Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge XIII Submission #10 - Forth Eorlingas!

 Arise, arise, Riders of Théoden!
Fell deeds awake: fire and slaughter!
Spear shall be shaken, shield be splintered,
a sword-day, a red day, ere the sun rises!
Ride now, ride now! Ride to Gondor!

 This submission is a force of Rohan riders and mounted commanders consisting of a box of 6 plastic Riders of Rohan, two metal Rohan Royal Guard, King Théoden in full armour on Snowmane, and the mounted version of the Captain and Banner from the Rohan Mounted Commander set, all from the Games Workshop's Lord of the Rings line of miniatures. 

 

Arise, arise, Riders of Théoden!

 

 All the figures were cleaned up, the horses assembled and mounted on their bases, and some sand was glued on with PVA. They were then primed black with an airbrush since it is still too cold to go outside to use a rattle can. As with the Rohan warriors I did two weeks ago, I left the shields off until all the painting was complete. I even left the plastic riders on the sprue to paint them. 

 I started with the horses, and used craft paints almost exclusively on them. The riders were painted with primarily Vallejo acrylics, along with an occasional craft paint. I used the same selection of browns (Chocolate Brown, Leather Brown, Beige Brown, Cavalry Brown) and greens (Camouflage Olive Green, Camouflage Luftwaffe Green, German Feldgrau) that I used on the Warriors of Rohan. Once all the basic colours were applied, the figures were mounted on their horses and the shields attached. They then got a coat of Army Painter Strong Tone Quickshade. 

 The easiest to paint were the plastic Riders of Rohan, followed by the captain and the banner. The hardest were the Royal Guard, and Théoden due to their armour that is covered with horse-related iconography. Plus my gold paint didn't want to flow well when I was doing Théoden's armour. I am a little concerned about the durability of the plastic horses that came with two Royal guard, the captain, and especially the banner. That's a lot of weight to be supported by a single plastic horse's leg. We will see how long they go before a leg breaks. At least Théoden is sitting on a solid metal mount.

 

King Théoden flanked by two Rohan Royal Guard

King Théoden flanked by two Rohan Royal Guard

Captain and Banner

Captain and Banner

Six Riders of Rohan

Six Riders of Rohan

Ride now, ride now! Ride to Gondor!

This entry concluded my Rohirrim muster. Thanks for reading. More to follow.

 

Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge XIII Submission #9 - Defenders of the Riddermark

 This submission is a force of Rohan warriors and commanders consisting of a box of 24 plastic Warriors of Rohan, three metal Rohan Royal Guard on foot, Merriadoc Esquire of Rohan from the 'Heroes of the West' boxed set, King Théoden in full armour, a dismounted Captain and Banner from the Rohan Mounted Commander set, four resin figures from the Rohan Commanders set, and a converted Gamling figure, all from the Games Workshop's Lord of the Rings line of miniatures.

 

Defenders of the Riddermark in front of Helm's Deep

 

All these figures were cleaned up, assembled where necessary, mounted on their bases, and some sand was glued on with PVA. They were then primed black with an airbrush since it is too cold to go outside to use a rattle can. As with the Dwarves I did earlier in the competition, I left the shields off until all the painting was complete. All the figures were painted with primarily Vallejo acrylics, along with a few craft paints. I used a variety of browns (Chocolate Brown, Leather Brown, Beige Brown, Cavalry Brown) and a selection of greens that aren't usually associated with fantasy figures (Camouflage Olive Green, Camouflage Luftwaffe Green, German Feldgrau). Once all the basic colours were applied, the figures got a coat of Army Painter Strong Tone Quickshade. The easiest to paint were the plastic Warriors of Rohan, followed by the various commanders. The hardest were the Royal Guard, Théoden, and Gamling due to the insanely detailed armour that is covered with horse-related iconography. At least the metal figures are more durable that the resin figures. The resin banner got snapped off as I was packing the figures up after taking all the photos. 😝

 

Warriors of Rohan Group 1

Warriors of Rohan Group 2

Resin set of Rohan Commanders

Dismounted Rohan Captain and Banner

Rohan Royal Guard

Gamlling, Theoden, and Merry

  The figure of Gamling with the banner is a conversion of the original miniature released by Games Workshop. The figure has since been re-released with him holding the Rohan Royal Banner in his left hand and his sword in a lower position. I had two minis of the early version, one which I painted up a few years ago. I decided to convert the other one to give him a banner since I have a mounted version of Gamling where he is carrying one. To make it easy on myself, I just replaced his left hand with one fashioned out of fine wire wrapped around a length of florist wire that forms the pole and some epoxy putty to build it up a bit and form the thumb of his hand. The pole itself is anchored to a hole drilled into the base with super glue. The banner is from an image plucked from the internet, tweaked to make it two-sided and printed off on my laser printer. Once the figure was all painted, I applied some PVA glue to half of what would end up on the inside, wrapped it around the florist wire pole and shaped it while the glue was still wet. Here is a comparison of the two versions.

 

original Gamling, and 'new improved' Gamling

Thanks for reading. More to follow.

Forth Eorlingas!

This is the second part of my 'Heroes of the Riddermark' project. It consists of five mounted figures depicting Théodred, Éomer, Gamling, a Rohan Royal Knight, and Éowyn. I had actually started the project by painting the horses, but then moved to the dismounted figures before coming back to finish the mounted characters. As much as possible, I tried to match the colour palette between the foot and mounted figures of the same character, so I kept the completed dismounted figures on my workbench to use them as a reference. I painted two of the horses as bays, two as chestnuts, and one as a dun, so only one new colour scheme for my horses having already done a chestnut and a bay on some mounted Gondor miniatures.

Théodred was a Prince of Rohan, and the only son and heir of King Théoden. He was slain by an Orc-man in the First Battle of the Fords of Isen. I copied the paint scheme on his armour from the Games Workshop website, and painted his horse as a dun. Alas, I only have a mounted version of Théodred. Dismounted figures are still available, but only as a part of a set, which makes it an expense proposition for only the foot figure.

Éomer, Marshal of the Riddermark, is the nephew of Théoden, and one of Rohan's foremost warriors. I gave him a bay to ride. He will make a nice addition to the tabletop.

Gamling, Captain of Rohan, is the Royal Standard Bearer. This was probably the most difficult figure to paint due to the sculpted standard with all its folds and creases. There is no raised detail on it, so I had to paint the running horse freehand. It was why I did this one last. I also mounted him on a bay.

A Rohan Royal Knight, he is part of King Théoden bodyguard. I mounted him on a chestnut with two white socks on its front legs. I still have a two more of these in unopened blisters, but I will leave them for another day.

 

Éowyn, Shieldmaiden of Rohan, is the daughter of Éomund and Theodwyn, younger sister of Éomer and niece of King Théoden. Disguising herself as Dernhelm, she fights at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields, where she and Merry kill the Witch King of Angmar. I mounted her on another chestnut. Since it was the only horse of the five without a chanfron, I gave it a blaze.

With the exception of Éowyn, all the other figures have very intricate designs on their armour. I found I could only paint one a day before my shoulder and neck muscles started to tense up trying to maintain the fine control on the tip of the brush. 

Time now to move on to 'building an army worthy of Mordor'. Stay safe and healthy until we can meet around the wargames table again.

Heroes of the Riddermark

 It took a while, but I finally finished my dismounted Heroes of the Riddermark. I still have five mounted heroes which are already in progress, but they will have to wait for another post. With the exception of the Éowyn figures, all the rest had a ton of fine detail on their vambraces and greaves that took much longer to paint than I had originally anticipated, hence the two week gap since my last post. I was also unhappy with the flesh tone I had initially selected for Éowyn (Vallejo Light Flesh) which came out looking too pale and pink. After a few attempts to fix it with some washes, I decided it wasn't going to work and scrubbed all three figures back down to the black primer using Simple Green cleaner and a toothbrush. I guess that is one of the advantages of doing the faces first.

My nine heroes were photographed in front of a 3D puzzle of Meduseld, the great Golden Hall at Edoras, the capital of Rohan. To my knowledge, with the exception of the Rohan Royal Guard, all of these figures are out of production or have replaced by new sculpts.

 

 

Below are Hama, Captain of Rohan and Doorward of Edoras, Éomer, Marschal of the Riddermark, and Gamling, Captain of Rohan and Royal Standard Bearer. (The mounted figure carries the Royal Standard, and a newer sculpt released by GW has the dismounted figure also holding the Standard. I have a second Gamling figure that came with a bulk eBay purchase that I may convert by putting a standard in his hand.) Éomer had the most raised detail that needed to be picked out with a fine brush, but was the easiest of the three to paint due to not having a lot of deep recesses where it was difficult to get a brush.

 

Next are three different sculpts of Éowyn as a woman of Rohan, or in armour from the Battle of  the Pelennor Fields. They came from different GW boxed sets of heroes from their Middle-earth range. (Heroes of Helm's Deep, The Fall of the Witch King, and Heroes of the West) Other than having to start over on the faces, these three were the easiest to paint as the armour consists of plain leather vambraces and riding boots. I am happy with the final result.

 

Lastly, three men of the Rohan Royal Guard. A lot of fine detail on vambraces, greaves, and shields bogged down the rate of progress on these, but I like the rich green on their cloaks and shields. They are now ready to do their duty as the King's bodyguard.

Next up will be the five mounted Heroes of the Riddermark. After that, I think I will need to take a break from all the fancy detailed armour  and work on some grot Mordor orcs or Fighting Uruk-hai.

Until the next post, stay safe and healthy. Hopefully we will be able to meet around the gaming table soon.

Fourth Painting Challenge Submission - Erkenbrand, Hero of the Westfold

Erkenbrand of Rohan, on foot and mounted, in 28mm - figures from GW.

My fourth submissions to Curt's Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge took my paint brushes to Middle Earth once again...

To find figures for the theme round this past weekend I went rummaging around in my hoard-o-stuff and stumbled across some figures from Games Workshop's Lord of the Rings range.  The Rohan Outriders went into the theme submissions - but I found another blister sitting on the shelf with them - Erkenbrand, Lord of the Westfold, hero of Rohan. Since I was painting some other Rohan figures anyway, I thought I might as well paint this fellow up too while I was at it. 

Beautiful metal casting from GW. Remember when they did metal?

Wanted the green on the cloak to jump out a bit. He is a hero of Rohan after all!

In "The Lord of the Rings" Erkenbrand was a hero of the Kingdom of Rohan, helping to defend the Westfold from invasion.  It was Erkenbrand who, together with Gandalf, led a relief force to help break up the assault on Helm's Deep.  Erkenband's character, however, was not in the 2001 movie trilogy (or if he was, I don't remember him at all) - in the film "The Two Towers" the relief force at Helm's Deep was led instead by Eomer (and, of course Gandalf was there too).

The mounted pose is beautiful - you can imagine the other Rider of Rohan rallying behind his charge!

Even though he was not present in the 2001 movie trilogy, the range of figures sculpted by GW was unbelievably comprehensive, and included several characters which appeared in the books but not the Peter Jackson films. I do not even recall purchasing this figure, but sitting as it was with the other little pile of LOTR stuff in my hoard, I must have just assumed it would be cool to have another hero-type for my Rohan force. 

I love the war horn he is carrying on his belt. Brings to mind the "Horn of Gondor" and poor Boromir...

And it is! This is a stunning casting.  While it retains the slimmer, more reasoned proportions of the other LOTR figures, he is still a good size - befitting a hero of Rohan! The figure is metal, but sadly the horse is plastic - and connected to the base by just one hoof. No doubt disaster awaits if we ever put this fellow on to the table while mounted...

I loved painting this figure. 

But it was just lovely to paint.  It has been a real treat to dive back into a figure range that I have not otherwise touched with a paint brush for more than 10 years. Hopefully we will find a game some time in 2019 where this fellow can run down some orcs! This submission was small in terms of moving me toward my goal of 1200 "points" of painted stuff, but it was sure fun. 

Painting Challenge "Theme" Entry - Rohan Outriders

Outriders of Rohan in 28mm, figures from GW

Curt's "Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge" features a number of bonus theme rounds, running every two weeks or so throughout the Challenge period.  Participants are encouraged to paint and share a figure that matches a given theme.  The first theme for this Ninth Edition of the Painting Challenge was "Reconnaissance" - and while I had a lot of options which might have fit the bill, in the end I opted for something I stumbled across while rummaging around in my hoard-o-unpainted-stuff - some Rohan Outriders.  These are 28mm metal castings from GW's "Lord of the Rings" ("LOTR") figure range.

Each blister pack contained one mounted and one dismounted outrider, so you see two packs' worth of painting here.

That one leg on the bottom is holding the whole thing up...yikes...

Beautiful sculpting, as always, by the Perrys

LOTR is a fine set of rules, and we have enjoyed many games over the years, if maybe a little less recently as Peter Jackson's brilliant 2001 movie trilogy fades from view and other interests have arisen in the intervening years to take its place.  I do have a small force of Riders of Rohan for the game, and there have been some memorable encounters for this force on Fawcett Avenue gaming tables over the years.  But my brushes haven't touched an LOTR figure in at least...10 years, maybe more?

Love this fellow drawing the bow while riding to battle, a great pose.

This pose really screams "Rohan" to me!

Anyway, I stumbled on these figures in the hoard, and resolved to get them painted up.  I couldn't tell you what an "outrider" does, as these seem more contrived for the game as opposed to matching a specific character from the books or movies.  But the GW website portrays them as scouts, and as such I thought they fit this theme round very well. They are little more armoured, and seem a little tougher, than the standard Rohan warrior, but are not as armoured as the Royal Guardsmen are.

I opted for fairly muted brown colours, although the green of the cloak and the metal bits of the armour do "pop" a bit. 

A distinctive green on the cloaks is a big part of the Rohan look, in my opinion at least :)

The GW figures for LOTR were top-shelf castings - I had forgotten just how nice they were. As an added treat, these are proper, honourable metal figures.  The proportions are slim and realistic, an attribute so seldom attributed anymore to a GW sculpt of anything meant to be a human or person.  The only downside to these beautiful figures is the plastic horses - they are connected to the base by means of only a single plastic leg...I'm worried how long the metal rider and plastic horse will last together while being used during a game...

These Outriders were a treat to paint. It has been great to visit the LOTR setting on the painting table again, and I'm hopeful that more LOTR stuff will be done this winter.