It’s that time of year again when people are talking about ‘New Year, New Army’ and drawing up their hobby plans for the months ahead, so I thought it would be fun to share some of the ideas I’m working on for 2026. I made a similar post last year, but of my four stated goals in 2025, the only one I fully achieved was completing the Silver Stars Kill Team! So this time I’m probably going to be a little more realistic with my aims.
Imperial Fists
The Imperial Fists were my main hobby focus of the second half of last year, and will be the main focus of this year too. I’d like to complete a solid 1500 points in total by the end of the year, hopefully in time for Armies on Parade 2026. With many units already partially assembled on my workbench, this doesn’t seem too unrealistic for the next 9-10 months.
Undead
There has been a recent surge of interest in Warhammer fantasy and Age of Sigmar in my gaming group. That, combined with the fun I had recently painting The Summons, has led to me giving in to temptation and buying the Deathrattle Tomb Host Spearhead. Expect to see some more skeletons over the coming months!
Stretch Goals – Traitors, Tyranids & Tutorials!
The Imperial Fists and Undead will be my main hobby focus of the year, but I also have some ‘stretch goals’ if I get ahead of schedule and have time to spare. I’d like to make some Age of Darkness Traitors – perhaps a combination of Death Guard and Daemons of the Ruinstorm. I’d also like to paint some more Tyranids for my very slow-burn Hive Fleet Cerberus project. Finally, some of my LED miniature tutorials are several years old now and could do with an update and refresh.
So those are my hobby plans for the year! I’m sure there will also be a few one-off miniatures and other hobby tangents. I hope you all have plenty of plans in mind for fun hobby too! As ever, thanks very much for reading, and please remember you can keep up to date on my hobby progress in 2026 by following me on Instagram, Threads, Bluesky and Mastodon.
This week I’m sharing my take on the Warhammer+ Soulblight Gravelords ‘The Summons’, with some extra LED magic of course! I had hoped to finish this spooky miniature in time for Halloween, but it took a longer to paint than I’d estimated.
Modelling
I’ve been flirting with the idea of building some variety of Warhammer Undead army for many years now. So when the Warhammer+ miniatures were announced for this year, the Necromancer really leapt out at me as the clear choice. The stock miniature doesn’t feature any obvious light sources, so I had some creative freedom on which parts I chose to illuminate. I considered a number of ideas; candles, lanterns, glowing necklace gems, burning green eyes on the Necromancer, and even an unholy glow projected upwards from the open grave.
I settled on illuminating the eyes of the Skull Staff, a soulfire flame in the conveniently outstretched hand, and the skull of the skeleton who is mid-reanimation. These areas created a visually pleasing triangle of light when viewed from the front.
When deciding on the paint scheme, I decided to stay reasonably close to the box art as I didn’t have an existing army colour palette to match. The purple and black robes were also very evocative of the classic Warhammer Fantasy Necromancer. But I did add a few small twists of my own. In my head canon this is Wilhelm Lichtenfels, a Necromancer I created for a short lived narrative campaign ‘Shadow Over Steepacre’, that I played with with my gaming group back when Age of Sigmar was first released. The Steepacre town heraldry was white and green, which is reproduced in the skeleton’s shield. I’ve made previous versions of Wilhelm, and each version becomes a little more corrupted (and a little more buff).
R.I.P? More like ripped! Am I right, ladies?!
Helga Stormglad, Steepacre resident (burned as witch)
The miniature was undercoated with Citadel ‘Chaos Black’ spray. All other paints are Citadel unless specified otherwise. It’s worth noting that for ease of access to details I painted the skeletons as separate sub-assemblies.
The only other thing worth mentioning is that the magical flame was painted with a thin glaze of Hexwraith Flame.
That’s all for today, I hope you’ve enjoyed this (sort of) seasonal miniature! I’ll be back again soon, most likely with more space marines. As ever, thanks very much for reading, and please remember you can also find me sharing my work on Instagram, Threads, Bluesky and Mastodon. Or if you prefer you can subscribe to my website by entering your email in the box below to receive updates whenever I post a new blog article or tutorial.
It’s that time of year when hobby plans are drawn up for the months ahead, so I thought it would be a good idea to share my plans for 2025. This is not only for my benefit, but also so we can all have a chuckle when I fail to meet the ambitious targets by the end of the year!
Tyranids
In January 2024 I introduced Hive Fleet Cerberus as my next big project. That plan didn’t quite survive contact with the enemy (the enemy in this case being hobby time management), but I’m keen to press on with the Tyranids as a high priority this year. The new Warrior Bioform Onslaught detachment has particularly inspired me!
Kruleboyz
The Kruleboyz have been a back burner project for almost as long as the Tyranids, but I’d like to give them more focus and try and get a painted and playable Kruleboyz Spearhead on the table and some Age of Sigmar games under my belt. The new Orruk Battletome is also imminent at time of writing, which seems like a good time to jump in.
Kill Team
I need to get up-to-speed with the new edition of Kill Team, which includes buying the new rules and finishing my Silver Stars Astartes Kill Team.
Flesh Eaters
I plan to “finish” the Flesh Eaters this year – although can you ever really finish an army? – with a few more units, vehicles and characters. I also hope to finish the year with one final Armies on Parade entry for this army.
New Year, New Challenge
The Warhammer Community team have thrown down the gauntlet with the New Year, New Challenge bingo card. Taking part and posting your progress online gets you entered into a voucher prize draw, and completing a row can earn you a pin badge in Warhammer stores. I’ll be giving this a go!
So those are my hobby plans for the year! I also have a few other minor projects and one-off miniatures on the workbench which I’ll be posting soon. I hope you all have plenty of plans in mind for fun hobby too. As ever, thanks very much for reading, and please remember you can also find me sharing my work on Instagram, Threads, Bluesky and Mastodon.
In this week’s blog post I’ll be talking about my recent Nighthaunt Spirit Host project. This miniature and its LED effects have been specially commissioned by the team at Green Stuff World to show off some of their 3D printed accessories and LED kits. This is my fourth Green Stuff World commission after Sergeant Khons, Custodian Kalden, and Genestealer Clamavus Voval Kreen that I posted earlier this year.
Modelling
This miniature was intended to demonstrate what could be achieved by combining the Green Stuff World 3D printed Resin Candles and miniature LED sets. When brainstorming ideas for how to include these in a miniature, I went to the Nighthaunts almost straight away. I did originally consider having the ghosts holding the candles. While that is definitely possible, it makes the process a lot more complicated and I was trying to keep this tutorial as accessible as I could.
Once the idea of having the spirits holding the candles had been eliminated, I decided to have them on the base instead. At first I was going to have them sitting on and around the grave in at random as though they were memorial candles left by mourners. Then it occurred to me they might look better arranged in a circle around the grave as though they were being used in of a necromantic summoning ritual.
As part of the commission I filmed all the stages of the build process, some clips of which you can see in the video below.
A full PDF tutorial for this build will be released via Green Stuff World soon. When it is, I’ll add it here and link to it from my tutorial section. In the meantime to get you started here’s a list of all the components and consumables I used.
You may also find my older LED Nighthaunt Candles Short-Form Tutorial interesting, which shows a similar process applied to a Nighthaunt Chainrasp Dreadwarden using slightly different techniques and components.
Painting
The paint scheme on this miniature was very simple and (I’d like to think) quite effective. I largely followed the technique I’d used with my previous Nighthaunt. The only difference was a slight change in approach to the green ‘ectoplasm’ which dominates the Spirit Host miniature. This time I thinned the Hexwraith Flame with Contrast Medium instead of Lahmian Medium. I don’t think Contrast Medium actually existed when I painted my previous Nighthaunt! I also made the layers and highlights thinner and more subtle. The updated key colours are listed below:
Green Ectoplasm
Grey Seer undercoat
50:50 Hexwraith Flame:Contrast Medium
Thin Ulthuan Grey glaze on raised detail areas (faces, hands, etc.)
White Scar dot highlight on sharp points in Ulthuan Grey glazed areas
That’s all for today, I hope you enjoyed this miniature and the demonstration of the Green Stuff World kits! Thanks very much for reading, and please remember you can also find me sharing my work on Instagram, Threads, Twitter/X, Bluesky and Mastodon.
Today I’m looking at some Orruk Kruleboyz Gutrippaz for Warhammer Age of Sigmar. These are the next miniatures in my new Kruleboyz project, following on from the Swampcalla Shaman I posted earlier in the year.
The Kruleboyz Project
Earlier in the year my young son expressed an interest in having a go at the Warhammer hobby, particularly the painting, so we had a look at the starter sets. My son is more into fantasy than sci-fi at the moment, and the Stormcast leapt out at him as something he wanted to paint. I’m a fan of greenskins (as you may recall), so I thought painting some Kruleboyz might be fun. We bought an Age of Sigmar ‘Warrior Edition’ Starter Set to split. I couldn’t resist picking up a couple of other Kruleboyz bits too (like the Shaman)! Unfortunately the rule book in that set is now technically defunct, but I’m not too bothered about that as I knew a new edition was on the horizon and we were mainly interested in the models.
The concept of “swamp orcs” has really grown on me since they were introduced a few years ago. I used to play a lot of black decks in Magic the Gathering when I was younger, so that probably helped! There is also an area of marsh land on the edge of my childhood home town, so I took a few reference photos (see below) on a recent visit, just to give me some inspiration for basing.
Modelling
The main feature of these Gutrippaz is the LED flaming torches, so I’m going to provide a short-form tutorial below on how it was made. I don’t plan to have too many LEDs in this army – something that I always claim at the start of every project – but I’m thinking maybe around three or four flaming torches in every unit of ten.
I don’t really see the Kruleboyz using the torches to light their way through the mist. They prefer to remain concealed, after all! I imagine the Kruleboyz using them as a way to intimidate and confuse their victims; think the “Fire Dragon” in the film The 13th Warrior.
Flaming Torch Tutorial
Prepare the base, resistor (in this case a 47 ohm resistor), battery holder and switch for this miniature were prepared using the method described in Steps 1 – 6 of my LED Eye Lens Tutorial. The single LED in the torch will eventually be connected in series with the resistor, battery holder and switch, as described below.
1. The LED used is a Switch Electronics 3mm Yellow Flickering 2.2V LED in series with a 47 ohm resistor (as mentioned above). Select a Gutrippa with a spear that is pointing upwards, as shown in the above left image.
2. Cut the legs of the LED as short as possible and solder on two connecting wires that will be long enough to reach the base when passed through the miniature. It’s useful to colour code the wires to remind yourself of the LED polarity (red is normally positive and black negative). Cut the spear down so it looks like the correct length for a flaming torch. as shown in the above right image.
3. Glue the LED to the the ‘wood’ of the torch, and then drill holes to feed the wires down through the arm, torso and one leg of the miniature so they can connect to the resistor, battery holder and switch on the base. If you need additional hints on how to do this, check out Steps 7 – 9 of my LED Eye Lens Tutorial.
4. While I was working on this miniature, the upper arm pinged off and disappeared into whatever dimension dropped miniature components vanish to, so I had to use wire and putty to replace the upper arm. However – if you don’t drop it – you can just use the upper arm. Repositioning the arm to hold the torch at a realistic raised angle may introduce gaps, but these can be dealt with at the next stage.
5. Fill in any gaps around the arm and shoulder with modelling putty. You will also need to use modelling putty to sculpt the ‘burning rags’ around the top of the flaming torch, which will help to hide the legs of the LED. Finally, use modelling putty to cover up any exposed components remaining on the base. The images above show what this looks like from the front and the back.
7. Start sculpting the basic shape of the flame over the LED using Water Splash Effect Gel from Green Stuff World. This is best applied with a metal sculpting tool, thin plastic rod or stiff length of wire. When you apply it, the gel will initially appear milky white – as shown in the above left image – but once it is fully dry it will be transparent.
8. Wait for the initial application of gel to dry (this can take several hours) and then continue to apply successive layers until you are happy with the shape. Building up thin layers over time will give the best results, as show in the above centre image.
9. Once you are happy with the shape and the gel has completely dried, you can paint the flames. You only need to apply a light glaze – this will not inhibit the light of the LED and will also make the model look good when the LED is switched off. First apply a shade of Citadel Fuegan Orange to the lower third of the flames. Once this has dried apply a layer of Citadel Imperial Fist Contrast thinned down with water to a glaze consistency.
Painting
The troggoths that haunt the swamps of the Tallowlands are giant, purple-skinned brutes with great ivory tusks and beady yellow eyes. The Kruleboyz take great delight in terrifying the decent, hard working folk of the Tallowlands by fashioning their shields into leering purple faces and emerging shouting and yelling from the boggy mists to rampage through the villages built on the edge of the swamps.
Excerpt from ‘My Travels in the Tallowlands’ by renowned bard Jonathan Allen Bow.
I’ve opted for a primitive look with the Kruleboyz; leather armour, troggoth hide shields, black iron for weapons and armour, and bronze for other tools and trinkets. I was trying to give the impression of barbarian raiders emerging from their hidden villages in the swamps, rather than a well-equipped and well-supplied professional army.
I don’t normally paint in sub-assemblies, mostly because LED projects usually require the whole miniature to be assembled before painting begins. However, if I have one tip for painting the Gutrippaz, it’s to keep the shield arms separate, as this makes it a lot easier to get at all the detail.
Below are the paint recipes for my Kruleboyz project. All paints listed are from the Citadel range and are applied over an undercoat of Halfords Primer Grey (a Citadel alternative would be Grey Seer.)
Kruleboy Flesh
Waaagh Flesh base coat
Agrax Earthshade shade
50:50 Waagh Flesh:Straken Green layer
Straken Green layer
50:50 Straken Green:Nurgling Green highlight
Nurgling Green fine highlight
Leather Armour
Mournfang Brown base coat
Agrax Earthshade shade
Skrag Brown highlight
50:50 Skrag Brown:Trollslayer Orange fine highlight
Stitching
Abaddon Black base coat
Eshin Grey highlight
Hoods & Cowls
Skavenblight Dinge base coat
Nuln Oil shade
Stormvermin Fur highlight
Karak Stone dot highlight
Wood, Wooden Tools & Corks
Dryad Bark base coat
Agrax Earthshade shade
Gorthor Brown highlight
Baneblade Brown fine highlight
Black Iron
Abaddon Black base coat
Nuln Oil shade
Ironbreaker edge highlight
Bronze Tools & Trinkets
Balthasar Gold base coat
Agrax Earthshade shade
Liberator Gold highlight
Runefang Steel fine highlight
Purple Shields & Troll Skin
Naggaroth Night base coat
Druchii Violet shade
50:50 Naggaroth Night:Xereus Purple layer
Xereus Purple layer
50:50 Xereus Purple:Genestealer Purple highlight
Genestealer Purple fine highlight
Yellow Eyes
Averland Sunset base coat
Agrax Earthshade shade
Yriel Yellow layer
Abaddon Black pupils
Teeth & Claws
Zandri Dust base coat
Seraphim Sepia shade
Ushabti Bone highlight
Screaming Skull fine highlight
Mossy Bone
Zandri Dust base coat
Athonian Camoshade shade
Karak Stone layer
50:50 Karak Stone:Ushabti Bone highlight
Ushabti Bone hightlight
Muddy Base
Rhinox Hide base coat
Stirland Mud layer
Agrax Earthshade Gloss shade
Gothor Brown drybrush
Karak Stone drybrush
Rushes & Cattails
Deepkin Flesh base coat on stem
Rhinox Hide base coat on flower head
Athonian Camoshade shade on stem
Agrax Earthshade shade on flower head
White Scar highlight on stem
Doombull Brown hightlight on flower head
Tuskgor Fur highlight on flower head
Ancient Ruins
Mechanicus Standard Grey base coat
Nuln Oil Shade
Dawnstone highlight
Administratum Grey fine highlight
LED Palette
As I’ve mentioned before, I like to limit my LED colour palette for new projects. This is to ensure they don’t look like multi-coloured Christmas decorations when the army is fully assembled on the tabletop. My Kruleboyz will use the following very limited LED colour palette:
Green for magic and potions.
Yellow for fire and flaming torches.
As mentioned above, I don’t expect to use a lot of LEDs for this project. They will probably be limited to character models and flaming torches in units.
Future Army Plans
I’m trying not to get too carried away with this project. My first goal will be to finish the rest of the Gutrippaz and the Killaboss that came in the starter set. After that, I may look at the Kruleboyz Vanguard box and aim for my first 1000 points. I don’t want to get too carried away though, as I still have Tyranids and my Flesh Eaters space marines on the go!
That’s all for today. Thanks very much for reading, and please remember you can also find me sharing my work on Instagram, Threads, Twitter/X, Bluesky and Mastodon.
Also, if you have time, please consider voting for me as ‘Best Mini Painter’ in the CRIT Awards! Voting closes on 7th July, so this is your last chance to vote if you intend to but haven’t done so yet.
Chris Buxey Paints 
