leaving it overnight I slapped Black all over the sand and then drybrushed it with Neutral Grey and Grey Seer.

The mushrooms are ones I painted a while back and never used. They were just glued in place to add some colour and then I stuck the skulls in place.

Apologies for this post being light on photos but honestly, I took the only three I could think of.

Another army is in the mail...

Thanks to Etsy and my nigh-on uncontrollable ADHD, I've gone and bought an entire Skeleton/Undead army. It set me back about $100 but to buy all the mini sets separately would have cost $140, so I think I won out there. Hopefully in about a month I'll have a bunch of wraiths, skeleton warriors, zombies, some dire wolves, necromancers, giant bats and a vampire count to paint, so now I just need some matte beige spray primer to speed things up a bit. Stay tuned!