Vastarian Weirdos

Warburton 40K Civilians, Mercenaries, Necro/Inquisi-Munda, Inq28, Vastarian, , , , , , , ,

I started painting these weirdos some time ago for the Between the Bolter and Me Vastarian Painting Challenge and in my usual style finished them around 18 months late.

Vastarian is a Necromunda (or Inquisitor 28mm, Inq28, perhaps) type setting. The lore is set out HERE on the Between the Bolter and Me blog. Vastarian is essentially a shrine world of the Imperium on a pilgrim route to Holy Terra. It is (or was) characterised by a large amount of beautiful and renowned architecture and also an unusual level of tolerance for various cults to develop their own version of the Imperial Creed. This went to chaos however when the Cicatrix Maledictum opened causing a psychic awakening in large parts of the population–many cults that had been benign or focused on scholarship and theology suddenly became bizarre and deranged under this baleful influence and madness began to reign unchecked.

The leader

What is unique about the setting from a 40K perspective is that Chaos is not involved, nor are genestealers or similar. The factions are warring servants of their Emperor all convinced that their bizarre form of worship is the correct one and that all others are dangerous heretics. The previous state of tolerance and harmony is gone.

The psykers – Rogue Trader models with Empire plastic arms

I decided to create a warband from figures I already had with the aesthetic of what Vastarian might have looked like if the setting had been created in circa 1998 with an old school Confrontation / Necromunda vibe. The warband lore is based on the Confrontation Psyker Gang archetype. My conception of them is that pre-Cicatrix Maledictum the cult was based on veneration of psykers as prophets of the Emperor rather than as something to be feared or destroyed. When the warp rift opened, due to the fact they had been dabbling in the occult already, they were more prepared than most for the disaster that came.

Caryatids

The figures are:
The leader is Privateer Godwin from Hasslefree Miniatures; a figure based on Jes Goodwin. I am not sure if this company is still in business though the sculptor, Kev White, is still going and I think is employed by Games Workshop now. A shame as Hasslefree made some absolutely stunning minis.
The caryatids are winged devil babies from Reaper Miniatures Familiar Pack IX.
The military advisor is the Trooper Leader with Handgun & Cigar from eM4 Miniatures Future Wars range.
The clerk is also from eM4 Miniatures, but from the legendary Spacelords range, being the Civilian Carrying Documents.

The psykers themselves are of course Rogue Trader models with modern plastic arms from the Empire hunters/scouts kit from the Warhammer Fantasy range.

Clerk wearing Pit Vipers
Military Advisor – the face was quite hard to paint!
Minor conversion, I swapped his regular pistol for a supersoaker sized 40K laspistol.
I tried to paint his cravat as blue with white polka dots, I think it works.

Overall, I am very happy with how these turned out. The only issue is if you look closely you will see varnish has bubbled in a few spots, annoying and I don’t know what caused it, but you cannot see it unless you look very closely. I may go back and cover that up with some dark paint at some stage (it has mostly appeared in crevices and areas that would normally be shaded) if it continues to annoy me. The eM4 Miniatures range is great – I am very tempted to get some more to paint! I highly recommend them though they are smaller than GW minis, and probably a lot smaller than what GW is currently putting out.

11 thoughts on “Vastarian Weirdos”

  2. Privateer godwin is a great fig. I tried to get him a number of years ago but the mold was worn out/damaged so it never really panned out.

    I was a bit confused as to how vastarian ‘worked’. Do you build a war band, play games and post up pictures and lore to add to the tapestry? And then there’s a group game at some point to wind it all up?

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    • Yeah basically you could have attended the event(s) if you lived close enough in the USA or you could participate by doing your own thing and reporting back to help build the lore. I don’t think the Vastarian project is over as such but the guys at Between the Bolter and Me have moved on to other projects. For me it was just an excuse to paint some cool figures I had that I didn’t really have any other plans for.

      Godwin is one of Hasslefree’s best figures; if their business hadn’t gone tits up then maybe they would have remastered the mould. I must have bought this guy more than ten years ago but only just got around to painting him!! I don’t have a spare unfortunately otherwise I would be happy to send it to you.

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      • That’s a very generous sentiment (about sending an extra mini). Thanks!

        I just went down a rabbit hole of reading about hasslefree recent history (and demise). I imaging increasingly tight margins, people having less disposable income, and the disruption by 3d printers is all sorts of ugliness for small (and larger) miniature companies.

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      • Indeed, I think in a small business like that when someone gets sick it can cause all sorts of chaos. It will be interesting to see what disruptions there are over the coming years, it’s hard to see terrain companies remaining viable in the face of 3d printing—why buy mdf terrain when you can buy far superior looking 3d printed buildings, usually much cheaper now?

        I hope miniatures companies remain viable though—the thought of having to source everything 3d printed is unappealing and most of the new miniatures I buy are still metal. I would hate the metal mini companies to become unviable. But with how much the technology keeps improving and how quickly things aren’t going to stay the same.

        And haha no worries just sad I don’t actually have a Godwin to send you!!

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