
Blipvertus multigame Dwarf army
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About the Project
It started out simple. I wanted a Viking army for Saga but I wanted it to be different because everyone does Vikings. So instead I did seven other armies. I finally hit upon the idea of using Dwarves as my Viking stand in. Dwarves are also a part of Norse mythology and they’re ill tempered and armed with axes. Seems like a natural fit! When Oathmark came out with a plastic Dwarf infantry box I found everything I’d need for a Saga army. You can make dwarves armed with bows, something that is pretty rare for most Dwarf models, as well as spear and axe armed dwarves. You can also equip figures with a weapon in each hand making them a great substitute for Berserkers. One of the nice things about this box is all the figures are wearing chainmail and to me, that’s quintessentially dwarfish. Originally I was going to make the spear armed dwarves my warriors and my axe and sword armed dwarves as my hearthguard. But Oathmark came out with a box of Heavy Infantry Dwarves so I may use them as hearthguard. These also feature chainmail but also have segmented armor and some platemail. They also feature a lot of steel face masks integrated into their helmets. This is something I love because Tolkien mentions something similar in The Silmarillion about the dwarves in Middlearth. With my Viking army all planned out and a couple of boxes of minis, I was set. Huzzah! Then Age of Magic arrived. And Warlords of Erewhon. The unit options in both games increased the variety of units a Dwarf army could take. So I set about trying to find suitable minis that would look good together. I found a nice set of crossbow armed dwarves from Conqueror. Conquer also had dwarves armed with two-handed axes. Both units are also in chainmail thus making it easier for them to blend in. I then found some chainmail wearing handgunners from Mirliton. Because I’m getting minis from several different ranges I worried about how to make them look like a cohesive army. I asked our local guru, Sean Twiddy. He’s one of the smart guys that teaches art at one of the local universities and uses miniature painting in some of his lessons. Sean is also an avid Saga player. He suggested using the same color pallet for the whole army in order to tie it all together. So I tried it and painted up a test color scheme and I think it’ll work. The header/thumbnail photo is of the test minis. I’m going to try to document how I got to those finished images. I’m going to try to show and explain every step as well as show the sources of the materials used.
Related Game: SAGA
Related Company: Studio Tomahawk
Related Genre: Fantasy
This Project is Active
Color Test
This is a color test and I’m pretty happy with it. I’ll go into detail about how I arrived here in later posts
The three figures on the left are from the Oathmark Dwarf Infantry box and are made of plastic.
http://www.northstarfigures.com/list.php?man=257&page=1
The figures with the two-handed axe and the crossbow are metal figures from Conqueror Miniatures.
https://conquerormodels.com/product-category/28mm-fantasy/dwarfs/
The handgunner is a metal figure from Mirliton.
http://www.mirliton.it/fantasy-25-28mm/dwarfs/dwarfes-handgunners-dw036
Bases
I prefer round bases and I especially like recessed bases. The recess allows me to hide the molded on bases that are part of the minis. I’ll hide that using base render.
This particular basing material is fairly easy to apply. I use a paint knife I picked up at Hobby Lobby in the section where artist oils are sold.
While the render is still wet, it’s easy to clean up using water and paper towels. Once dry excess material is a little trickier to deal with. I use a dentists pick that I got from Micro Mark.
It’ll take a couple of hours for the render to dry. Once dry the next step will be to add some texture.
Adding sand
I’m going to cover the bases with sand to give some texture to the surface. You can use any sand of a suitable size but I’ll be using some I picked up from Games Workshop.
I use Elmer’s Glue (it’s a PVA glue), an old paint brush and a little bit of water to cover the base with glue.
Base Coat
General approach to painting
Be lazy.
I paint whole armies and I just don’t want to spend a lot of time painting any one thing. Heroes and special characters, sure. But not whole armies.
Here’s my way. My way is not THE way. It’s A way. And it works for me.
First, choose good minis. A nice sculpt will look good with less effort. Bad or very plain sculpts will require more effort because the painting will have to be of a higher quality in order to impart some character to the models.
Second, just sit and look at the minis and think about how you’re going to paint them. Have a plan, try it and see if it works for you. If not, try another plan.
Third, where practical, combine steps. I generally like to base coat with colored primers to save a step. And generally I like to Prime in a color that’ll be the majority color.
Now for this army and it’s horde of chain mail clad dwarves you’d think I’d go with a metallic silver. Instead I went with the Wolf Grey. While the hands and faces are still accessible on most of the minis, the cloth coats are very small details and surrounded by other details. So I decided those would be Wolf Grey, as it’ll be a nice contrast to the chain mail, and base coating in Wolf Grey will save time because I won’t have to try to be super precise to get to those smaller details.
Fourth, paint from the inside out. For this army, from the skin out. This is because on sword and shield armies the flesh is usually in the most recessed parts of the minis. And that’s generally the case here.
Fifth, paint in assembly line fashion. Choose a color, then paint that color on all the minis. For this army I’ll group the minis in Saga sized units of eight or twelve minis at a time. This is a small enough number of minis not to get overwhelmed and when finished, I’ll have a complete unit. Both of these points will help to keep my motivation up.
There it is. That’s my plan.