Kustom Bossrokk

Filed Under: Hobby

Tagged: Warhammer, Age of Sigmar, Orruk Warclans, Terrain

Every Christmas season in the Rollmodels community we have a Secret Santa, and this year my santee was my good friend Rich. I had no ideas for what to give him until late November, when all of a sudden I connected three things:

1. That Rich is an Orruk Warclans enjoyer.
2. That the preview for the upcoming (now released) Orruk Warclans update included a terrain piece. (Since then the terrain piece has been released.)¹
3. That I like to scratch-build terrain and wanted more practice.

The synthesis of these 3 facts was obvious: I should build my own take on the new Orruk Warclans terrain piece and gift it to Rich!

Going into this project I had no idea how to begin building this thing, so I asked various folks for suggestions and settled on a mixture of DAS clay, XPS foam and balsa wood. I began by cutting three lengths of balsa wood, one long enough to poke out the top of the tower’s head and the other two short enough to support it. I then used a hobby knife to shave the wood, creating an impression that these were trees that had their bark removed by orruk axes. These became the tower’s poles.

I began by creating a big ball of tin foil around the long pole, near its top. I stabbed the other two into the ball, then wrapped the whole thing in DAS clay. I stuck the whole thing to its base using hot glue and covered the joins in more DAS clay.

I made two small balls of DAS clay and glued them to the front of the larger orb. These would be the tower’s eyes. Then I started cutting up little bits of foam and building up the face with them, hot gluing them to the clay ball and to each other. This process took a while and was very improvisational.

Once I’d built up most of the head I began building the platform out of struts and planks of balsa wood. I also added some struts beneath the head.

As I went I made sure to make sure ol’ bossy here would fit:

I continued building up the head by adding more chunks of foam, adding texture to these by pressing into them with a rolled up bit of foil. I then filled in gaps with yet more DAS clay. I added some foam teef to the front of the platform – I imagine these being made from beaten metal, like Ironjaw armour – and a ladder I’d made earlier out of bits of sprue. I also had a partly-successful go at making ropes out of greenstuff:

I think the paint job will have to do some heavy lifting here…

Finally, I gave the whole thing a coat of Mod Podge mixed with black paint – my universal way of priming terrain. It’s tough as hell.

Before sending it off, I made a little note to go with the gift. When Rich paints up his Kustom Bossrokk I shall share his photos here.