[15mm Fantasy] Painting Log Update for April

Another update of my painting log featuring, amongst others, these Battle Valor Games Dwarian Crossbows.

[15mm Fantasy] Army Building - Painting Progress

The Army of the Unseelie Court - as of mid-December

My Army of the Unseelie Courts is slowly taking shape. At the moment I have more Orcs and Goblinoids painted than Dark Elves, so the army is more an Orc Army with Dark Elf allies.

My latest unit completed is a regiment of Man-Orc pike from Eureka Miniatures.

Man-Orc Pike

These are great figures and very reminiscent of Saruman's army at the battle of  Helm's Deep in the Two Towers movie.

Orc Legion with Shaman and archers plus Dark Elf troop and archers

 These Orcs are from Splintered Light Miniatures - Orcs with great axes at the rear and Orc Shaman and archers at the front. The Dark Elves are from Ral Partha Europe and are essentially the figure mix from the Blighthaven company pack (with an extra archer).

Ogres, Orcs, Goblins, and Dwarves

A pair of Ogres from Splintered Light; Goblin and Orc Archers, also from Splintered Light; an Orc Regiment from Splintered Light; three Dwarves from Splintered Light; and an Orc Shaman from Eureka Miniatures.

The Witch King leading his Orcish Hosts

From 15mm.co.uk, a Wraith Lord (or Witch-King) on his fell-beast, leading his Orc hosts.

The Queen of Air and Darkness, ruler of the Autumn Courts

The Queen of Air and Darkness, an Elf Queen from 15mm.co.uk,

Dark Elves

And some of her subjects, from Ral Partha Europe.

[15mm Fantasy] Army Building - the Host of the Unseelie Court

As I painted and based more fantasy figures, a clearer idea of the army I'm building has emerged - the Host of the Unseelie Court.

The Witch King of the Winter Court

Wanting a Fantasy army that didn't follow the usual tropes, and fascinated by the RPE Dark Elf figures with their asiatic-style armour, I cast around and came across references to the Unseelie Court -

The Unseelie Court consists of the darkly-inclined fairies. Unlike the Seelie Court, no offense is necessary to bring down their assaults. As a group (or "host"), they appear at night and assault travelers, often carrying them through the air, beating them, and forcing them to commit such acts as shooting at cattle. - Wikipedia

So, Dark Elves without the Warhammer silliness, plus I could use Orcs, Ogres, Trolls and Goblins as the lesser denizens of the Unseelie realm.

Updated my Modelling Log

Splintered Light and Eureka Miniatures Orcs

Having fallen a bit behind, I finally finished updating my Modelling Log tonight - lots of 15mm Fantasy figures from Splintered Light, Eureka Miniatures, and some from 15mm.co.uk and Ral Partha Europe painted up over the last couple of months. Some of these photos you may have seen before and some, hopefully, you will not have.

[15mmFantasySkirmish] Ogres and Orcs

Khurasan Miniatures announced on TMP a planned expansion to their 15mm Fantasy range by showing off greens for an upcoming release of large Orcs. An interesting discussion ensued on the nature of Orcs which proved to me that Jon of Khurasan is a Tolkien buff and really cares about his source material.

Along the way, as you do, the conversation wandered off course and we began discussing 20mm scale, Angus McBride inspired, Orcs, originally released by Dark Hold Miniatures and sculpted by the late James Tharpe. These figures had then been produced by Rebel Minis, before ending up with Splinted Light Miniatures and rebranded as Armoured Ogres.

As it so happened, I had bought a set of these Armoured Ogres from Splintered Light recently, and had just finished painting them up. For some reason, I had originally thought that these figures were Hobgoblins - and it so happens that in this TMP thread from early April, Khurasan Miniatures announced the up-coming Mighty Hobgoblin Army, which I'm rather looking forward to - but once I realized my mistake, the Ogres' vaguely oriental style armour inspired me to paint them up in a vaguely bakemono fashion.

While I painted the chainmail black and silver, I went for a gloss black on the plates for that lacquered samurai look. As red always works with black, straps and clothes were painted various shades of red.

The second ogre from the right had a pre-quartered shield so I ended up painting it contrasting blue and yellow. The left and right ogres had skulls embossed on their shields so their shield designs were pretty straight forward. The second ogre from the left had a plain round shield with a central boss so he got a maltese cross design from a pack of Veni Vidi Vici 15mm shield transfers I bought from Spirit Games.

The second group of ogres - the second ogre from the right is actually holding his sword in an over-hand stabbing style.

These ogres all had plain shields. Greek hoplite shield designs work really well with this style of shield, particularly the hydra pattern on the second from the right ogre (looks a bit like a yellow blob from this angle).

In this group shot we have, from left to right: Splintered Light Orc, Splintered Light Ogre, Splintered Light Adventurer, and Ral Partha Europe Dwarf Veteran.

One question that was debated on the original TMP thread was whether the Ogres would work as large Orcs. This is where we move into the "vision" part of gaming.

Khurasan Jon states that he is developing a Tolkien-inspired line of fantasy figures. To this end, he is carefully following such descriptions as feature in Tolkien's various writings concerning creatures found in Middle Earth. This is why Khurasan's Orcs are crook-legged, stoop-shouldered, and less than man height. Even Saruman's Man-Orcs, as described by Tolkien, are still shorter than men, even if they can pass for men. As Jon pointed out, the James Tharpe Ogre figures are taller than man height, and walk upright.

In my opinion, the Ogre figures, while excellent, are too dissimilar in both equipment and appearance to be larger versions of "standard" orcs in a pure Tolkien-esque setting. And, if anything, these Ogres are too slight of body and lightly armed to be used as Olog-hai - the great Gorgoroth trolls that feature in the Battle of the Morannon. For Olog-hai, I would be inclined to use Khurasan's Trolls as they seem to have the heft and are armed with the massive clubs and hammers described in The Return of the King.

If we switch focus, however, to a slightly more generic Fantasy world, the Tharpe Ogres then become likely candidates for a large Goblinoid race, used by Dark Lords to stiffen Orc assault columns, or operating as apex bosses of goblin raiding bands. While your standard Fantasy Ogre tends to be rather brutish and primitive, this niche can be easily filled by various troll types. The Tharpe Ogres, with their relatively sophisticated helmets and body armour appear too advanced for the traditional ogre stereotype.

In conclusion, the Tharpe Ogres, with their Angus McBride inspired armour, are very nice figures. In a pure Tolkien-esque setting, they probably won't work as they are too tall (20mm scale), and too upright. In a more generic, Dungeons and Dragons inspired fantasy world, they would, in my opinion, make excellent large Goblinoids - either working on their own, or as apex bosses of smaller Orcs and Goblins - as, I think, their armour and equipment is too sophisticated for traditional Ogres.

Of course, this is Fantasy, and Your Mileage May Vary.

Ogres leading a band of Splintered Light Orcs. The Ogres are taller even than the Boss Orc (to right of center with the elaborate hair style).

A core unit of Ogres adds heft to an Orc warband.

 
A comparison between Splintered Light Ogres and various Splintered Light Orcs and Goblins.

[15mmFantasySkirmish] Warriors of Reduced Stature

As I slowly worked my way towards drawing a line under my painting tally for March, I spotted a thread on Dwarves on TMP. Amongst the figures I had completed in March were a company of Dwarven Clan Warriors from Ral Partha Europe's Blight Haven range.

The left-most, vaguely Ostrogothic Warrior is an adventurer from Splintered Light Miniatures. He stands about 17mm from the top of his base to his eyes, so you can get an idea as to how tall the Dwarves are.

These Dwarves are equipped with chain mail or plate mail and appear rather Late Medieval or Early Renaissance, rather than the more usual short, angry Viking look that is more common for Dwarf miniatures. I like to think that this High Medieval look is due to the Dwarven smiths being ahead of the armour technology curve.

The shield designs are transfers from the Veni Vidi Vici range I acquired through Spirit Games in the UK.

The Ral Partha Blight Haven range has very nice figures and is well worth checking out.

[15mmFantasySkirmish] Some painting progress

In spite of not being able to paint for any length of time, I've managed to get through a number of 15mm Fantasy figures over the last couple of weeks.

Orcs on Fell Beasts - Eureka Miniatures

These three Orcs on Fell Beasts are from Eureka Miniatures - from left to right, Chieftain, trooper, Shaman. The Chieftain has a mouthful of enlarged canines, which haven't come out very clearly, and has three heads attached to his saddle. The Shaman is very similar to the dismounted Shaman from the same range, and seems to be making some sort of arcane gesture. He has a couple of skulls attached to his saddle. The Fell Beasts remind me of large hyenas, or hyaenodons. Excellent figures and I need to get a few more, and some Orcs on foot as dismounted members of the troop.

Skeleton Warriors - HoTT Fantasy from 15mm.co.uk

Skeleton "Horde of the Dead"

Close up on the Skellies

The skeleton warriors from 15mm.co.uk - now rebranded as "Horde of the Dead" in 15mm.co.uk's reorganization - I painted quickly. Black undercoat, cheap white craft paint, Devlin mud wash. Then a dry brush of Screaming Skull and/or Bleached Bone and a final wash of Babadab. The shields were done with watery Vallejo colours to give the appearance of weathering. For basing, a post by Mark on the Winter of '79 blog where he talked about the visual effect of group basing in a skirmish game inspired me to dig out some old Flames of War bases for my skellies. I wanted a sort of "blasted heath" or "cursed Earth" look so went with my usual PVA and sand texture, black undercoat, and then a coat of red/brown craft paint (I'm really starting to like craft paint for covering big areas). I then touched up any large grains of sand with Codex Grey (or whatever it's called these days) and added some gravel from the foot path across the street. Finally, finished things off with some of my "dead" flock.

Wood Elves from Ral Partha Europe's Blight Haven range.

The Wood Elves from Ral Partha Europe's Blight Haven range are a nice selection of personalities for a warband. I played around all my shades of green to make the members of the warband both uniform and individual. The most elaborate paint scheme was for the Mage. Only two of the Elves had shields. I ordered a small selection of Veni Vidi Vici shield transfers from Spirit Games and, when these arrived, I selected the Star and Tower as suitable Wood Elvish badges. These worked very well, I thought.

I'm happy with my initial results. Now to paint some Adventurers.

[15mmFantasySkirmish] Oops, another diversion

Around the tail end of January, I succumbed to the siren call of 15mm Fantasy.

A few years ago, I had thought about getting into 15mm Fantasy as I've always had a hankering to play something Tolkien-ish, and even bought some Irregular Miniatures Orcs. These, I was rather disappointed with, especially as I then discovered Eureka Miniatures own, very Lord-of-the-Rings-movie-ish, Orcs from their own 18mm Fantasy range. The project, and the Irregular Orcs, ended up tossed in the back of Lead Mountain.

Recently, I've seen such excellent work in 15mm on the G+ 15mm Fantasy Miniatures group that I decided to revisit the scale and genre for myself. I ordered four warbands from Ral Partha Europe's Blight Haven range - Wood Elves, Dwarves, Dark Elf Ronin and Human Mercenary Warband.

While these were winging their way from Old Blighty to West Auckland, I recalled that amongst the Irregular Orcs I had put away were two trolls. I dug them out and painted them up.

Irregular Trolls

Back view

There is a certain asymmetry about these figures that is both annoyingly crude, and vaguely LoTR-movie-like.

Since the RPE figures have arrived, I have started painting the Wood Elves, and have undercoated the Dwarves. They are very nice figures and I'm very pleased with them.

A couple of weeks of work-madness has stalled the project but, on Friday, two little orders from Splinted Light and 15mm.co.uk arrived.

Cleaning up and basing new figures

I spent an hour this evening cleaning up and basing my new arrivals.

HoTT Griffin from 15mm.co.uk with Splintered Light Orcs and Goblins.

From Splintered Light, I received some very nice Orcs and Goblins, as well as a set of Adventurers. From 15mm.co.uk's HoTT range, I received a Griffin and a party pack of skeleton warriors.

HoTT Skeleton Warriors from 15mm.co.uk

I'm really looking forward to painting these guys up.

For Skirmish rules, I'm currently looking at Swordplay from Two Hour Wargames, as well as beta tests for Dungeon Crawl from Two Hour Wargames and Splintered Light's David McBride's Fantasy Skirmish Rules.