Shadespyre's OWAC V Wrap Up Post - The Completed Kingdom of the Gnolls (or is it Goblins?) (2871 or 2773 points)

OWAC V - The Completed Kingdom of the Gnolls

July

We interrupt this OWAC for some health news:

Veterans of OWAC IV (where I painted Lizardmen) may remember that my progress was interrupted by a spell of serious back pain, but OWAC disaster was averted by my having been ahead of schedule before that. And I've been bothered on and off by it ever since. Well, in June, I finally had an MRI scan on my back showing (as I long suspected) that I have a severely bulging disc in the lumbar region which is the cause of my many symptoms. Currently I am waiting to see a consultant to discuss whether I need surgery (spoiler alert - yes, I damned well do!) and what that involves. That, and its possible impact on OWAC VI, is for the future.

Right now, the impact is that I can't bend or stretch much, or walk far or stand up for long. Which means I can't access much of my mini collection (which is in the loft) or get in any floor level cupboards or even reach the high shelf which I have been stashing my Gnolls on as I finished them. Which was bad planning, it turns out. Fortunately, good planning means that I took a few army pictures way back in April of the almost completed project. So those are what I can share this month.

And now, back to your regular scheduled OWAC!

Where we started:

This is the first picture of the planned army, although even at this stage it was a little bit dishonest! There are no cavalry models here, for a start - not because I didn't plan to include them, but because at this stage I was hoping to get more of them and so wasn't sure what the final unit breakdown would look like. 

Now here's our old friend, Gnoll #1. All these colours made it through into the final army, including the "I've really no idea why I used this" pale blue. But he's a bit dull. I don't think I'd have been too happy churning out unit after unit looking like this, to be honest.

As it was, I think I'd painted 50 or 60 of the little fellas before I forced myself to address the issue. And then along came good old Waleran, Earl of Worcester with his checkered coat of arms (and checkered history) bringing us the bright red and yellow heraldry that saved the day. Thanks, Earl Wally!

Where we finished:

These pictures were taken in mid April, and contain almost everything that ended up being painted (the two children are the main omission, I think). The tents rather dominate, don't they? I'm pleased by the size of the army - I had to spread it out on the floor because I couldn't easily get it on a table, on my trusty old Citadel grass mat. The red and yellow flags and shields stand out quite nicely, I think.

I could repeat all the pictures from the previous blog posts, but that seems a bit redundant. Go have a look back if you want to!

"Final" Army List

There are two versions of the army list, one which runs as close as possible to the 3rd Edition Orcs and Goblins list in Warhammer Armies, and one which is based on it but tweaked to better reflect the "Great Goblin" statistics from 1st and 2nd Edition. The simplest way to achieve this was to define my Gnoll statline as being the same as Half-Orcs - which means I can use all the points values for characters that are listed in Warhammer Armies, and results in an easy to calculate 1/2 point saving per Infantry model or 1 point per Cavalry model. I then conjured up a new statline for Lesser Goblins, again based on 1st / 2nd edition stats, and awarded it a points value of 2, as it is worse than both Goblin or Halfling in 3rd edition...!

	M	WS	BS	S	T	W	I	A		Ld	Int	Cl	WP		POINTS
Great Goblin	4	3	3	3	3	1	3	1		7	6	7	7		5
Lesser Goblin	4	2	3	2	2	1	4	1		5	5	5	5		2

Because of this, the army lists will now have two different points values. The only massive change is that in the "Gnoll" list the Chariots have been completley re-built using the 3rd edition rules and so are both better and much more expensive. Also I made the little Jester a Gnoll rather than a Goblin as he is in the O&G list.

Here goes then:

 

Name	No	Counts As	Gear	Points
				O&G	Gnoll
King Waleran	1	Level 20 Orc / Gnoll Hero	LA, Sh, 2HW	121	110
Queen Boardica	1	Level 25 Orc / Gnoll Hero	HA, Lance	148	155
Royal Chariots	2	Orc Battle Chariot	2 x Short Bow, Scythes	172	-
Royal Chariots	2	Heavy Chariot, 2 x War Boars, 3 x Gnoll crew, 3 x LA, 1 x Bow,		-	244
Court Wizard	1	Level 20 Orc / Gnoll Wizard		251	240
Royal Standard	1	Level 15 Orc / Gnoll Hero	LA, Sh, Army Standard	141	133
The Aunties	2	Level 10 Orc / Gnoll Wizard		182	170
Court Jester	1	Level 5 Goblin / Gnoll Wizard		45	60
Gnoll Gnights	5	Snortas (Orc / Gnoll)		235	230
Gnoll Boar Riders	8	Gruntas (Orc / Gnoll)	LA, Sh, Standard	221	212
Royal Huscarls	20	Biguns (Orc / Gnoll)	Standard	199.5	189
Gnolls-At-Arms	11	Boyz (Orc / Gnoll)	Standard	102	96
Royal Champion	1	Level 10 Orc / Gnoll hero	LA, Sh, Spear	65	59
Gnolls-At-Arms	20	Arrer Boyz (Orc / Gnoll)	LA, Sh, Musician	220.5	210
Gnoll Clan Riders	6	Gruntas (Orc / Gnoll)	Sh, Standard	147	140
Gnoll Clansmen	20	Boyz (Orc / Gnoll)		170	160
Gnoll Schiltron	12	Boyz (Orc / Gnoll)	Halberd	126	120
L Goblin Archers	20	Stickas (Goblin / L Goblin)	Sh	80	60
L Goblin Scouts	30	Gobbos (Goblin / L Goblin)	Sh	105	75
L Goblin Horde	30	Gobbos		90	60
			Baggage Bonus	50	50
			TOTAL	2871	2773

(Items in bold are characters)

The points don't quite fit the army list in either case, there are a few too many points in characters for the 1/3 limit but this would be easily balanced by adding some Magic Standards (which count as Rank and File if in units) rather than extra miniatures. I could also nudge up the rank and file numbers by incorporating some of the miniatures I haven't included in units so far:

3 Gnolls with polearms

2 Drunken Gnolls

2 Gnoll children

Cyril the Bear

maybe even the cutesy boar piglet?

Obviously, options for allies or mercenaries from elsewhere in my collection, too.

Future Additions & Missed Opportunities

I've whined many times about how hard / expensive it is to collect miniatures of this period. In fact, supply of models was quite an issue with this project - often the prices sought on eBay are ridiculous, but worse iss when the minis just aren't there at all. I assume the mid 80s explosion of Warhammer popularity and greater number of minis manufactured and sold is one reason why it's so much easier to collect an army of early slotta minis than from just a year or three earlier?

Scarcity of models obviously dictated the size (even absence of) some possible units. Less obviously, it made me more reticent to cut up and convert some of the miniatures that I could find, so there are far less weapon swaps and standard bearers than I'd like. If a miniature is rare and also sturdy, you can't even buy any pre-broken ones, it turns out.

Another area I'd still like to explore is adding some of the early Night Goblin models as a unit or two, but the early night-shirted fellows are no easier to find than the Gnolls are. This is how I'd have liked to fill up that 20 Arrer Boyz requirement, and would have been the proper place to pop in some early Goblin Fanatics, too. It wouldn't even have been cheating, as they were pretty much the last range announced before the "C" cataloguing system started.

Another expansion option would be a Monstrous Host, with the obvious choice being a massive herd of hairy piggies! I'd have loved to have done this if I could lay my hands on more Boar models of suitable age. (Perhaps I need to have a chat with Benjamin about how he's populated half a Beastman army using press-molding?)

Coming Next?

Right now, I fully intend to be OWACing again in 2023. I have all the same choices that I had this time around (mostly variations on the word "Elves") plus that Fimir army which I accidentally acquired this year. I'd say at the moment Dark Elves feel most likely, but it's what I feel like come November and December that really counts, isn't it?

Thanks

Big thanks as ever to Our Mighty Overlord for having me along again, and to everyone who leaves comments on my posts here and on Facebook. I'd be painting miniatures anyway, but almost certainly not completing armies like this one. This is a brilliant community to be part of, and I'm ever grateful for it.