Adrian's Rank & File month 1 - Sharpshooters! (217 points)

 

The high elves are proud of their archery skills since their rise as an empire. Professional armies made good use of this elite troops. However, after the war of the beard and the disbandment of large portions of the once majestic imperial elf army, these corps have been made of trained levies.

Still highly skillful archers besting the elite marksmen of other races and usually commanded by war veterans.

By the time of the crisis of Tor Nimtala, one of the last settlements on the continent, Nevarth's Sharpshooters were an effective combat unit capable of defend themselves against hordes of greenskins and beastmen harassing their domain.

Nevarth's worked with the lack of support from Ulthuan after the High King's order of abandoning the continent, and opted to mix the levies from the tiranoc and nagarythean lineages of his lieges, in order to boost their camaraderie in case that the unit shall increase their numbers in a major conflict.

They sport the colours of the differnt houses and mix together to compose a colorful and lethal unit. If you see their banner, you're about to get a deadly shoot.

Apart of my theme of a combined army of Nagarythe and Tiranoc levies, I used the mixed colours and patterns to improve the character of the unit. I love the monopose archers and think that they retain much more character and are in every way better than more modern plastics or even many of the 3rd party attempts at elf archers.

However, as we all know, a regiment, not even a large one, can be tedious to paint and boring to display with only one pose available.

12x Archers with a Champion, banner and musician - 217 points

Lastly, my secret santa's offering

Sorry for the blurry picture of the front, but I almost forgot to take the photos besides it has been painted even before knowing that Mariano was my secret santa.

Next month, hope that I can complete the spearmen in time (with mixed colours AND freehanded shields!).

Until then, Adrian's out.

Bill's Rank & File Month 1: Totleger's Carvers

 "Vogelburgh is a small village, up in the foothills of the mountains, forgettable aside from its monstrous poultry (and largely forgotten by the Empire at large except during tax season). It musters and supports only a single small regiment of state troops - a regiment of Helblitzen, zealously trained and drilled by Captain Totleger. Though they be few in number, their training is comparable to any regiment raised in more cosmopolitan regions of the Empire, and their strength is bolstered by that of the ogre known as 'Big Frug.' Frug is considered something of a mascot to the regiment, dressed in a fine uniform and assigned the all-important task of guarding the regiment's lager ration."

 

Here we are, month one of OWAC VII is in the bag! I'm not going to lie, I struggled a little bit this month; I'm really out of practice painting figures that have been primed white, and I'm definitely still getting the hang of using Contrast paints effectively. A big chunk of the month was spent dreading the possibility that I'd made a horrible mistake - either in choosing this army instead of my comfort Waaagh, or in not priming black and doing 'slap-chop' style painting with the Contrast paints. 

Once I started applying highlights (and in the case of the yellow, painting Vallejo Golden Yellow over the Iyanden Yellow Contrast), I started to feel a lot more positive about what I was doing. As always, it's important to trust the process; I think the end result is pretty good all things considered.

The Halberdiers are Wars of the Roses billmen, originally released by Front Rank Miniatures (and now manufactured and sold under the Front Rank name by Gripping Beast). They're pleasingly solid sculpts, comparable to 5th and 6th edition Empire figures in size and dimensions. Definitely took some work to clean up the mold lines and excess material, so the molds might be ready for a remaster in the near future. 

 

Big Frug is an Imperial Ogre from Knightmare Miniatures, sculpted by Drew Williams. He's a charming sculpt as well, which comes as no surprise given Drew's talent. I've got a rather substantial number of trolls he's sculpted and they're wonderful, and we'll see more figures from his studio in this army before this OWAC is done. The barrel he's standing guard over is part of a set from Dunkeldorf Miniatures, based out of Denmark. A lot of them have skulls, wine bottles or candles atop them, but I definitely think this one, unadorned save the iron cross design, fits better with him. 

Dunkeldorf's figures are ideal for player characters and NPCs in games of Warhammer Fantasy Role-Play, though they are closer to 32mm scale, making them tower over standard 28mm figures. I've got a couple that I've incorporated into this army, but it was a bit of a surprise to realize these figures are head and shoulders taller than almost everyone else in the army. And speaking of Dunkeldorf, their "pets" accessories yielded this charming rooster for my purposes:

So here we've got what we'll call 19 Helblitzen (that rooster's a fighter!) and Captain Totleger, a Level 10 Hero. So points-wise, that looks like:

• 19 Helblitzen, plus standard and musician = 189 pts
• Level 10 Hero with hand weapon and light armor = 57

For a points total this month of 246 points.  

And again, here's my "price of entry/secret santa" figure before it goes out:

Ben's Eldar - OWAC VII - Rank and File Month 1

The blue stone representing the Spirit Walkers moved off cautiously, and on the battlefield the great war-machines strode forward.  In his multi-compartmented mind a dozen potential futures blossomed.  He saw the machines fall blasted by heavy weapons.  He saw them stride among the dreadnoughts and engage them in melee.  He saw them stumble on rough ground.

In the air the red runes rearranged themselves.  In his mind's eye he saw the human heavy weapons belch.  Flowers of flame bloomed at the feet of the spirit walkers.  Kelmon reeled, feeling the pattern of the conflict emerging from the maelstrom of probability.

I've enjoyed getting stuck into the pile of primed potential this month, and after some initial faffing, my Christmas present of a lightbox really helped with photographing them (thanks Mrs F).  First I painted some Wraithguard, a Dreadnought/Wraithlord, and a Warlock/Wraithseer to guide them through the mortal realm:

The dreadnought has a loincloth banner made from tomato paste tube foil and greenstuff that was not too neatly done but painted up okay.  Some of the icons come from transfers I bought as a 14 year old to decorate my Epic army - many fell to pieces as they came off the paper, but enough survived - looks like I have to get some matte or satin varnish to dull them down though!  

Then, a I painted couple more jetbikes with converted riders to add to a squad I painted in a different challenge last year, again with a foil banner, and a squad of Aspect Warriors from the rare Dusk Stalker shrine:

I hope a ranger themed shrine on Alaitoc fits in with the association of that craftworld with scouts.  They are made from scouts with metal guardian add-ons - 2nd edition shuriken rifles, and 3rd edition storm guardian heads.  The Exarch has half a high elf head atop half a guardian head.  It was a fun exercise but I'm not doing any more - it definitely cured me of nostalgia for converting metal models.  Not so much the extra force required to cut them, but the overshooting that follows meaning gems get squared off and shoulderpad edges trimmed.

The last thing I painted was a mini-squad of Striking Scorpions to round off a squad I painted last year (after I was finally able to pick a few more models up for a reasonable price). To accompany them, Phoenix Lord Karandras who was as fun to paint as I remember the first time.  I originally painted this model for my mate almost 30 years ago, and he kindly gave it to me to strip and repaint for this challenge.

Finally, here is my challenge entry fee for Chris P's Orks - a Rogue Trader era Runtbot with a later goblin wolf rider banner.  Runtbots don't feature in the 2nd edition codex, but I'm hoping it could count as a Gretchin Standard Bearer for his Goff Clan, or failing that a Gretchin Assistant:

Month 1 total - 900 pts

Warlock, Singing Spear – 76 pts

Exarch (converted), Shuriken Catapult, Power Sword – 61 pts

Karandras – 150 pts

2 Guardians, Jetbike with Shuriken Catapults, Jetbike with Shuriken Cannon – 67 pts

4 Dire Avengers (converted) – 88 pts

3 Striking Scorpions – 78 pts

5 Wraithguard – 175 pts

Dreadnought, Extra Distortion Cannon – 205 pts

Filippo's Undead - January Rank and File I

 

"Welcome back to the land of the livin'... Now pick up a shovel and get digging!"

January complete and I'm really pleased on how they turned out.

Here's the list:

20 Skeletons with shields: 180 points

Classic old plastic skeletons with music and banner. I had few decals, so I freehanded all the shields. 

For the banner I used an old drawing I made some time ago when first started to collect again Undead models

8 Skeletons with bows: 80 points

Two models were already painted for my Mordheim warband (Restless Dead)

Screaming Skull Catapult: 74 points

Nothing much to say, except that this model is gorgeous! Loved every small details

EXTRA UNITS: 5 bases of Spirit Hosts (no points)

Part of the sixth edition list, these models are a little extra for January

For the Secret Santa here's an old alternative model for a Dark Elf witch (still working on it)

See you next month!