To bring more toys to play in the wood, here's how to build your own ghost of Redwood.
This is an easy job that just need a few pieces from your personnal bit-box.
First, a description: the name of 'ghost' is, of course, not used on its primary definition, as the ghost of Redwood isn't really a wandering spririt, nor a poltergeist. The ghost is in fact a kind of sentinel, left here ages ago. Various theories can be noticed on wether it's guarding against invaders from the sea, or defending the shore from terrestrial attack. From the sculptures to be found below the forest, in tunnels that connect with the sea, once can assumed the ghost had been created by the Ancients in their war against the old ones. Is it still standing guard, waiting for the return of its masters ? Has it be left on its own, forgotten ? Did it choose to stay here ?
Physical manifestations tend to happen in specific locations throughout the forest were no excavation or sytematic investigation could be conducted. Modern age technologies helped in getting a more accurate idea, as topogaphy can now be explored via satelites.
Physicaly, the creature has a clear modus operandi: a group of tentacles emerges from the ground, entangle its prey and take it into the ground, without leaving any clue of it: neither the gound, nor the close landscape seems to bear any sign of the attack. Now, just before it happens, it's been noted birds and animals in general do sense something and run away. To discover how to predict attacks is still a work to be done.
The very limited amounts of descriptions on its appearance make it difficult to understand the very nature of the ghost. Most testimonies come with descriptions of red tentacles, a squamous skin with an horrific noise, like wet rubber stretched then released. Its dominant colour is to be a dark red, that make it even more difficult to see in a forest of red trees. Some depictations come with mouthes (multiple) that seem to be dispatched on ground level, with sharp teeth placed in circle.
To build it (tem, in fact), I used 3 basic elements: a 30mm base, one of genestealer's pond, and a couple of tentacles (my favorite being
Tengu's):
second step is still easy: using smal metal rods; place the tentacles on top of some of the mouthes, then consolidate it with green stuff, in order to gently blend tentacles on the structure. Glue it on the base (that is optional, but gives a good render as you'll see later)
Trhird step is painting session: I adaptaded
Anatoli's technic, as it work brillantly on large miniatures. It consist in multiple sessions of drybushes and washes to apply a variety of colours and blend them. start with a black undercoat, then drybrush the ghost in
Mechrite red. Once completly dried, a first wash of
Ogryn flesh is made, then a second of
devlan mud.
A new drybrush is applied, made of flesh ton, and a third light one of
thrall flesh, only applied to the most proeminent parts. Furthers washes of
thraka green, and finaly
leviathan purple in the deepest parts of the body.
Teeth are painted in bleached bone, then white on their points, and a light enhancement of thrall flesh is brought to the veins on the main tentacles and on the smaller ones. A brillant vernish will make it more disguesting, making it moisty. Finally, the base is painted black (like in the song ....).
There you have an horrible pack of tentacles and jaws ready to tear investigators appart. Now, you wonder what the base is intended for ? Well, I realized it was perfectly fitting an invocation circle I had (guess it's from Reaper, but not sure), popping the crature up perfectly:
In term of play, I consider them as mutoïds, with extra specifications : they do not have the 'slow' disadvantage, then gain 'blocker', invulnerable(1) and '2 distorded tentacles' attack, for a rating of 45 first, then 40 for additionnal ones. The grater the menace, the more tentacle are to be spawned.
