The sacred host

A huge portion of the Warhammer hobby is modelling and painting an army. It's such a central part of the game that a typical tournament includes scores for an army's appearance. (There's a legitimate argument that the composition score -- which encompasses an army's appearance -- and the sportsmanship score exist to make up for an atrocious ruleset, but that's something we don't need to delve into right now.)

I've got several Warhammer Fantasy miniatures, including enough to field a small Lizardman army and the beginnings of a Demons of Chaos army. Both forces are eminently customizable and both fill a niche I don't normally indulge in gaming -- the "I did it because it was cool" style of play. While I plan on taking sensible, synergistic choices, my primary goal in this endeavor is to make awesome-looking armies. The power of the army will take a backseat to the cool factor of the models. (Fortunately, both the Lizardman and Demons of Chaos armies are short on lame and long on cool -- Games Workshop has produced some truly lovely plastic models!)

Because I have more lizardmen and because I can already field an army with what I have, I'm going to start my modeling and painting with them. My goals are this:
1) Model and paint a legal 1,000-point Lizardman army.
2) Model and paint a 1,000-point Tetto'Eko Lizardman army.
3) Model and paint a legal 2,250-point Lizardman army led by a Saurus Oldblood riding a carnosaur.
4) Model and paint a legal 2,250-point Lizardman army led by a Slann Mage-Priest.

A legal army is one that includes all Games Workshop models (i.e., no making your own). However, legal armies can include extensively converted models. Obviously, there's a lot of overlap in these lists; I imagine that I'll be able to meet all four goals and still own less than 3,500 points worth of lizardmen.

When I say "model and paint," I mean just that -- I plan on modifying every character, unit leader and model on a medium-sized or larger square base in my army. Some changes will be simple, such as additional jewelry. Others will be more significant, including modeling dinosaur-skull helmets, extra weapons and mystical implements.

I'll also have to build a Tetto'Eko miniature. In fact, that's one of my first projects, and I chose to do it from scratch. I'm starting with a more-complicated project both to see what I can do and to set a bar for myself -- I'll come back to recreate him later, I'm sure, and it'll be useful to have a record of where my abilities were before I started all this!

Once all four goals are met, I'll move on to one of these two projects, depending on how much I'm willing to spend:
1) A legal 1,000-point Demons of Chaos army.
2) A 1,000-point Chupayotl Lizardman army.

The first interests me because the themes I'd use -- of Khorne, the god of battle and bloodlust, and Slaanesh, the god of debauchery and regular lust -- intersect in ways that can really be used to make some cool models. Additionally, Khorne and Slaanesh hate each other, so there will be some interesting model choices to represent such an unusual alliance.

The second, while it's more lizardmen, is rich with modeling possibilities. Chupayotl is a city claimed by a tsunami and is now inhabited by some form of unknown sea entities -- the Lizardman army book isn't clear if there's even an organized force there. I thought it would be excellent to model a lizardman force spawned in the city's pools after it had been claimed by some primeval, marine force. The saurus warriors would sport vicious shark heads, their leaders having a hammerhead's jaws; skinks would have tentacles. The whole army would use underwater weapons -- tridents and javelins -- and be led by a giant lobster or crab model that would count as a skink priest.