Lots of Rivendell Knights

These past two weeks I spent mostly in Middle-earth. I finished up the first batch of Rivendell Knights and put the base colours on the next six. I also worked on the Emyn Muil versions of Frodo, Sam and Gollum as well as some Wild Wargs. In between the wanderings in Arda, I also put the base colours on my Aeronautica Imperials Eldar.

Pict 1713: Elrond leads the Rivendell Knights

Pict 1714: Rivendell Knights

Pict 1715: Rivendell Knights

First up, I finished the four Rivendell Knights that were almost done by my last post. I'm really quite happy with them, especially with the free hand pattern on the banner. However, I think by now that I could push the contrast on the grey parts of the cloaks a bit further. Also, I simply was not able to paint in the eyes, the space inside the helmets was simply to small. Still, with the five Warriors, the Rivendell riders are starting to look like an army in my display case!

Pict 1716: Rivendell Knights (WIP)

Next, I want to try and finish up the remainder of the Rivendell Knights. There are still the shiny new plastic Elrond and the beautiful ForgeWorld Glorfindel as well as several sculpts of Arwen waiting for me. But if I finish the Warriors first, these heroes can be the cherry on top. One of the Knights had been converted into Lindir on horseback but in this current edition he has lost the option for a horse. So I took some time to reconvert him back and gave him back the lance bow and helmet. Anyways, the base colours are done and as ever, I hope the washes and highlights go on fast.

Pict 1717: Aeronautica Imperialis Iyanden Eldar (WIP)

After the first test model for my Iyanden airforce, I went into production mode and put the basecoats and oilwashes onto a good part of my current collection: The two further Nightwings and three Phoenix Bombers from the Wrath of Angels box. I also got two each of the original Nightwings and Phoenix Bombers that ForgeWorld produced for the first edition of the game from @smallthingsmodeling. These are of course a bit smaller than the newer plastic models but that works out well since I can make them into Crimson Hunters and Hemlock Wraithfighters by painting them as such. Sadly the appropriate models from the second edition were only sold for a very short amount of time and are really hard to come by.

Pict 1718: Sam, Gollum and Frodo in the Emyn Muil (WIP)

The new book for MESBG inspired me to dig out the Emyn Muil set containing Frodo, Sam and Gollum. They seemed to be the sculpts of these characters fitting most of the scenarios. I hope to finish them soon to try and play some of these scanarios!

Pict 1719: Wild Wargs (WIP)

Lastly, while I did some work with Green Stuff on the Knight formerly known as Lindir, I also used the putty to fill in the gaps in the fur on these Wild Wargs. The white lines on their backs are simply Vallejo Plastic Putty. I hope to give these flat surfaces a bit more structure, but it is an experiment and I might go back in with the Green Stuff depending on how it paints up. I do enjoy these sculpts now that I have them in hand and I look forward to painting them up and use them in some games. A bit like Orcs, they fit into quite a lot of armies and should provide some good mobility!

Hitting the ground running

The first two weeks of the year are always good for my numbers, since I got to finish projects that were already mostly done. I started out with Gríma and the Amon Hen statue head for Middle-earth and then did the final highlights on some more Legions Imperialis Blood Angels. After that I also started some more stuff in these universes with more Orcs, an Ent and two small scale Cerastus Lancers.

Pict 1527: Gríma Wormtongue at Amon Hen?

Pict 1528: Gríma Wormtongue

The first model of this year was this Gríma Wormtongue. Again, the new edition is a great opportunity to find these smaller projects and update my armies. The old sculpt gave me a bit of trouble. Especially the strands of hair in the face made painting the eyes quite difficult. Its nice to finally have this model painted! I even got to play a game with it and I am very impressed with him. It was against the the Army of the Dead including Legolas and Aragorn. Gríma really did a lot to keep these two heroes in check while my Uruk-hai Berserkers cut down the ghosts.

Pict 1529: Amon Hen Statue Head

Pict 1530: Amon Hen Statue Head

After painting the Solstice28 idols at the end of last year, I was in the mood to paint more terrain in the same colours. Combining this with the Middle-earth hype, I finally got to the fallen statue head from Amon Hen. A very cool scene in the movies and a treat to have gotten this simple little piece of terrain made by ForgeWorld. The statue once again painted up fast over a few evenings – really satisfying!

Pict 1531: Legions Imperialis Blood Angels Commanders and Veterans

I am taking part in an escalation campaign of Legions Imperialis in the first few months of this year. An opportunity to get some more stuff painted! During the first stage of the campaign I want to power through the main part of my infantry. The first of them are these four here: two command squads and two bases of Tactical Marines. The latter I build with some special weapons and painted them as Veterans accordingly with golden helmets.

Pict 1532: Procon Vi Cerastus Knights (WIP)

I also had a start on the Knight Household that will accompany my Legio Solaria as well as my Blood Angels. After reading up, I decided on House Procon Vi (having fitting decals on the Solaria transfer sheet certainly helps). The colour scheme is quite simple - mainly steel for the frame and trims, black panels and some blue spot colours - and the base colours went on very quickly. I can see myself painting a lot of these...

Pict 1534: Ent, Orcs and Dead Marsh Spectres (WIP)

I also started to add to my Fangorn collection with this plastic Ent as well as a few more Orcs and Dead Marsh Spectres. The latter will add to my Mordor collection to make it playable as a Minas Morgul list. I love that the Spectres are finally back in Mordor and the list seems quite strong on paper. I'll have to see, once they are done.

Solstice28 Idols

One last post for 2024 – finishing up some more Middle-earth miniatures, that had been unfinished for some time. Also getting to the Solstice28 Icons to do some more terrain!

Pict 1518: Orcs and Wargs

Pict 1519: Solstice28 Icons

Pict 1520: Solstice28 Icons

Since it is that time of the year, I got out the Solstice28 icons sculpted by @4ydra and quickly painted them. They are done in the same way that I had painted for example the Garden of Morr and should fit in nicely on my Realm of Battle board.

Pict 1521: Sharku, Wild Warg Chieftain, Orc Shaman on Warg

These four Wargs / Orcs had also been started this spring and had lain about since then. After finishing the Orcs, I showed of in the last post, I also finished this Wild Warg Chieftain, Orc Shaman on Warg as well as Sharku over a few evenings. The new edition is generally looking quite good and I look forward to adding a dew more pieces here and there to my armies to get them up to speed in the new year!

Pict 1522: Gríma Wormtongue (WIP)

The first of these small additions will be Gríma Wormtongue to slot into my Isengard army. Odd that it should take me this long to paint him up since he performs quite a nice role. But to be honest, I didn't even remember I had this metal sculpt stashed away in one of my boxes...

Legio Solaria Warlord Titan

These past two weeks, I completed the paintjob on the Legio Solaria Warlord. Afterwards, I also finished up a few more projects that had been lying around, some of them for quite some time.

Pict 1503: Legio Solaria Warlord supporting Blood Angels

Pict 1504: Legio Solaria Warlord Titan

Pict 1505: Legio Solaria Warlord Titan

Pict 1506: Legio Solaria Warlord Titan

Pict 1507: Legio Solaria Warlord Titan

Pict 1508: Legio Solaria Warlord Titan

Pict 1509: Legio Solaria Warlord Titan

Pict 1510: Legio Solaria Warlord Titan

That's my first finished Titan – ready to be used in games of Legions Imperialis. Such a great looking model! The little Marines on the base help to sell the scale even more. As you can see from the pictures, the arms are magnetised; the shoulder mounted guns are as well. I can see myself getting some of the more exotic arms made by ForgeWorld. I am also looking at adding in at least some Warhounds and Knights of House Procon Vi to get the collection ready for Adeptus Titanicus as well.

Pict 1511: Mordor Orcs and Warg Riders

Pict 1512: Mordor Orcs

Pict 1513: Warg Riders

With the new edition of the Middle-earth Strategy Battle game, I also finally finished the remaining four Warg Riders that have been in my box of current projects for over three years now. It feels great to have them finished now. I even got to play a game with them yesterday as part of the new Army of the White Hand. I also took this chance to finish some more Orc Warriors that I had laying around half-finished for a few months. These conversions of Orcs with both spears and shields might not see that much play, however, since the load out has been removed by the new edition.

Pict 1514: Zone Mortalis Reactor Tile

Pict 1515: Zone Mortalis Reactor Tile

Pict 1516: Zone Mortalis Reactor Tile

Pict 1517: Zone Mortalis Reactor Tile

Lastly, I also put the finishing touches on this Zone Mortalis tile, I had started sometime during the summer. I'm quite happy with the result! After the oilwash, I only picked out a few more details and then added the grey weathering powder that I use for my 30k/40k minatures.

With these ones finished, I have managed to hit my goal of painting 100 miniatures this year – just in time for the look back I will do at the start of January!

Ready for Gardenhammer

Once again, I do not find as much time for the hobby as I would like, but I finally managed to finish my 4x4 Realm of Battle gaming board and if the weather holds, I'm now ready to play some Gardenhammer! I also started to paint some reinforcements for my Badab Enforcers as well as more terrain for my 40k/Heresy collection.

Pict 1311: Realm of Battle Board ready for Gardenhammer

Pict 1312: Realm of Battle Board

These boards took up so much space, I had to put them away once the normal work week started. And of course, once out of sight, they were out of my mind. But with the bank holidays in May, I got them out once more and worked on them whilst watching the Star Wars prequels. I'm super happy with them and am very much looking forward to getting to play on them!

Pict 1313: Crebain

These birdies were a really unexpected little project. I decided on saturday morning that I wanted to play them on the sunday in a simply Isengard army and started by putting them together. The painting as done within about an hour in the evening. Really what took the longest was carving the backs of the wings free from additional material between the feathers. They are clearly not my best painted units, but they should fit in nicely with the rest of my Isengard collection!

Pict 1314: Badab Enforcers (WIP)

Pict 1315: Arachnos Rogue Doc and Orderlies (WIP)

Reinforcements for the Space Police, including a dog! Of course, there is also a Rogue Doctor to patch up any wound they might sustain. I also kitbashed two cultist lads with chainswords. I like how their masks mirror the one worn by the Doctor. Clearly the Enforcers of Badab have already been infiltrated at this point!
At this stage, they had the base colours and sponged on highlights applied and are ready for an oil wash before getting onto the finishing touches.

Pict 1316: 40k Terrain (WIP)

Now that I have a nice gaming board for games in fantasy settings, I also wanted to do some more work to prepare for the upcoming edition of 40k and get some more Sci-Fi scenery on the go. Same as the Enforcers, these pieces are mostly ready for an oilwash.

The Butterfly's Tally 2020

As is customary, in this first post of the year, I take a look back at what I did last year and make resolutions for the new one.

Pict 971: Uruk-Hai Army

Hobby Tally 2020

If you want to have a look at the tallies of the past: The Tally 2017, The Tally 2018, The Tally 2019

And these were my resolutions for 2020:

• Paint all of my Infinity models
• Paint the Uruk-Hai army to a playable level of 600 points
• Paint 25 miniatures for D&D, concentrating on the Critical Role miniatures
• And of course paint more models than buying them...

Pict 972: Sekban Naval Unit

Quite obviously I did not manage to paint all of my Infinity miniatures. In fact I bought some more and only painted the five Sekban in June. Since I played almost no games of Infinity, I lacked the motivation to do more, even with the release of a new edition of the game.

Pict 973: Uruk-Hai Army

Pict 974: Lutz and Friends

The Uruk-Hai however are quite a different story! The same week I finished the Sekban, I also put the finishing touches on a phalanx of Uruk-Hai Warriors. But the stand out for this project will have to be my conversion of Mauhur. All in all, I painted about 1850 points. Great sucess!

Pict 975: D&D Miniatures

Almost all of my miniatures could be used in D&D, but some of them are specifically to play RPGs. I'll have to add in the Shadow Deep miniatures as well as Valten and Bertrand's Bowmen of Bergerac to reach the 25 I wanted to do. But I will still count this resolution a sucess even if I did not paint that many CR miniatures. My highlight here has to be the Hill Giant - I'd venture to say he's my best painted miniature, barring maybe the Unicorn from the end of 2019.

And lastly, as you can see with a look at the Tally to the left, I once again failed to buy less miniatures than paint them. I did however sell quite a few as well and thus improved my ratio of painted to unpainted miniatures nontheless. And 283 painted models in total is also quite an impressive number!

Last year, I also decided to swich my postings to every other week. This shedule worked better with my life outside the hobby and I pretty much kept all of the dates. I count this as a sucess as well and will stick to this shedule in 2021.

Hobby resolutions for 2021

Seeing as I could not quite keep my resolutions this past year, I think I may have been overzealous especially with the goal to paint all of my Infinity miniatures. So for 2021, I will try and keep it simple: As per usual I want to paint more miniatures than buying new ones. Other than that I will only add one more goal. I want to paint a 4x4 gaming board and at least 4 pieces of terrain to play smaller skirmish games on.

Mordor Uruk Hai of Cirith Ungol

This week I did some more work for the Cirith Ungol Legendary Legion I had in mind with Quest of the Ringbearer. Mainly I converted and painted some Modor Uruk-Hai, but I also had the time to get to a few more Orc models.

Pict 937: Mordor and Cirith Ungol

Pict 938: Shagrat

Pict 939 - Shagrat

Of course you need Shagrat to lead any Cirith Ungol force. The older model with the mithril coat wears armour surprisingly similar to the Isengard Uruk-Hai but I wanted to change up the colours to dfferentiate the armies. The model with the Shield of Cirith Ungol is very cool as well and the shield was a welcome template to make some more for my converted Mordor Uruk-Hai.

Pict 940: Mordor Uruk-Hai

Pict 941: Mordor Uruk-Hai

Pict 942: Mordor Uruk-Hai with Shield (Conversion)

Pict 943: Mordor Uruk-Hai with Shield (Conversion)

With 18 assorted Uruk-Hai, this is probably enough for any army I want to run. I painted up one set of six painted up as is, the other I converted with Green Stuff and plasticcard so that they all carry sword and shield.

Pict 944: Mordor Uruk-Hai with Bow (Conversion)

Pict 945: Mordor Uruk-Hai with Bow (Conversion)

The profile also offers the option to take an orc bow and with the Uruk-Hai shoot value being better than an orc's, I wanted six of those as well. So I quickly scuplted some chainmail over the banded mail of Uruk-Hai scouts. Looking at it now, it could be finer, but it works for my taste.

Pict 946: Kardûsh, Gorbag, Grishnák, Snaga, Zagdûsh

Pict 947: Kardûsh, Gorbag, Grishnák, Snaga, Zagdûsh

After so many Uruks, this bunch of Mordor Orc heroes was the next logical step. I got Gorbag out from the box of orcs and any other named Orc heroes I had along side him. They also painted up quite quickly and getting to use some more colourful skintones was fun as well.

Pict 948: Orc Trackers

Pict 949: Orc Trackers

Lastly I also painted up these three Orc Trackers. Even though Frodo and Sam are tracked by an Orc and an Uruk-Hai after escaping Cirith Ungol, the Trackers can not be taken as part of the legendary legion. But I'm sure, the miniatures will see some play in a pure Mordor force at some time in the future. The models themselves look a bit out of place with the rest of the Middle-earth range. But I find them endearing in an old school sort of way nonetheless.

Next up could be Orc Captains and Banners, but I will have to finish Shelob as well!