Legions of Isengard

These past two weeks, I spent some more time with the Legions of Isengard and built and painted a batch of Uruk-Hai Warriors.

Pict 893: Armoured Uruk-Hai

Pict 894: Uruk-Hai Captains (Conversions)

First up are the two commanders I put together to lead the warriors into battle against the Rohirrim. They are both converted – the armoured one is a simple headswap of the Uruk-Captain I painted I february with the Battle Games in Middle-earth conversion sprue supplying the helmeted head. The scout captain is a bit more involved and combines parts from both a cut up Uglúk and a cut up Lurtz that were left over after my Mauhur conversion. Even the head is Uglúk’s – I clipped it of and thought about using an imprint of the official scout captain’s helmet. But after removing most of the hair I liked the remaining top knot and put the head back on resculpting the leather around the shoulders and the back of the head.

Pict 895: Uruk-Hai Captains (Conversions)

Now since the captains wont win Saruman the keys to Edoras alone, I also needed some more warriors. And in fact I managed to paint up twenty Uruk warriors with shields in only one week! That’s not only great news for Saruman but also for my tally that now is back into the green numbers!

Pict 896: Uruk-Hai Warriors

As a big group, the models really hold up quite well considering they are from 18 years ago and some of the first plastics of the range and the individual poses are great for basic warriors. They had some very obtrusive moldlines however and getting the whole posse ready for priming took about a week’s worth of hobby time.

Pict 897: Uruk-Hai Warriors (WIP)

And because painting 22 Uruks at the same time, didn’t break my spirit, here are another 37 Warriors, this time armed with pikes. For now, they are still a bit shiny with only the #metal# applied, but they already make for an imposing phalanx.

The Uruks really are not painted to the highest standard I could achieve. But they do look great as a group and they are predominantly meant to be played with. After finishing the warriors with pikes, I’ll have to get myself a batch of crossbow wielding ones as well. With them, I pretty much have everything, I need to assault Helm’s Deep!

Pict 898: Otherworld Packbearer

And to get a bit of respite from Uruk-Hai, lastly here is the finished Packbearer by Otherworld Miniatures. Once again a beautifully characterful miniature that will be used in D&D or even Rangers of Shadowdeep.

Eclectic Painting for Dungeons and Dragons

So another quick post today showing what I painted when I needed a break from the Blacksmith Forge from last week. I focused on painting an eclectic bunch of miniatures mainly for Dungeons and Dragons, but I may use them with other systems such as Rangers of Shadowdeep as well.

Pict 891: Dungeons and Dragons Miniatures

Pict 892: Dungeons and Dragons Miniatures

First up I want to talk about two models on the right made by Otherworld Miniatures. They really have some amazingly characterful faces and were a joy to paint up. That Rat-chatcher has such a grat face while the Were-tiger simply has an amazing pose.
The guy secend from the left is another Critical Role miniature - the Gentleman. I debated whether to put a gloss varnish on his skin since he's supposed to be a Water Genasi. In the end I didn't because I could not imagine it turning out great.
And the last guy in the group is a Dwarf Fighter made by WizKids. I already painted the first iteration from that set pretty much two years ago to the day! This one is slightly converted - I added spikes to make him into a Battlerager - basicly a dwarf barbarian weaponising their armour.

Pict 893: Dungeons and Dragons Miniatures (WIP)

And here is what got started during the same time: Two more Reptus Skullbreakers by Reaper Miniatures to be played as Dragonborn. A Packbearer by Otherworld - again I love the face! And the last CR miniature from the Steamforged Games Vault - Caduceus Clay. This last one is not to far along since the colourscheme is quite different to what I usually paint.

Assembling the Party

I painted some more heroes to add to my D&D party and with those I'm almost have the most recent group ready. After that I also got to some more Haqqislam miniatures that might just get me started with the Dashat mercenaries.

Pict 731: Human Captain, Gnome Wizard

Pict 732: Schicksalspfade Captain

Pict 733: Schicksalspfade Captain

I once again painted a model from the game Schicksalspfade. I really had problems finding a simple fighter with a shild and a sword - I would have liked for him to have a cloak as well but for one I didn't find a suitable model in my usual miniature lines. And after looking through my several boxes of unpainted miniatures, I found this guy already in my possesion. I enjoyed doing the back of the shield (he isn't really holding it to protect himself?) and after I was at a stage where I would usually call a model done, I also went back in and did some darklining.

Pict 734: Gnome Illusionist / Thief

Pict 735: Gnome Illusionist / Thief

Similar to my search for a human fighter was quite vexed to get my hands on a (male) Gnome Wizard. This miniature by Otherworld is the only one that fit the bill to an extend. He is marked as an illusionist as well as a thief and for example the dagger in the right boot does not quite fit my image of a wizard. Nevertheless I liked to paint the blue cloak as a somewhat more expensive cloth. The gem in the left hand also fits very well, since the character represented by the miniature has the guild artisan (jeweler) background.

Pict 736: Hunzakut, Bahshi Bazouk

And here then are the next two Haqqislam miniatures. I pretty much got through all of the miniatures I had for the Hassassin sectorial and with these two I might dip into the mercenary Dashat Company. But I want to at least try and paint more of the vanilla Haqqislam / Qapu Khalqi ones before I go out to buy some more...

Pict 737: Female Mage (Darksword) WIP

Other than the other heroes, this miniature however was a quick find. I like to go browse the Darksword category Visions in Fantasy to look for characters and when I was on the lookout for a druid, this miniature was a natural fit. I inverted the colours of the cloak and tunic of the official paintjob since I like the contrast between the bright orange and the framing muted green but thought the orange cloak impractical when blending into the underbrush of a forest.

Kobolds Attack!

This week, Kobolds attack! I did something good for my tally of painted miniatures and quickly put some paint on these minute monsters.

Pict 693: Kobolds Attack!

Pict 694: Kobolds

Pict 695: Kobolds

These Kobolds are rather cute but I wasn't that happy with the sculpts (Nolzur's Marvelous Miniatures by Wizkids). The detail is somewhat washed out and that makes you guess sometimes what a particular detail is. I also didn't bother to paint the three versions of the same sculpts differently. I assume that the individual Kobolds will die fast enough in combat so that it wont matter. Nontheless I'm happy to have them in my arsenal to pester low level characters. I also like the little bright red spot I did on the heads that make them stand out and even cuter.

Pict 696: Female Gnome Fighter, Twiggy

Pict 697: Female Gnome Fighter, Twiggy

After that I finished the two gnomes I had started to balance out the Kobolds in the cosmic scales. Twiggy is a cool miniature, but I'm really in love with the female gnome fighter with the crossbow. Even if she should not be used as a hero, I will use her as a bandint or similar to ambush my heroes.

Pict 698: Goblintown Walkways and Plattform

Since I wanted to have some cool scenery for those Kobolds to ambush the Gnomes in the first picture, I also painted these Goblintown walkways and plattform. I had built and primed them at the tail end of last september and even tough they paint up super fast, they lay about on my todo pile for quite some time now.

Pict 699: Hassassin Fiday, Husam Spec-Ops

Pict 700: Hassassin Fiday, Husam Spec-Ops

I finished this Spec-Ops for a tournament last weekend but he seemed to suffer from new model syndrome and didn't really help me. The Fiday was then painted this last week to prepare myself for the next escalation league I'll be a part of and in which I'll be playing the Hassassin Bahram sectorial.

Pict 701: Victor (WIP)

And lastly here is a quick work in progress of the next Critical Role miniature: the insane blackpowder merchant Victor.

Again with the Haqqislam and D&D

These past weeks did not amount to much hobby time but now after two weeks without a post, I have to show something for myself: I painted some more Haqqislam miniatures as well as something for D&D.

Pict 687: Al Fasid, Djanbazan (Hacker), Ragik, Djanbazan (Conversion), Muyib, Hafza

Pict 688: Al Fasid, Djanbazan (Hacker), Ragik, Djanbazan (Conversion), Muyib, Hafza

With the completing our Infinity escalation campaign I painted some more miniatures, I wanted to try out in the last round and some that I just wanted to get some colour on. The old Al Fasid might get used as a Nahab with Boarding Shotgun until they release miniatures for them. The two Djanbazan might have to stand in as one with an HMG until I get myself the fitting miniaure - the profile is just to good in combination with the amount of smoke the rest of my lists can put out.

Pict 689: Kern, Orly

Pict 690: Kern, Orly

After my Critical Role Kickstarter miniatures arrived (more of them in the coming weeks!), I went ahead with these two resin Critical Role miniatures. Orly was quite fun since I got to look at lots of turtles for reference. Since Kern is a half-orc, I used the colourscheme that they established with Fjord. I like the two tones even if I don't really subscribe to green orcs in my D&D settings.

Pict 691: Haqqislam (WIP)

And here are even more Haqqislam miniatures that I started. The Fiday simply has to get some paint, becaus I have that one friend againt whom my old Fiday never managed to do something relevant. With the new miniature painted, I hope to remedy that!

Pict 692: Twiggy, female Gnome Fighter (WIP)

And to add to my growing pile of WIP miniatures, here are some more figures I want to use while playing D&D. Twiggy is again from Critical Role while the female gnome fighter is made by Otherworld Miniatures who really have a great selection of adventurers and monsters.