A Kindness From a Friend I've Yet to Meet

A small parcel arrived in the post late last week, sent entirely out of kindness by one of those beloved wargamer friends that we haven’t yet met.  

In this case, the friend is Dai, one of the regular readers of this blog,  Dai is a fellow blogger, who does interesting and lovely projects in WW2, among other stuff.   We’ve exchanged emails and messages for years and encouraged one another in our lives’ ups and downs, but I’ve never met him, and I earnestly hope to do so if I can make it to California some day.

Dai knows that I am fond of Tolkien and have quite a few of the GW figures for my LOTR gaming, with an especial fondness for the Rohirrim, so he sent me these figures from his stash, thinking I could make better use of them then he can

Well, I hope he’s right.  These are lovely figures, and while I can break the GW horses off their bases just by looking at them the wrong way, they have great potential for painting and I can’t wait to get at them.

Thank you Dai!   You are too kind, and a fine example of what young Conrad Kinch likes to call “The Freemasonry of the Hobby”.

Speaking of Rohirim, recently I got one of those “You may like these …” from Kickstarte, and my eye was caught by a project called Riders of the Plains,  a set of STL files for figures that looked suspiciously like these, only slightly different.   I suppose a lawyer might have said they were just generic Gothic dark ages cavalry, but what appears to have killed the project was that the creators called themselves The Hobbit Hole.  That was too much for Warner Bros, which now apparently owns the Tolkien IP universe, and they killed the project faster than a Nazgul can screech something fell in it’s fell voice.    Had the project called itself something else, like “Small Cute Things Living Below Ground”,  they might have gotten away with it.  Anyway, my backing evaporated along with the project, but at least I have these fellows (and, to be honest, many more like them) to paint.

Cheers and blessings to your brushes,

MP+

Nasty Nazgul, or, Mordor's Mounted Minions

Missed the Fantasy Friday deadline, but here are two dangerous Nazgul types for my LOTR collection to terrify both the legions of Mordor and their foes.   Both are Games Workshop figures.  The one on the left is the King of the Nazgul when GW used to make metal figures.    On the right is a plastic alternative rider for the Fell Beast that came in the Pelennor Fields boxed set I mentioned here recently.   I decided to keep him, and found a caparisoned medieval horse in the lead mountain that promised to work well when painted black.

 

\Painting black is an art form that greatly intimidates me.  I started with a Citadel Chaos Black spray undercoat, then highlighted in Vallejo German Gray, then added Folkart craft store indigo highlights, and finally some dry brushing as I finished the bases to suggest dust and dirt on the fabric.   I think they’re reasonably spooky and unpleasant and should add some biting power to the hordes of Mordor.

I really think I should start work on that mounted Gandalf figure i have tucked away - I think he’ll be needed!

Cheers and blessings to your brushes!

MP+

Friday Fantasy: GW Ringwraith on Fell Beast (or, Meanwhile, in Mordor)

As a rule I disapprove of super-monstrous units on the wargaming table.  My WW2 collection only has one 15mm and 1 20mm early-model Tiger tank, and you will search my collection in vain for a Maus, JSII, or King Tiger.   I confess I look askance at people who are all too ready to put such figures, or a French army consisting of just the Imperial Guard, on the table.  It’s just not right.   If you can’t eke out a win with PzIIIs, T34s or line infantry, then you aren’t really trying.   OK, I’ve confessed my prejudice, feel free to disagree.

However, if one is going to do the Lord of the Rings in a large way, then there are certain epic fights where you want a Nazgul lord on a horrid flappy mount, because if nothing else, you want to motivate your orc hordes to throw themselves onto the bright spears and swords of their noble foes.    When I found a Battle of the Pelennor Fields box set in my local games store at 50% off because, said the owner, no one wants this stuff anymore, I jumped at the opportunity, because it included a number of large models in plastic, including this guy.

I didn’t put a massive amount of work into the painting.  I started with an undercoat of Vallejo German Grey primer and then drybrushed with several lighter shades of grey craft store paint.  I picked out the veins in the wings with a medium grey.   The Ringwraith was black with successive shades of grey highlights on the folds of the robe, while his armour was Citadel Warplock Bronze, then a wash of Nuln Oil, then a dry brush of gunmetal.  I put the most work into the ringwraith’s sword.

 

I think most of my effort went into the detail on the base, to be honest.

This figure will mostly sit in my display cabinet, but if it ever makes it onto to the table, it would only be for a very large scale battle.   If using Dragon Rampant (my friend James and I really haven’t found a better set of rules for big fantasy battles), I would give him the Goader ability to make the two closest units move automatically, as well as make Good units within a certain radius (at least a foot, I would think) check for Fear unless an equivalent hero like Gandalf was on the table.   

Thanks for looking and blessings to your brushes!

MP+

Meanwhile, in Mordor

Hello friends!

My new (since June) post-retirement church job has kept me happily busy, along with finding safe day-trips to do with Joy during a stay-at-home summer.   I was able to use part of the last few months to finish this lot of orcs for my Lord of the Rings collection.  What a horrible lot!

This batch includes a GW orc captain from the lad pile, as well as eight Thistle and Rose (formerly Vendel) orcs, painted in Mordor livery.  I love that they are well wearing the same baggy trousers and puttees, it gives them a bit of a regular army look, the 3/92nd North Mordor Foot, maybe.  If you want to see Thisle and Rose figures well painted, visit Rabbit Man’s blog.

“Roiht, you ‘orrible lot, what do you do when you sees an Elf Lord?  You stick him, see!  No, don’t bleeding tickle him, STICK HIM!"

This ‘orrible lot also includes a box of Oathmark goblins that I purchased May 2019.   I built some as archers:

Spear chaps without shields.  Sorry the photos are rather dark.

Shields and hand weapons.  Tried for a general red and black theme to the shields, with some Mordor Eye livery, some more tribal.

Shields and shabby sticks.

Regimental photo before marching off to Gondor.

In general I found the Oathmark plastic figures to be easy to assemble, with a pleasing variety of weapons and gear.  While the Oathmark universe, from what I’ve seen of the rule books, is standalone fantasy, the figures fit well with my existing LOTR collection and have a Tolkienesque feel to them.  I haven’t done the math to see if they are cheaper than GW plastics, but they add a variety of poses to the Perry orc sculpts, so I may order a few more boxes over time, though the old Vendel figures, happily back in production through Thistle and Rose, are appealing..  I currently have a box of Oathmark wolf riders half-assembled to tackle next.

Blessings to your brushes!  

MP+ 

 

 

Meanwhile in Rohan 8

This post will be much less interesting than the last one, as there are 100% no scantily dressed figures.   I got a bit of flack for posting the elf maiden photos on the Wargaming in Middle Earth Facebook page and rapidly deleted the post.  I never thought I was creepy, but apparently some did, so lesson learned.

So to today’s duller content.   Here are 12 Walkers of Rohan, bog-standard Rohirrim foot fighters, fresh off the Games Workshop sprue.

No mods of any sort.  The only concession to originality was to give a few of them grey cloaks vice the usual green cloaks.  I also made some attempt to change up the colours on the shields by using some blues and reds for variety.

Archers.  Can’t have enough of these chaps, especially for a siege game.  I have plans.

Fellow in the foreground is a bit of an oldster.  My white hair is almost as long as his in these lockdown days.

The most creative thing in this post is this Gripping Beast lead figure, of Alfred the Great, repurposed as a Lord of Rohan.  The shield transfer is from Little Big Men Studios.  

 

 Blessings to you brushes!

MP+

Sometimes You Paint, Sometimes You Build, Sometimes You Salvage, Sometimes You Re-base

I love starting new projects, and always have too many on the go, but sometimes it’s good to revisit some older figures that just need some love.  This weekend, while Joy was in the states visiting her daughter and granddaughter, I had the place to myself and found that what I got done wasn’t at all what I had thought I would do.

Here are some GW LOTR plastic orcs that a friend gave me - he found a bag of about 30 figures, very roughly painted, jumbled in a zip-lock bag.   I had my doubts about remediating the paintwork, but I pulled out a handful and decided to see what I could do with them.   I’d say I repainted about half of each figure and tried to give them scary-face shields, though I think my surrogate granddaughter could have done scarier faces.

I also gave them my usual bad-guy base treatment - scrubby, mostly barren ground, evocative of Mordor, Dead Marshes, etc.

I liked how these fellows turned out - they fit nicely into my growing evil LOTR models.  I will probably salvage handful in the near future.

Also underway is a significant basing project for my Isengard collection.   About ten years ago, when my son was a teen and living with me, we played a LOT of the original GW LOTR Strategy Battle Game.   To get some figures on the table quickly I cut a lot of corners, such as leaving the bases still in their original black undercoat and nothing more.  Currently I have about 30 of these figures in the basing shop, and a few of them marched out ready for action this weekend, including this Uruk-Hai captain.

These 6 Uruk-Hai crossbowmen were only 60% painted, and required a fair bit of brushwork to get them ready.   Repainted and with some proper basing, they look ok.   I would like to get a full unit of 12, but they were pricey buggers ten years ago back when GW sold LOTR metal models in blisters of 3.  Perhaps I can find some more on Ebay or the like.  In Dragon Rampant terms, I would rate these as heavy missiles.

Between the stray basing material and my cat deciding that the light box makes a good place for a nap, these pictures are rather messy.

I did also finish painting some new figures and got them based.  These are 8 orc arches from Vendel miniatures.   My friend James and I are very fond of the Vendel fantasy range, and there are some great examples on his blog.  They’re fairly simple figures but they have a pleasing, old-school look and feel to them with tons of facial expression.

The Vendel moulds got sold recently so all this range is sadly OOP at the moment.  When I was at Hot Lead this March, I was talking to an American fellow who knew the chap who bought the moulds, so I have hopes that they will be back in production soon. 

I only have 8 of these archers, so I decided when I was ordering some bits from North Star recently, that I would splash out on a box of their Oathmark goblins, to see if I could build this unit up a bit.

Each sprue comes with five torsos that can be built out in several ways.  I decided to build four of them as archers.   They have a hunched, furtive look, making them look sneaky and fierce, but they look suitably Mordor-ish.   It took me about ten minutes to assemble five figures, with a minimum of hacking and cutting.

Side by side comparison with the Vendel figures.   I think they’ll work together.

‘So a mixed bag of thoroughly bad hats, with a variety of worthwhile ways to use spare time - painting, salvaging, basing, cutting and gluing.   I’m pleased with the results, though I had better get some reinforcements for Rohan and Gondor into the field soon.   And speaking of the field … I should use these figures in a game - what a crazy thought!   

Blessings to your brushes!

MP+

Some Captains Of Mordor

It’s been quiet here, with little painting done of late, but here are four Games Workshop figures from their Lord of the Rings line a Mordor orc command team.  The figures are fine case resin, which I suspect are now done on a print on demand basis as orders come in.  The figures are generally good, with a little flash, but the banner bearer’s sword is quite wavy and to quote Blackadder, looks a bit like an Oriental disembowelling hook.

The banner is totally coped from one done (better than mine) by my friend James.

I’ve been toying with some modified command rules for Mordor for Dragon Rampant, which I need to revisit.   These fellows will play a role in getting otherwise inert and quarrelsome lumps of orcs going anywhere.  Also, the fellow on the right is described as being an Orc Shaman, or a chaplain, which I find kind of creepy, that the orcs have their own padres.

Blessings to your brushes!

These figures bring my 2017 totals to:

15mm: Vehicles: 3, Foot Figures: 4, Scenic Pieces: 7

20mm: Foot figures: 18

28mm:  Foot Figures: 86;  Mounted Figures: 11; Terrain Pieces: 17

Meanwhile, In Gondor

MINAS TIRITH, MIDDLE EARTH PRESS SERVICE:  After accusations from the White Council that Gondor has gotten lax and fallen behind on its security, the Office of the Steward announced that the Gondorian army has been increased.   Said Denethor, Steward of Gondor, “Our new rapid deployment force will allow us protect our borders and keep the people of Gondor safe.  Our troops are the best.  Not that Sauron is a bad guy.  I don’t know Sauron, but I am sure that if he and I got together, we could do some deals together."

Twelve new troops for my Gondorian force.   These are of course the classic GW plastic sculpts as per the Peter Jackson films.  They are figures that Chris Stoesen sent to me at Christmas as part of the Santa Clause project.  Thank you, Chris, great gift!

Also finished are these eight figures from the GW Warriors of the First Age sprue.   You get four per sprue and I had two sprues, so …   I think they could pass for palace guards or some sort of ceremonial or elite unit.

They have comfy blue cloaks.  Definitely an elite unit.

 

Then, just to have a bit of a gloat, I put all of my Gondorian figures together for a group shot and was pleasantly surprised.  Almost fifty figures in all, and this force has never fought together on the tabletop before.  Shall have to fix that.

Gondorian archers.  My take on them would be that they are the best archers of the race of Men, second only to the elves.  Other races of Men, like the Rohirrim, use shorter bows suitable for mounted work.    So, for example, in Dragon Rampant I would give Gondor 18” missile range and allow the sharpshooter upgrade as well as an upgrade to their armour from 2 to 3 on the grounds that they walk around inside tin cans.  Of course, that would be an expensive unit to field.

“Men of Gondor …” sung to the tune of Men of Harlech.   Inspiring lot, and very shiny.

Thank you and blessings to your sharp swords of Men.

 

These figures bring my 2017 totals to:

15mm: Vehicles: 3, Foot Figures: 4, Scenic Pieces: 7

20mm: Foot figures: 18

28mm:  Foot Figures: 82;  Mounted Figures: 11; Terrain Pieces: 17

 

 

Meanwhile, In Rohan - 5

For months, as dark clouds gather near Orthanc and rumours multiply of yet another steading put to fire and the sword by merciless raiders from the hills, the word among the crofters and far folk of the Westfold has been, “What news of Eomer?”   All know that the King is preoccupied, and that his household riders are too valuable to be sent out after yet another raiding party.  All hopes rest on the good Lord of the Riddermark and his hardhanded, chosen warriors.

Now, in this small village on the edge of the wind-swept plains, one boy comes running from the outer pastures.  “Mother!  ’Tis Eomer!  Eomer and his riders have returned!"

Brythbart’s parents exchange looks, for the boy is ever given to flights of fancy.  But scarce are his words out when the sentinel in the watchtower sounds his horn, the single blast that means friends!

Forsooth, it is indeed Eomer!  The Lord of the Riddermark has returned at this most dangerous of hours!

 

The villagers cheer lustily.  “Will you feast with us this night, Lord Eomer?”, the headman cries out.  “I thank you, good headman,” Lord Eomer calls out graciously, “for we have long days in the saddle and are weary, for many orc helms have we cloven this last fortnight.   There are dark things stirring, yet the might of Rohan has not yet waned, I think!!"

Bakkonraed, Pig of Rohan, looks on anxiously, wondering if he is invited to dinner.  Look at those sexy SixSquared resin haystacks, they have doubled in number this last while!

These nine GW Riders of Rohan are not new - I have had them rattling around in a box since 2006 when my then teenagers and I were gaming together.  They have since been repainted and flocked, and I am quite pleased with them.  Very glad to see that they are getting new life.  All are plastic except for the Eomer figure on the front, though his horse (my attempt at a dapple grey) is plastic.  I never understood why GW put metal cavalry figures on plastic horses, as the anchor points for the hooves were quite fragile.  No fear now, everything is fine cast plastic.  Even so, the GW Riders of Rohan are lovely figures, fully capturing the inspiring scenes of the films.   As someone once said to me, the Rohirrim are sort of Vikings on horses, and these figures fit that bill nicely.

Here is the might of Rohan’s cavalry on maneuvers, though a few figures were forgotten in a box and missed the photo shoot.  I think i can field 20 figures, with another half dozen purchased second hand currently in the basing shop.   That should give Sauron and Saruman something to think about.  

 

Thank you for looking and blessings to your brushes!

MP+

These figures bring my 2017 totals to:

15mm: Vehicles: 3, Foot Figures: 4, Scenic Pieces: 7

20mm: Foot figures: 18

28mm:  Foot Figures: 62;  Mounted Figures: 11; Terrain Pieces: 17

Troops For The Elven Realm

Middle Earth, I find, is rather like Napoleonics, in that after a while, you start to want to do all the armies.    Well, maybe not all of them, but I do have some unpainted 6mm Bavarians and I am not sure how that idea started.

While my Elven force has been decidedly, well, matriarchal thus far, some years ago I acquired some of the GW lead sculpts of elves as seen in the (infamous to book purists) Helm’s Deep sequence from Peter Jackson’s The Two Towers.  I also had some sprues of the GW plastic elves from the Warriors of the First Age set, the chaps seen in the prelude to the first Jackson film, where Sauron is walking around all “OOO, look at me and my shiny ring on my vulnerable finger, bet you can’t cut THAT off, hahahaha … bugger, that hurt!”.  

I had enough figures to do two 12 strength units for Dragon Rampant, if I augmented the archers with some other figures.   Besides, my good friend James has been knocking it out of the park since November with his amazing progress on the Vendel fantasy sculpts we chipped in on, as you can see here.  His hand painted banners are a thing of beauty, and he’s been doing some terrific BIG solo battles using Dragon Rampant, such as this one, which is accompanied by some lovely writing.  I figured that the next time we get together, we can combine forces, and I can augment his elves with these chaps.

 These will probably be fielded as Light Foot in DR terms, using the upgrades cleverly thought through by Iron Mitten/Secundus here. Chaps with the silver skirts in the centre of the unit are lead figures, which now appear to be OOP.

 

Unit of eight archers, also from the plastic Warriors of the First Age set.  I had a bit of a disaster priming these with black spray paint, as the paint got all thick and nubbly on some sides of some figures and hid a lot of detail, so they don’t look terrific up close.  However, in their bright blues, violet and gold, they look sharp enough from a distance.   Getting another sprue just for the 4 archer figures is annoying but probably cheaper and more useful than buying these chaps, as the plastic sprue will give me enough figures to make up a 12 figure unit of men of the First Age that can pass as Gondorians.

 

Finally, a close up shot of the command group.  I gave the boss a white cape, and tried a new technique for me, starting it out as brown, and then layering it up with three successive colours, ending in titanium white.   You can see it better in the first shot, not sure I like it.  I got the nerve to try the flag thanks to James’ good examples.

So, a force to keep the orcs on their toes, I hope.  If you haven’t seen these figures yet on the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge, they appeared there with another project which I will show off separately here another time.

Blessings to your brushes!

These figures bring my 2017 totals to:

15mm: Vehicles: 3, Foot Figures: 4, Scenic Pieces: 7

20mm: Foot figures: 18

28mm:  Foot Figures: 57;  Mounted Figures: 2; Terrain Pieces: 10

Secret Santa Satisfaction

It was a quiet and very happy Christmas at the Padre’s Painting Chapel. Madame Padre and I had an excellent time.

Among the goodies under the tree was this package wUK postage mark, thanks to the Secret Santa project organized by Cath and Ian Willey, with this inscription on the outside.

I certainly did like it, Secret Santa!   Inside the package was proof that my Secret Santa had carefully studied my blog and had discerned by interest (dare I say obsession?) with the Lord of the Rings, and the Isengard army I have been building.  Secret Santa was extremely generous in giving Saruman some new offensive capability.  Here is an Isengard uruk-hai battering ram team, ready to knock on the doors of Helm’s Deep.

Or maybe they’re doing log PT.  I always hated log PT.  

 I guess I had better start making something for them to batter.

As if that wasn’t generous enough, my Secret Santa also included this Isengard bolt thrower with crew, including a chap carrying  a reload.

Such a great model.  It will add some offensive punch to Isengard’s forces.   Should also prove very effective in Dragon Rampant games.   High roll to activate, but deadly when it does fire. 

Saruman is delighted with his new toys.  Here Captain Nurg explains the principles of bolt throwing to Saruman.  Nurg graduated first in his class at the Isengard Artillery School the day after he spawned.  Nurg is definitely a streamer.

Also under the tree was this box of LOTR figures from the Santa Clause project run by Christ Stoesen.  More reinforcements for Gondor!   They will need them.  Many thanks, Secret Santa Clause!

Now that Madame Padre is home and doing well, I have my own Secret Santa projects procured and painting has commenced.  They should be out the door soon.   These gift exchanges show how generous and supportive our blooging community is, and I am so grateful to be a part of it.  My thanks to my generous benefactors!

Blessngs,

MP+