Grimmhammers and a whole lot more done!

This last week was really quite productive. I managed to almost double my tally of painted mininatures from 34 up to 60! I finished the Grimhammers monday evening and had the time over the following evenings to get to some minions for my DnD game.

Pict 107: Grimhammers

So as advertised, here are the Grimhammers. I was rather happy to have them done - now I can field a full warbad with either young Dwalin or young Balin. I'm sure I will paint some more to play the scenarios from There And Back Again. The other heros for Thror's Army are primed in a box and I want to do right by them, so I will wait until inspiration strikes to start with them. Once I paint more Grimhammers I might try and highlight the metals individualy and not drybrush as I did here - I am not convinced that the drybrush saved me that much time.

Pict 108: Reptus Skullbasher

Pict 109: Reptus Skullbasher

Next up is one of the Reptus Skullbashers. I painted him up as a bronze dragonborn and I'm really happy with the bronze scales. The orange for the loin cloth was chosen by chance, but I do like the contrast with the rest of the miniature.

Pict 110: Skeletons (5. ed.) and Giant Spiders

Pict 111: Giant Snakes

And the last two pictures show the minions I painted for DnD. Most of my sunday was spent running a great group of friends through a dungeon filled with goblins. Sadly I overprepared (as ususal) and none of the above actually saw the tabletop.

Other than the painting I spent my hobby time with basing, filling gaps and priming the stuff I build during the last two weeks. With a Hobbit tournament at the end of april fast approaching, I will most likely focus on the rest of the Iron Hills and the Gundabad Army.

Death (Rat)tle and a lot of stuff built

So despite having a lot to do in real-life, I got a bit of painting and quite a bit of building done.

Pict 098: Skeleton Warriors and Undead Rats

So first up are three skeletons from Warhammer 5th edition and their pet rats. I really like the two undead rats; they are from Mantic and I think I got them with some eBay lot. I love the idea of a young wizard with a pet rat. One day the rat died. the wizard snapped and turned to necromancy to bring the rat back. As you can see two of the skeletons are a bit damaged, but I was to lazy to search for the missing parts or replacements. I figured that reanimated corpses should defend themselves without the use of a shield. And if not you can always raise more!
The skeletons will be the start of a Death AoS army (so that I have one from every great alliance) but I don't know what I'd run these rats as. Maybe they will only be markers. Charactefull models nonetheless.

Pict 099: Giant Rats

Next up are more rats. This time they are alive at least. The miniatues from 1998 still hold quite the char, I'd only wish they had different poses. I used different colours for every one at least whilst highlighting. Since I mainly used drybrushing for that, they were painted in one evening while working on some other painting projects.

Pict 100: Luna Wolves Tactical Marine Commanders

Next are some pictures of the miniatures I built this week. Above are the Command Marines for my Luna Wolves Tactical Squads. I like having 20 Marines in a squad for a change and it fits the lore of the Luna Wolves, so that's what I'm doing for my troops choices. What's missing with nearly all of the models I built is the Green Stuff work and bending under some hot water as you can see with the vexilla on the right.

Pict 101: Iron Hill Goat Rider Dismounts

Pict 102: Iron Hills / Gundabad Objective Markers

Here are the last Iron Hills Dwarfs I will build for this batch. I might add the second Command pack later in the year, because that Banner looks amazing, but we'll see. The other picture shows objective markers I made from the left over shields of the guys above. Since I will use them as dismounts for my Goat Riders they wont need the shields. I also added Gundabad Berserker weapons on some of the bases, so that I will be able to use them for either my Iron Hills or my Gundabad army.

Pict 103: Gundabad Ogres

Pict 104: Gundabad Berserkers

Pict 105: Hunter Orcs

Speaking of Gundabad, here are the Ogres, the Berserkers, and some Hunter Orcs. I bought the hunter orcs to bolster my nubers with the Gundabads beacuse the Ogres and Berserkers are quite expensive pointswise so that the force will be broken quite fast. I had some practice games on satuday and was not really to happy with them. It might just be that painted miniature perform better, but nevertheless there will be some tweaking with the list. I'm eyeing the Goblin Mercenaries and the War Bats but there are no models released by Forge World yet. But I will do some testing with the Goblintown Goblins that I have, to see wether or not they would work.
The bases are just made out of some cardboard that I cut to shape. I will paint them up like the floor in Dol Guldur and add some fallen leaves. I might experiment with snow as a contrast, but I'm not sure yet.

Pict: Skin Wolves

Andd the last picture of the day shows three Skin Wolves. I love the miniatures Forge World produced here and I was rather surprised by their size. They come with 60mm bases and fill them well but with enough space to fancy them up a bit. I'm not sure how I will do that, since I'm not even sure what army they are going to be a part of.

The Iron Hills Cavallry arrives (Dwarfs riding Goats!)

So this week was not as succesful for my painting as I only managd to drybrush leadbelcher on the Grimhammers. I wont bother taking a picture because the is hardly a difference to the picture form last week. But as I expected I was distracted by the order that arrived from Forge World.

Pict 093: The Forge World Order

Pict 094: A Bunch of Resin

So here is a picture of all the resin goodness; first still in packaging, second everithing unpacked and ready for a soapy bath. Once everything was scrubbed down with a toothbrush and some dishsoap water, I started building.

Pict 095: Iron Hills Captain and Banner Bearer

Pict 096: Iron Hills Goat Riders

At first I straggled a bit with the Iron Hills Command pack. While the miniatures are amazing, I had to once again get to grips with my super glue. And once I got to the Goat Riders everything was in full swing. They went together like a dream - almost no moldlines, only a little bit under the hindlegs. I will have to sillin some gaps that cant be avioded but I can't strain enough haw amazing these miniatures are! I really looking forward to getting some paint on them and ger them on the tabletop.

Pict 097: Reptus Skullbreakers (Conversions)

Finally I will have to add three more miniatures onto the pile of miniature bought - I got myself three Reptus Skullbreakers from Reaper and converted them a bit to give a litte variety to weapons. My Dungeons and Dragons party got reinforcements in form of a Dragonborn Warlock. I look forward to test those eldritch powers against my minions!

The Army of the Iron Hills (and some of their Allies)

So this week I can finally present you the first stage of my Iron Hills army completed. With Dáin, a Ballista and 12 warriors I have about 400 points playable.

Pict 079: The Iron Hills Army (Start of March)

The only miniatures I had to finish this week for the completion of the army were Dáin Ironfoot, both on foot and mounted. This I achieved with the painting time in the evenings this week - the mounted model just in time on the friday because I had more games with the army lined up on saturday.

Pict 080: Dáin Ironfoot

Pict 081: Dáin Ironfoot

Pict 082: Dáin Ironfoot

Pict 083: Dáin Ironfoot

I'm rather happy that I finished Dáin - not only is he the leader of my army and the last miniature to complete the first 400 points. He is also the last miniature I had to paint to finish up all the miniatures I bought with my last order from Forge World - so now I'm ready for the next! It should early next week and I'm looking forward to start work on some Goatriders to build up my army to 500 points, ready to fight in tournaments!

Pict 084: Dáin Ironfoot mounted on Warboar

Pict 085: Dáin Ironfoot mounted on Warboar

Pict 086: Dáin Ironfoot mounted on Warboar

Pict 087: Dáin Ironfoot mounted on Warboar

As I said I played some games on saturday. We agreed on 500 points to get a grip on our armies for a tournament in late april. Since only 400 points of Iron Hills were painted, I had to ally in something. I toyed with the idea of using Thranduil, King of Mirkwood for a Battle of the five Armies theme (more on that later) but settled on Young Balin and Young Dwalin for a Battle of Azanulbizar army. Next up are a picture of my and my opponents army ready for battle.

Pict 088: Iron Hills Army with Young Balin and Young Dwalin

Pict 089: Army of Spiders with the Spiderqueen and Drûzhag

Since I planned to ally in Thranduil, I painted him up on wednesday and thursday evening. I really like the scuplt; my only complaint is the sword - even after several bending attempts under hot water, it still is a little bend away from the miniature. But fortunately that's only noticable when viewed directly from the top.

Pict 090: Thranduil. King of Mirkwood

Pict 091: Thranduil, King of Mirkwood

While tossing around ideas for forces that would ally with the Iron Hills, I not only had the young dwarfs in mind, but also the warriors that were present at the battle of Azanulbizar. Thus I bought a box of Grimhammers on a whim and already started to paint them.

Pict 092: Grimhammers (WIP)

I do like the poses and the fact that they are mostly metal because that means they paint up rather quickly. Everything you see on the picutre above was done on saturday evening and sunday morning. The basecoats are down and everything is washed. What's left to do is highlighting and picking out some details. I can see me do this on monday and tuesday evening, but we'll see what the next week brings (I might get distracted by the order from Forge World).

The Luna Wolves Legion Champion

So this week was rather good painting wise - I got to paint a little bit almost every evening and had a great tuesday afternoon paining session with a friend.

Pict 068: Luna Wolves Legion Champion

Pict 069: Luna Wolves Legion Champion

Pict 070: Luna Wolves Legion Champion

Pict 071: Luna Wolves Legion Champion

So here's the first thing I got done this week: my Luna Wolves Legion Champion. I just love the model and since he came in a pack with the Master of Signals I just had to have it. I do like the look of the blade that comes with the model but what's better than a giant chainsword? The hardest part of this miniature was to get the transfer into the space on the left shoulder pad. Once I get around to paint on the red markings onto all of the army I'll be sure to put some onto the heavy chainblade. I will only have to make sure that they don't look to much like White Scars.

Pict 072: Luna Wolves Tactical Marine

Pict 073: Luna Wolves Tactical Marine

Other than thae Legion Champion I also finished the second Tactical Marine. Pretty much the same as with the first one. I really like the faceplate on this one and standing together the white Marines do look rather nice. I very much look forward to having the Tactical Squad finished and taking a group photo.

Pict 074: Gor and Bestigor

Next up are the Gor and the Bestigor, that I had promised for the previous sunday. I added a little bit of blood onto the off hand weapon of the normal Gor - with the next batch I even might try and put some drops onto the base.

Pict 075: Bestigor and Gor (WIP)

Speaking of them: here is a picture of the next two Beastmen I just today got my hands on. I hope to finish the ten from the box, so that I can call this litte project done and move onto some more miniatures, that I want for my DnD game. The next project is already on its way from Forge World but more on that later.

Pict 076: Dáin (WIP 2)

Pict 077: Dáin on Warboar (WIP 2)

Pict 078: Luna Wolves Tactical Marine (WIP)

The last three pictures for today show what I am working on at the moment besides the Beastmen. I already showed Dáin last week and not to much was done on him. At least I finished all the basecoats and the washes and I also have drybrushed his furcoat. As I've said on the one hand I want to take my time with him, on the other hand I want to finish up all the miniatures from the last shipment from Forge World before the next arrives and Dáin would be the last two. With the Goatrider out this weekend I had to get myself some of them. As with my next DnD project they are on their way from Forge World but have not yet arrived. I may do an extra post once they arrive to show all the resin goodies I got for myself.
The last picture is just an other Luna Wolves Tactical Marine. He's just before the shading stage and if I'm lucky I might get to that today. In one of my last postings I complained about the many layers of light grey and white it takes to achive to Luna Wolves armour, but right now I'm rather enjoying the meditative exercise. Let's hope it stayes that way throughout the year!

The Iron Hills are almost ready for War (and yet they already went there)

As I promised last week, I finished the remaining five Iron Hills Warriors for my Iron Hills Army and I started work on Dáin. I did not however finish the Gors I started last week. Instead of paining I spent my sunday afternoon playing the Hobbit SBG with the almost painted Iron Hills Army.

Pict 062: Iron Hills Warriors

Here is a group picture of the five Iron Hills Warriors I painted this week and the one I painted last week. With this first warband done, only Dáin is missing to lead the 400 point army.

Pict 063: Dáin (WIP)

Pict 064: Dáin on Warboar (WIP)

And here are two work in progess pictures of Dáin. As of yet I pretty much have the main colours down. I will have to touch up some places like the handle of Dáin's hammer and his beard jewelry. I already started with the washes on his hammer - at first I was unsure how a red hammer would look. I decied to try and make the red not a solid colour but try and make it a metallic red. To achive this I used Carrobourg Crimson on the parts that will be red. I think it looks good, but I don't know how I will highlight this part, but that will come in time.

As mentioned in the beginning, I did play some games with the Iron Hills army consisting of Dáin on his Boar, eleven Warriors and the Ballista with an aditional crew member.
The first game was against a dark denizens of Mirkwood army with plenty of giant spidders, two Mirkwood spiders some Fellwargs lead by the Spiderquenn. Of course with Dáin only partially pained, he did not do to well and was swiftly eaten by the Spiderqueen. Without their leader the remaining Iron Hills dwarfs were overwhelmed by the giant spiders; the Ballista took of one wound each of four siders and a crewmember managed to slay one, but other than that it really was a points sink. Thanks to my opponent who took the next three pictures. The first one shows the situation before the lines clashed, in the second the lines have clashed and Dáin is just a turn away from death by spiderfang. The last picture is the end of the game - not to many dwarfes left...

Pict 065: Iron Hills Dwarfs vs. Dark Denizens of Mirkwood

Pict 066: Iron Hills Dwarfs vs. Dark Denizens of Mirkwood

Pict 067: Iron Hills Dwarfs vs. Dark Denizens of Mirkwood

In the second game I faced a Moria goblin horde lead by Durbúrz, a shaman with some prowlers and two marauders sprinkled in. Here the Ballista could capitalize on the closly packed goblins and killed seven of them even before the lines clashed. Dáin did his part and in the end I could eke out a draw.
For the third game we decided to test the Iron Hills against a Galadhrim army lead by Haldir, Rúmil and a stormcaller. The scenario was reconnoiter and with the short dwarf legs I didn't fancy my chances. My opponent spread out his elves to minimize the damage the Ballista could do and in fact it didn't do to much. In the end it even managed to kill two woodelf warriors in close combat to prevent them from getting of my board edge. And with breaking the opposing army, not being broken myself and killing the leader Rúmil, I surprisingly managed to win, since only one woodelf left the board!

To reflect a little bit on how the army played: I really liked how surviveable the dwarfs are. Only the mobile two attack spiders didn't have that much of a problem - even heros such as Rúmil and Haldir stuggled to kill lone Warriors even when they could not make use of their shieldwall. Speaking of the shieldwall: I foud it rather difficult to make use of this rule once the lines clashed. I hope to improve that with more practice (especially when backing away from a lost fight), but I think it will always be hard to get the defencebonus. I really like the Ballista as miniature, but agaisnt anything other than a battleline of shield/spear warriors it is not that effective. It only hits on a 4+, so only about half of every shot will hit (reroll ones is nice), even before rolling on the scatter table. I didn't have a engineercaptain with it and so every three I rolled to hit hurt. But then again: the captain is almost as expensive as a second Ballista. With only Dáin as the hero there were only three might points to go around each game, which is unfamiliar to me. Becoming used to that will come with practice. But I really want to get one or two Iron Hills Captains; they will help with their might points and with their tactical awareness special rule.