Defenders of Helm's Deep and Blood Angels Reinforcements

It has been quite a while since I wrote a blog entry, but as always I have not been idle. (Of course the last few nice days of summer also demanded attention!) I painted up Théoden, Gimli and a few Rohan Royal Guard for a tournament at the start of September and added to my Blood Angels. The latter got a Cataphractii Centurion, a Librarian, a Vigliator as well as five Despoilers and Assault Marines.

Pict 1637: Théoden and Gimli looking out over Rohan

Pict 1638: Rohan Royal Guard on foot

Pict 1639: Rohan Royal Guard on foot

I only needed three more Rohan Royal Guard on foot for the army list we were playing and fortuitously I had three of them sitting in a drawer. I showed them partially painted in my last post. Now they are done and I'm quite happy what I was able to do with these (by now) venerable sculpts. I also took this opportunity to update the single Guard on foot I had painted in 2019. My paintjob was similar but I'd like to think a bit better by now. The main areas I worked on were the gold and the green cloak.

Pict 1640: Gimli and Théoden, Defenders of Rohan

Pict 164: Gimli and Théoden, Defenders of Rohan

Gimli was the first miniature of this particular batch that I finished. The small hero models from MESBG are both iconic and characterful. Of course there is a lot of reference material out there and thus they paint up really fast. This Gimli was a fun sculpt – the Defenders of Rohan box with the resting poses still holds up. And of course since they depict the heroes waiting during the beginning of the siege of the Hornburg, the miniature was quite fitting for the Doubles tournament. 

Similar to the Royal Guard, I also reworked the Defenders of Rohan Théoden. I painted this sculpt originally in 2018. I am really quite pleased with the result. I find the face and the armour really improved. Originally I wanted to finish a Théoden sculpt with a shield, but did not find the time or motiavtion to do that. So there are a few stragglers from this attempt a Rohan miniatures and I hope to finish them in the next few weeks.

Pict 1642: Blood Angels Patrol

Pict 1643: Blood Angels Cataphractii Centurion

Pict 1644: Blood Angels Librarian and Vigilator

Pict 1645: Blood Angels Librarian and Vigilator

First, however, I am returning to my Heresy Blood Angels. In addition to the Librarian and the Vigilator I had already shown, I also built and painted the Cataphractii hero from the Betrayal at Calth box. During painting, I removed the Power Weapon greeble from the Librarian's Force Staff / Spear and I am now really quite happy with the conversion. The Vigilator sculpt is unaltered while the Terminator had donated up his Combi-melta to my Justaerin Conversions a while back and got a Combi Bolter as a replacement. And of course he is standing on the base topper steps from the new Lemartes kit, that a friend gifted my to use with my Blood Angels.

Pict 1646: Blood Angels Inductii Despoilers

Pict 1647: Blood Angels Assault Marines

I also finished the five each of Despoilers and Assault Marines to fill out the respective Troops choices I have to the maximum of twenty. A comparatively simple paintjob – I tried to go a bit easier on the weathering and scratches this time and I do like the result. I'm really happy to have these done and I'm already thinking about a second big Assault Squad, maybe Veterans. And Veteran Breachers. And Desintegrator Vetereans. And Terminators. And...

Pict 1648: Blood Angels Spartan Assault Tank (WIP)

Next up will be a ride for my Despoilers in the form of this Spartan. The vehicle might be reassigned to Terminators once I get around to painting some, so I'm using a bit more bling than might be necessary for a simple troops choice. I painted the interior ahead of final assembly and am now looking to add a few more decals – especially a band of gold filigree running along the top of the side armour. After that it is on to the oil wash and detail work, once that has dried.

Pict 1649: Legio Solaria Reaver Titans for Dreadtober (WIP)

With October fast approaching, I'm also looking ahead towards Dreadtober. My plan for this year will be to paint the two Reaver Titans for my epic scale Legio Solaria. I built them back in May, but haven't had the chance to paint them yet. The main parts should be done quite fast (except for the trim as always!). I hope all the various magnetised weapons will get done during the month as well.

Pict 1650: Luna Wolves Ghrastak (very WIP)

As is somewhat of a tradition for me, I also aim for an ambitious stretch goal. This time around it will be the last (currently) unpainted Dreadnought in my collection. Another Contemptor, that I want to build and paint up as part of my Luna Wolves. The inspiration is a picture of an individual Sons of Horus Dreadnought named Ghrastak from the first Black Book Betrayal, only at a time when the Legion still was the Luna Wolves.

Middle-earth tournament prep: Beechbone and Rohan

While I did not finish to much – pretty much only Beechbone for my Ents – but I there is some good progress with more Middle-earth miniatures as well as some Heresy Blood Angels!

Pict 1631: Beechbone

Pict 1632: Beechbone

Pict 1633: Beechbone

When Beechbone here was announced, I was happy to add him to my Fangorn collection. The sculpt has some really nice details such as the face and the nest with two little birds on his head. The leaves are still a bit to cookie-cutter for my liking, but they look better than the ones on Birchseed. I will play the three hero Ents as well as Merry and Pippin in a small tournament next weekend.

Pict 1634: Rohan Royal Guard, Gimli, Theodon, Rohan Banner (WIP)

Staying in Middle-earth, the weekend after next, there will be a Doubles tournament. My team mate Small Things Modelling and I decided to bring the Defenders of Helm's Deep, since the army would allow us to split the force thematically and have a little mini game with Legolas and Gimli counting kills. It has been quite some time since I played Rohan at an event – in fact most of my Warriors were painted for a similar Doubles event with the same team mate almost 8 years ago! Since then I'd like to think that my painting has improved somewhat and I'd like to try and go over the warriors once more.

Before that, however, there a two more Rohan Royal Guard on foot that I have to paint for the army and I'd like to take the opportunity to also do a third one as well as new paintjobs for the most important units of the army: Théoden, Gimli and the Banner bearer. These will be the priority. Any more highlights on the Warriors would be the icing on the cake!

Pict 1635: Blood Angels Assault Marines and Despoilers (WIP)

The first units I built to bring my Blood Angels into the third edition of the Horus Heresy are these five Despoilers and five more Assault Marines. The former are all equiped with the basic boltpistol and chainsword since my unit already has two heavy chainswords and two poweraxes that now share the same one-in-four slot. They are once again painted as Inductii – I'm looking forward to getting rules for them as well. For now, they will be a squad full squad of twenty normal Despoilers. The Assault Marines also bring up my squad to the full twenty. The base colours, decals and oil wash are down, so only the highlights to do on these!

Pict 1636: Blood Angels Librarian and Vigilator (WIP)

Anytime I add a small squad to my Blood Angels is another opportunity to also add to their Officer cadre. This time around I started to work on a Librarian I had converted from an Ahriman earlier in the year as well as the Forge World Vigilator. Both of them should come in handy when list building in the new edition. They are at the same stage like the troops, but I'd like to give them a bit more attention and details.

Blood Angels Air Support

The first proper post of the year with the first three completed miniatures, of which only one was stared last year! The big one is the Avenger Strike Fighter painted in Blood Angels Legion colours. The other two are Rohan miniatures I wanted to use in game.

Pict 1261: Avenger Strike Fighter Crew

Pict 1262: Blood Angels Avenger Strike Fighter

Pict 1263: Blood Angels Avenger Strike Fighter

Pict 1264: Avenger Strike Fighter Rear Gunner

This was quite a neat project – really something different from what I usually do. And quite big as well! I sometimes had difficulties handling the plane while painting.
To get my bearings I looked at a lot of other Blood Angel aircraft as well as other Avenger Strike Fighters. To my delight, google recomended one of the latter painted on the blog Würfelwiese – a blog I highly recommend! I looked at it for inspiration on which panels to set apart in a contrasting colour and for pointers on where to put weathering on the model.

Pict 1265: Rohan Captain and King's Huntsman

On a whim, I painted these two Rohan miniatures for a game today. They are both from the Rohan Commanders set, but the Captain with the Orc is the metal version, converted with a Warhammer Woodelf bow, while the King's Huntsman is unaltered. Sadly the latter suffered from a bad case of Finecast face, but I did what I could... And for an evening's work I'm very happy with the pair of them!

Pict 1266: Blood Angels Assault Marines (WIP)

Lastly, these Assault Marines are pretty much done as well. If the Rohan Commanders had not jumped the queue, they might be there already. The are only missing the weathering on the red armour, so I expect to have a neat little before/after comparison with the next post!

New Year, New Projects

These past two weeks, I spent pretty firmly in Middle-earth. Not only did I paint a lone Rohan Royal Guard, I also started a new branch of my Mordor army following a Black Gate theme. I painted up the Mouth of Sauron and started converting two Mordor Troll Chieftains.
After all that I did also have some time to finish the ArcWorlde Mjowls and Brutogg the Ogre from Cursed City.

Pict 1116: The Mouth of Sauron attacked by a Rohan Royal Guard

Pict 117: The Mouth of Sauron

Pict 118: The Mouth of Sauron

The Mouth of Sauron painted up very fast following my usual Nazgûl scheme and adding different highlights to the cloth. He seems like an interesting character to play. He'll be the magic user for my Black Gate force and I hope for some good synergies with the two big monsters!

Pict 1119: Mordor Troll Chieftain (Repose)

Pict 1120: Mordor Troll Chieftain (Repose)

Pict 1121: Mordor Troll Chieftain (Repose)

Pict 1122: Mordor Troll Chieftain (Repose)

Continuing on with the Black Gate army I converted these two Mordor Troll chieftains. The first one (really just a repose) was a raffle prize from the christmas stream of Battle Strams in Middle-earth and kickstarted the whole project.

Pict 1123: Mordor Troll Chieftain Conversion (Duel with Aragorn Elessar)

The second one is a bit more involved. He's an eBay rescue and was missing the left arm and his head but came with replacement bits from the plastic Mordor Troll. At first I wanted to have him standing on the rock from the Wild Warg Chieftain I still have from my White Warg. But when heroichighlights' diorama contest came up on Instagram, I decided to replicate that duel from the end of The Return of the King and have Aragorn Elessar crushed underfoot! Right now the main pose is sketched out – Aragorn is alredy lying down but I will still change both his arms to have him stab the Troll's toe with his elven dagger. And of course there is quite a lot of gap filling and sculpting of armour plates left to do!

Pict 1124: Rohan Royal Guard

This mounted Rohan Royal Guard was a quick project for a bit more than and evening. He was painted during the first Battle Stream of the year. The stream was themed around the 40th issue of the Battle Games in Middle-earth magazine. Incidentally you got a mounted Rohan Royal Guard with the issue if you were subscribed back then and that was a good excuse to paint up one more from my drawer of Rohan cavalery.

Pict 1125: The White Council

Pict 1126: Amon Hen

Since I was in build mode after converting the Trolls, I also put together some new models that I want to paint within the next few months. Among them are the beautiful White Council, that was made to order late last year as well as the ForgeWorld Amon Hen (too big for my lightbox of course!). Once again gap filling to do, but I hope it will paint up quickly since it's mainly just ruined stone and ground texture.

Pict 1127: Brutogg Corpse-Eater

Pict 1128: Brutogg Corpse-Eater

Pict 1129: Brutogg Corpse-Eater

Brutogg Corpse-Eater was one of the models I looked forward to the most out of all the Cused City box. He's not only an amazing Ogre miniature with a great pose but really tells a story with all the additional bits he's lugging around such as a procelain jug (what could be in it?) and substitude weapons (you can never have to many!). The best details have to be his face and the shoulder pad making him look right at home in the Old World as a Maneater.

Pict 1130: ArcWorld Mjowls

These cute little cat/owl chimeras named Mjowls were started back in April shortly before Cursed City took over my painting projects. Now they finally got the highlights they deserve and can get up to some mischief annoying the Wildelves and Halfings in the ArcWorlde shelf of my cabinet.

Pict 1131: Dagnai Holdenstock (WIP)

And lastly here is another WIP picture. Dagnai Holdenstock is the last hero from the Cursed City. I was not really inspired by the steam punk dwarf aesthetic and found it quite difficult to decide on the colours. Now he's had the washes done, hopefully I don't take to much time highlighting.

New and old Projects

I did not have that much time for the hobby and did not touch a brush to a model during the past two weeks... But I managed to strip some new and old friends and build a few more models to take up space on my table.

Pict 907: New and old Projects

As you can see my model selection is somewhat eclectic once more: some Warhammer High Elves, one Bretonnian, six more Rohan Royal Guard, Jarlaxle Baenre and of course that montrosityof  a Red Dragons in the background... Next I'll have to get out the green stuff and fill in some gaps. Fortunately the dragon fit together pretty well after some hot baths.

Picking up a few things throughout Middle-earth

I used the past two weeks to pick up a few projects and finishing others with a focus on Middle-earth. I managed to paint Eorl and a few Warriors for my Rohan army, the Moria Goblins of a few weeks back as well as some more heroes. I also painted two more models for D&D and started on a few more.

Pict 859: Rohan vs. Moria

Pict 860: Grôblog and Armoured Moria Goblins

Pict 861: Grôblog and Armoured Moria Goblins

First up are the armoured Moria Goblins. I really like the models - the mail coifs are an element that didn't extend towards the plastic goblins and makes these stand out.
With Grôblog, the guy with the tactical dwarven ruin, I particularly enjoyed painting the flowing cloak. But as is tradition with finecast, before priming I had to carve out the detail on the pillar because it was to washed out. I was very pleased however how the whole batch turned out and what was at first meant to be a small group to be played as hobgoblins in D&D might now get turned into an army? I already stripped the paint of about 70 plastic goblins, so that might be a reality...

Pict 862: Eorl, Warriors of Rohan with Horn and Banner

Pict 863: Eorl, Warriors of Rohan with Horn and Banner

After having painted Eorl on foot, of course I had to paint him on horseback as well. Intrestingly GW painted their version with a brown horse while Felaróf is clearly described as white. So that's what I went with. I also painted two more warriors - a bannerbearer and a hornblower. The banner will surely see play while the horn is a bit on the expensive site pointswise.

Pict 864: Gildor Inglorion, Gandalf the White, Aragorn

Pict 865: Gildor Inglorion, Gandalf the White, Aragorn

I then pulled out some more Middle-earth heroes from various armies and simply painted what took my fancy. The three poses of Aragorn were painted at the same time and now put me at nine painted Aragorns - only five more left to go and I painted all of the official poses that GW put out!
Of Gandalf I also showed a WIP. I'm not perfectly happy with the eyes, they are sculpted to be rather small on the model and now he looks a bit surprised. But after several tries, that what I ended up with. Gildor Inglrion was painted with the scenarios of the Fellowship Journeybook in mind. The colourscheme combines elements of my Highelf and Woodelf miniatures, since he's able to include the latter in his warband.

Pict 866: Dragonborn Rogue, Halfling Ranger

Pict 867: Dragonborn Rogue, Halfling Ranger

And to make a few steps outside the Legendarium, I finished up this Dragonborn Rogue and afterwards painted this Halfling Ranger. Once again, the miniatures are made by Darksword and a joy to paint!

Pict 868: Morgul Stalker (WIP)

And lastly here is a WIP of some Morgul Stalkers that I just started. The miniatures are a bit comical but I like the design choice to have spiky hoods and gauntlets. The faces with the big teeth just scream for a skull-motive face paint. I'll see what I can do!