The Dwarrens

There’s quite a few that needs painted, so I’m going through them fairly quickly, not spending too much time making perfect blends or aging and weathering them at all. Also, they’re only lightly glued to the bases, cause I’m expecting them to be snapped off and put on the round bases 🙂

These are the paints I’ve used so far. Unless I am adding new colors in, I will not repeat the list, cause I’ll be using this recipe as much I can throughout all the dwarves.

Unless otherwise noted, it’s Scale75 colors:
Skin: Basic Flesh, Reikland Fleshshade(GW), Golden Skin
Purple: Violet, Flat Black, Braineater Azure, Lendar’s Grey
Silver: Black Metal, Nuln Oil(GW), Heavy Metal
Black: Petroleum Grey, Flat Black, Birch
Wood: Brown Leather, Flat Black, Birch
Horns: Pale Skin, Seraphim Sepia(GW), Birch
Gold: Retributor Armor(GW), Reikland Fleshshade(GW), Auric Armor Gold(GW)
Cloth straps: Birch, Agrax Earthshade(GW) x2
Eyes: Petroleum grey, Birch, Flat Black
Bags: Dubai Brown, Agrax Earthshade(GW)
Red Beard: Kalahari Orange, Agrax Earthshade(GW), Birch
White Beard: Birch, Nuln Oil(GW) watered down, Titanium White (Schmincke)
Yellow Beard: Iroko, Seraphim Sepia(GW), Birch
Grey Beard: Rainy grey, Nuln Oil(GW) + Agrax Earthshade(GW) 50/50, Birch

I keep wanting to go back and take them to a higher standard. I just know that I’ll never get them done in any kind of reasonable time, if I start doing that. So I guess this is my ‘tabletop standard’ for now :p

I’ve added a one more beard color, so here’s the paints I’ve used for that. As always, it’s Scale75 unless otherwise noted.

Brown beard: Brown Leather, Agrax Earthshade(GW), Birch

The two beserker dwarves I had lying around. The images is a bit washed out, so it’s not really showing up on them, but I did a bit more work to their skin, since there’s so much of it. So for the shadow areas I mixed in a little violet, to give them more depth.

Also, one more beard color has been introduced. As always Scale75 unless otherwise noted.

Light Orange Beard: Mars Orange, Seraphim Sepia, Birch

@halfmileduck has been so kind, and offered to help paint some of the dwarves. So I’m sending him this unit of 12 trigger happy Dwarrens. Following along as a chaperon is one painted axeman. Only because halfmileduck seemed eager to color match as much as possible 🙂

Have a great journey lil dudes.

I didn’t realize they had little candles in their helmets before starting to paint these. I love that. Too cute <3

All 8 of these are done, so it’s terrain pieces next I think. Only one new beard color added to the mix. and the recipe for the candles off course. As always Scale75 unless otherwise noted:

Redish brown beard: Red leather, Agrax Earthshade(GW), Birch
Candles: Birch, Seraphim Sepia(GW), Titanium White(Schmincke)
Flame: Titanium White(Schmincke), Sol Yellow, Mars Oraange, Aldebaran Red, Petroleum Grey

UK UPDATE: Following an 800 mile journey, my first batch of Dwarves arrived in rainy Berkshire. I’ve been a wargamer and painter for over 30 years but have never before painted a Fantasy Dwarf figure, so I was extremely excited to get my hands on these models, plus kind of flattered to be invited to be involved with this project.

The thunderers needed a bit of TLC/preparation, with a myriad of mould lines, plus following aurorainbag suggestion I removed the plastic tabs and then very lightly superglued the models to the original square (shock horror!) bases, assuming that the BoW team will be rebasing them at some point. My standard approach is to prime the models in black from a Halfords rattle can and then zenith in grey and then white through my airbrush. I find models hold the colours of the paint much better this way. I started with the metallics as I find drybrushing the chainmail can be a tad messy, so those got a basecoat, wash and drybrush, then did the same with the skin tones, you can see the WIP models drying after the skin has just been washed.

Note from Aurorainbag: I just wanted to say thank you so so much to halfmileduck for helping out. I really love the fact that we are more working on this together. It’s becoming a community project for our favorite gaming site. Also…that test dwarf looks stunning <3

The cannon team is all done. And so is a bit of the ‘terrain’. From my own stash, I only have the General and pony wagon to do. I don’t think I’ve added any new colors to this.

The first unit of Thunderers is now finished. I’m pretty happy with the results, they are double matt varnished and ready for basing. First up the 10 rank and file Dwarvesies. I mixed up the beards to try and add a bit more variety to the unit but overall quite pleased with how they came out.

Next up is the unit Champion and Standard. These guys were really good fun to paint. I have to say that I have really enjoyed painting Dwarves, they are so small, you can make real progress very quickly. I stuck to the same basic colours and metallics as the unit, adding in some warmer brown tones to the standard bearer and a bit of freehand fun on the Champions base.

Overall, I really enjoyed painting this unit and it is great to get an opportunity to give something back to the OTT team, I’m chuffed that I got the chance. This got me to thinking and I braved a trip up into my loft to visit my “Pile of Shame” of unpainted tiny fighting men and I discovered a couple of very old Dwarves buried deep within The Pile. I will be winging this unit off on the last leg of their round Europe trip back to their new home and may also be including a couple of other models too at some point. More on the details of them in my next update. As always, thanks for reading!