Get your brushes and clippers, and welcome to the Space Dinosaur Hobby Table, where I cover what I finished painting or building recently for Age of Sigmar, as well as my thoughts on the sculpts, how easy they are to paint, and any tips or tricks I can pass on to make your life easier. Today's post will cover Demigryph Knights from the Cities of Sigmar range.
After the Steam Tank from last week, the Cities of Sigmar push continues with a unit of 3 Demigryph Knights, all armed with cavalry halberds. These are elite, monstrous cavalry, each sitting atop a 30x75 mm base. They are painted to match the rest of my Heldemarch army, although I toned the yellow down a spot, from Flash Gitz Yellow (GW) to Averland Sunset (GW). This gives the models a more subdued look to them, which I hope will contrast from the less noble members of the army.
The kit comes with various options, and the arms, heads, shields, etc of the riders are all interchangeable. I used this to conglomerate all of the skull paraphernalia into one model, whom I've dubbed the "skull knight" and is my favorite of the trio. The banner bearer is slightly converted, as the flag is only available on a spear, and I wanted them to all match with halberds.
Painting the Demigryphs themselves was a breeze, just a basecoat of a light tan color for the fur, followed by a wash, then a deeper brown color for the feathers drybrushed with bright red. The armor is where most of my time was spent, and there are still details I skipped so as not to spend an eternity stuck on these models.
I started by basecoating with black then picking out all of the gold details, then going back with black to correct any mistakes, then back with gold etc. A final wash with a red tone on the gold gave me the hue I was looking for. Finally, I picked out the trim with silver. You want a nice, fine tipped brush for all of this, otherwise you will have a bad time.
The riders got a similar treatment, starting with a black basecoat. A light, and I mean light drybrush of dark grey on the black will help bring back some details, but don't over do it. Pick some of the details out with gold and wash with red tone. The yellow on the shield and sleeves are the aforementioned Averland Sunset (GW). For a final spot color, I painted the reigns in a rich blue, which contrasts nicely and gives the model some visual interest. Then base the model to match the rest of your army.
Once all of that painting is done, you can admire your handiwork. For models that are from 8th Edition Warhammer Fantasy, they're not too shabby. I will say they are starting to show their age compared to some more modern Age of Sigmar monstrous cavalry, like Stormcast Eternals Vanguard Palladors, but they held up a lot better than the Freeguild Guard kit. They definitely lack the dynamic poses we're used to seeing nowadays though. I do think that it's a cool idea though, and executed well for the limitations of the time.
From here on out in my Hobby Table Posts, I will provide a score of the model, in two parts. Firstly, the sculpt itself will be scored on a scale of 0 to 10, with 5 being average, 0 horrendous, and 10 a marvel. For a reference point, I consider the Stormcast Liberator to be a 5, neither great nor bad. Just a passable, average model. Then I will score on Ease of Painting, between 1 and 5, 1 being a slog to paint and 5 being a breeze.
My final assessment of this kit stands thus:
Sculpts: 7/10
Ease of Painting: 2/5
Final tips: Seriously, a finely tipped brush is a big necessity here.
-The Space Dinosaur
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