Today we’ve got a very special army for you: Craig Boyle’s award-winning Gloomspite Gitz.  Craig recently scooped the double at Rotten Seagulls GT 2024 in the UK, picking up both Best Army (player voted) and Best Painted (judged) at the same event!

This army is sensation and I hope you enjoy it.

I’m Craig – a 30-something dad from the North East of England. I used to collect Warhammer when I was a kid then quit for decades before I returned during COVID.  Our local AOS scene is small but fiercely competitive in a friendly way, which keeps me really engaged.

I used to compete in MMA when I was younger, so I do enjoy competition. AOS is a good outlet for that, but I can get a little disheartened by unoriginality, so I dislike meta-chasing, netlists and finicky arguments about being half an inch out. If I’m going to win, I just want to use armies I enjoy and earn that victory fair and square…which is probably why I’ve never 5-0’d, ha!

I was delighted to win both Best Army (player voted) and Best Painted (judged) at Rotten Seagulls GT 2024 – it was a great feeling after spending about 4-5 months bringing this army to life.

The inspiration for the army

I mained Sylvaneth through most of 3rd Edition and tried to make them look as great as I could, but never took home a painting award – so I knew I needed a new army to push myself even further.

Enter the Gitz – a real playground for vibrancy and experimental ideas. I make decisions for armies based on colour scheme ideas, and I knew from the get-go that my Gitz would make heavy use of teal / turquoise / magenta / pink. I wanted them to make your eyes bleed…which seems on-brand for stabby lil’ goblins!

I also decided that all my goblins would be based as though they’re standing in a blueish cave, with some fluorescent mushrooms and crazy alien tufts breaking things up.

I like the idea of a medley of goblins and trolls, but I hate painting massive hordes so I focused most of my time and attention on the trolls and goblin heroes. That way I could push the painting quality up as high as possible without investing too much time in large units of tiny models.

I’ve always liked creating a bright ‘pop’ achieved through contrasting colours. I tend to block in the main tones and then whatever I want to ‘pop’, I consult the colour wheel to pick something on the opposite side. It can really grab people’s attention but just make sure you use it sparingly and don’t overdo it.

My Dankhold Troggoth illustrates this, using orange OSL to contrast against his blue skin. The flesh tone stomach is a good way to create a mid-tone bridge between both shades and tie it all together.

About a week before the GT I decided to repaint my Loonshrine. It was originally a rush-job featuring a big yellow moon and lots of fluoro green mushrooms, but I wanted this army to look the best it could possibly look, and to me it stuck out like a sore thumb.

I repainted it entirely and tried a few new ideas about layering from a purple / pink / magenta base up to a yellow. I redid the base rock to fit my scheme and then also manually painted the dots onto loads of the Shrine’s mushrooms – which took AGES but was sooooo worth it!

Putting it on the table

As the meta stats show, Rockguts are the current MVPs of this army. In my second GT game against my best mate Sam (who is a fantastic player in the tournament scene), I managed to keep a single Rockgut alive after his full LRL army went into it to deny Slay the Entourage, which pretty much won me the game!

In conclusion

I’ve always enjoyed reading Plastic Craic, so this has been a real pleasure! If you like my painting, you can follow me on instagram, but I warn you in advance that I only post sporadically.

I’d like to thank Luke and the guys at Rotten Seagulls for organising the tournament and being so good for the community. My pal Sam for listening to me agonise over lists and pushing me to perform better at tournaments. Liam and my own club West Allotment Wildlings for giving me the opportunity to practice on a near weekly basis.

Finally I’d like to thank my wife Ellen and our daughter Miri for being patient with dad’s hyperfocus and occasional weekend-long gaming ventures.

If you enjoyed this article, you’re welcome to check out our recent showcases on Cara Newby’s heavily-converted Mega Gargants and Nic Wright’s world-conquering Ironjawz. 

If you’d like to help us continue our work, we’d love to have your support. All Patreon Tiers include Discord access, exclusive articles and regular contests. Our Tiers are priced to be within everyone’s reach, so please click here to join us today!