Silver Bayonet

The leather coat over the French tunic came out well. Snakebite Leather Brown did the majority of the work, with some sepia wash here and there, some Zandri Dust around the edges and a touch of Nulin Oil.

The painted on collar on the neck has come out well. The vivandière was a nurse, a camp follower, traders, sometimes wives etc. I chose the bottle and the knife in her pose because in the game a vivandière has a hand weapon and the bottle represents water (because firing muskets dried out the mouth). I might suggest that this is holy water and something she could throw at creatures allergic to faith.

The bottles are painted Dark Angels Green Contrast. The trousers are Morghast Bone and Wraithbone highlight and the tunic is Ultramarine Blue Contrast and Mephiston Red.

The backstory

Monique Franckinioulle is a pro-French Walloon. Her husband was wounded under the eagles and she searched the battlefield for his body, only to find a pack of ghouls feasting on his barely cold corpse. She was found by a cavalry patrol drenched in the blood of several ghouls she had beaten to death with a broken musket. The troop arrested her and brought her back to camp. As Ghouls are feral humans, looking like any other human in death, to the young cavalry officer it looked like a deranged murder of civilians by a grief stricken camp follower. The word got out about the killing and her self-defense claim that they had tried to eat her. A Supernatural investigator and a French Officer halted proceedings and said that she would be tried in Paris, but she was released from her shackles as soon as they were out of earshot of the army. Since then she has been invaluable to the team.

The white cross belts and the Napoleon N on his pouch helps tie him to the era. I am confident that a fez was popular and he looks cool. The transfer on the book and the sword are from a 40K decals sheet.

The backstory

In 1799 Jean-Michel Dubreton was a young French private, abandoned by Napoleon after his failure to seize Acre from the British and local forces. Dubreton’s hero was his resolute General Jean-Baptiste Kléber who was left to fight on with no hope of success. When a peace was agreed with the locals and British (Sir Sydney Smith at least) Dubreton was deflated in defeat but had the sense to see that no good would come of fighting on. When Lord Keith of the British refused to honour the peace struck Dubreton marvelled at how Sir Sydney chose honour over patriotism and got a message, that Dubreton delivered himself, to Kléber warning him that the peace was no longer sealed.

Then the sudden assassination of Kléber started Dubreton on his Occultist path. The annals of history would rule the culprit to be an Arab student, but Dubreton knew that it had been a demon. He saw it happen with his own eyes, but no one would believe him. Assuming him traumatized and driven by grief to temporary madness they pursued their own flawed investigation.

Dubreton told some of the locals what he had seen and he found someone who believed him. An Occultist by the name of Nizam-i Pasha. Dubreton deserted his unit, set on a path of honour over patriotism, to see the supernatural killer of his General put to death. He did eventually see that quest to it’s bloody conclusion, but returning to the French army after his desertion seemed fool hardy at best. The things he had seen, the adventures he was having gave his life fresh meaning and he followed his mentor Pasha on a crusade against the occult.

Though he had a nagging dislike for Napoleon, after his betrayal of the army he left behind in the middle East, he felt that his nation needed him. After years of hunting Jinns  and demons and vampires in Egypt, Syria, Morocco and Spain, the French recruited him. His endeavours against the dark forces preceded him and had made him an obvious choice when looking for Occultists. The Silver Bayonet were on the French radar and the Huntsmen were acknowledged as a real threat. Both these elite British supernatural fighters and the mysterious huntsmen would need to be countered and Dubreton is willing to do his part.

Didn’t follow it to the letter but this GW YouTube video helped.

Used Rhinox Hide brown and Wyldwood Contrast and took the scruff spine and tail all the way to black.

Could have been tidier around the paws and been bolder with the blood spatter, but he’s turned out OK.

Thanks for all the likes and encouragement. I love the hobby, but I have found that photographing and sharing my work has become a much bigger part of it. Will keep plugging away and work towards a solo battle report. Probably February at my current pace. ?

I think the Jokaero Orange eyes and the blood spatter on the chest came out best. I did look at wolves on Google for inspiration, but realised that most horror film werewolves don’t lean into a wolf’s markings that heavily. I tried adding some sepia wash around the legs to reflect that many wolves have a tinge of brown on their coat somewhere.

This is a second attempt at this model, as my first attempt wasn’t finished and wasn’t going right. Rather than strip it and lose all the basing etc I just primed over and went from there. The base stone is Athonian Camoshade wash over the Halfords prime and Grey Seer highlights.