Hive Settlement "H.BLOC-47B" (Terrain)

"Kekar, East, Yana hold and not a sound", directed Inquistor in hushed tones over the vox. "Any moment now...".

Finally, after what seemed an eternity of dead-ends and false leads, Tylo Haariginer, Imperial Inquisitor, had traced the rot to H.BLOC-47B. Standing as it was, isolated in the slag dunes surrounding the lower levels of Necromunda's hive shell, the habitation block served as the base for The Enlightened Fire Cult - one of the many heretical Cults that merely added to the shell's danger.

Typically, cleansing of such Cults was the work of the Adeptus Arbites; however, the spread of The Enlightened Fire Cult's influence was notable for its speed and - even by Necromunda's standards - extreme brutality. Some other factor was at play and that drew the attention of the Imperial Inquisition.

Guttural shouts accompanied the tramp feet as the Cultists streamed from the settlement's heavily armoured door. Tylo's vox clicked in code: SIX.SET.CONFIRM??? Kroot mercenaries were in position to eliminate the lookout AND there were another five hostiles.

"What I would do for Bell's help right now," lamented Tylo. "Wytch he might be, but if we just knew what's inside that Throne forsaken building, I'd be a lot more comfortable."

Steeling himself with a quick prayer to the Saint, he activated his Powerglove and announced over the Teams' channel.

"This could get rougher than a grox's tongue, so look sharp. On my mark I want this building breached and whatever's inside cast back to whichever warp pit it called home. Three. Two. One..."




Earlier this year I entered the Necromunda Terrain Makers Facebook Group's Terrain building competition.  Alas, I did not win (given some of the competition, that came as no surprise), but I did have fun and now have my own Yakult terrain set.  The 2019 Second Quarter Terrain Competition theme is Hive Settlement:

Hive Settlements dot the underhive. From scrap-shanties to hab blocks. They are peopled by the brave, the foolish and the desperate. Gaining control of one of these settlements will grant the controlling gang access to a ready supply of fresh meat for the grinder that is combat in the underhive! Let's see what your imagination can conjure up, what kind of settlement will you build?

While I had and still have a few things in mind, one thing that I wasn't about to compromise on was a modular build.  Whatever I came up with needed to be able to largely sit flush with my other creations and be of comparable height and colours.  I think my style is a tad on the Cyber Punk side of Grim Dark (Grim Punk? Cyber Dark?), but having grown up with Sigue Sigue Sputnik on non-stop rotation for God knows how many years is sure to have some side effects!  Once I had secured my foundation piece - an old modem/router that was 7"x6"x (about) 3" in size - things move along at a cracking pace.

With all construction complete and greebles added, I hit the whole thing with some good old-fashioned rattle cans - first black and then a dusting of white.  When it came to the actual painting I used my standard recipe of Aldi airbrush blue, red and green.  I did some drybrushing with Leadbelcher and then Mithril Silver and mixed my own dirty wash using my paintbrush and airbrush wash jar + a bit of black Aldi paint, really watered down.  It took a few coats to get it right but I finally got there.

The above shot includes two of my favourite pieces of terrain.
Notice that I kept the new Settlement's colours consistent with the fan and walkway.

So what's next?  The interior.  With this competition's theme being a Hive Settlement, I'd like to try and create at least one interior with some rooms and cots, maybe a bathroom/kitchen-type area - there's plenty of inspiration locally to draw on such that I can convey the right grim-dark atmosphere 😬

PS I spent an hour or two giving the interior a try and came up with the following variable layout.  Of note is the use of masking tape which provides an interesting texture that the drybrushing picked out nicely.  Job done!

Below is a compilation of photos to give you an idea of how the build has progressed.

I started off with a router I found on
that someone had tossed out with their hard waste

Opening that bad-boy up yielded some great components.

Using some plastic L-shaped leftovers from my deck build (a real one), I glued
acrylic walls to the roof, recessed inside the roofline

Further walls were added providing a box-like internal frame.

The floor also received a slab of acrylic -it looks like that Banshee is ice-skating!

Now you get the idea: the walls lift and separate the foundations from the roof,
making for a decent far-future look.

That circuit board?  Fits nicely onto the rooftop.  I've used a lot of circuit boards as
 roofs in the past, so thematically it will fit with the rest of my table.

After the shell finished, it was greeble time!  A rummage through my bits box came up with lots of things including: piping and fan unit from my boy's rocket launch pad, some small circuits, a flat battery, a Bey Blade launcher, keyboard keys, the ubiquitous poker chip as a manhole and a piece of cutting board plastic with a raised grid pattern.

And now with some base coats...