Blood Bowl – Mordheim Marauders Part 5

And now it is time for decals! I chose the white numbers from the Nurgle Rotters and grabbed my decal set from Vallejo to get started.

The paints / products that I use are:

• Vallejo Gloss Varnish
• Vallejo Matt Varnish
• Vallejo Decal Fix
• Vallejo Decal Medium

Of course you can use products by other companies like Micro Sol and Micro Fix, it is just that I had access to these and made good experiences so far. I'll go through the steps of application in this article, but you can find a video of how the appliance works on Youtube by Vallejo as well.

Shake all bottles well before using, and the first thing you want to do is apply a coat of Gloss Varnish to the area where you want to place the decal. The gloss varnish creates a smooth surface for the decal to grab onto. Once that settles / hardens, you add Decal Medium to the area (some people brush that on the decal itself) and it is used to soften the decal / transfer.

For the decals to part from the sheet, you put them for about 30 seconds in a flat container with water. I usually trim the decals as close to the print itself, so less area has to wrap around the surface and it is easier for the decal to blend with the surrounding area. You can use a brush to pick up the decal and place it on the area, and correct its orientation while it is still wet.

Once it is in place, dab of the liquid with a paper towel or larger brush and then you can apply Decal Fix. This is alcohol based and will further soften / settle the decal onto the surface. While this does happen, the decal is prone to damage, so ideally leave it as it is until the alcohol evaporates.

After this step, we have some very bright numbers on their shoulder pads and jerseys. So we need to tone things a bit done. Most likely you will have some parts of the area, where the decal medium and fix was applied, where the gloss coat still shines through. So at best add a thin coat of matt varnish over those areas. In addition I weathered the areas with stippling Soft Tone on them, as well as the light green tone (AP Green) to add some chipping to the numbers as well.

And after that settled I'm done and have this as a result.

I spread out the numbers as followed;

• 2 to 5, 7, 8, 10, 11 for the regular Beastmen
• 6 and 9 for the mutated Beastmen
• 12 for the mutated Chaos Warrior
• 13 for Lord Borak the Despoiler
• 14 to 16 for the Chaos Warriors
• 91 for Grashnak Blackhoof / Big Guy Minotaur

Lucky number 13 for the Chaos Star Player felt appropriate, as did the Big Bull's 91 as an hommage to Dennis Rodman (both wearing a nose ring). Next up names and team pictures.