As you may notice, this article isn’t titled “Warhammer Underworlds”. As I missed the opportunity to buy The Exiled Dead as a warband I had to get them as an Age of Sigmar unit. Which meant that they didn’t come with the cards needed for Warhammer Underworlds and that the models themselves were in the default grey plastic rather than a specific colour.

Not that it mattered, I had no intention of using these in Warhammer Underworlds anyway but rather to add them to my horde of Deadwalkers. The fact that the warband’s leader, Deintalos, is a vampire is largely irrelevant. He’s a creepy necromancer and that’s all that matters. 

Regardless of my intentions for the warband I first needed to get them assembled. They came together fairly easily, I did my best to fill the gaps and make them look seamless but it’s still something I need to work on. As these models needed to fit in with the rest of the zombies who are on swamp/forest bases, I decided not to use the bases that come with the kit. Fortunately I had a whole bag of spare 25mm bases. Unfortunately I didn’t have a spare 28.5mm base the same size as Deintalos’ base so I had to settle for a 32mm. Not exactly game legal but I wasn’t planning to play any games of Age of Sigmar anytime soon. 

The only complication was Prentice Marcov, the one with the withered arm, who is clambering over a piece of scenery. Fortunately, I had some spare MDF disks from a paint rack I built a while ago that were conveniently the right height. I cut the disk in half and superglued it down to a base. I then mixed up some Milliput to blend the disk to the base, creating a small slope. It wasn’t perfect but I could further blend things during the basing stage with some texture paste. Speaking of, to give the disk the appearance of a fallen tombstone I thinned down some Vallejo Red Oxide texture paste with some water and spread it over the disk. Once it dried it gave the impression of rough stone. To attach the miniatures to their new bases I put a dot of white paint on the pegs and pressed them to the new bases leaving a small dot of paint. I then used my pin vice to drill holes through the dots and then I could slot the miniature into the new base and glue them in place. With all that done I then prime the models with Colour Forge Standard Grey. 

With that done I used Daler Rowney Burnt Umber and Sap Green acrylic inks, and Vallejo Game Ink to add shading to the zombies’ skin. For the most part I sprayed these from below to create shadows. I also used Daler Rowney Red Earth ink on Regulus armour, shield and weapon to give it an underlying colour of rust. As he is still amongst the living I needed to paint the skin on Deintalos with Two Thin Coats Dwarven Skin, I also put this on the big grafted-on arm that Coyl has. It’s supposed to be an Orruk arm but I had soft plans to incorporate these guys into my Kill Team campaign so I needed something more human looking. Lastly to tie everything together I gave each model a zenithal highlight with Liquitex Titanium White acrylic ink. This ended up covering up some of the preshading I had done earlier as Titanium White is an opaque ink. In hindsight I should have done the zenithal highlight before I shaded with the more transparent inks. 

With the preliminary work done I could make a start on the painting proper starting with all the zombie skin, for which I gave them a coat of Army Painter Speedpaint Malignant Green. The zenithal highlight and preshading from the previous step providing lots of variation in the resulting skin tones. From there I moved onto the scraps of clothing they’re wearing. I gathered the same paints that I had used for the Deadwalkers’ clothes and started picking out clothing almost at random. The paints that I used were: 

•  Army Painter Speedpaint Desolate Brown

• Army Painter Speedpaint Runic Grey

• Scale75 Instant Colour Arcane Purple

• Citadel Contrast Skeleton Horde

• Citadel Contrast Basilicanum Grey

• Citadel Contrast Snakebite Leather

• Citadel Contrast Cygor Brown

• Citadel Contrast Creed Camo

Next I moved onto the metallics, painting them with Army Painter Speedpaint Broadsword silver. As intended where I had shaded with Red Earth ink showed through as a rusty undertone. The only downside is that Broadsword Silver isn’t quite as “contrasty” as some other Speedpaints so I then gave these areas a wash with Army Painter Dark Tone followed by a light drybrush just on the armour and shield of Necron Compound. To further the rusty look I used Greenstuff World Dark, Medium and Light Rust Liquid Pigments to build up some rusty deposits in the recesses. The wiring that wraps around some of the metal spikes I painted with Balthasar Gold and a bit more variety I painted the balls on the end of the spikes with Warp Lightning. 

For the remaining areasI picked out any wood with Wyldwood and any leather with Gore-Grunta Fur. A few of them have rope belts so I painted them with Snakebite Leather. Any hair I painted with Black Templar. The tombstone on the bases I painted with Basilicanum Grey. Poor Bault has a nail in his exposed brain, the latter I painted with Army Painter Speedpaint Familiar Pink. For Deintalos big ol’ stitched together coat with Garaghak’s Sewer, the rich dark brown is great for bringing out the raised areas and stitched areas of the coat.

WIth all the main colours done I could move onto some finer details. For example I carefully painted a line of Army Painter Skeleton Bone over any exposed teeth. To both darken the open mouths and shade the teeth I gave them a coat of Army Painter Strong Tone. Speaking of darkening recesses, to give them a sunken and hollow appearance I dabbed a little bit of Scale75 Instant Colours Arcane Purple into the eye sockets. For Deintalos I instead used Reikland Fleshshade to provide some depth to the taut skin-mask that is their face. Similar to the armour I then did some quick highlights by drybrushing Pallid Wych Flesh on the zombie skin, mainly on the face and hands. To make the stitches on his coat stand out a little more I finished the models off by highlighting Deintalos’ coat with Army Painter Buffed Hide. 

With the models complete I could move onto the bases. To start with I covered the bases with Vallejo Thick Brown Mud texture paste, thinning it with water to blend the paste around the gravestones. Once the paste was dry I then washed the bases with Athonian Camoshade and then gave them a drybrush with Tyrant Skull. I made some toxic pools by painting on some thinned Caliban Green into some recesses on the bases and then dabbing on some Nurgle’s Rot technical paint leaving a small amount of Caliban Green visible around the edges. Next I thinned some PVA glue with water and spread it in patches on the bases, to which I then sprinkled on some Geek Gaming Scenics Base Ready Forest Floor. Once that was dry I repeated the process this time with some static grass. I painted the rims with a couple coats of Warboss Green, and then stuck down some Army Painter Meadow Floor and Low Shrubs tufts. 

And with that the zombie horde grows just a little more! They might lack the tree branches of the Deadwalkers but they should fit in just fine. I think in hindsight that Prentice Marcov isn’t supposed to be a zombie but whatever, he is now!