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Monday, January 6, 2020

Paul's Border Princes - Intro post

"Back once again for the renegade master(1)

D4 damager(2), power to the people

Back once again for the renegade master

D4 damager, with the ill behavior!"

The battle cry of the Halfling Halbediers, led by Roger 'Wildchild' McKenzie. (1) The lines about the 'Renegade Master' seem to be a clear reference to the Halfling's service to the human renegade Knight who ruled that area of the Border Princes at the time. (2) No one knows quite what the "D4 damager" bit is about but scholars of Halfing Troubadourship seem to agree in their disapprovement that it is "a bit meta." Whatever that means...

Howdy folks! I'm Paul/StuntCat and this is my second OWAC. Last year was an absolutely brilliant experience, but was definitely a challenge and I'm hungry for more. I did consider continuing my Chaos Beastmen/Nurgle army from OWAC2 but I couldn't resist the lure of a new project, so this year I'm opting for a mixed force of Humans, Halflings and Dwarves with the idea that this is a cobbled together force of the good(ish) peoples of the Border Princes, rather than a high falutin' Grand Army of the Empire.


Having checked out the map (one of the first ports of call in any army building project) and a quick scan of background available on the usual fan wikis along with the 4th Edition Empire Army books I have started to come up with a more defined idea for the force, but not all the minis are in place quite yet, so for now I've gone with an initial list of about 1400 pts but with room for this to shift a bit.
Apologies for the terrible picture - I'll do better once they are painted!

For the most part I will be using Battle Masters Plastics for my human troops. These have been knocking around for ages with the same intention as I've heard many people state, to turn them into a cheap and cheerful Empire Army. Well now is the perfect opportunity! However, the sculpts are obviously very basic and I'm already slightly cursing this choice!

I even managed to get some spray undercoating done on Boxing Day.... in the UK... If that isn't a sign of Climate Change I don't know what is!

The Halflings are from Ye Alchemist (part of their Short Wars range) alongside the classic Citadel Hot Pot, and the Dwarves are Citadel/Marauder. I've got some possible extras in the pipeline, but for now that will do.
Looking forward to painting this crowd!

So, fully expecting this to change/grow as the Challenge develops over the next 6 months, here is my initial list:

Human General (L. Armour, Hand Weapon, Flail) - 103

Human Wizard Champion - 118

11 Human Halbediers (Halberds, Light Armour, Shields) inc. Standard Bearer - 120

9 Human Crossbowmen (Crosbbows, Handweapons, L. Armour) - 90

21 Human Archers (Longbow, Hand Weapon, L.Armour) - 210 (three units of 7 skirmishers)

Mortar + 3 Human Crew - 100

Halfling Hero (L.Armour, Hand Weapon, Pistol) - 69

Halfling Wizard - 56

15 Halfling Halberdiers (Halberds, L.Armour) inc. Standard Bearer, Musician, and Champion - 138

Halfling Hotpot + 3 Halfling Crew - 50

Dwarf Hero (L.Armour, 2h Sword, Pistol) - 110

10 Dwarven Thunderers - 130

Dwarven Cannon + 3 Dwarven Crew - 110

Initial Total 1404 pts

I wish all my fellow challengers the best of fortunes and look forward to seeing your work and commenting on your posts. There are some really brilliant army ideas again this year and I can't wait to see them!

To those still standing on the other side... I hope to be among you once again.

Right, let's get stuck in! :D

8 comments:

  1. Love this force! If it were me, I would pick a single color to show up in all three forces, and otherwise have each unit have 1 or 2 other colors individual to that unit. (making it easier for them to do their double duty ;)) That would make them unified to my eye. But then, what do I know?

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    1. Thanks Lissanne - I'm definitely going for a unifying and fairly generic colour scheme. I want these to be as multi purpose as possible. My main question was whether to paint them in the Tan Leather and Green Canvas uniforms of the Guard of Felmoor from my current D&D campaign, but I just wasn't loving that for this challenge so I've gone a different direction.

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  2. Look at all that lovely plastic goodness. This is going to be great!!
    Good luck mate.

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    1. Thanks James! We will all need luck and courage in equal measure for this challenge! :D

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  3. Cracking blend of races! I'm always a fan of simple plastic models - once a paint scheme is down they should for through pretty easily. Good luck, sir!

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    1. Thanks! And yes, it's all about getting that colour scheme right and then sticking to the recipe. It certainly served me well with my beastmen last year :)

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  4. A great assemblage of races, as expected form border realms! This is going to be a really nice army!

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    1. Thanks Andrea - and many thanks for helping to run this years' challenge too! :)

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