Showcase: Zoggrok Anvilsmasha, Klonk and Ardboy Big Boss

Sometimes you just need a change of pace. I haven’t painted Orruks since 2018 and Games Workshop kindly sent me some of the new Orruk models so I decided to paint them up, but what scheme? Well find out in this post!

I’ve recently been stuck in Shyish, the Realm of Death painting Soulblight Crimson Court and a lot of Flesh-eater Courts and it got me wondering; “What would an Orruk Warclan from Shyish look like?”

In my mind, Shyish is devoid of colour. It’s desaturated, dark and gloomy. I decided to use this approach to paint my Realm ov Deff Orruks. The skin is sickly pale and unnatural (more so than the usual unnatural green skin of Orruks). The armour is purple, but it’s faded and lacks any vibrancy. The metals are encrusted in filth, as if they’ve been buried with the dead and pulled out of the ground. I painted the dags (little tooth armour pieces) a cold white as a spot colour to break up the armour. The face mask was painted a dark blue. I think the desaturated look worked for everything apart from the tusks, they’re too creamy and warm and don’t fit with the scheme.

Zoggrok Anvilsmasha and his walking anvil Klonk is a new named character for the Orruk Warclans. Klonk is a great little Squig; he really reminds me of classic metal Squig models. I think it’s because his jaw is on the ground and his mouth isn’t an open cavity like the new plastic Squigs, he’s just a solid little lump. For his paint scheme, I wanted shades of purple and green to fit with Zoggrok, but not be the same. It’s kinda worked, but he’s more magenta and teal. His colours are one step along the colour wheel to Zoggrok’s colour, like someone moved a slider in photoshop. I think they work well together.

I thought I could batch paint Zoggrok and the Big Boss at the same time to get more painted before the Games Workshop pre-order date. It worked out pretty well, with me finishing these models the day before. Just enough time to photograph them and make a recipe card. There’s a lot more going on with these Orruks than I anticipated. When I first looked at them I thought, “oh this will be easy, it’s basically skin, armour and dry brushing armour” but I was wrong. Like most modern GW plastic kits, these are intrinsically layered sculpts, with wraps, tabards, chainmail, hanging ornaments and more before you even get to the armour. I had to keep going back over them as I’d missed a bit of rope or a piece wrap here and there and repaint it.

Overall, this was an enjoyable side project that only took a week. If the new Orruk range get Warcry rules, I’m pretty tempted to paint up some more models for a Warband. If you’ve been following my hobby the past few years, you’ll know this means I’m then going to paint a whole army of them. Gork help me! (or should that be Mork).