Blue's Boar Boy Battalion Bash!! Full army reveal and Challenger Wrap up post (1204 pts!)

 Well...here we are!  

This Challenge always seems so easy at the outset...and perhaps it remains that way for some of the competitors...but for me this year the challenge became...umm...more challenging as the months went on.  Like several others have stated I had much bigger plans at the beginning...I have an whole additional unit of converted savage boar boyz to add to this army that just didn't make it across the finish line with the rest of the herd.

Anyway...the point is that we made it!! Fuck yeah we MADE IT!! congrats to all to completed the task...

...and nothing but SCORN for those who fell by the way side! (I'm looking at you Street!) 😜

Well...now to the important stuff...

THE PICTURES!!

Obligatory Posed shot of yours truly...with the herd.

Pictures of the full army

Individual Unit Shots and Points Break down

Lvl. 20 Orc General mounted on a Boar with barding...and he travels with his standard bearer and trusted body guard (4-Snortas with barded boars).  (284pts)

Unit of 10-Snortas with spears, including Standard and Lvl 10-Hero (310pts)

 Unit of 10-Gruntas with hand weapons including Standard bearer and Lvl 10-Hero (330pts)

Unit of 10-Gruntas with Bows including standard and Lvl 10-Hero (280pts)

 Total Points: 1204pts.

It has been an honor and a pleasure to once again participate in the OWAC....the quality and quantity of work being done by the participants continues to exceed my expectations with every blog post I read.  Congrats to all...we really are all winners at the end of the day because we have more painted minis to use in our games.

Cheers,

Blue

P.S. Keep an eye on my personal blog for Army shots that include these boar boys and the swarm of Marauder Goblin Wolf Riders I painted in 2020.

Blue's Boar Boys Rank and File month 4 (last one!) (222 Points)

 This was a challenging month....many distraction and low motivation.  But it is done (-ish) and time to move on!

April will be my last Rank and File Month with 8 more Boar riders added to the growing force.  Essentially this finished the second and third units for my army, the first being the mounted archers discussed in the March post.

The 8 boar riders painted this month represent the last four for both the hand weapon unit and the Spear unit.  All 8 figures this month are straight-up Marauder Boar Riders straight from the mind of Trish Carden.  The only Odd-duck, is the standard bearer for the Spear unit that is basic conversion...the unmodified version of this figure will be in coming next post. They are mounted on Marauder Boars with a few of Clam's Boars added for some much needed variety.

Here are the 8 newly painted Marauder Boar Boys

The new Spears....

The new Hand Weapons...

 And here are shots of the two units they now complete.

 I'll have more individual shots in the future on my personal Blog...but I had to share this one with you.  This Boar Boy goes by the name Harrin Stephens...

 Here is the Points Break down

 Points:

• 4 Snortas w/spears (no shield)  100 pts
• 4 Gruntas w/hand weapon and Standard (no shield) 122 pts
  
• Total: 222 pts

Alright, enough for this month...bring on May...that's going to be my command section for the army.

Cheers,

Blue

Blue's Orc Boar Boys...Rank and File Month 3! (167 pts)

 Hi all,

Another Rank and File month for this month...the mounted WWAAAGGGHHH!!! grows yet more.

This month I have six new Boar Boys one of which is a standard bearer.  We have three from the hand weapon unit and three from the spear armed unit.  Sadly the package with the shields for these guys is still in transit so they are lacking for the moment. (I have not counted the shields in their points total)

All the riders this month are actual Marauder Boar Boys, sculpted by Trish Carden...except the standard bearer who is a converted Citadel infantry model. He came to me already cut (a little sloppily) to fit on a boar and he is a great figure so I'm going with it!  The Standard in this case is more of a totem of "da Iron 'ard Bull" or "ol' Nick" as the Ladz call him. 

Group shots

 Individual shots 

 

Points:

• 3 Snortas w/spears (no shield)  75 pts
• 3 Gruntas w/hand weapon and Standard (no shield) 92pts
  
• Total: 167 pts

Next Month I think I'll be back with one more even larger group of Rank and File before I turn to My Hero Month for May...and hopefully something special to wrap up the challenge in June!

Stay the course ladz!! we are half way through!!

 Cheers for now!!

Blue

Blue's Orc Boar Riders. ....In the beginning...(180 points)

Rank & File #1 

Hi all!

Blue here with my first monthly update for the current OWAC season.  As promised I started right in on my Horde of Orc Boar Riders and knocked out the first five.  

This group is a mix of Citadel and Marauder Orcs.  Two of the Citadel Orcs came to me in a lot of Boar riders...and they were already fused to their marauder boar mounts.  At first I considered taking them apart and using the boars for Marauder riders...but in the end I just made use of them as they are.  Third Citadel rider was designed to be one of the chariot drivers but I have promoted him to be a boar rider now.

The Marauder minis in this small group include one archer who is a "conversion" of an infantry model but I think it works well...and you will be see more of these in the future as this project continues.

Here are my five boar boys...this group consists of 4 Snortas and 1-10th Level Orc Hero on a boar for a total of 180 pts.

 I'm really looking forward to getting on with next months group ASAP.

Cheers for now!

Blue

Blue's Boar Boyz...Here we go again!!

 Hi All,

It's me Blue! ...how you doin'?!  Fucked up world we're livin' in eh? 

Well...in a world full of uncertainty, it is nice to have something constant and dependable...

...Thank the Maker for the OWAC!! 

After taking a season off I'm back for my third OWAC...and I'm chomping at the bit to get started.  

In the first OWAC I worked on a small army of Jess Godwin Wood Elves...and they turned out to be some of my all time favorite miniatures...something I never thought I'd say about sneaky elves...

For OWAC II (son of OWAC) I returned to my roots and worked on elements of my Puff and Slash Dwarf Army.  Again it was a hard slog but I came out the other end with a very nice little force that I was glad to get on the table.

I took a pass on OWAC III (OWAC strikes back) as my hobby priorities were in a different place at the start of 2020.  I was beginning to work toward a March 2020 deadline of hosting a WFB 3rd edition siege game at the Cold Wars gaming convention.  

...as you might imagine that convention did not end up happening...nor did any convention since! So...I missed out on OWAC III but I was spent the remainder of my Quarantime "training" for OWAC IV (OWAC rides again, again) by painting up masses and masses of Goblin wolf riders.

 ...yeah... yeah ...I get it...sorry...you're probably sick of hearing about it...

Anyway, for OWAC IV I will continuing to work toward my goal of a (nearly) entirely mounted Greenskin army...by Painting up a mass of Orc Boar Riders. For this force I will be focusing on the Marauder Boar Riders that were released in the 3rd edition.  There are a few minor conversions and few citadel orcs have snuck in as well...for boars I'll be using mostly Marauder boars, but I will also be mixing in a few of the Boars produced by Clam as part of his Ewal Dvergar range...(more on them in a future post).

BLUES OWAC IV BOAR BOYZ ARMY LIST

Note: in two instances I will be incorporating some previously painted Boar Boyz into the units I'm painting...they have not been included in the points values presented.

The Boar Rider Force will be led by a Lvl. 20 Orc General mounted on a Boar with barding...and he travels with his standard bearer and trusted body guard (4-Snortas).  (284pts)

Unit of 10-Snortas with spears, including Standard and Lvl 10-Hero (3 painted) (310pts)

Unit of 10-Gruntas with hand weapons including Standard and Lvl 10-Hero (330pts)

Unit of 10-Gruntas with Bows including standard and Lvl 10-Hero (2 painted) (280pts)

 Army Total: 1,204 pts

To this I will add a few special things if I'm able to fit them into the tight time schedule.

For offering I will be redoing the skin on this Goblin with the new recipe and sending him north of the boarder to Iannick.

Alright ya'll...lets do this!

Once more into the Breech my friends!!!

Cheers,

Blue

Blue's OWAC 2019 Wrap up Post...Dwarf Reinforcements

Hi all,

After wrapping up the painting of the last few figures, the hand gunners and swivel gun, I was anxious to get some group shots of all the figures that I have managed to paint during the course of this contest.

So I quickly set up some terrain and started gathering my lights, tripod and other assorted Photog equipment.  

...then I spent way too much time arranging...and re-arranging my units until I was happy with how they were presented. 

But here are the results!  
 
A sizable reinforcement to the Grand Army of Strausburg...a thriving trade city on the outer fringes of the Empire. Strausburg is unique in that its rich mountain setting and acceptance of Dwarf refugees from abandoned strongholds in the Worlds Edge Mountains have given it a nearly equal population of Dwarfs and Humans.  In the City the Dwarfs have adopted much of the Imperial fashion (Puff and Slash)...and the Grand Army has adopted the dwarfs love of (and proficiency with gunpowder weapons) and large blocks of sturdy Infantry.

The OWAC 2019 has provided me the opportunity to further expand and refine my Puff and Slash Dwarf Army (which is a component of the mixed race Grand Army)...This is my largest army and the one that I have been working on the longest...literally since the late 1980s...it was the Marauder Dwarf Pike Block that started me down this path to insanity when I was 14yo!

Full Army Shot!

Click to see FULL size

And Some Close ups...

First some much needed reinforcement to my missile troops.  In the past I have always used my Unit of Bugman's Brewers to fill this role...but they are still in their 1988 paint jobs and really fit better, stylistically with my Imperial dwarf Army, so I'm glad to be able to replace them with some more appropriate shooters. And to fill this role there are no better figures than the Marauder Dwarf Xbows...these are all really great figures with a lot of variation to work with.  I decided to build two units of 12...though I fell short of that mark for one unit.  Additionally I added a small 3-man Cannon and a Swivel Gun to my force.

My original plan had been to do one large unit of Xbows...but as I started to cleanup and prime the figures it became apparently to me that there were actually two different "styles" contained within the range.  Half the figures are very much Puff and Slash...while the others have simpler "uniforms" with less puff and slash and feathers.  With this in mind I separated out the figures of each style into two units and added some more figures to bulk them to 12 dwarfs each.  The first unit of Xbows is from Strausburg proper and has fully embraced the Puff and Slash style of dress.  The second unit are recruited from outlying areas that are a little more rustic and not as concerned about being "flashy".  I have the figures ready to expand both of these units to 14 eventually.  (Also note that each unit has a "converted" standard bearer)

As to the Cannon...it is a very old style gun that will also see service with my Bret Army...this crew will transition to the Marauder Organ gun (from whence it came) when I get it painted.

The swivel gun is one of those fantastic White Knight sculpts (now sold by TAG) and is a nice addition to the Marauder swivel gun.

Next is the center piece unit....the PIKES!! (and all the rest...) When I started this challenge I opted to paint a full complete units (like the Xbows) as well as paint some reinforcements for already painted units.  For this reason I painted just two Zweihanders and nine handgunners.  Since these are not complete units and would look odd photographed as individual groups I decided to add them onto the Pike Unit for the photos...

So here we have a 21 Dwarf strong unit of Pikes with 9 handgunners arranged as "sleeves" on either side of the Pike block (they are the "shot" in "Pike and Shot") and they are further protected by a Zweihander on each flank.  This makes for an impressive looking centerpiece unit.

the Pikes are all White Knight sculpts, the handgunners are all Marauder sculpts....as is the Zweihander on the right.  The Zweihander on the left is from the short lived and tough to find Runecast dwarf range.

Points Break Down:
21 Dwarf Pike Block:      381pts
12 Dwarf Xbows:             224pts
11 Dwarf Xbows:             209pts
9 Dwarf Handgunners:  126pts
2 Dwarf Zweihanders:     30pts
Swivel Gun:                        50pts
3-Man Cannon:                 69pts
ARMY TOTAL:              1089pts

So...I guess this is the end! We have survived another OWAC and we have great stuff to show for it.  Congrats to all who stuck with it and finsihed strong (to those in the field of bones...I have only contempt...) :)

Hats off to Iannick for doing the grunt work of keeping this challenge moving forward and coming to a successful conclusion.

Cheers for now!!

Blue

Blue’s June ‘19 OWAC Submission: to the sound of the guns! (176pts)

Well here we are!  It’s remarkable to me that I actually made it thru the OWAC once again!  I’m not gonna lie...it was Very touch and go there for awhile.  So I’m very happy to here at the finish line and getting ready to take some quality pics of my completed army.

So despite the threats to paint some more Xbow dwarfs....at the last minute I shifted gears and went with some thunderers instead.  I’ve had five painted up to my current standard and I really wanted to expand that to a functional unit...so I opted to work up 9 additional handgunners to grow my unit to a tasty 14 strong unit. These are all figures from the excellent MM16 Marauder Thunderers range...all excellent figures and, IMO, some of the best dwarf sculpts ever...

Additionally, I decided to add a second swivel gun to my army.  The first is the classic Marauder Dwarf Swivel Gun...this second is from White Knight’s excellent range of puff and slash dwarfs (now owned and sold by TAG) I think it looks superb with the hand gunners!

So here they are! The handgunners and their swivel gun back up!

And here they are in their combined units with other non-OWAC figures

Points breakdown for June
9 Dwarf Handgunners with light armor and arquebus 126 pts
1 Dwarf Swivel Gun and Crew 50 pts
Total: 176 pts...a little light this month but enough to put me over the 1000 pt total

Next up! Group shots!!

Cheers,

Blue

Blue’s Missile Support Part 2 (209 points)

Hi all,

Back with more missile support troops for my growing Empire Dwarf army.  Here we have another small unit of Dwarf Crossbow troops with standard, musician, and 5th lvl hero as leader.  Now, like the last unit, this was to be a unit of 12 total but as I started painting I realized that the figure I had chosen for the commander just wasn’t working for me so I had to remove that figure and the replacement didn’t arrive before the end of the month....so I ended up with a unit of 11 (for now).

Here they are...A tidy little unit with some very characterful sculpts in it.  This unit is decidedy more "puff and Slash" than the last unit...which were a bunch of bumpkins...these guys are the pride of the army with their gaudy uniforms.  The standard bearer is conversion of a MM15 Dwarf Warrior...It may be sacriligious to slice and dice such a nice figure but he didn't really fit with any of my units...and there is a definate lack of command section figures in the Marauder catalog...so it seemed a perfect chance to employ an underutilized figure.  The standard icon is a spare from one if the White Knight dwarf kits.

Points value:

• 10 dwarf crossbow men, light armor, Xbow plus standard and Musician 156pts
• 5th lvl hero, light armor, Xbow 53pts
• TOTAL: 209pts

I've really enjoyed painting both of these units of Dwarf Crossbows...and I think I'd like to expand both of them to 14 figures total...so I'll probably be adding some into my next months allotment.

Cheers,

Blue

Blue's April Missile Support Detachment (293pts)

Hi all,

Not much to discuss this month...it was a rough one but I'm finally wrapping it up and am very happy with the results.  These guys will represent a much needed boost to the missile support part of my Empire Dwarf Army....as I have found the thunderers to be less than satisfactory in the last few games I've had...

...so to rectify that situation here is a unit of 12 Dwarf Crossbows and a 3-man canon to back up those big pike blocks!

Point Breakdown:
11-Dwarf Crossbows with Light Armor, Xbow and Hand Weapon, incl Musician and Standard: 169 pts

1- 5th level Dwarf Hero, Light Armor, Xbow and Two-handed Axe: 55pts
1-3-Dwarf Canon and Crew: 69pts

Points Total for April: 293 pts

Here is the whole group:

Here is the Canon and crew solo:

Rear rank of Xbows:

And complete Xbow unit.:

See you next month with some more Crosbowmen and additional light artillery support (swivel gun).

Cheers,

Blue

Blue’s March Madness ...Forward the PIKES!!! (212 points)

Hi all,

After last months mulligan I had hoped to knock out a couple of batches of figures this month...but once again I found myself down to the wire cranking out the rest of my pike unit and a couple of spare Zweihanders to fill out my point allotment.  It was a near run thing with some unexpected work travel that took me away from my painting desk for the final weekend of the month.  But it all fell together at the end and I’m quite happy with the results.

Here is this months allotment... 12 pike dwarfs including standard and musician and two Zweihanders...which I run with hammer stats (+4 shock elites).

Here is a close up the Zweihanders

...solo shots of the pike reinforcements.

And the Pike unit as a whole! I’m very happy with how this unit has come together in the end.  While the figures are not quite as characterful as the original Marauder pike block it will be an excellent addition to my army.  Plus with all the helmets and breastplates in this unit I can run them with heavy armor...and with their slightly larger size than the smaller marauder pike men I can also opt to upgrade them to clansmen and make them a more formidable unit.

And here is a quick pic of the newly expanded Zweihander unit...now up to 14 members it is looking fine and is quite a force to be reckoned with on the table top. 

March OWAC Points break down:

12 Dwarf Clansmen with pikes +musician 182 pts.

2 Zweihanders 30 pts

March total 212 pts.

Next month I think I’m moving onto some fire support for these guys.

Cheers,

Blue