Colore ton Monde: March, the Green Lady

I'm on a roll thi month, three minis done and posted, and more to follow. Here's my mini for this month's Colore ton monde painting challenge, which was to paint something green, for spring.

This is a Reaper mini, and was bought to act as a sorceress for my fledgling Bretonnian army. It is a beautiful Werner Klocke mini, and deserves a better paint job than this one, but it will do for now. I'd like to go over the eyes again, as the close up of the photography as always makes them look scrappy.

 

Traditional Oldhammer Goblin Green for the base, but with some very modern flowers, in-keeping with the spring theme.

Warhammer Fantasy: Wood Elf Wardancers

Continuing this week's theme of showing off my early works, I stay with the Wood Elves again, but thsi time we have some Wardancers. The Wood Elf Wardancers were without a doubt my favourite unit for any Warhammer Army. Maybe of any army of any system, well at least back in the 90s they were. I was also a big fan of their incarnation in WFRP, and had a couple of Elven characters I wanted to advance to this career, but unfortunately that never transpired.
These particular Wardancers were painted to go more with a High Elf Army, as a Sea Elf allied contingent. The Wardancers in this case were the first over the side in a landing party or boarding action. The marines of the Warhammer world.

Three of these guys have shields, all done with freehand. Something which I rarely attempt these days, but I think I should start looking at again, as some of these are alright. I especially like the eye.

Compare these to my more recent attempt at painting a wardancer, and you can see how my painting has evolved over time.

There's at least one more post of Wood Elves to follow, at least of my painted minis from back in the 90s. There are a bunch more Oldhammer minis that I brought back, but none are painted. Some will be though, as these old minis are really working as an inspiration to me to get me going on them.

As to the old painted minis, I don't know yet if I want to repaint them, but they will certainly be rebased. Maybe I'll just go over them with the odd ink or two, just to help them pop a little more.

Warhammer Fantasy, Some Thoughts

After a gap of about 20 years, I played a game of Warhammer fantasy battle last week.

There has been talk of playing 500 point games, as they fit perfectly within the time available to us on a Tuesday evening, and of course do not need many figures, although most of the palyers have many more points than that available to them as we are players of a certain age who grew up with GW products. I do of course have a similar amount of figures, just not at my immediate disposal, and a recent trip to the old country didn't leave me with enough free time in my parents attic to fill a suitcase with WFB armies. This is one of the reasons I picked Bretonnians. It meant I could collect an army from what I found in the bits box at the store (started off with the big bag o' archers I found a while ago), combined with some Perry War of the Roses infantry and some nice Reaper minis.

At the risk of becoming a battle report without pictures (I didn't plan to write a report, so I didn't take any pics), I write for your enjoyment of my thoughts on the battle, and why it seemed to go so badly for me. It also may become a comparison betweeen the current edition of WFB (what is it,6th, 8th?), and my hazy recollections of 3rd Ed.

The basis of the game has of course not changed, and this is of course intentional on the part of GW. They have kept essentially the same stat line, and basic rules of Hit, Wound and Save. There are of course changes to the minutiae, and maybe even some of the larger parts of the game that I have forgotten from 3rd ed, or did not come up in our game. The magic system is one place that seems to have changed the most, and seems more streamlined from 3rd ed. I do indeed recall one of the reasons I dropped WFB with the advent of 4th ed was the changes to the magic system (and I lost interest in the minis that were released with that edition), but that does not mean the system was perfect before. I do recall there being the exceedingly broken Vortex of Chaos, and even worse Vorpal Hurricane of Chaos, which, if unleashed would rip an army in two. Of course this was magnified by the exceedingly cheap points cost of Goblin mages, increasing their chances to have it by spamming mages, still, I digress.
In the game last week, I lost badly. The main problem I seem to have had was my army selection. It seems Bretonnians suffer particularly badly at the 500pts level due to their required picks of a paladin and a banner (which we dropped), and having to have knights as the base unit. This plus a mage of level 2 only left me with enough points to field a basic unit of archers and pikemen. At the 500 point level you really need bodies on the table, and I didn't have those. My opponent took High elves, and his only character was a mage attached to a unit of spearmen, this meant his base troops were more than enough to deal with my peasant horde, and my Paladin is but one man to stem the tide.
The last issue I had was underestimating the charge distance of the High Elf Infantry.  I thought I was safe and well placed to charge him next turn, but no, random charge distances of 2D6 plus Move was more than enough to plug the gap. I think this was more of an issue of me thinking in Warmachine distances rather than 3rd ed, as I have no recollection of how charges were handled there.

How can I fix this? Well, I don't have to take the peasant force that I did. For 500 points, we don't need to take 2 units of Core forces, just 25% of the total, so my unit of Knights alone cover this. What would I then take? Well, with the compulsory Paladin, and tactically compulsory mage, I really don't have too many options. I could fill the field with archers, stand behind the stakes and shoot the hell out of the opponent. Kind of boring, but it may be the only way.

So, in the end, I was stuck with a list that was uncompetitive in two ways, one because of the choices I made, and two because the Bretonnian list seems to be limited in the choices it can make much more at this level than it may be at higher points games. There was also the theory that since the army book for Bretonnians was older than the rest, it was not as balanced as the newer books, or at least not in balance with the newer force books. This is one of the main issues I have with GW, and their games, and what has put me off from playing their games in the last 20 years (that along with their prices and business practices, but you may note, GW have not profited directly from my purchases).

Still, I would like to try again, and may do so this week. Afterall, who really gives up on their first love?

Sir Guy, the Red

The perfect mini for the "Paint it red" challenge is obviously this guy (pun intended). Anyway, he was mostly finished last week, but a painting session last night let me get him based (in a very simple manner, there's not much space to play with on a 20mm base) ready for use in a Bretonnian army (at some point).

I'm way ahead of schedule for this month's challenge, but I hope to get a couple of better pics before I sent off my entry.

I also all but finished off the section of 91st Highlanders, with only the tartan to do (what a surprise), so I hope to post them soon. They're good practice for the coming Black Watch section.

Bretonnian Army I

As a side project, I have been raking bits boxes and bothering friends across the city to pull together a 500 point Bretonnian army. The basis of this army, is of course the bag o' archers, with the addition of a bunch of knights, and billmen. Of course GW is evil, and therefore I have no intention of giving them any money at all. To this end, I have ordered and received a box of Perry plastics, and am awaiting a Reaper Sorceress to fill things out.

I have also decided to make my own stakes for my archers, which, let's face it, is hardly the hardest of modelling to do. Literally, take some wooden sticks bought in the dollar store, and attack them with a craft knife. Child play (not that children these days are allowed to play with craft knives). All that remains is some polyfilla mud and a lick of paint and away we go!


Spikey!

I've also put together my first couple of units. The first unit of archers I based on round bases, so I could field them as skirmishers, and use the movement tray I have that fits round bases. The scheme for this unit, and likely the second unit (for whom the stakes will be used) is taken from the uniform of the Burgundians. This also allows me to use them in historical battles, if I ever manage that. I had initially planned for the skirmish unit to be painted in Sherwood green, and consist of a certain English terrorist and his happy compatriots, but that plan may have to await a further unit (which obviously would never fit in a 500 point army, would it?). Anyway, I'm going to burn through the Delvan Mud at this rate, and will have to buy into another wash system soon.

The finished product. Well, Table-top quality anyway. An appropriate leader has yet to be found and painted.

The mascot

Then on to the Men-at-Arms. Unit of 10, ready to be painted. There will be a movement tray of some kind made for these guys before too long, as there will for the second unit of archers. I really like these minis, they're full of character and possibilities. Perry' plastics really are great value for money, and will of course fill the bits box with all the extras included.

Lastly, a command group for the second unit of archers. Including a musician rather than a standard bearer I think, it fits better with a unit of archers.

All that remains is to paint this lot, and put together the knights. I'll be going through my historicals to pull out a Paladin to lead the unit of knights, and the army. I'm sure there are some options there I can use.

Oldie's Hobby Night

I went along to my FLGS last night, for Oldies Hobby Night. The first time I've made it along, although I have been planning to for a while. A good evening, and good to catch up with people I haven't seen for a while. I didn't manage to find an opponent for Dystopian legions, but I did get a 150 point game of Infinity in. This is only the second time my Highlanders have come out to play, and they managed a much better showing than the last time. A fun game, and an impetus to get on and paint these guys. They've moved on down in the paint queue, and nothing has been added since I first put brush to metal, and that was a while ago. There's no reason not to finish them though, as I only have 8-9 minis. Well, except for all the tartan...

Another fun game that was being played was WFB at 500 points This is a fast and simple way to play the game, although it may lack some of the straegic aspect of longer games. This does give me a use for my Bretonnian archers. All I need to do is scrape together another 2 units and a hero or two, but that should be easy enough. Especially since  saw some knights in the bits box at my FLGS. Full army, no cost, just the way I like it! It seems, from trolling the web, and not buying any books, that a 500 pt Bretonnian list entails a champion, a unit of knights, a unit of men-at-arms, and a bunch of peasant archers (with the odd character mini/musician here or there). Maybe swapping out the unit of men-at-arms for another unit of knights. Seems simple enough and attainable. 

First step, go paint my bag-o-archers. I think I'll go with a historical palette anyway, that way they can be used for other games too.

Otherwise, in the same bits box are a few woodelves, which I could put together with these guys. Afterall, 2 armies at that points range is never going to break the bank. Right?

Oldhammer find

I take a break from what seems to be turning into Dystopian legions January, to bring you this cross post from my RPG blog, as it may be of some interest to the Oldhammerians who sometimes visit.

I know the word Oldhammer has been coined for 3rd ed WFB, but I think it works ust as well for the GW version of WFRP. In a trip to an LGS, I found a batch of first edition hard back WFRP supplements. Mostly for the Enemy Within Capaign. Commonly thought of as one of the best campaigns for any RPG.

WFRP was one of the first RPGs I really got into, and I had played in, bought and run the campaign as it was sold in the early 90s in the guise of Warhammer Adventure and Warhammer City of Chaos. I had never got round to either buying or running the latter parts of the campaign.

The Books I found today were Power Behind the Throne (1988), Something Rotten in Kislev (1988) from the Enemy Within, Warhammer City (1987) and The Restless Dead (1986). The only issue seems to be a missing map from Warhammer City, and from SRiK, but since either will likely be available online, I don't see that as a big issue. All the other handouts still seem to be in place. At $8 each, they were a bargain, even if I never play with them, and sell them on at some point. There was one other old WFRP book that was there that I didn't pick up, the Castle Drachenfels adventure supplement. I own this already, (although my copy is in the UK), and I was never really taken with it as an adventure. It was much more in the realms of a dungeon bash, with each room being weird and whacky. I think it was written based on a Warhammer Jack Yeovil novel, but I have never read the novel, so most of the references went straight over my head. I left that one on the shelf.

I was particularly excited to find The Restless Dead. This is a module I have heard lots about, but never seen. It contains such classic adventures as Rough Night at the Three Feathers, The Haunting Horror, and Grapes of Wrath. I'll be putting these guys away for future use for sure, although whether i bought them to play with, ot it's the collector in me that has come out to play, I'm not entirely sure.

It is a real treat to flick through these guys and look at all the old artwork, adventure details and PCs supplied with the campaign. Brings back some great memories.

Cross Posted to my other blog.

Wood Elves

Golden Gobbo from here

Inspired by the host of Oldhammer blogs I have on my Blog roll, and a sale at a LGS, I picked up a couple of GW blisters today. Both Wood Elves.the first, a pair of Wood Elf Wardancers, and the second a pair of Wood Elf scouts. My intention is to chose one (probably a Wardancer) and paint  it up for entry into the Golden Gobbos contest, although setting stats and background for him may not come too easily, as I'm rather out of touch on the actual rules for 3rd Ed Warhammer.

Back in the day, I always had a hankering for a Wood Elf army, but the way the club I was a part of played, I ended up with Empire (long boring story). That did not mean I did not collect Wood Elves, in fact I had a full unit of Wardancers painted up (although they were nominally a Sea Elf unit for a High Elf army). One of the only full units I have ever painted. It would be interesting to compare these guys when finished to the original unit I have, if I remember to dig them out on a return trip to Scotland.

Wardancers, circa 1995

What is with the hair on the guy on the right?

Scouts, Marauder minis circa 1992-3

More big hair