Adrian's Rank and File month 4 - Fear the Emerald Sword (304 points)

 

The lethality of every elf warrior is legendary, but there are even deadlier and fearsome warriors among their ranks.

The princess Lottyerhe security is assured by the relentless swordmasters of the family. The Dawnbringers ranks are filled with poets, scholars and wise advisors that have studied long years in Hoeth. But it is not the only knowledge adquired in the White Tower.

The study is intermingled with countless hours of hard training in the arts of the sword. Armed with the best swords, the reknowned emerald swords forged by the best smiths and magicians from Tiranoc and Nagarythe, the regiment proudly stands, visible for all their enemies in the battlefields.

This April I changed my mind a little bit and tried something else for my swordmasters. Instead of the dark blue metals I used in the test miniature and other units, I opted for a darkest metal contrasted by a bright, color-shifting emerald.

The swords and some of the armours are painted in Vallejo color shifting Emerald. Sadly it is not visible in a photograph and I had no time to make a gif, as in hand it shifts from silver to emerald green.

I boosted the emerald swords glazing it with Scale 75 inktense green.

Also, the magic sword of the champion is even more magical thanks to GSW fluor green in the runes.

The recipe is simple but I am training my light source effects as it is not as simple to glaze the white before the OSL and fluor paints, as it leaves stains sometimes if you're not careful enough.

Did I say that I have recently watched Excalibur? None would notice. I couldn't resist to be completely carried away with the emerald greens as I was listening to Rhapsody of Fire Emerald Sword saga half way through.

For the other colours I chose the usual greens, whites and deep pinks. I had few spare time for the cloth motifs so this time I went only for the japanese patterns on the helmets.

 

As always, I would have love to change several small details and work a little bit more those swords. But it is a matter of how much you can accomplish in the given time and I am happy with the results. Also, I could expand up to five more swordmasters, so it is a playable unit as it is now, that's another point.

 

That's a total of

15x High elf swordmasters with Champion and full command - 110 points

Next month, the wild card? Or should I paint the dragon at last? we will see, I have some surprises for the wild card that I'm hoping to paint.

 

Until then,

Adrian's out.

Paul's High Elves - Reinforcements have arrived! Rank & File Month 4 (510 pts)

Reinforcements have arrived!

April has been a very busy, but very productive month for me both in terms of the OWAC and Real Life - Boo! On the plus side it is also my birthday month and this gave me full license to indulge in the fine OWAC traditions of 'changing plans mid challenge' and 'buying lots more minis' :p

I'm pleased to say I was able to more than meet my needs from the trading groups rather than resorting to the dreaded evil-bay. My thanks to Lee G, Marc P, Carl H, Ben P, and Gavin M all of whom were a pleasure to deal with and helped me fill in the gaps in my changed OWAC plans at short notice, as well as picking up some Goblin wolf riders for my eldest, and a near mint copy of the 5th Edition Magic supplement - so we even got to play an actual game with my OWAC minis this month! :D

A solid Elven back line is supported by two wings designed to press forward and fall back

The plans was working perfectly, the Lion Warriors moving in for the kill, until...

A bloody great Zombie Dragon and Vampire Lord turned up to ruin everyone's day!

Sadly, shortly after this picture was taken the High Elf Mage had his head ripped off by the Vampire Lord and the game ended in victory for the Forces of Evil.

Right, enough of that embarrassing loss! Let's get to this month's painting.  First up were a handful of reinforcements for my Shadow Warriors, with four more to bring me up to a unit of 12 overall, and another four Swordmasters for a unit of 20 in total.

Apologies, I've just noticed the one at the front is out of focus, but it's too late now!

As a prestige unit my Dragon Princes clearly needed a full command group, not least because it is another chance to do a banner, but also because the DP special rules in WFB 4th /5th Edition mean that they get their standard bearer for free (rather than having to pay double, as you would normally). 

My green stuff skills are a bit lacking, but I was fairly happy with this in the end.

The same rule does not apply to the musician however, and at 86 points I'm not sure many HE players actually bother(ed) to take one for their Dragon Princes in 4/5 edition. That may be why they didn't get a musician model until the much later release of newer Dragon Prince sculpts. I managed to get my hands on one of the horn arms from the newer DP sculpts and do some very ropey metal and putty work to convert an older DP trooper into a musician.

R to L Standard Bearer, Champion, Musician, Trooper

My family are by now well trained in spotting useful bits of junk on the ground to bring home to see if they can be used in junk builds and scenery projects. This time my wife played a blinder by bringing home a scrap of old rubber from a netball, as she thought the dimples made it feel like lizard skin. She was not wrong and it makes an excellent dragon hide banner!

The elven rune is named Caladai 'the symbol of the line of kings, the dragons of flame', which seemed perfect for the haughty Dragon Princes of Caledor. I'm afraid the weather was turning so I didn't get a chance to take a picture with the rest of the unit, but there are 9 of them in total now and I've just managed to acquire the bits to make another horse, so a 10th might be on the cards in the future.

I also added another five Reaver Knights in the same blue and golden yellow colour scheme as those I painted in February. Back then the blue and yellow colour scheme just happened to match the flag of Ukraine. This time it's deliberate and I hope the emblem of the phoenix on their shields is prophetic. It's always an important and sobering moment for a fan of 'war games' of any description to be reminded of the realities of war. My experience however is that most wargamers are actually keen students of history and well aware of the evil and misery of war, and it has been heartening to see the response from the community as we come together to hope for peace. 

I had started to hate painting these, but love how they look as a big group. I've got another 5 waiting, inc. command, but I'm in no rush to paint them quite yet!

Total for the month:

4 Shadow Warriors (12 pts each) - 48pts
4 Sword Masters (16 pts each) - 64pts
5 Reaver Knights (w/ spears, bows, and shields - 33 pts each) - 165pts
4 Dragon Princes (43 pts each) (inc. Champion*, Standard**, and Musician**) - 233 pts

* DP Champion = 61 pts
** DPs have a special rule that means the unit gets the standard bearer for the same price as a standard trooper, however the musician costs double as per normal.

Total: 510 pts

I also managed to rebase an existing unit of Silver Helms, and replace their mostly blank shields with a matching set with horse head design from the WFB4 box set, although looking at them in the photos I think they could 'pop' a bit more so I might look at those again at some point.

They had also been badly missing a banner, so I've added a simple pennant with the elven runes Sethai meaning 'Flight, wind, cry in the far mountains' and Harathoi meaning 'Youth, boundless energy, jealousy' used together here to represent the speed and potency of the young elven nobles that make up the Silver Helm cavalry.

May will hopefully be leader month, although I might yet swap things around and play a wild card before finishing with my leader. We shall have to see how the dreaded 'Real Life' behaves ;)

Thanks for reading and bon courage to all my fellow challengers. The end is in sight! :D

Pokrzyw's High Elves - Sword & Spear with a bit of magic- Rank&File #2 (566pts)

 High Elves are masters in sword, magic and lance.

Every army need fast, hard hitting cavalry. Silver helms are children of nobles, trying itselves in warfare. Bright colours visible in every corner in Poland in last month, white tabards of course silver!! 4 nobles with champion and standard bearer.

Sword masters will be a bulk of my army. Hitting hard, looking awesome, Although Marauder miniatures are really small comparing to GW elves. Looking for bright, but not obvious scheme I choose fiery orange (almost dwarf's slayers style). They are small, using zweihanders and looks like a carrot. 14 swordmasters including full command group. Enjoy :)

Mage on foot is the remnant from the last month. Teclis and another mage are waiting for some free time.

Roster:

CHARACTERS

Mage (59pts)

Sword Master Champion (52pts)

Silver Helm Champion (56pts

REGIMENTS

13 Sword Masters [banner, musician] (240pts)

4 Silver Helms [banner, shields] (159pts)

TOTAL 566pts

Andrea's Sword Masters (260 pts)

Hi OWACers,

Here we go with April post!

This time is for Sword Masters, the central unit of the army: they are my favorite High Elf unit, worth to build an army around it! All miniatures of this unit are from the 6th edition, they already show many modern traits, with respect to the previous version, but I think they still retain an oldhammer flavor. I enjoyed really much painting them, as expected! ;-)

As for archers unit, I have prepared a proper banner: this time I have modified a classic banner from High Elf army book, changing the phoenix with the Saphery tower. I hope you like it!

So, here is the Sword Masters unit, all clad in their mithril and burnihsed gold heavy armor:  I used the same scheme color of the army General, to makes them as fiery and shiny as their lord.

The front rank, with command.

The second rank.

This month,  I added 208 (Sword Masters with command) + 52 (the unit champion)* points more to the list. This is also my half-challenge post, so the grand total so far is 712 points. And, here is the family picture at this point of the OWAC:

 

Well, I really looking forward to paint the rest of the army, which include Teclis: I am super-excited!

So, see you next month,

ciao, A.

* uhm... yes, in the introductory post of OWAC3 I forgot to include into the list the unit champion! ;-)