Wargames Factory Zombie Vixens

Wow, that took a while.  Twenty days later, I'm finally able to post the finished results for my Wargames Factory Zombie Vixens. I didn't even build the whole box! Well, I've been busy with other things and my recent binge-watching of Sons of Anarchy on Netflix has contributed to dereliction at the painting table. There's only so much time each night for leisure activities.

While calling them vixens is a bit of a stretch, here's the mob of undead gals. Click for a larger picture.

 The box gives a lot of different options and is quite an improvement over the Zombie Horde box, which is male zombies only. Here you have head options, two arm options, and accessories. Why zombie women need so many handbags is beyond me. I added one, just for laughs. Maybe she died holding it and never let go.  Anyway, my only complaint is the models don't have any good join points, which means those spindly arms fall off and the necks don't align with the torsos.  I had to constantly repair while painting, since some arms have only the barest of contact surface with the torso.  Still, overall I'm satisfied with these additions.

Here's my zombie horde with both men and women, forty models strong right now.

You can see that the female boxed set provided bases, but the male set did not. That was unfortunate, as I had matching bases but didn't realize it until too late. So their bases and corresponding heights are mismatched. Not a big deal, since most of my collection don't match bases. My fantasy stuff has both square and round bases, so I shouldn't really care about this minor difference with my zombies.

This is a nice start to a zombie apocalypse theme. I will need more survivors, and I have the boxed sets of survivor men and women from Wargames Factory. However, for now I think I'll paint and use the survivors from the Zombicide game. They'll get double duty that way.  Also, they will be done faster and give me a chance to do something else!

In the meantime, let the zombie madness begin!

Zombie Chow!

What good is a zombie horde without a bunch of hapless victims? I asked the same question, and my answer was "not much good at all."  Therefore, I broke open the piggy bank and sent some cash to Reaper Miniatures. They sent back some blisters full of modern figures suitable for zombie gaming.

Here's the batch, representing "citizens", criminals, and police.  These are all Reaper Chronoscope line models. Click for a larger view.

I'll work down the rows to explain what I've got. First row is a single blister of Townsfolk: Ladies of the Night. Reaper has several of these townsfolk blisters, which are a good value for the price. These girls will fit with an urban area, and can be used in other modern scenarios other than zombies. I guess if I ever find a good prostitution game these figures will be handy.

Next row is Townsfolk: Jock, Chick, Nerd. I bet you can tell who's who. Again, this is a single blister and is a good value. They represent the classic triumvirate of teen slasher movies. I will have to buy Reaper's serial killer model just to go with these kids.

My favorite of the bunch are the bikers. These had to be purchased individually.  You have Noel the biker boss in his duster and shotgun, Peaches the old lady, and Stubs the Biker. I made sure Stubs was a full patched member of his club. From the rockers on his back, you can tell he's with the Cthulhu Riders of R'yleh.

Lastly we have some law enforcement. With all these prostitutes and bikers running around, you need some police. One officer is a Bones model, which you can tell from the non-matching base. The other is a Chronoscope sheriff. The girl is actually a "Sci-fi Heroine" but I figure she can be a professional zombie hunter. Seems to fit.

There you have it. I'll be adding way more to my modern zombie collection. I'm currently working on female zombies, then I've got hordes of modern "armed civilians" to complete. This has turned out to be a seriously involved project, but I'm enjoying it.

Wargames Factory Zombie Horde

Is it strange that I keep hearing "The Monkees" theme song whenever I look at my newly created zombie horde? Substituting "zombies" for "Monkees" in they lyrics really works. You should try it some time. Or not. Anyway....

Behold the start of the zombie apocalypse at my house! Here are twenty male zombies from Wargames Factory. Click for a bigger picture.

I've grown tired of my standard rotation of WW2 and Fantasy models, and decided it was time to do something modern. Zombies fit the bill. I'll be filling in this startling gap in my collection by creating a small horde of about 40 zombies. Then I'll move on to survivors, police, criminals, and plain ol' innocent bystanders. When done, I'll have the foundations of a modern zombie game that I can then expand as I want.

These Wargames Factory models really allow for lots of variation. According to their website, you can make 1,800 unique combinations out of one box. That's pretty cool, though I think the variations are fairly minor and you are stuck with some obvious repetition, like the doctor / raincoat guy and the guy holding a severed foot.  Still, it's a remarkable value even at full retail cost (which you can get cheaper if you look around online).

Here are just a few detailed shots of some of the zombies. Due to their pale flesh, I overexposed the pictures slightly. Still, you get the idea.

I went a little crazy with the GW blood effects paint. Also, I went heavy with brown washes to make them appear dirty and rotting. I think zombies benefit from a rough paint job. Overall, I'm pleased with the detail of the models, though some of it was very shallow and therefore obliterated beneath primer and paint. Take a lighter hand than I do and you should be fine.

My only complaint with these models is they are small compared to my other 28mm figures.  I guess I can excuse this as maybe being dead means they've lost some mass. I was hoping to mix these with other models, but I fear they might not mix too well when it comes to size.

Of course, having only zombie men is unrealistic (which is a weird thing to say when we're talking about the living dead). I also got the box of female zombies. I wince at calling them Vixens, as what could possibly be attractive in a pile of rotting, wounded flesh? Still, I will populate my horde with both genders for equal opportunities at undeath.

I didn't do the whole contents of the box (20 out of 30 models) just to save time. The models need assembly and each one is an individual model for painting purposes. No uniforms to make batch painting speed up things. Once all is done, if I need more zombies I'll finish out the boxes.

So up next will be some survivors and citizens, along with cops and bad guys to add some variety to my games.  These are from the Reaper Chronoscope line, and are a little bit bigger than these models. Still, I think they can match up. I'll have a comparison next time.