Paul's Wood Elves of Avelorn - Rank and File Month 4: There's Woodies in the trees! (696 pts)

 

My final rank and file month is dedicated to my very dear friend, Shaun (previously seen commanding Undead alongside Spawn #1). We've known each other for over 30 years and Warhammer and RPGs and all things nerdy have underpinned our friendship all that time. Indeed it was Shaun who pointed me towards the Oldhammer community when I picked up my brushes again back in 2013/14, which has proved to be a huge boost to my painting and hobbying in all sorts of ways!

Wood Elves always make me think of Shaun and these sculpts have particular resonance for various reasons, so this is by way of a thank you to him as well as a trip down memory lane.

First up are Skarloc's Archers, a "Regiment of Renown" in Warhammer lore going back to the 1980s. Every single one of them is a work of art. I love these sculpts, some of Jes Goodwin's best work of the period in my view. I love the storied history of the unit, the crazy mix of characters who nearly obscure the man himself, the detail on the 'basic' archers, and the rich possibilities and flexibility all of that brings to using the unit in games or RPGs.

People often talk about big miniatures like giants and dragons, or special characters being intimidating and needing a bit of a painting run up before they can do them justice. I think I felt a bit like that about these models. That real need to do them justice and to pay proper homage to the (imho) golden era of old school gaming from whence they hail.

The description on the box includes this line on colour scheme: "The scouts wear leather surcoats over their chain mail, in various shades of green and brown for camouflage"

I already had the idea that as experienced Scouts I wanted them to look like an elite military unit, so I turned to a range of military uniform colours like US Olive Drab, English Uniform, Steel Legion Drab etc. and kept everything fairly muted bringing in Dryad Bark for a more matte finish to the leather boots etc. I also brought in Vallejo Hull Red as a connection to the core units of the army, but also brought in more blues and yellows, which should allow them to fit in with other elements still to come.

I also opted for matte grey on the chain mail, with the idea that shiny metal should be kept to a minimum when hiding in forests. The only problem was that by the time I made that decision I had already used metallic paints on the exposed weapons for some of the heroes. One of the pit falls of batch painting across units when using up paint mixes during the OWAC, but in true OWAC style there is no time to look back, only to keep painting! 

Here we have the man himself, Skarloc 'The Hooded One' aka 'Captain' on the flyer. I can hear Clannad just by looking at him and I'm pretty sure the shade of Michael Praed lurks under that hood. I think he would also make a great (Dever/Chalk) Lone Wolf.  It's a brilliantly brooding sculpt, but the thing that always puzzled me is that he isn't featured that prominently in the box art, as a result a younger me thought that the archer with the patch over one eye was Skarloc. This idea has always sort of stuck with me, and as a result I have promoted the eye-patch archer to unit leader when hooded Skarloc is busy with his other 1980s side projects.

Next up is "Araflane Warskald" the unit musician. Another great sculpt and the use of animal skin makes him seem more celtic and savage than later WE sculpts, which is something I leant into with this unit alongside the military uniform colours.

In a previous post I hinted that another 80's influence might be creeping in to my WE colour schemes, but now wasn't the time for double denim. Rather the woodland fashion question for May was one of Plaid vs Tartan vs Not Getting Carried Away!! OK... maybe a just a little denim to bring that blue back in.

Two of my favourite characters/sculpts from this regiment got special treatment and I tried my hand at Plaid/tartan patterns for the first time. Not entirely successful, but I'm happy enough and I learnt it is best to keep things simple. Getting the flow of the lines seems more important than the complexity of the pattern.  

"Kaia Stormwitch" is described as both Standard Bearer and/or Mage in the unit description and I love this versatility in the sculpt. In a more direct nod to the core units of the army I've made the heart and vines on the staff/standard the same dark red and green combo.

Do ask her which army surplus stores she shops in. Don't ask her if it's real animal skin. 

"Glam, the Laughing Warrior" aka Wardancer/Champion, probably needs his skin tone lightening a touch, although I'm equally tempted to go back and give him some suitably Bowie-esque face paint. Tartan trousers were already a stretch on this model though, and I didn't want to ruin the Slaine type vibe of the sculpt which I think the darker tone helps with.

It doesn't help with photos though. Sorry about that.

Not officially a member of Scarlok's Archers, this is the falconer from the Wood Elf  War Wain, who I think makes a good mage (for when rules don't allow your standard bearer to also be a mage - lame!). The blue and slight touches of yellow are also a nod to another emerging faction within my Wood Elves, while hopefully not taking him too far away from the rest of Scarlok's Archers.

I like the fact he has a falcon on his arm, and wish there were more Beastmaster options in WFB 4/5. I think Wood Elves lost something in not being able to have more animals in their forces, but the presence of the falcon marks him out from the standard Wood Elf and brings us on to the subject of "Multi-purposing and Special Characters by Proxy" as in a pinch he could double as Skaw the Falconer.

As could the next guy, a Chaz Elliot sculpt from RPE who I thought also fit with the Scouts, but because of the basing stands a little taller so has ended up as a slightly separate character model. He is painted in a mix of the Chrace/Winter colour scheme, and the newer Blue-Yellow scheme, while keeping in the broad range of the Scarlok's Archers scheme and wears the three armed branch emblem on his broach as Kaia Stormwitch does - all in the name of flexibility. He could also do double (triple?) duty as Sceolan from the WFB4/5 WE Army Book if needed.

A final note on the birds, I have decided to use colour schemes inspired by birds of prey native to the British Isles, so not-Skaw is accompanied by a not-quite-Goshawk, and not-Sceolan is accompanied by the slightly smaller, not-quite-Sparrowhawk. 

If Scarlok's Archers are an iconic Oldhammer unit then for me the iconic Middlehammer era  Wood Elf unit are the Waywatchers (aka Tree Ninjas as I have started affectionately calling them while painting). 

I can remember Shaun and I being very taken with both the concept and the sculpts (especially the one with the balaclava style mask who looks like a Wood Elf Beach Head from Gi Joe/Action Force!) and almost immediately incorporating them as an influence into our D&D games and characters.

Those of us who have been painting Elves in and around the OWAC for the past few years have been noted to remark on more than one occasion that we are DEFINITELY NOT competing with Mariano! ;)

This year was even worse for me as I would be painting Wood Elves alongside the master himself, so more so than ever I. Am. Not. Competing. With. Mariano.... (say it to yourself quietly ten times before you snap your brushes and cry) ... but.... (joking aside) I have been taking inspiration from him! :D

So these are my most Mariano-esque Wood Elves to date, working more with light and dark, I've kept to a brutally simple green-brown colour palette to pick out the detail, letting the sculpts and poses do the heavy lifting themselves. No glorious rainbow NMM however! I know I could have taken these further, and been braver with the brightness levels on the green highlights, but the slightly understated colour scheme keeps them looking like an elite military unit in my mind.

Finally we come to a mini I'm not even sure how I acquired (possibly as part of a trade with a friendly UK hobbyist?) but ended up fitting my army, and the theme of this post, absolutely perfectly. If anyone can identify him then shout in the comments, I'm not sure I've ever really tried tbh.

In a post on another blog about another project entirely, I mentioned that there is a long honoured and respectful tradition in my D&D games for Elven Rangers (and by extension in that RT project, Eldar Scouts) to be named after Nigerian footballers... which was definitely also Shaun's fault.

Yet there was always one who stood apart from this tradition...

Shaun's  character Garion "Red Fox" Kevanarial was directly inspired by the Wood Elf Waywatchers from Warhammer and we found fruitful parallels in the TSR AD&D 2nd edition era material and this sculpt could be the very image of how he started out (or indeed how his brother Allain looks in the Dragon Magazine we borrowed from), before his truly epic descent into Chaotic Neutral naughtiness and on to allegedly double agent evil-doing and Demi-god impersonation... You know, PROPER D&D, with Thac0 and variable XP tables and hard maths.... 

Anyway... the point is, it reminds me of Shaun so this one is called Garion :)

F*ckin' Tree Ninjas! Yeah!! :D

Monthly Total:

10 Scouts (inc. Musician and Standard Bearer) - 192 pts
Champion/Skarloc*- 51 pts
Mage - 59 pts
Wood Elf Hero w/ Longbow (I) - 107 pts
10 Way Watchers - 180 pts
Wood Elf Hero w/ Longbow (II) - 107 pts

Total: 696 pts

* I will look at Special Character/proxy point values in the final wrap up post

Tom's Bony Bit:

I am so fed up of painting these stupid skeletons! They have taken me some time to come back to but I am glad they are finished and I can move on to my wild cards! 

I have kept with the colour scheme and recipe, although I had to go back over some of the red to get the right fade. I like the rusty metal finish and how they tie to the rest of my army.

Monthly Total:

10 Skeletons w/ light armour, shields, spears (inc. Musician and Standard bearer) - 144 pts

Total: 144 pts

You can see below I have added some models I have already painted to boost the unit and I will add some more for the future. 

Shadespyre asked about DnD models so I included this necromancer as another example. She has been undercover as an agent of the Red Wizards Of Thay, so her colour scheme is reversed with red magic and purple and pink robes. Both DnD Necromancer models were very difficult because of being one piece sculpts and having very difficult areas to reach.

Good luck to everyone for the last month, the end is just around the corner!

Paul's 90s High Elves - Wild Card Month! (1134 pts)

Summer is here and it's time for a visit to the scenic coast of Ulthuan :)

It's both wildcard month and the final month of the challenge so with the benefit of a kick start thanks to some time off work during Jubilee week here in the UK, I pushed myself into the painting and am very happy with the results. I know I could have taken a few things further in terms of detail, but my aim was a balance between quality and quantity as it has been throughout the challenge, and in many ways this month felt like a mini OWAC all of it's own! 

I've always liked the idea of Sea Elves, and saw an opportunity to play with this theme and the idea of a Dragon and Sea Serpent alliance between Caledor and Lothern in my High Elf host. I've been planning a unit of proxy Seaguard from the start of the challenge, although slightly lost heart with this unit halfway through as I got sick of all the press moulding... but it was on the original OWAC list so I made myself pick it back up. 

As you can see the unit is a mix of plastic monopose Spearmen and Archers, with extra equipment added to represent the full load out for Lothern Seaguard. The shields, bows and quivers, and (very chunky and no tat all pretty!) spear tips are all press moulded from milliput, with brass rod for the spear shafts. 

The command group are metal Seaguard Standard Bearer and Musician, and the Champion is actually just a standard Seaguard trooper, and his bow and quiver is a green stuff press mould, but he looks the part next to the plastic proxies. The rune on the banner is Cython meaning "The serpent, wisdom, knowledge, futility, the symbol of Lileath" used here to echo the shape of the sea serpent emblem on the shields and banner top.

I might have been sick of painting plastic spearmen by this point, but I was enjoying painting the Sea green/Teal colour scheme, so decided to expand the Lothern detachment with a Mage (though not the one I had originally been planning to paint, which I now think will be added to my future Wood Elves). I have to say I wasn't always sure about this sculpt fitting in my Caledor themed army until I saw how well it would fit in with the Seaguard, and I'm glad I decided to switch the models as it ended up also being my entry to the Oldhammer Gary Morley challenge for June. #JusticeForGary

I also added two Repeater Bolt Throwers in the same colour scheme, although in my mind this means that I definitely need at least one more unit in this colour scheme so I have lined up a unit of archers for the future. I kept the loaders but swapped out the two commanders for an old citadel Elf Warrior and a Chaz Elliot sculpted Elf Lieutenant, both of which felt like they had the sea elf vibe to me. Not only does this add a little character to the Bolt throwers, but I've also got plans for the commanders to appear as unit leaders for a couple of archer units.

Definitely not Oldhammer, but continuing with the Lothern Seaguard theme, I was able to do a pretty quick paint job on this modern plastic High Elf hero on Griffon. I painted the Griffon a bit like a sea eagle (the wings are very flat and lack detail, so I had fun trying to add feather texture with old knackered brushes), and added some coastal elements to the base to emphasise the connection to the bolt throwers and Seaguard. The runes were already part of the banner, which was convenient, and read Lathain on one side, meaning: "Storm, wrath, gently falling rain that brings eternal sleep" and Thalui on the other, meaning: "Hatred or vengeance." He does look quite angry! 

Yet more painting detail that you can't see on the finished model

There was just time to push for one last stretch goal and finish the last unit of five Reaver Knights after striking it lucky and being able to source half-way suitable horses for them (they still don't sit well on the saddles, but never mind). Speaking of horses, there was one Reaver from the first unit I did that had to use a Silver Helm horse. At the time this just looked like he was the unit leader, so had fancy barding for his steed, but as the ranks have grown it has started to stick out and bug me, so I was glad to be able to replace it with one to match the rest of his unit, and now I have a fancy Elven steed without rider for my D&D games :)

The banner was a bit of a rush job, although it did feel right for the final piece of my OWAC 2022 to be a banner. The rune is Lecai, meaning "Light, nobility of the soul, lightness of being" which seemed to fit well with the idea of Reaver knights being messengers and scouts as well as fast attack cavalry. I do slightly regret not adding some more detail around the rune, but in the end I just needed these to be done as time had run out and so, finally, had my mojo. 

Total for the month:

21 Lothern Seaguard, including full command - 362 pts
Mage - 59 pts
2 Repeater Bolt Throwers - 200 pts
Hero (Heavy Armour, Lance) on Griffon - 259 pts
5 Reaver Knights including full command - 254 pts

Total = 1134 pts

Congratulations to everyone who made it over the line, I'll see you for the wrap up with cut off t-shirts, mullets, and cold beers! :D