Malifaux Thunder

I have become enraptured by the idea of Malifaux. The world is fascinating, and then when I saw The Thunder faction, I was absolutely sold. The models are beautifully sculpted, and fascinating.

The bases are all slottabases, but the models don't have slots. This makes it basically necessary to do fanciness, and so of course I wanted to do them up properly.

The more 'refined' a model, the more refined the base. The Desperate Mercenary (sadly out of focus) is on a mix of rough stone and old planking. The first of the Oiran is delicately stepping off a wooden level on to a piece of stone in the midst of either random dirt, small stones, or an ungroomed zen garden.

The other two Oiran, essentially Geisha, are on a set of Tatami mats (right) and the other central on a thin wooden bridge (as a kind of: "to pass, you must defeat me" notion)

The three Torakage (peasant-looking ninja) are on, respectively, stonework with Japanese kanji inscribed, and two others on a typical road or sewer style base. There's a distinct line of thin sidewalk, and some 'road'.

Finally, the two characters from the starter box. First is Ototo, a big Oni-like character. I disliked how far off the base he sits, so I I modified the plough shape, pushed his mace off the base a bit, and added some tiles pushed up and out by the force. Misaki herself is on a base that's distinctly a zen garden, made from my thumbprint. To help with the whorl caps, I put small pieces of gravel as stones, and the single foot touching the ground rests upon one of these, as though she too is delicately attempting to avoid touching 'base ground'.

I'm now researching colours and proper patterns, so I can paint them up as beautifully as I can. I intend to use proper colour patterns, and markings. I am frustrated in this search by so much misinformation about ninja, and such insane detail and variety in Kimono pattern. I'm going to make Yamaziko and Misaki Orange (royal colours in Japan), the Torakage faded blues and greys (typical peasant garb), and something for the Oiran that looks appropriately Geisha. Ototo himself... I'm not certain. Yellow for divine? Red for blood and aggression? I'll figure it out perhaps when I see the rest.