The Quick and the Undead!

With the end of the month fast approaching, Zomtober hasn't proved quite as prolific as I had hoped.  That said, I felt that I probably had enough revenants to tackle the second solo scenario of The Silver Bayonet, having already completed my unfortunate French artillerymen and, of course, Napoleon Blownapart's revolting revolutionaries.  I was of a mind to leave matters there, but whilst rummaging through the 'Trays of Trepidation', that peculiar holding area where prepared and occasionally primed miniatures languish in a sort of plastic purgatory, I came across a selection of Zombicide: Black Plague Walkers and NPCs, or Notorious Plagued Characters.*

Now, Zombicide was something of a guilty pleasure of mine back in the day and is largely responsible for introducing me to the term FOMO, or Fear Of Missing Out!  Whenever a new Zombicide Kickstarter campaign was launched, I would steadfastly refuse to become involved; I clearly had more than enough miniatures already, thank you very much.  Unfortunately, as the campaign progressed, my resolve would invariably weaken.  The dreaded plastic crack would take hold of my senses, loosen my wallet and, before I knew it, I had pledged at a considerably higher level than originally intended or could afford.  The initial euphoria was inevitably followed by a creeping sense of dread as I contemplated the arrival of yet another enormous box of plastic zombies upon the threshold of Awdry Towers.  Would I manage to smuggle it inside before the Saintly Mrs. Awdry noticed?  More importantly, where on earth was I going to put it?

Now don't get me wrong, Zombicide is a fabulous cooperative game, and we have spent many a happy hour laughing, shouting and occasionally screaming at the improbability of escaping the ravenous hordes. Whether battling through the nameless streets of a post-apocalyptic city, the medieval world of Black Plague, or even the Wild West, there is something wonderfully entertaining about the whole business.  As the years passed, however, I began to recognise the telltale signs of my incurable affliction and managed to resist some of the later offerings, including Marvel Zombies.  Quite how I subsequently found myself in possession of the rather silly expansion that saw Monty Python's most memorable Flying Circus characters arrive on the doorstep remains something of a mystery; nobody expected that!

 I digress.  As I began painting these long forgotten plastic penitents, I was struck by a nagging sense of familiarity, had I not travelled down this particular road before?  A little rummaging amongst the accumulated detritus of previous hobby endeavours unearthed four similarly afflicted individuals and, rather more surprisingly, an unfinished blog post dating all the way back to 2018!  Good grief!  It would appear that these particular zombies had been awaiting resurrection for rather longer than I had imagined.  According to my abandoned notes, I had been experimenting with Army Painter Quickshade, a process that involves block painting the miniatures before applying a generous coating of a rather alarming, treacle like substance.  Once dry, the Quickshade settles into the recesses, providing definition and a hard, glossy protective finish; I remember finding the whole business distinctly unnerving.  Having spent time carefully applying the base colours, the prospect of covering everything in brown goo seemed somewhat counterintuitive and I was far from convinced that I wasn't about to ruin the lot.  As it happened, the results were surprisingly pleasing, with a little additional highlighting, a coat of matt varnish and a slathering of gore I had transformed the original four into a perfectly respectable collection of thoroughly disreputable corpses.

Encouraged by this rediscovery, I decided to repeat the process with the latest arrivals.  Remarkably, the original pot of Quickshade was still serviceable, which seemed entirely appropriate for a project devoted to things that stubbornly refuse to die.  With the painting complete, I rebased the original quartet to match the new recruits and the rest of this month's undead offerings, bringing the whole sorry collection together at last.  The Zombicide miniatures are relatively lightweight plastic affairs and the detail is perhaps not as pronounced as on some of the more recent figures I have been painting.  Nevertheless, there is plenty of character in the sculpts, and they lend themselves particularly well to this rather speedy approach.  It certainly isn't my usual method of painting, but I have to confess that there is something rather satisfying about getting a group of miniatures finished without becoming overly concerned about every last detail.

And so, another handful of unfortunate souls have escaped the Trays of Trepidation and joined the growing ranks of the undead.  I still have one more Zomtober offering in the pipeline, although I fear that October may well have departed before I manage to finish it.  Still, perhaps that is of no great concern, after all, these particular miniatures have already waited eight years for their moment in the spotlight, I rather doubt that another week or two will make much difference!

*For those unfamiliar with Zombicide, the Notorious Plagued Characters, or NPCs, were special ‘Walker’ class zombies represented by unique and distinctive sculpts.  Collecting five different NPCs during a game allowed players to exchange them for a powerful Vault Weapon, providing an additional incentive to dispatch these particularly unsavoury individuals, which almost always meant taking unnecessary additional risks.