Adrian's May Rank 'n File month - The Kwae Karr orcs (328 points)

Rank and File month #4

King F'yar's own tribe, the Kwae Karr orcs, must not fall behind the other tribes gathered for the battle against the Grand League. On the contrary, they should make an example utterly crushing the crossroad settlement of Lind Way. 

King F'yar gave orders to one of his chieftains, Magyar Ironfist, to utterly crush the resistance in Linden Way.

However, such a menial task is nothing but an insult. Magyar is made for something more than wacking petty villagers in their homes. He should complete the objective fast and with few casualties, as if F'yar is killed or something bad happened to him at Orc's Drift, surely someone with a powerfull army should arise as the next king of the orc tribes...

I truly wanted to paint this unit. I think that, along Harboth's orcs, these are the most iconic regiments ever produced for the orcs. While I want to play them as regular orcs, I gave everyone of them the crossbows at their back.

Gudruk the champion is not truly armed with a magic sword but the evil lookin two handed sword and the runes demanded it to be painted as something wrong is contained inside that piece of metal. Magyar miniature blend with the rest of the unit pretty well and I think i'll deploy him as a regular boy when I use them in a battle as a normal unit.

Sadly I couldn't get my hand in additional troopers and I didn't want to convert the initial 18 or so from the original box. So there is no Kwae Karr banner as for now.

Look! I finally broke the shield curse and could finnish all the shields for the entire unit! yeah, that includes additional shields for the rest of the 20 or so. While I have to expand up to 30 for the campign I'm aiming at a realistic objective for this year after the challenge.

Ruglud got his shield too. Love how everything went for those shields. However, is not that easy to put a evil face in them, so I managed to include some messages here and there instead as well as the Kwae Karr symbol (a camel dragon? a jabberwork? the bastard child of a cockatrice and a dragon?)

Magyar Ironfist itself. Lovely miniature. Its face is covered by the arms in a pose about to give someone a bad day, and it is a same because the face has a great expression difficult to photograph as it is.

But wait THERE IS MORE

I have the oportunity to purchase the old citadel Legolas which can act as Erdolas (or degraded as Herndil) for ttrpg and make the iconic photograph of the campaign box. If I have Erdolas (or Herndil)... I should have some wood elves to accompany him.

I do not plan to own an entire wood elf army but I wanted to have a small unit mostly based on Scarloc archers, that can be boost up to 25 with a batch of monopose wood elves. which I purchased for this challenge. And that way I also can convert someone to have the iconic banner of the campaign book.

Also, despite not having 100% all the units of the campaign, with the wood elf small unit it gives me the opportunity to proxy the different troops and replace some of them for a good pictures. So I can do an entire report with the proper miniatures deployed.

In an extremely productive month, I got both Erdolas and some elves painted.

I didn't plan this unit originally and while I mix tones here and there, I do not know for now if they should have some pattern in the capes as in my high elves or leave them as they are. But at least it was fun to paint some wood elves for the first time.

Oh, and I could finnish also their shields just in time!

Lastly, as I got free from my curse at least for the time being and I was pretty motivated, I got the shields of the other units (except for the poor four dwarves from Uther company, I do not had time to replace the shield that desintegrated).

And finnish also the bases, now that I've repaired my homemade applicator.

Woah, what a month.

With both units finnished that makes:

Magyar Ironfist + 14 orcs with shield = 170 points

Erdolas + 9 wood elfs with shield = 158 points

For the next entry, the Kwae Karr orcs and let's hope for some surprise I got in the mail.

Until then,
Adrian’s out

Andrea's additional Leader month - The Seer and the Dreddy

 So, Owacers,

this is the second leader month and I can't be more happy as 1) I turned 50 and still feeling good, 2) I painted the most spectacular Eldar Farseer ever sculpted: the finger-pointing, mosquito-helmet, dramatic-pose Farseer!

The best thing is that, being a fine sculpt, it is as funny as expected to paint: a real pleasure! The shape of the helmet (marvellous, despite - or maybe, thanks to - its mosquito appearance) was abandoned in favour of a more technological-looking and mysterious version (cool, nothing to say) and only very recently recovered in the last Farseer incarnation (that I still have to get it!). 

But, this month is not only about the Farseer but it is also about another old friend, whose aesthetic remained longer on the shop shelves: the Dreadnought. Actually, in the RT era there were three version of it, but all based on the same body which remained basically the same even throughout the 2nd and the 3rd edition. Of the RT three patterns, I got the War Demon one: a Dreadnought apparently made to slap enemies, rather than shoot them down!

And now, of course, a little comparative analysis of its changes through time:

Here are the three main incarnation, form the left: RT, 2nd/3rd edition and 4th edition (the Wraithlord, although the full plastic kit like this one is more recent). 

Ok, I would have like to paint more but time is very tight these days, but still these are 330 points (Farseer, 170 pts; Dreddy, 160 pts). I hope to get more time in the next month!

Keep painting, fellows! and see you in June!

ciao, A

Byron's Invasion of Ulthuan - The Wrath of Eltharion (550-562 points)

 Down swoops Eltharion the Grim, Warden of Tor Yvresse!

After months of the Goblins pillaging and marching across Elven lands, Eltharion has taken to the skies seeking vengeance.

Eltharion espies a lone column of wolf riders down below.

Eltharion has been a blight upon the goblins ever since. He soars high over the country and searches for weak points in the goblins' designs.

Eltharion races down from the sky to assail the goblins.

Eltharion's daring and dashing raids have left the goblins on high alert and paralyzed their formations. The goblins are unable to leave their bivouacs for fear of interdiction by the terrible elf. This has left the goblins strung out in clumps of encampments down a forested valley. 

The warden pounces on the terrorized goblins, scattering them. 

The goblins recognize the threat and need to stop him. If they don't their entire campaign will be ground to a halt in the valley. However, each time the goblins seek out Eltharion, he falls being a blocking force positioned mid-valley. The force of elves is positioned on a hill that funnels the goblins between difficult ground. The elves know if the blocking force is overcome the goblins will stream down through the alley and threaten Tor Yvresse. 

Eltharion hides smuggly behind Elril's guard. 

The goblins have begun various strategies to assail this position and over come it. 

Frontal assaults have failed. So the goblins have attempted other schemes with comparable results. The goblins needed a solution.

Goblin fanatics are shot by supporting archers in the woods.

Eltharion was flying high over the valley in the following days when....

YEEEEEEeeeeeeuuuuuUUUUMMMmmm! (that's the Doppler effect of a goblin) A goblin on a novel type of constructed wings cut through the clouds and arced right by him!

My kids read those Dog Man books with the "flip'o'rama" pages. Try toggling back and for between the pics to get a similar effect.

The flying goblin continued his arc back down to the earth below and crashed into the blocking force. 

The wailing goblin bowls over the elves in a mess of canvas, goblin limbs, and fine elven ithilmar mail.

Seeing the grim violence done to his comrades (and fearing that the next might not miss him either), Eltharion searched for the source of this new goblinoid devilry.

Flying overhead, Eltharion spotted the goblin device several hundred yards beyond bowshot. The device was well-guarded by archers making a direct attack alone too dangerous. The goblins had won this round. The blocking force would have to retreat, but they had bought precious time to prepare the next battle and evacuate the locals.

The defender of Tor Yvresse would wait. 

Now for pics of this month's minis:

Eltharion the Grim: 450 or 462 points

Why the points discrepancy?

Eltharion first appears in the army list present in the Maugthrond Pass scenario pamphlet. The total elf force is 992 points. If we subtract the cost of the rest of the force using the points values contained in the WARHAMMER ARMIES pamphlet, also contained in the starter set, then we get a value of 462 points for Eltharion.

However, the 4th edition high elf book provides 450 points for the Elf warden:

The Doomdiver catapult: 100 points

This warrants a bit of an explanation. This doomdiver catapult uses the 6th edition warmachine, 4th edition goblin ammunition, and an orc crew. The reason for this is that most orc and goblin warmachines in 4th edition had orc crew, I liked the 6th edition catapult more, and the rules around the doomdiver crew (how many are there??)s feels too ambiguous. This arrangement felt more in keeping with the other war machines in the army - because of course orc bullies would delight in flinging goblins beyond the horizon. 

This pic is to emphasize that the orc is pulling the slingshot back with a rob and is not holding a whip.

Elven shields: 0 points

These elves have been sitting on my shelf without shield from before I ever participated in OWAC. 

Also, my final goal for this OWAC is to recreate the box art from the starter set. The box art includes an elven shieldwall, so I'll need some of those for the final picture. 

Total: 550 or 562 points.

A Cemetery Photoshoot - Valtteri's Undead Legion - May Wild Card Month

 

As some of you may remember, my inspirational art for OWAC 9 was the superb 4th edition Army Book cover. And I had plans to try and recreate the models from that painting.
Well, I did just that and then decided to take it a step further.

So here's my version of the cover art:

It's not an exact replica but I think the vibe is pretty spot on!

I decided to only use minis that were available in 4th ed for the characters. I also didn't want to cut up any metal minis for reposing or converting, it just feels wrong to me.

The Evil Threesome.

The necromancer is pretty much the same model as the vampire in the cover and I didn't convert him at all.

The standard bearer got some horns and a hairdo but the skeleton knight involved the most conversion work.

The rider itself is untouched but the steed is almost completely redone. The base is a plastic skeleton horse with barding from a modern Perry medieval knight set. I then did some greenstuff sculpting to fill in the gaps. The head is from the same Perry kit with the lower part cut off and replaced with a skeleton horse's lower jaw. The original knight has a lot of bat decorations so I painted a similar symbol on his shield. 
I'm not an experienced sculptor by any means and I always find it pretty intimidating, but I really like how the knight turned out!

Golbat, is that you?

The thing I was most worried about was replicating the banner. All my previous banners in this challenge have been painted on top of a black&white print, but now I'd actually have to draw!

Luckily this turned out to be easier than I feared and I really like the end result. It's a different style than the rest of my banners but I'm going to use him as Battle Standard Bearer, which I hope explains the extra flourish. 

Sketching.

Painting.

A few weeks before the end of May I stumbled upon a set of Skeleton Summons by GSW when I was buying some paints and brushes and they looked perfect as unit fillers. After buying them I remembered  the newly risen dead from the Army Book cover art and decided to use them for that instead. (There's one extra skellie in the second picture that I did a few months ago so I could get nice neat ranks).

Since these are only half of a model I decided to count them as such - so only 0,5 models per skeleton rounded down.

I did a cemetery themed board for Necropolis two years ago which was the perfect scenery for the photoshoot. I still needed to a moonlit sky with a bat swarm to complete the vibe so I did some A4-scale freehand. My kid did some of the bats :)

Blending is way easier in 28mm scale.

The photoshoot setup.

Extra models

Since this was a Wild Card month I didn't feel much pressure. Even if I did only a few models it would be enough. Armed with this Zen-mindset I decided to try and paint the rest of my Wraiths and the wonderful Wights from Warhammer Quest. In my mind the pair are the General's personal body guards.

The whole gang.

What a dashing duo!

Originally I hoped to do some special terrain as well but I really didn't have time for that. (I painted a bunch of non-OWAC minis too...). Maybe I'll try to do it for the final month? We'll see!

Statistics

I've painted a lot of models so far and to be honest, it's starting to feel that way. The challenge has been a lot of fun but I'm also glad it's over soon.
For my final month my plan is simple: paint my army's general - a Liche on a Zombie Dragon. Stay tuned!

January
25 Skeletons w. Swords&Shields, including Command Group	214 points	25 models
Wight	40 points	1 model
Necromancer Champion	163 points	1 model
2 Skeleton Ogres	72 points	4 models
2 Mummies w. 2-handed weapons	90 points	2 models
February
2 Wraiths	150 points	2 models
Wight	40 points	1 model
20 Zombies including Command Group	88 points	20 models
Zombie Ogre	16 points	2 models
Screaming Skull Catapult	74 points	5 models
March	904	61
Chariot w. Scythed Wheels, Crew w. Shield & Bow	79 points	5 models
Skeleton Horsemen w. Shields& Light Armor & Command Group	276 points	10 models
1 Wraith	75 points	1 model
April
8 Mummies w. 2-handed weapons	360 points	8 models
6 Skeletons w. Swords&Shields	54 points	6 models
6 Skeletons w. Spears&Shields	60 points	6 models
3 Wraiths	225 points	3 models
Vampire Count	200 points	1 model
May
Necromancer	68 points	1 model
Battle Standard	90 points	1 model
Mounted Wight	46 points	2 models
2 Wights	82 points	2 models
3 Wraiths	225 points	3 models
11 Skeletons	88 points	5 models
Total	2875 points	116 models

Previous posts:

January
February

March
April