For this month, our Army of the Month is Austin Carrigan’s breath taking Nightstalkers. Austin recently won best painted at the US Masters, and has a long trail of paint awards leading up to that with this army. So please, pull up a chair, and be prepared to drool over the pictures and details of this astounding army!
Austin said his miniature wargame story originated in ‘99, when he walked into a Hobbytown USA store. Art had always been an interest of his, following in his grandmother’s footsteps. Art was her full time trade, and it was primarily fantasy and portraits.
The fantasy realm took my interest, so when I stepped into Hobbytown store at 8 years old, I saw Warhammer fantasy and 40k; I was instantly drawn to the artwork on the boxed sets. Now that I look back, at the first few miniatures painted and purchased, I had no army consistency, my purchases were purely be sculpt-driven. I was terrible at painting at the time, and there was no Duncan telling people to thin paints, so eyes swallowed the faces of my miniatures, along with whites painted over black in a layer.
This was on and off again side hobby, until 5 years ago, when I got serious into painting again. After the End Times for Warhammer Fantasy, I got rid of most of my armies thinking I was done with the hobby. Then in May of 2017, I joined the Kings of War Fanatics page out of curiosity.
Todd Perkins and Tim Smith reached out to me, and said there was a tournament they were hosting, that same weekend, and asked for me to come. I didn’t have an army at the time, as I sold majority of my stuff, so Todd said he’d let me borrow an army, and show me the rules. Friday night before the tournament (TNT), Tim walked me through a game, with Todd’s all Lycan Herd army .
I didn’t quite understand the rules after a single play through, but there was something magical about the friendliness of the game and sportsmanship, so I decided to play that weekend. I bombed that GT, hard, but had wonderful games, and had some opponents; including Charlie Ryan, show me some tips, even in a tournament scene. I found this was absolutely mind-blowing, I didn’t see any win at all costs mentality come out.
After looking over the armies, I instantly gravitated toward Nightstalkers. I didn’t know the specific units that made them good, but I loved the horror and nightmare aspect, and wanted to run with the tribute my love for horror.
Once TNT 2017 was over, I immediately started on the Nightstalkers. I wanted to get a playable army on the table quickly, and was familiar with the GW line, so I refilled my GW Vampire Counts, primarily with some Dark Eldar 40k kit bashing, as the initial 1.0 Nightstalker army. After I got the playable army deployed, I wanted to work on models that caught my eye. This led to Nightstalkers 2.0 composed primarily of Mierce Miniatures, and used for most of 2018.
The army project evolved continually up through the 2018 Masters in San Antonio, where I finally was able to call it finished. I always replaced units, or added different models, so that I never had the exact same presentation from event to event. I have our wonderful community to thank for keeping me motivated, and inspiring me to constantly improve.
The biggest challenge was the CMON Dragon, representing the Terror in the army. It seems like a lot of larger sculpts need attention, to green stuff gaps, ect. and this was no exception. From an assembling perspective, it needed reinforced brass rods through the wings, as I was confident without help, it would break, given the awkward height, especially if someone cut the table corner and clipped its wing. The tower and body needed a ton of green stuff, and assembling it was about as difficult as finding the sculpt. I enjoyed the process, as it made a fun conversation piece in tournaments, and made the battles feel epic, as units slammed against the base. (Not to mention is became a bit of a internet meme-Editor)
MVPs for the army have to be the Dreadfiends. They seemed to be the piece I was missing the first half of the season, and were the critical turning point to finding success on the battlefield. For the points, they are an extreme nuisance, and Joey Greek definitely helped encouraged me in trying a triple Dreadfiend build.
Austin advises generals hoping to create beautiful armies not worry about what army is currently winning GT’s, instead, find an army you enjoy and build what inspires you.
A big shout out of thanks to Austin for taking the time to talk with us here at Dash28, and for sharing pictures of his lovely army. If you know someone you think should be featured in the Army of the Month, comment on the article to help us get in contact with them. Until next month, keep hobbying and keep improving!
