Kniggit Goblins!

Started working again on my Kniggit Goblins again.

For lack of a better name, I came up with the name from Monty Python and the Holy Grail.  I love the idea of a big Night Goblin and Squig cavalry unit, but I was disappointed in both the lack of a squig heavy cav unit and/or the Squig Hopper rules.  Thus, I came up with the idea of a unit of Giant Squig riders.  However, buying a bunch of Games Workshop's giant squigs would run me around 300 dollars.  I don't have 300 dollars to spend on this unit, so I did some Googling.  I found some squig-like models on a UK website that were 3 models for 9 pounds (approximately 15 dollars)).  This was a much better deal and I could just convert them to have Night Goblin riders.

The squig bodies are made by Scotia Grendel.  These are available HERE at this website.  Just a word of caution if you're buying them, though.  The models are good but the casts were really sloppy.  The models are resin and there were globs of extra resin all over them.  I used a drill with a dremel tool grinding bit at first and accidentally melted one models face half off.  This was a bad idea.  Whoops.

My girlfriend had a dremel-like tool that's normally used for grinding a dog's toenails down.  I used a finer dremel bit this time and it worked really well.  I managed to get all the flashing and globs off, but I'm going to have to resculpt parts like toenails, belts, and musculature on the models.  All in all, I waited a long time for these models and was disappointed in the quality.  But...they're squigs!  I am using them as a Troll unit.

Trolls Versus Squig Herds

So far, I have not been excited about the Trolls.  People on the internet talk about how great they are, but I can't see how they're that much better than the Squig Herd unit.  They don't have animosity, but the leadership 4 means they have to sit right next to the general.  At the last tournament I went to, I used them and they seem really situational.  Go up against a unit with the fire banner or flaming shots/magic?  Dead trolls.  Going up against a unit that's good in combat or strikes first?  Dead trolls.  The low initiative, low weapon skill, and low leadership means that the trolls have to win and win big in combats.  The squigs at least have a higher weapon skill and initiative.  Toughness 3 and no regen, but still nearly just as good.

It could be that I play against opponents every week who take the flaming banner and flaming magic attacks, but they just die before they do anything.  The big advantages I see for trolls are the faster movement, the ability to kill 1+ save monstrous cav units, and the ability to sit and front of my character bunker and not squabble.  I put squigs in front of my bunker at the tournament and I squabbled at least once every game with them.

Now I just need to make some kind of unit filler for them.