James Hobby Projects: Azyrite Township (Warcry Starter Terrain)

Here we go, it's the first blog post of 2021! And what better way to start off than by clearing one of the oldest projects in my backlog, the Azyrite Township from the Warcry starter set. I've been sitting on this terrain for over a year now, and it's been a consistent frustration to not have it painted. It's terrain after all! Not like I have to spend any serious amount of time on it. So, my first goal of 2021 was to crack out the brushes and put the finishing touches onto the set.

I'd already painted up a fair chunk of this in 2020 as it was something I wanted to get finished during the initial lockdown (ah, that feels like a lifetime ago now), but, as is typically the case with my smaller hobby projects, I got distracted very quickly and never finished everything off. Given I only had three pieces left to complete, the start of the year seemed like a perfect time to quickly reset from my last big undertaking and quickly knock some terrain out, and I'm happy I did so.

I always forget quite how satisfying dry brushing can be; the speed at which the models get painted and how easy it is to pick out details surprise me every time, and I'm always left feeling very satisfied after only a 30-minute painting session. It's definitely made me realise how easy the whole process of painting terrain can be, and I'm looking forward to cracking on with more pieces for AoS soon. 

In terms of the visual feel for the kits, I wanted to give the impression of a town that's been raided and left to slowly decay. I've used watered down Loren Forest on all the masonry to simulate some moss growth, while all the metal has been rusted using diluted Skrag Brown. The only pieces I wanted to look vaguely fresh were all the wooden barricades and stairs that the devotees of Chaos have made after moving in to claim what's left of the settlement. The design team have done a great job with this kit, and I love how consistent the visual themes are across pieces. The repeating patterns of lions heads and noble warriors in all of the masonry speak to a town very much devoted to the God-King Sigmar, something one of my favourite pieces, the broken head from a presumably giant statue, only helps to further reinforce. By contrast, all the pieces constructed by Chaos worshippers have a very cobbled-together feel. They're all crude wooden spikes nailed onto steps or lashed together around fallen pillars, and speak to the more depraved and warlike nature of the Chaos warbands. Of course, there's also the liberal application of skulls that helps with this narrative!

Overall, I've really enjoyed quickly slapping these terrain pieces together, and as such, I'm planning on adding a few more pieces to the collection. My current set will allow me to fill a 4ftx4ft battlefield amply with terrain, so I'd like to push that up to a full 6ftx4ft table. To do this, I've got a box of the Azyrite Shattered Plaza from Games Workshop which will provide me with another two two-tiered buildings for some larger area terrain and a few scatter pieces in the form of a fountain, treasure chest and some pieces of rubble. This will complete my terrain set nicely, and leave me with a visually interesting backdrop to play some games. I'm also planning on picking up a Souldrain Forest kit for some trees to add some variety to nothing but buildings, but that's for a later date once I've managed to get some games of Age of Sigmar in. 

So there we have it, 2021 has only just begun, but already my backdrop is shrinking. I'm glad to have a set of terrain complete, and I'm planning on painting up my army of Ossiarch Bonereapers this year to make use of it all. I'm hoping there are some big payoffs in the Broken Realms narrative to get me extra excited to paint more Age of Sigmar, and I'm looking forward to seeing GW deliver!

Until next time,

James