Goblin Chief's Chariot...

This is a bit of a work in progress post, if only due to the fact I can't find the crew for this Chronicle Goblin Chief's Chariot.

Released in 1985 (code BN1), the chariot was sculpted by Rick Priestly, whilst the (AWOL) crew and wolves are Nick Lund sculpts.

This is a repaint and the chariot has previously seen service with two Orc archers (original ex-LOTR). I decided that it should return to the Chronicle fold and hopefully I will soon find its crew. I do have the Grenadier four wolf Orc Chariot Nick sculpted somewhere so the Red Orcs will have some mightly impressive wheels when both are completed...

Norscan Mountain Orcs...

Kev "Goblinmaster" Adams has sculpted miniatures for a huge number of companies in addition to Citadel and these Mountain Orcs he produced in the early nineties for Alternative Armies are a couple of my favourites.

They are considerably larger than even the hulking Black Orcs and this necessitated mounting them on 40mm square bases. I do have some more hiding in a filing cabinet somewhere so will look to hunt them down. I do have a cool concept for a standard bearer if I get the chance...

Background wise I have decided that they are the mongrel offspring of Orcs and Trolls, found in the mountains of Norsca. I haven't thought much about a stat line for them but will probably use Ogre stats with Orc Animosity and Troll Fear, Stupidity and Regenerate special rules.

Goblin Lost Bod Tribe...

And now for something really old... None of your 3rd edition newness here, I bought most of these miniatures back in 1980 b.w. (before Warhammer).

The Fantasy Tribe Goblins released in October 1980 (as Fantasy Tribe Gnolls) are some of my favourite Citadel miniatures, not just for reasons of reminiscing, but also because they are nice sculpts with a number of random variants per code.

For some unknown reason most of this regiment have sat unpainted for the last 34 years, whilst comrades have won countless victories under the banner of Gorbage the Goblin against the evil Dwarves. That situation has now been rectified and the Lost Bods are ready to march!

Whilst these are (of course) pre-slotta, they have been based on slottas to fit in with the rest of the refurbished army.

I have also painted them in my 'modern' black undercoat style and used some wash on them. Ironically the original figures were subject to a Sepia Brown oil wash as part of my teenage technique to grubby them up as well as provide some shading.

I have converted one duplicate polearm sporting Goblin into a standard bearer, I know some readers will be aghast at this "butchery" but it has to be done as I did not have a spare FTG standard bearer to hand.

Next? Possibly some very old pre-GW Chronicle Miniatures Orcs (that are so small they will have to be rebadged as Goblins)

Rechgrundle - Warrior Maiden of Dim Ponn...

The last miniature of Speciality Set 3 - Knights of Chaos for a little while, this time a female Chaos Knight, the delightfully named Rechgundle!

I've always liked this model and she did prove fun to paint, especially her unusual costume that seems to owe more to an S&M party than it does a battlefield (not that I've been to either!!!).

The design on this shield is nicely done and was easy enough to paint using a wash and some odd highlights. As I've said previously I am not a fan of engraved shields but I do like this one with its vaguely Japanese demon design.

With seven of the set now painted I have begun to rethink my initial Band of Brigands plan and am pondering using them as a special kick ass unit in small scenario driven games- The Malnificent Seven perhaps?

Tomar Spogh - Warrior of the Divine Tuluk...

I managed to hunt down a couple more of the Knights of Chaos from 1984's Speciality Set 3 and have just finished Tomar Spogh - Warrior of the Divine Tuluk.

As you can see he is considerably different from the current Chaos look, much more Middle Eastern in look.

Initially I painted him up in a red coat but was not happy with the end result. I then tried blue which was better but I was still not 100% satisfied. In the end I added some "lightning stripes" effect to break up the solid colour, I'm not quite sure if it works but it will do until I have a better idea.

Just got the Warrior Maiden of Dim Ponn to finish from the set (until I find the AWOL Agrad), in the meantime I have started some prep work on a unit of Fantasy Tribe Gnolls, some of who have sat in Lead Mountain since 1980...

Three Fighters Walk Into a Bar...

I found a few Citadel CO1 Fighters from 1985 that are shown in the Third Citadel Compendium and decided to paint them up. Compared to earlier Perry sculpted miniatures these are distinctly below par and demonstrate that not everything that is old is necessarily any good... :-(

First off is Beowulf the Bezerk, an unusual barbarian type wearing a breast plate of armour with a G-string and posing pouch. You have to wonder what the sculptor was smoking...

Next is Angus Hardheart a reasonable enough Dark Ages type fighter with a ridiculously overscale spear (I thought these telegraph pole spears had died out with Minifigs in the seventies). Perhaps we could be generous and say it is a dragon hunting spear?

Finally a female fighter, called Erlic in the Compendium. A very bland average figure...

Doomed Ratchragged - Priest of Wenwoch the Waylayer...

I'm not sure who Wenwoch the Waylayer is but his priests have an "interesting" line in cut away chainmail, clearly a bit of air conditioning on the battlefield!

Doomed Ratchragged is another nearly thirty year old miniature from the Knights of Chaos Speciality Set.

A bit of a weird model with his cut away chainmail leggings, I decided to paint the chainmail up using brass to provide some relief from the steel plate.

The model had a poorly scratched star shield design, I did consider painting this over with some Liquid Green Stuff but decided to go with the original design, despite the fact it is not up to the same standard as the rest of the model.

A rummage in Lead Mountain today has led to the discovery of two more from the set so I have based and primed them, I just need to hunt down Agrad - Champion of the Laughing Jokkie and the set will be complete.

Cursed Doomhandle - Apostate of Heinus Suth...

Yet another Citadel miniature from 1984's Speciality Set 3 - Knights of Chaos, this time Cursed Doomhandle - Apostate of Heinus Suth (I can see him getting the proverbial taken out of him and being called Cursed Broomhandle!)

He is a pretty heavily armoured chap with a lot of chainmail which sped up the painting process no end.

The shield had and embossed flaming bull head design. I'm not a fan of this sort of thing but decided to run with it rather than sand it down. I've kept with the red and black approach to provide a unit coherency to a non-uniform unit.

I have one more of the set left to paint and three AWOL somewhere in Lead Mountain which need hunting down...

Buoophut Bane-Arrow - Devotee of Alaman...

Another chaos knight from Citadel's 1984 Speciality Set 3 - Knights of Chaos, this time Buoophut Bane-Arrow - Devotee of Alaman.

Again a model I really like, the only thing I am not keen on is the pigs snout face but hey most of it is covered by his wonderful bird helmet.

It will be a bit odd having an archer in a unit of troops with melee weapons but that's what "olde skool" is all about! :-)

Sir Palomides Pureheart...

Sir Palomides is from Citadel's Speciality Set 5 - Warrior Knights of Law, another pre-slotta base 1984 release.

 I can't recall buying the box set so I'm not sure how I ended up with him and he has always flummuxed me as to how to paint him due to the unusual look of the miniature (what's with the bloody hat?!).

Anyhow I had another crack at him with the view to sticking him in the band of brigands hence the red and black shield scheme (with a boar head decal from Veni Vidi Vici).

Overall, fairly pleased with him...

Thel - Knight of Gorth the Great Obesity...

Before Nurgle there was Gorth the Great Obesity...

This is another miniature from Citadel's Speciality Set 3 - Knights of Chaos released in 1984 and my favourite figure from the set. I would love a unit of troops kitted out like this.

I especially like the dragonhide shield - very swords and sorcery.

I have tried to keep the paint scheme quite plain so not to distract from the detail on the miniature, which is excellent.

 

So the Band of Brigands grows and is starting to look pretty good...

Red Dulmoon - Dark Saint of Insane Gotd...

Another one for the Band of Brigands, a lovely miniature from a boxed set of Knights of Chaos bought in 1984. Red Dulmoon - Dark Saint of Insane Gotd (as he is called on the box, who is Gotd?) predates Realm of Chaos and has a distinctly non-GW canon Chaos look.

There were nine miniatures in the box, three more are on the workbench, the other five hiding on Lead Mountain and need hunting down...

Band of Brigands...

A rummage through Lead Mountain has shown that I bought a lot of miniatures in the Eighties without any rhyme or reason apparently! Over the decade I seem to have bought a lot of fighters and adventurers which, whilst being nice figures, aren't part of any planned army. These two fighters were released by Citadel as part of their Collectors Series in the late Eighties, one previously having been released as a Chaos warrior!

1113 Evil Fighters

I have been pondering what to do with them (and their colleagues hiding in boxes and carrier bags around the house) and have decided on a plan. Rather than worry about the lack of a common theme equipment wise I am going to embrace it and paint them up as a small mercenary or brigand band which can fight with pretty much any army.

Paint schemes are fairly downbeat and weathered with rusty weapons and armour, though I am thinking of sticking to a red and/or black shield colouring to give some kind of unit coherency with such a mixed bag of miniatures.

Several more (some pre-Slotta) are current sat on the workbench having just been undercoated and will be added to these two as and when time permits...

Worset the Undead...

Whilst the Tomb Kings might not be an Olde Skool concept, Araby is with the Arabians being included in the WHFB 2nd edition Battle Bestiary. I do have some nebulous idea that once I have finished my Old World armies to look at raising some small armies for some battles in Araby (hopefully after someone has released some suitable 28mm plastic historicals).

Anyhow, today I decided to paint up an old Grenadier UK Giant Mummy (still available from Mirliton) which has sat on the workbench for the best part of a decade and a half. An impressive model at 65mm tall, it was a fairly straightforward paint job of drybrushes with some Devlan Mud washes. When it came to basing I decided he would be the first miniature of the Araby project using Dead Grass flock instead of the traditional green.

I'm not sure when I will get around to paint some more miniatures for the project but he is a start...

In the Northlands...

Unfortunately I have not had too much time for my Olde Skool Warhammer project this year but I have kept it in mind when working on other projects, most notably with my Dux Bellorum Arthurian army. Dark Ages miniature warriors are equally at home whether beating each other up or laying into Orcs and Goblins so when it came to Dux Bellorum I have made sure that the miniatures can be used for both the Dark Ages wargame and WHFB2!

The background to WHFB2 is not as detailed as in later editions which allows for the some interpretation in what can be used. The Old World is largely dominated by humans but all we know is that the ones who live in the north are "technically and socially primitive (11th to 13th century Europe)". Using Dark Ages figures may be pushing the early edge of this time period though there is little difference between a 6th century Saxon and a 11th century one and we are talking fantasy wargaming here...

Consequently my Dux Bellorum Romano-British will form part of a Northern Old World force, possibly allied with other good or neutral races. The miniatures here are shown in their Dux Bellorum sabot bases and comprise of Old Glory, West Wind and a couple of Gripping Beast cavalry.