Though appearing to be Daughters of Khaine at first glance, closer inspection reveals the Knives of the Crone to be fanatical believers in the creed of the prophetic goddess Morai-Heg. Living only to serve fate’s will, this cadre of killers is led by Kaerna Vix, a powerful haruspex who gleans the desires of her patron deity from the viscera of slain foes.
None, save perhaps the Croneseer Krethusa truly knows why the Knives of the Crone are abroad in the underworlds of the Mortal Realms, though speculation has been abound since they were first sighted in the tunnels of Embergard. Perhaps they seek more artefacts which once belonged to Morai-Heg, or maybe the location of the stricken Lord-Arcanum Brena Vennerdreizh who's testimony might help to tear down the veil of deception which Morathi-Khaine cast around her apotheosis, or perhaps they are simply scouting for the material resources with which their master might wage more open war against the followers of the pretender.
Whatever the case, with agents of Morathi-Khaine remaining in relentless pursuit despite the Croneseer's considerable powers of prophecy, a bloody reckoning between the two matriarchs seems to be all but unavoidable.
Purporting to be of the 'Mastery' archetype (but leaning towards 'Strike' I think) the Knives of the Crone are a four fighter warband. They are led by Kaerna Vix who is accompanied into battle by her lieutenant Tazari as well as the 'Wings of the Crone' Krieta, who descends mercilessly upon those that draw her master's ire, and 'The Hag's Eye' Azphel, who's crossbow ensures that even distance will prove little defence from these Aelves.I quite liked the look of the warband when they were first released, as it was great to see more followers of the Crone God Morai-Heg emerging into the Mortal Realms. After all the deception, manipulation manipulation and outright murder it seems Morathi-Khaine's chickens crows might be coming home to roost and it will be interesting to see what this means for the Daughters of Khaine going forwards. What really got me inspired to get some paint on the Knives of the Crone though was reading Spent Glory's review of the newly released Raging Slayers rivals deck.
The 'mastery' element of playing the Knives of the Crone seems to stem from being able to successfully use the advantages that their warscroll confers through prophecy rolls, which are deliciously thematic and revolve around fighters making successful attacks. Of course, for fighters to be making successful attacks, the warband needs to start swinging at the foe as soon as possible and the Raging Slayers rivals deck looks like it will support this really nicely. Not only will it make charging fighters more accurate (and more accuracy means more successful attacks) but the natural agility and built in defense buffs of the Knives of the Crone should mitigate the impact of the stagger tokens imparted by the Poor Footing condition of the Raging Slayers deck. In short, it seems like a match made in, if not heaven then a nicer bit of the hellish tunnels of Embergard. I know that playing games using Nemesis format could let me improve things further, but as I may have said before, I quite enjoy the challenge of a restricted toolbox that Rivals presents players with.
Because my copy of Raging Slayers only arrived last weekend, I've not had the chance to play any games with it yet, but I did take the KotC for a run out last Tuesday evening and they performed pretty well for a first outing. Paired with the Blazing Assault deck they came in only 1 glory behind The Emberwatch and Pillage and Plunder. I was a little too cautious with the KotC in the first round of the game, which meant that I struggled to get them inspired and causing mayhem. That said, the whole warband survived the game though, with Foretold Protection providing a significant amount of damage mitigation so I've a better idea of their capabilities at least. Right, that's quite enough pontificating - on to the painting!
After priming the minis with Humbrol Spray Primer #1, I got stuck into painting their bases. Although the boxart has them on bone coloured rock, I fancied something different and ended up drawing inspiration from the mouldering stone of the studio version of Ushoran's base. I started out by giving the rocks a basecoat of Karak Stone - this took a few thinned layers to get good coverage as it's such a light colour. With a nice smooth basecoat in place, I used glazes of Gorthor Brown, Rhinox Hide and Khorne Red to paint all of the Karak Stone areas until I was happy with how they were looking. Once everything had thoroughly dried, I painted the roots growing across Krieta and Azphel's bases with Steel Legion Drab before a quick drybrush of Karak Stone helped to 'key' some initial highlights which were then refined with thinned Karak Stone and pin highlights of Rakarth Flesh. To finish off the roots I gave them them a quick glaze of Seraphim Sepia, followed by a little Athonian Camo in a few places.
The mud around the stone was painted with Skavenblight Dinge and then given some rough stippled layers of Stormvermin Fur and a shade of Eshin Grey. The Eshin Grey was washed around the lower areas of the rocks to help blend them into the ground around them. The bones and skulls were painted with my stock bone recipe (Morghast Bone, Seraphim Sepia, Morghast Bone, Ushabti Bone, Screaming Skull) before I added a few tiny beige tufts from Gamers Grass to finish the bases off.
Kaerna Vix
Tazari
Krieta, "Wings of the Crone"
Azphel, "The Hag's Eye"
The burgundy leather garb that each fighter wears was basecoated with Barak-Nar Burgundy before being shaded down with Nuln Oil. After this, I picked out all of the edges and folds with a chunky highlight of Screamer Pink which I refined with a finer highlight of Pink Horror. To finish off, I used Cadian Fleshtone to add some pin highlights to the sharpest points and folds of the leather.
Although they take slightly different forms across each model, each of them has some form of cloak or cloth, or in Krieta's case wings and these were all painted with the same colours. Starting from a basecoat of Abaddon Black I began by picking out all of the folds and edges of the fabric with a chunky highlight of thinned down Naggaroth Night. Once I was happy with this I followed up with a more precise highlight of Xerus Purple before using Dechala Lilac as a final highlight.
To get the dappled texture on the upper surfaces of Krieta's wings I stippled them with each purple shade rather than highlighting them before giving the edges a highlight of Skavenblight Dinge that was refined a little with Stormvermin Fur.
The burnished gold armour and fittings across each model were basecoated with Retributor Armour and shaded with Seraphim Sepia. This wasn't quite working, so I decided to add some Druchii Violet to the recesses to enrich things a little. From there, I layered the gold up with Liberator Gold and then used Stormhost Silver to pick out the edges and sharp points.
With the exception of Azphel, each fighter has feathers incorporated into their outfit in some way. I wanted to try and create the impression of iridescent blue on them to suggest that they are raven feathers as the Age of Sigmar narrative established that they are emblematic of Morai-Heg. From an Abaddon Black basecoat, I started out by roughly layering each feather
with Dark Reaper before making a more refined pass with Thunderhawk Blue. A final highlight of Fenrisian Grey was used to define the sharpest edges, providing a nice sheen. With each of these layers of colour, I tried to keep my brushstrokes oriented at an outwards angle away from the rachis of each feather, so that the texture would look more natural. This was quite labourious as each feather was painted four times, but while I could have gone much faster by drybrushing it simply wouldn't have resulted in the texture I wanted across the vanes of the feathers and I think the results were worth the extra time.
And there we have it - the Knives of the Crone all painted up and ready to shed some blood in search of glory in the Underworlds. They were great fun to work on and I'm looking forward to getting in some more games with them and seeing if I can get the hang of their prophetic powers.
At the same time, I'm also very excited for the recently announced Spitewood expansion which I expect will hit shelves next month and while I'm intrigued to find out more about the Helsmiths of Hashut warband The Blood of the Bull, I think Kurnoth's Heralds edge ahead of them slightly as I've very fond memories of gaming with Skaeth's Wild Hunt before the pandemic.
I'm sure I'll find something else to get on the painting desk between now and Spitewood though, but in the mean time, as always, thanks for reading and happy hobbying!
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