From TeemuL: "I am no man" [Literature] (95 points)

• Witch King: [taking Eowyn by the throat] You fool. No man can kill me. Die now.
• [Merry stabs the Witch King from behind; the Witch King shrieks and falls to his knees. Eowyn rises and pulls off her helm, her hair falls down over her shoulder]
• Eowyn: I am no man.
• [she thrusts her sword into the Witch King's helm and twists; he shrieks and implodes]*

*From imdb.com

This topic was difficult for me, maybe I was overthinking it, may be not. May be it was my lack of English skills to understand "snooty" and "highbrow". I mean Literature might be easy, just have a book reference for example, but the whole Challenge is about the books and the description of the topic made it more difficult. Happily my Thor's Day crew was helpful and enlightened me that snooty can for example mean Jacob Rees Mogg (UK politician) or a high elf, highbrow might mean Einstein or a Doctor at the School of Natural and Environmental Sciences of Newcastle University. In the end I decided to try a literal approach. And use couple of more words than are actually needed.

The Witchking of Angmar is snooty to me, if I understood correctly. Likes to look down on others and is completely arrogant and believes to be immortal. There is an old "prophecy" regarding him, made by Glorfindel during the Second Age: "Do not pursue him! He will not return to these lands. Far off yet is his doom, and not by the hand of man shall he fall." The prophecy is quite literal, because in the end it needed a male hobbit and a female human to kill him. May be he should have been more literal and consider the holes in his theory? I guess snooty and highbrow people tend not to do that.

This trio is from Games Workshop boxed set "The Fall of the Witchking", those mini diorama style boxes they used to make in order to sell the same characters with different sculpts over and over again. And in the movie Merry is without his helmet, so this is not even accurate. I got this years ago as second hand, box was opened, but nothing done except removing the stab from Eowyn, that's why she is on an mdf base.

Some time ago I painted all my Rohans and in the last Challenge painted the rest of the Rohans - those with broken or missing weapons converted to standard bearers and musicians. This time I finish the same army third time by adding Merry and Eowyn in Rohan uniforms. They were fast to paint, since the colours were well known to me and even the black Witchking was quite easy to paint with two drybrushes of different shades of grey. I have painted a dozen or so ringwraiths in the past, so a well know method. I even managed to paint Eowyn's eyes quite well.

This is quite a surprise entry. These are from Warlord Games's Gaul Tribesmen, a box from my "paint the models and get more storage room by recycling the cardboard box" challenge. Why a surprise? These were on my list to finish during the Challenge, but I didn't know I would paint them so quick. In theory they were painted in a single session with Citadel Contrasts, but in practice they took couple of quite short sessions. They don't have many details and while I skipped the squares, stripes and other markings, they were super easy and fast to paint. Perfect for painting gamer, who wants ok quality in no time. Very far from modern GW minis for example.

I chose quite bright colours as suggested by the box art and then quite randomly painted blues pants there, a blue shirt there. There are couple of grey and off-white here and there to create contrasts. I don't know the colour of hair of Gauls, so I went quite random there, too.

I used the bases from the box. They are quite thin and the edge is higher than the rest of the base, so a miniature with a small attached "base" sinks a bit inside the base and basing hides a bit of the attached base. Quite clever. I should have added some basing stuff there before starting to paint, but these are ok.

The models themselves were single piece plastics with metal spears. I have not encountered this method before, but I'm quite firmly in the fantasy section of the hobby. There are some mould lines, which could have been removed, but I didn't bother. So they were quite easy to assemble, too, just add the spear (or javelin). And the spears won't snap like plastic spears. I'm very happy with these, the only problem being that I really don't have any game use for them... At least yet.

The boxes emptied and minis painted - more storage room!

After revisiting the Section 1, I go back to completed Section 2 and enter the Section 4. Some kitbashing next...

I hope the literal requirements of the Literature topic is fulfilled with this entry and I can claim 15 points for 3 28mm minis and 20 bonus points for the Literature topic. And then 60 points for 12 28mm minis without any topic relation.

 

 

Sylvain: Your Literature entry is well argued. And well painted too. It was a great scene of the final movie of the trilogy, and a great dad joke at the Ring-Wraith's expense. Like you I find that spears are tricky to work with, but your combination of plastic and metal seems to work well. Excellent job!

 

 

From PeterD: Roman Infantry for Under Construction (80 points)

Next up for me is a unit of 12 Late Roman Infantry for the Under Construction theme. I had a good burst of painting activity on mid to late October and got these figures partly painted during that time. Then my wife came home from visiting her mother and suddenly there was a lot of other stuff to get done.....

Anyway they are finished now, 12 28mm figures all of them Gripping Beast.  Ten of the figures are stock from the Plastic Late Roman box kit while the standard bearer and one of the officers are metals from the Arthurian range. 

I have painted them as members of the Legionis Secundae Augustae based at Rutupiae near Sandwich in Kent, now known as Richborough Castle, under the command of the Comes litoris Saxonici per Britanniam. This is one of the units based in Brittania which are the descendents of Legio II Augusta who had been part of the original Claudian Invasion force and never left the island. Rutupiae is where a lot of the action in Rosemary Sutcliffe's novel The Silver Branch takes place.

So far I have painted several units based on Legio II Augusta including some Lanciari and a ballista earlier in the Challenge. I'll treat this as a standard unit of Auxiliary, neither Verean or Raw, under the To the Strongest ruleset we've been using. The GB plastics give a nice regular look to the unit with a couple of archers in the back ranks for a bit of long range fire power. The vexillum has a rough impression of the Capricorn (a sort of goat/mermaid hybrid) emblem of Legio II Augusta.

I also thought I'd share some photos from a recent game played with my Barbarian Conspiracy period armies, which I began work on during Challenge XII. It's at Curt Clubhouse using his terrain mat and river, but you can see my British Village, Dark Age fort and a lot of my troops on table.  Also visible are JeremyM from prior challenges, SylvainR (with beer) and Curt's legs.

The Scots Irish deeply so as to give the ballistae in the fort a wide berth.

Roman battle line

The bases I used are a little wide for the fort's ramparts so we used MDF bases to prop up the missile troops

Typical late antiquity scrumming the background, with Roman Cavalry in the foreground.

I make it 60 points for the figures plus 20 for the Under Construction theme.  The base points count toward both the SPQR and Carausius Emperor of Britain Side duels.

From TeemuL: Good looking Romans and they don't even have too-complex shields with them. There has been some different minion decisions regarding Under Construction Studio, some have rewarded full points for minis, which were partly started before, others have rewarded only the Studio bonus. Personally I think both are bit extreme and there is clearly room for confusion. So far I have awarded the full points and I will continue like that until whipped.

Your games look nice, having a friendly Snowlord nearby with a nice garage is a benefit.

From PeterD Late Roman Limitanei (60 points)

 

I've got 12 Late Roman infantry from a Limitanei cohort of Tungri. Figures are Victrix plastics, which went together well and painted up nicely. The units designated Limitanei were essentially garrison troops and typically not as well equipped, trained or led as the Comitatenses in the field army. However, quality likely carried considerably between units from part-time militias of farmers who showed up to drill on occasion, to full time regular troops. Some of the later got drafted in the Field Armies as pseudocomitatenses.  Benito recently posted a very fine looking unit of the part timers, while I am envisioning my Tungri as more regular.  

There were two similar named units in Britain in the late 4th Century. The Cohors I Tungrorum was based at Borcovicio (the Housesteads fort in Northumberland). A second unit under the officer Praepositus militum Tungrecanorum were at Dubris (Dover).   That means that  can comfortably field my Tungri against Scots-Irish, Pict and Saxon raider alike. The cohort names indicate that the units were likely originally recruited from Tungri tribesmen in Northern Gaul.  However over time they morphed into locally recruited units of Romano-Britons.

While I did want this unit to be reasonably well equipped, I didn't want them to look as turned out as my veterans from the Field Army of the Comes Britanniae.  Only one officer has metal armour with a couple of sets of leather army and I tried to make them look less look as tightly drilled. I modelled severall figures with outstretched left hands and this gave me troubles keeping some of their shields glued on. Based on an illustration from Simon MacDowell's book on late Roman Infantry I went for blue tunic decorations instead of my usual red one. It took several tubes of blue before I found a colour that I liked and I think that I'll be going back to red in the future.

According to some source the static Limitanei troops typically had more uniform equipment as they drew on local suppliers and arsenals where the Field Armies ranged over large territories and therefore picked stuff up as needed from where ever was local at the time. That might have been true for the units Juilan took from Germany for his disastrous Persian campaign, but my I figure that the Comes Britanniae had a much more limited range and therefore drew from the same armouries.

Reformatting the photos, I noticed that there is stray hair that needs to trimmed from one figure.

I again free hand painted the shields. They look like the work of a 5 year with lacking any artistic talent up close, but ok from a distance. The Notitia Dignitatum doesn't show shield patterns for Limitanei troops so I opted for a variation on the "Head on a Stick" design shown for several Auxiliary Palatina infantry units. I used a crimson vexillum with an impression of a winged victory (or angel) design held by the rather stout and self important fellow in the leather armour.

Twelve 28mm foot figures should be another 60 points, which will also count against the Carausius Emperor of Britain and SPQR side duels.

From TeemuL: Good looking infantry, I like the cloak and everything. The bases are great, too. I'll use my minion superpowers to grant you 10 bonus points for the shields and the banner.

From SimonG: Imperial Might - 20 28mm Roman Legionaries (100 points)

Phew, now I know why I don't do Napoleonics! Batch painting large numbers of uniform soldiers is quite a chore. However for my Jewish Wars project I do have to field some Roman Legionaries so my first off studio submission is a batch of 20 Victrix early Imperial legionaries -- from the Legionaries Attacking set.

These are very fine sculpts -- easy to put together and with clean detail to paint. Almost too much detail (all of those buckles and ties!) but I think they were ultimately worth the effort.  Those deep set eyes within the Galea had me digging out my rarely used ten zero brush!  Suffice it to say I've only given close ups on the best results, for mass troops I'm not going back over and correcting stuff that only shows on close up 🤪 !  I also enjoyed adding a modicum of dust to suit fighting in the middle east.

The shields are LBMS -- actually I've only attached shields to 10 of the 20 as I've got some 1st Corps Cornered Scutum on order as I'm not sure that the classic curved profile rectangular shaped shield was actually used in the Jewish wars.  I'll have to hand paint these shields and I'll repost as soon as I have this done.  Still without shields you can see some more of the detail on the figures.

Finally I do hate having to do sandals, quite time consuming but at least you get the chance to add toe nails!  Just don't count how many there are on every foot 😏

This focus stacked shot is actually quite amusing as it creates the impression of motion among the group!

And here is a shot of the lots together so you can see some more details on the basing (another PITA when you are doing large numbers of single figures) -- it's a Geek gaming mix with added tufts and rocks.

Points wise this is a simple 20 28mm figures for 100 and continues my total marching along.  Next week it's back on the Studio lot with a sample of global ghoulies for World Cinema!

Those Roman legionaries look fab, Simon! 100 points whizzing your way!

Tamsin 

From PeterD: Roman Lanciarii (33 points)

 

Second post for me this week, a group of 6 Lanciariiiii for my Late Romans.  These are 28mm plastics, mostly from the fairly new Victrix boxed set plus a few add ons from Gripping Beast plastic Romans (shields and a head or too).

Lanciarii were detachments of Legionaries or Auxiliaries told off to form a skirmish line much like the Napoleonic Light companies.  The name references the use of the lancea, a light throwing spear.    I've also thrown in a couple with plumbata, essentially militarized lawn darts with a lead weight added for extra distance and punch.  I again painted shields to match up with Legio Secunda Britannica.

I am normally late to the game on new figure releases, but when Victrix released Unarmoured Roman Infantry this year I was pretty quick on the PayPal switch.  They make an interest contrast to the Gripping Beast Plastic Roman Infantry.  Comparisons are summarized below.

• Gripping Beast are better value, 40 figures for 24 quid vs 36 figures for 34 quid.
• The GB box includes torsos for armoured spear/swordsmen, unarmoured spear/swordsmen and archers while the Victrix has no archers and they are mostly unarmoured.  Consequently there's less variety of poses to form a single unit using the GB figures, but this gives them, a more "regular" appearance.
• Both kits come with lots of possible head and arm/weapon combos.   The GB he's are all "roman" and include some in Pannonian caps which Victrix lacks.  Victrix does both Roman and Barbarian heads.  So far it appears that heads and arms can be swapped about between ranges.
• The GB torsos have the sleeve and should decoration carved in, while these have to be painted on the Victrix figures.  Therefore GB make good Romans or deserters, while Victrix figures can double as Germanic tribes. 
• I think both boxes are good and useful, and I'll like buy more of each.

The 30 points will count for two Side Duels (Carausius Emperor of Britain and SPQR) and I'll fill in the requisite forms once they go live.

From TeemuL: Good looking Lanciarii and nice to share the comparison between different products. The solution seems to be buy everything. :) I'll give you a few extra points for hand painted shields.

From PeterD: Late Roman Cheiroballistrae For 80s Retro (60 Points)

It always takes a while for me together my first post on the Challenge no matter how small I make it.  My last uni exam was written on December 22nd and by the time I had it marked it was late on the 23rd and then there's Christmas, etc. whine.....

Anyway I have two Late Roman cheiroballistrae (sp?)with crews for my first post.  I am not intending to focus too much on the Studio map but will take the theme lot points when and where these are available so I will count this as 80s Retro.  Back in 1980 Halifax, 18 year old me took a windy route home from my first year Philosophy Class (Death and the Mind) to stop in at a new Hobby Shop.  Turned out that this was run by Ross MacFarlane of gameofmonth a regular gaming partner for the next 18 years before I moved very far west.  One of the games were played back in the 80s was WRG Ancients 6th Edition using Ross' Late Romans and then later Greeks and Persians.

The models are 28mm Gripping Beast metals.  The ballistas went together easily enough once I downloaded the picture from the GB website and the crews were nicely cast.  I like the age old trope of the grunts doing the heavy work on the coffee grinder winches while the officers kneel around and look important.  I free handed shields to match two of my infantry units.  The bolt shooters themselves would be more use against elephants or cataphracts than against unarmored Celts, but do give a longer range and with some punching power.

Exculcatores Iunores Britanniciani

Legio Secunda Britannica

I also found six members of my first ever 25mm ancients unit.  Greek slingers for my Spartan army of Agesilaus II in Asia Minor.  Slingers are Ral Partha, the flautist is a Minifig. They were painted 42 years ago but have seen action on table in the last 10 years.

Points wise I make it 

• two crew served weapons @10=20
• 4 foot figures @5=20
• 1 theme lot @20
• Total =60 points

The non-theme points will go against the SPQR and Carausius Emperor of Britain side duels.

_______________________________

It's good to have you back with the Challenge, Peter, and now on the points roster too! 

Great work on these Late Romans and a nice walk down memory lane with the Greek slingers (Stacy would be proud). I remember seeing the artillery in one of your preparatory photos, so it's nice to see them in all their painted glory, ready to pin the enemies of Rome like wayward lab specimens. Also, very nice work on the painted shields. All those radiating lines and wings can prove to be tricky brushwork, so well done with that. 

Now my friend, gird your loins for your minionship this Monday. You have a rough and tumble mob to manage. ;P

- Curt

From TomG - Shaun the Sheep Had It Coming! - The Shrine - 25pts

After a successful burst of hobby productivity, I bring you my second entry of the day, with this ancient priest, mid sacrifice, trying to please the gods and enjoy some tasty mutton after the ceremony. The miniature was a freebie given away with the release of the SPQR skirmish game from Warlord Games, and was very nearly the entry prize this year, but he fitted the Shrine setting too well not too silly his services there. 

I wanted to distinguish between the warm yellows and reds used in the knife, tunic/toga and his skin, from that of the sacrificial sheep, but it was harder than I thought. My initial fear was the the white wool would completely blow out the colour composition of the model, leaving a desaturated and washed out effect. However that wasn't the case, simply by changing up the texture and going for a more muted brown/off-white tone.

I attempted to add this texture to the sheep but selectively adding rough patches of highlights, then highlighting again with another semi random attack pattern. ,I ed with this were the dark horns and hooves and the sheep no longer detracted from the priest, and instead helped the model "pop" as some might say.

Although the model is made of an odd soft resin plastic, which made clean up harder, the overall finish was fun to create, and allowed me to practice yet more on my journey on perfecting painting yellow. Long way to go yet but I'm happy with this one.

Points -

28mm Infantry = 5pts

Challenge Bonus = 20pts

Total = 25pts