Théoden's Army taking to the fields of the Pelennor once more

This week I'm off to a large Middle Earth Strategy Battle Game tournament. And because I still needed some more Rohirrim, I finished the seven Riders I had started a few weeks back. I also finished the fourth Ghazi and then went on to some more miniatures that I might want to use at the tournament

Pict 644: Théoden's Army

Pict 645: Bolg's Army

Pict 646: Riders of Rohan

Pict 647: Riders of Rohan

These Riders still had to get their washes done and then were missing the highlights and detailing. The washes went on fast enough and I managed to blast through the highlights by batchpainting them one colour at a time. The first pictures here show the armies I took to the tournament: Théoden, Éomer, Dernhelm and Déorwine with a bunch of riders on the good side and Bolg, Yazneg, Fimul and Narzug with even more Hunter Orcs.
I also magnetised all of the bases with neodymium magnets so that I was able to easily transport them to the tournament and in between games.

Pict 648: Ghazi Muttawi'ah

Pict 649: Ghazi Muttawi'ah

This last Ghazi was pretty much done last week, but I didn't have it in me to finish her in time for the post. On monday I only had to do the bright armour and the black parts as well as the base and the glow. Finally I also marked the arc where the miniature is looking. Usually I like my bases to be a solid colour but for gaming purposes this makes things a lot easier. Thankfully all of that went pretty fast so that I could focus on the Rorhirrim the rest of the week.

Pict 650: Éowyn (Fall of the Witchking)

Pict 651: Éowyn (Fall of the Witchking)

Speaking of Rohan, here is an other Éowyn I painted up quickly. I wanted to play Dernhelm but the model was not released in time to paint up for this weekend. Thankfully the organiseres were kind enough to allow me to use the normal Éowyn on horseback as Dernhelm but I then wanted to have the correct model on foot. This one is from the 'Fate of the Witch-king' Diorama and fit the bill perfectly.

Pict 652: Royal Guard (WIP)

Lastly here is a WIP of a Rohan Royal Guard on foot. I wanted to finish this one because I played Déorwine, Chief of the King's Knights - his model is also not yet released. I used a converted Háma on horseback as the mounted version but that wouldn't do for the one on foot. Obviously he is missing the highlights at the time of writing but I hope to have him finished in time.

Haqqislam Tutorial and Conversions

Since we had the fourth installment of our escalation league last week, I painted some more models I wanted to use with the added rules and extra points this round. And since every Haqqislam player out there seems to sing their praise, I decided on some Ghazi Muttawi'ah and added in a Bashi Bazouk and a Hafza for good measure.

Pict 637: Hafza, Bashi Bazouk, Ghazi Muttawi'ah

Pict 638: Bashi Bazouk, Ghazi Muttawi'ah

Pict 639: Bashi Bazouk, Ghazi Muttawi'ah

These four Muttawi'ah presented a bit of a challenge since I was not sure how to distibute the colours I decided on with my Haqqislam. I went with the dark grey as the main colour, but kept the boots brighter.

Pict 640: Hafza (Tutorial)

Pict 641: Hafza

Pict 642: Hafza

With the Hafza I did something new: I took quite a few pictures while painting to document how I went about the different steps. I only put in a few here, but I wrote up the tutorial on the site where I put my Haqqislam recipie.

Pict 643: Hassassin Lasiq, Odalisque (Conversions)

Since I had trouble painting, I converted some miniatures for Infinity. So here are a second Lasiq with Viral Rifle (looking forward to playing them in a Haris Team) and an Odalisque with a Contender that I looted from the Spec-Ops. The Lasiq's new hand is from the Dark Eldar Hellions kit but I'm not sure whether it's an acutal hand or a trophy.

Thinking about my problems with the Haqqislam miniatures now, a week later, I am pretty sure the problem is that I am a bit burned out on the Haqqislam colours. I still have the fourth Ghazi from the box pretty much done but I couldn't find the inspiration to finish her. I hope I can paint myself out of this corner with something really different. I will have to get my Riders of Rohan done next week so I hope they will rejuice my painting mojo.

The Owlbear Family, tiny Azra'il and more

This week I made headway with two more miniatures for my Haqqislam, the Objective Markers from last week and more Rohirrim for the Middle-earth SBG and even more. First up however is a new miniature for D&D.

Pict 629: Owlbear Family

Pictt 630: Owlbear (GF9)

Pict 631: Owlbear (GF9)

Right now I am also in the process of touching up older miniatures and giving them a protective coat. This week I got around to the Owlbears from two years ago. Now since I already had the fitting colours all mixed up, I got to painting another fierce Owlbear mommy to the little family. This particular miniature was part of GaleForceNine's Monster Paint Set and is comparativly large in comparison with the ones made by Darksword. Of course the details are way better with the metal miniatures but I really like the pose of this newer one.

Pict 632: Azra'il

Pict 633: Azra'il

These two figures do not really have a use right now - they are the outdated Azra'il models from about 2008. I really liked the look of them when I first got into the game and bought them now as legacy pieces when I had the chance. I might use them as proxies of some kind but sometimes it's great to simply paint some nice miniatures even if you don't have a use for them.

Pict 634: Sauron Objective Markes

Pict 635: The Three Hunters Objective Markers

And here are the objective markers that I started last week. I pretty much went ahead with my plan on the evil markers and I really like the result. I also wanted to use wetblending on the markers with the leafs of Lorien but the green didn't really lend itself to it. I did put in a lighter green but after putting in the other details and the wash over it not much remains to be seen of it. Still, they will serve their purpose.

Pict 636: Riders of Rohan (WIP)

Lastly here is a WIP of seven more Riders of Rohan that I need to round out my army for the tournament at the end of the month. For now the base colours are down (sloppily) and I hope to finish them quickly with only the washes and the highlights to go.

Mordor Orc Heroes and even more Haqqislam

I finshed up Golfimbul and Grishnákh and then got onto some more Haqqislam figures. I'm looking to bolster my choices there before we play the next stage of our league. After that I started on some other fun projects:

Pict 623: Golfimbul mounted, Golfimbul on foot, Grishnákh

Pict 624: Golfimbul mounted, Golfimbul on foot, Grishnákh

I really enjoyed to paint these miniatures - the faces are especially expressive and I'm very happy with how I managed to paint the eyes. Golfimbul of course has no reference in the films so that Citadel had to imagine something - I think that's why he looks rather like a Warhammer model. Even the fact that he's overweight reminds me of Grom the Paunch, a classic Goblin character.

Pict 625: Tuareg Hacker, Hassassin Govad HMG, Tuareg Sniper

Pict 626: Tuareg Hacker, Hassassin Govad HMG, Tuareg Sniper

And here are the next few models of the next wave of my Haqqislam army. I got myself two Tuaregs since we will be adding the rules for hacking next game and the possibility of popping out of T/O Camo and 'surprise'-hack the opponent seemed quite nice! The Govad with the HMG on the other hand will privide some heavy firepower.
I also experimented a bit with the 'greenery' I used on the bases with the addition of a bit of lichen to get another spot of brightness on the otherways rather dark bases. I like the effect and might have to go back and put a bit of lichen down on the other Haqqislam miniatures.

Pict 627: Sauron Objective Markers (WIP)

Back to Middle-Earth I have a big tournament coming up at the end of April and will have to paint some more additions to one of the armies. Before that however I will also have to paint at least three markers that we have to bring in for some of the missions played. Being me I of course will paint a whole set of six for each of my two armies... (The seventh one  here is the original.) I started with the evil ones by wetbleding a fade from yellow to red for the flames around the eye of Sauron and then picked out the iris in black, Sauron's helmet in a dark metal and the area around the flames with a dark grey. To finish these, I might just put down a wash on the grey and the metal, paint the rim black and then call it a day!

Pict 628: Rath Modar (WIP)

Lastly I got to painting for role-playing games once more. This miniature represents Rath Modar, a Red Wizard from Wizard's Tyranny of Dragons story line. For now however I will use him to play a Fire-Cleric in a Pathfinder game. I'm looking forward to trying my hand at the flames in his left hand - maybe even some OSL? I'll have to see what I can do.

Chicken-Leg Remotes

Well, this week was not quite as productive as the last few. But I still managed to finish the paintjob on my two chicken-leg Haqqislam Remotes.

Pict 619: Fanous Remote, Shaytanyiah Remote

Pict 620: Fanous Remote, Shaytanyiah Remote

Pict 621: Fanous Remote, Rafiq Remote, Shihab Remote

I particularily like the look of these two because I had the opportunity for many glowy bits on red armour panels which makes for a nice contrast. I built them as a Shaytanyiah with the Missile Launcher and a Fanous with the Sniffer but nothing else. I magnatised the guns onto the Fanous, so that I can play them as a Rafiq with Rifle and Light Shotgun or a Shihab with the HMG. The latter will have proxed a little because I didn't want to magentise the 360° Visor as well - the conncetion seemed a little to small to attempt it.

Pict 622: Golfimbul mounted, Golfimbul on foot, Grishnákh (WIP)

With the sucess of the Mordor Orcs I also started on heroes to leed them: Grishnákh to also go with Merry and Pippin from earlier this year and Golfimbul mounted and on foot. The latter currently has no profile, but I imagine he might be a fun hero to play in Battle Companies.

Mordor Orcs and three Hassassins

I finished the Mordor Orcs this week and I managed to order the next wave of Infinity miniatures and threw some paint on the first few of them.

Pict 613: Mordor Orcs

Pict 614: Mordor Orcs

I like how these turned out and I especially enjoyed painting on the symbol of the burning eye onto the shields. I took inspiration from the Black Guard of Barad Dur's icon and reproduced it a bit smaller. It might be nice to have the eye on the other Orcs as well, but I didn't really know where to put them. Other than that I pretty much used my recipe. I used some more warpaints on the skintones and I have to say you really have to thin them a lot, but then they flow nicely.

Pict 615: Hassassin Barid, Hassassin Ragik, Hassassin Lasiq

Pict 616: Hassassin Barid, Hassassin Ragik, Hassassin Lasiq

And here are the next few Hassassins for my Haqqislam: a Barid, another Lasiq and another Ragik. The newer sculpt of the Ragik is really nice in comparison with the old one but I was not quite sure how to replicate the colours. The Lasiq was easier, because the scuplts are really similar and the Barid worked well enough.

Pict 617: Hassassin Lasiq and Naffaûn in Battle

Pict 618: Nasmat ready to revive the Haqqislam Troupe

I also got to use these three in play yesterday. We had our third league day and I managed one win and a loss - nevertheless I had some fun lighting enemies up with an Forward Observer and then throwing grenades at them.

"If you touch me ever again, you shall be cast yourself into the Fire of Doom."

This week I returned to Middle Earth to paint two characterful versions of Frodo Baggins and Samwise Gamgee each: Both in Orc Armour and the two of them at Sammath Naur, seemingly ready to get rid of the one ring once and for all.

Pict 607: Sammath Naur, the Cracks of Doom

Pict 608: Frodo and Sam (Mount Doom)

Pict 609: Frodo and Sam (Mount Doom)

I really enjoyed painting these - the dishevelled look about them, the expressions - all in all really great miniatures and quite a quick paintjob too! Gollum from the first picture was already done for quite some time and I love that the set is now complete and can go onto my shelf.

Pict 610: Frodo and Sam (Orc Armour)

Pict 611: Frodo and Sam (Orc Armour)

I had this version of Frodo with the basecolours almost done lying about for nigh on two years now. But as with the other pieces of the last weeks, inspiration struck while reading and I quickly painted both Frodo and Sam. I'm done now with the Return of the King and I'm looking forward to see what the appendices are going to inspire me to do.

Pict 612: Mordor Orc (WIP)

After finishing the Hobbits in Orc Armour, I wrote down the recipe and got to work on these Mordor Orcs. I don't really have any ambitions to play a Mordor Army any time soon, but now that the opportunity presented itself, I wanted to use the practice I got with the Hobbits. Obviously the Orcs are a bit different that Frodo and Sam but I got through the basecolours and the washes pretty quickly nonetheless.