Necromunda Squats, Magnets, and the Joy of Bits Box Engineering
We love those hobby updates where a project suddenly stops being “just a pile of parts” and starts looking like an actual gang. This weekend, end3r pushed his Necromunda Squats forward in exactly that way: magnets, weapon experiments, head swaps, and a lot of healthy kitbash optimism colliding with reality.
The first milestone was a big one: the first Necromunda Squat Prospector is finally assembled and ready, with the arms, weapons, and head all magnetized. Even better, the other seven little dwarfs are already close behind — they only still need magnets and weapons.
That is exactly the kind of progress we like to see in an army-building project: one finished test body, then a clear path for the rest of the gang.
And of course, as soon as the first model was standing on its own feet, thoughts immediately went to painting. end3r already has an idea for the color scheme, although calling it a full “scheme” might be giving it too much credit. Right now the concept is delightfully direct: a Salamander in a dark green coat. Honestly? That sounds fun. Very Necromunda, very personal, and exactly the kind of idea that deserves a test model before committing to the whole crew.
Michał was immediately on board with the look of the Prospectors, and we get it — these models have loads of character. Once the first heavy weapon went on, there was also the important realization that the gun somehow no longer looked absurdly oversized. Maybe the Squats just bulked up enough to make it work.
But the really fun part of this project is the freedom to go wild with leftover bits. Necromunda is perfect for that. end3r is already planning to use all the strange treasures accumulated from other kits: a Kharadron weapon standing in as a mining laser, a Salamanders flamer, a Votann captain head, and whatever else turns out to fit once the bits box gets properly excavated.
That was the theory, anyway.
In practice, the next stage became a very relatable hobby story: wait, this is not how I imagined it would look at all.
Then came the follow-up energy of pure confidence:
And right after that, the classic kitbash lesson hit: kitbashing does not, in fact, do itself. Parts do not automatically become compatible just because we believe in them hard enough. Heads looked weird, weapons seemed off, and suddenly every ambitious plan had to pass the cruel test of actual proportions.
Some options still worked better than others, though. Michał called out the second head as a good fit, and end3r agreed that it definitely worked better than the third attempt.
At one point the whole thing nearly drifted into full body-horror territory, with a wonderfully cursed “The Thing” version and the immortal slogan: talk to the hand.
Thankfully, this is also a story about perseverance paying off. After a bit more dry-fitting and rummaging through the bits, the weapon situation suddenly started looking much better. In fact, end3r officially retracted the earlier statement that the weapons did not fit.
A deeper review of the whole bits collection confirmed it: there actually are enough compatible options to make the gang work.
And maybe the best part is that the head swaps turned out to be less crazy than they first seemed. As Michał put it: they really do fit normally.
By the end of the update, the whole project had moved from one successful proof-of-concept model to a gang that is steadily taking shape.
Slowly but surely — powoli do przodu.
That is probably our favorite kind of army-building progress: not the clean, perfect version where every idea works on the first try, but the real one. The one where you test weird heads, discover that your genius conversions are maybe not genius yet, dig deeper into the bits box, and eventually come out the other side with something unique.
We are really looking forward to seeing that first painted test Squat. Dark green coat, Salamanders flavor, Necromunda grime, and a gang full of custom weapons sounds like exactly the kind of project that can get gloriously weird in the best possible way.