Uruk Hai, the return! And more……..much much more

I’ve set up the next two core units in my warhammer Uruk hai. And it’s Pikes! So we can stick em right up that stuck up elf’s Jacksy! After all they look like they store a pole up there anyway.
“Make way for the Pile cream!”

Pikes make such a visual impact on the tabletop, and these Perry sculpts work brilliantly. Well they should considering they made such a huge range of historical minis! These skirmish game models rank up beautifully too.

This injection of realism into fantasy models helps enormously in their long term appeal. The stance is correct, the length of pole, the method of shouldering and the scale of the orcs are not overblown either. There’s a plausibility about these models, not like some of the steroid hulks that are out there!

This plausibility is when fantasy is at its best for me, I like Immersive games and the lord of the rings aesthetic pulls this off in spades for me.

Just gotta paint the bloody things now!

I assume it’s the same for many of us, start work at 7:30, day winds down by 8pm. ‘How am I feeling?’ I ask me brain.  Sometimes it acidly replies ‘Are you JOKING!?! We are F$€#^d. Go to BED!’

So I decide to do something less taxing than paint, I make mini’s for further down the pipeline. I don’t like to waste the dead spaces in my day, you know the ones. It’s those 10mins or 30 mins between tasks while you wait for something or someone to do what you need them to do. Usually stop the mindless violence for 5 minutes and brush their teeth!!

So while I wait I can strip some minis from eBay, spray up a batch or assemble and clean up some minis in my wait pile. When I’m tired I find making mini’s the easiest thing to do.

so I made another 30 Uruk hai with army command! The scope just keeps on creeping…….Goblins are good at creeping?.

Also managed to get the pikes and command unit sprayed up.

One thing I’m wrestling with in my mind is what can I do to denote the command unit as the toughest bastards in town. I suspect I will be using them as Black orcs in my warhammer game. So maybe they all have the hand of Saruman on their faces? Or as an emblem on their shields? Unsure. Need inspiration, I would like it to be a subtle thing though.

It’s taken two weeks but I’ve got there! 40 Uruk pikeman for my warhammer army. I just love these models.

couple of teething issues, I really have to make sure the primer is fully removed from the previous owner before I prime. Sometimes I leave the primer if it was done well but on a couple of my front rank ‘the heavy hand of a priming novice’ went unchecked by me. This made a lot of detail quite soft on the edges. I dry brushed these fellas (or woman? Orcs aren’t sexed are they?) a bit tough to paint quickly as dry brushing works best on hard edges as well we know!

I suspect it wasn’t a citadel primer as these usually come off, but some of those cheaply had car body primers don’t come off quite so willingly.

ah well I’m happy with them anyway! An orc shouldn’t be too neat!

another factor may have been the sub zero temperatures at which I tried to strip them. I know from school that chemical reactions work better in milder climes (don’t we all!), so next time I will put them in a takeaway tub and seal the lid. Leave it in my utility for a couple hours then brush them off outside.

Well, onto the final unit!

I buy them all off eBay. Always do, making sure they are caked in muck so I can afford them easier. Stripping minis is easy, just time required.
I often buy bundles of stuff so I get a right mix, bit of Uruk, few goblins, some humans and ohhhh a few elves!?! Well that was a bit o luck!

Trouble is I only bought them for the uruks. I say to myself ‘I’ll strip the odd bits and sell them on”.

It rarely happens, I’ve now got a Moria goblin contingent in the works. An elves of the last alliance army and a men of Numenor section!

Free wheels keep on turning, tyres keep on burning…no control.

So I think this unit of uruks will be my last bit of this project and I will open up a section on Morian night goblins! My cavalry will be a part of this new project too. No matter how much I want to pass wargs off as boars, they just look like wolves crossed with hyenas. So wolf riders they are, and now a part of the goblin contingent. I’ve posted some photos of a converted gobbo command and a converted gobbo shaman. As well as my warriors of the last alliance so far!

To the substance of this entry then, my final Uruk unit. This is my Uber unit, the command unit. Containing the big boss himself, the army standard, a couple of front row characters and a badass looking trumpeter! I got this Lass (could be, they don’t seem to be sexed) as part of a bundle off eBay. The sword was broken off and the left hand missing. Well, ball and chain with scratch built trumpet me thinks!

ive decided I’m going to paint them a little darker armoured than the others. More scarab shell black with edge highlights of shining silver so they look black armoured. A hand of Saruman on each shield for the warriors and on the faces of the command. I’m going to use them as black orcs in my game!

I finally managed a game with my Uruk hai!

Uber unit of 35 orcs with a sizeable 20 boy archer unit, and the flank covered with my 15 man gobbo/warg/wolf riders fellas!

The commanders are 2 Shaman and a big boss.

They are attempting to dislodge a warhammer 4th edition force of empire troops. Lovely minis.

We played 6th edition rules for warhammer  and loved it! We will be playing again with more forces and all painted!!! Hurrah.

Following my first battle it was quite evident I lacked some firepower. So I checked my 6ed lists and saw, spear chukkas and doom divers.

I scratched the back of my brain to stimulate the grey matter a bit. And Roman scorpion sprue popped into my head! I can rob the Romans I’ve got (empire swordsman variant) and give it to the Moria gobbo’s! I cut up an archer model, only took the bow off  and glued it to his back for use later, bent the bow arm at the elbow and voila! A gobbo sighting down the bolt thrower.

It looked a bit clean though, Romans seem neat and tidy, tidy and neat. So I cut up a base to look like jagged metal shield in front of the thrower. I am really pleased with the results!

I also want to use the bolt thrower in my lord of the rings games, as an avenger bolt thrower for my numenoreans. The Roman bags and bolts can be stuck straight on to a last alliance swordsman. No problem. A green stuff strap and he will be sorted. But the person firing the thing is more time consuming. Cut the legs above the knee guards. Hollow out his arse with a file and re glue the legs in a kneeling position. The cut off his sword and bend the arm over so both fists are touching like he is holding the bolt thrower. Looks good enough to me…… a lot of green stuff needed to blend though. And a touch of green stuff needed to make the cloak look gathered over the back of his legs. But I like it.

Lastly I made a doom diver from a spare cheapo plastic Moria troll and a very old doom diver catapult I got for cheap on eBay. £4!
minor head and arm repositioning, cocktail stick under the catapult and pin the lot together!
I love the model. I want to adjust the rules so it can be a troll bully instead of an orc one, I see the gobbos doing what the troll wants more readily than they would with an orc.

Loadsa warg riders spare. Warhammer 6th editions ravening hordes lists still had forest goblin spider riders.
I stumbled across wargames Atlantic’s giant spiders.
Well. Looks like a unit of forest goblin, ex warg riding, nut bags are taming the children of ungoliant. A whole unit is now in progress following this little experiment. The bar just keeps moving.

The spiders legs just need to be kept reasonably tight to the body to make sure they rank up. One spider should also favour the back 2/3 of the base while the next favours the front 2/3 and continue alternating.
the riders legs need tucking in closer to his bum, no problem there. And a needle file to hollow out the arse to crotch area so it nestles over the spiders back.

Some feathers from my warlord games landsknecht sprues (empire stand ins) and some random broken off horse tails for the mad plumage going on for his Mohawk! Oh dear….I love these minis now too.

Finally managed to get one of my hard hitters into the army. Didn’t take long either, 2 evenings at 2 hours an eve. Sorted!

His name is Lee as he is the spitting image of a Roofer mate of mine, a couple in to the evening but not quite steaming. If your in the west berkshire region of the uk and you hear a quite, deep but firm voice say ‘oh dear…’ in earshot of you. Run. Drop your pint, forget the girl your with, she’s safe (after all Lee is a gentlemen) and make like a tree and get outta there!

Really fun to paint and full of character. It was my favourite giant in my teens, never liked the Albion giants or the marauder fella. But this one, I knew blokes that fit this caricature all my life. Just spoke to me.

Up next, painting the rock lobba!

I got distracted again.

I want to expand the type of units I have available for my Orcs and Gobbos. I had no chariots and I thought I would give it a whirl in my chop shop! So here is my goblinoid wolf chariot.
I’m not totally convinced with the result. I think maybe the chap with the reigns is a bit much and perhaps the chariot is a bit small.
Would welcome anyone’s thoughts, maybe I just need to paint the bugger.

I got distracted again.

1. I want to expand the type of units I have available for my Orcs and Gobbos. I had no chariots and I thought I would give it a whirl in my chop shop! So here is my goblinoid wolf chariot.
   I’m not totally convinced with the result. I think maybe the chap with the reigns is a bit much and perhaps the chariot is a bit small.
   Would welcome anyone’s thoughts, maybe I just need to paint the bugger.

Finally got a game out of the uber project! 3000 pts per side, the forces of order are desperate to defend against a Goblinoid horde. The humans have been forced to enlist their ancestral dead to attempt to gain control of their God gate by getting a wizard to the DHD and dial up the gate and summon heavenly reinforcements before the Orcs destroy them or summon their own devilish forces via their witch! The Orcs have a Rainbow Hag to whom they must engage for one turn and make a sacrifice of one model in base to base contact to summon their own other worldly reinforcements at the crossroads. The road allows 1.5x normal movement and each side has their objective just off the road. Table edge was rolled for and we did secret deployment using a grid reference system which really added to the tension in this scenario.

only got half way through in one day so will have to return for the conclusion, but so far the humans are up against it having sacrificed their cavalry in a glorious(foolish?) charge up the hill to clear the woods of Goblin artillery!

Finally got a game out of the uber project! 3000 pts per side, the forces of order are desperate to defend against a Goblinoid horde. The humans have been forced to enlist their ancestral dead to attempt to gain control of their God gate by getting a wizard to the DHD and dial up the gate and summon heavenly reinforcements before the Orcs destroy them or summon their own devilish forces via their witch! The Orcs have a Rainbow Hag to whom they must engage for one turn and make a sacrifice of one model in base to base contact to summon their own other worldly reinforcements at the crossroads. The road allows 1.5x normal movement and each side has their objective just off the road. Table edge was rolled for and we did secret deployment using a grid reference system which really added to the tension in this scenario.

only got half way through in one day so will have to return for the conclusion, but so far the humans are up against it having sacrificed their cavalry in a glorious(foolish?) charge up the hill to clear the woods of Goblin artillery!

The children of the hydras teeth set is my favourite ever skeleton soldier set. It’s so lovely in detail and so flipping versatile!

My Uruks will eventually form the ally contingent to my core undead force, with the Sauron model as my lead necromancer! So I best do some skeletons hadn’t I!

90 skeletons for £40 says warlord! ‘SHUT UP and take my money you fool!’ Says I.

So I’ve now got 270 skeletons to make…..all with separate fecking feeet!!!!

I spent years (I call them the wasted years) cutting out the feet separately and sticking them on, one at a time, like a chump. But! If after 6 months and 100 skeletons in, you turn your sprue over and see the legs numbered to the feet. You can glue all the legs into their respective feet and cut the feet out after the legs are glued. Much quicker, I cry blood at the memory of this discovery.

How much variation can I get from this spruce though? Turns out, a ton. Here is my efforts with spear, sword and shield, Bow armed, Crossbows and pikes! I love pikes.

Oh, if you happen to have some Perry miniatures foot knights, WELL. They make beautiful crossbreed undead foot knights.

Fab!

Distracted again, I made the error of idly flicking through my old ‘lord of the rings strategy battle game’ magazines.( I’m missing no.90!!!! Where has it gone!?!)

Well, in these awesome hobby Tomes is beginner and intermediate scenery projects and guiding you right through all stages of hobby goodness. I’ve never come across better hobby resources, they are superb. I am completely hooked by the Moria campaign. I spent a day kicking around with polystyrene cutters and card templates. Then I chucked a load of sand at some battle boards and cut a ravine into two of them. The ravine doubles as normal battle boards as I kept the shapes interlocking for when I don’t want one. I hate doing things twice! All my miniatures and scenery double, treble or even quadruple up into game formats. I don’t want to paint or make things twice! I’m now mucking around with balsa wood and card detailing. Then painting.
One day, sometime, I might, just MIGHT, be able to stay on track to a target.

One day.

I think Uruks can fight in Moria? Why not!
It’s one of the places they could team up I’d say. Where did all that ore for the armour come from after all? I’ve got this concept of a religious cult of orcs who worship the balrog over Sauron as they where rival servants of morgoth, and so I will probably be making the lava pit temple to the balrog to make my Moria board an 9×4 play scape. I believe the Battle games in middle earth packs layed out something of the kind so I will be returning to them as source material.

This particular build taught me just how simple terrain building can be. This all took me 5 evenings off work so approx 10-12 hours total. The polystyrene is the finish. And I think it looks great, I weighted the standing pieces by shoving screws in the bottom to stop tipping over etc, and that was essential to have done for gameplay. Metal Lotr models that have been lovingly painted don’t tip over a 1 foot chasm well. ?.

The expanded polystyrene makes a brilliant pattern for stone walling. Many buildings and structures round my neck of the woods are flint stone and brick/stone block construction. The flint is the infill pieces and the stone blocks the tie in and support structure. So if this EPS was used as the main structure and some cerial packet squares glued over joins at the corners to simulate blocks. A crude dry brushing later would have a rapid flint wall construction.

The wooden components are super quick too. 2 evenings of the five had the wood structures made and painted. Balsa and super glue are awesome! So is Dulux colour chart paints. So flipping cheap and I can’t tell the difference between it and GW paints. It’s all acrylic. £15 of paint has me a tonne of black, bestial brown and fortress grey. I haven’t used half of it on this project.

Just means I’m going to have to make a bridge, river and balrogs lair. Oh, and some pontoon assault boat landing craft.

Why?

Cos the battle games mags have some that’s why!!

Originally, the movement trays were entirely card. I’ve moved on.

Now they are magnificent, just what I want from trays. Cheap, infinitely customisable, slim and sleek, works as part of my storage solutions and….did I mention?Cheap.

I use 1 or 2mm thick (1/32”- 1/16ish for those who measure correctly! Alas the UK is caving in like a flan in the cupboard on this point) high density card stock. It comes at the back of note pads or back of pizza packets. I also buy it at A4 size in packs of 40 from my children’s arts and crafts shop. Less than a fiver. That’s a lot of movement trays.

I then cut to the size of my regiment or company in question, plus 1 or 2mm overall in each direction to allow some slop. Slop is especially important for those miniatures from the same school of dance as Michael Jackson or the film cast of 300.

The next stage is using those coffee stirring sticks you find everywhere (or Tea bag paddles, as is their proper use). Found in Costas, supermarket cafes, petrol station’s and the corner of every builders merchants on the land!

The last place is where I get all mine, very useful to tell the management what you want them for. It will be the most amused the depot manager will be till he hears how Dave had to sneak out the lavatory window. We are English and for us there is always a way out of everything, and the bog window is the usual route.

The manager asked “Ow many d’ya need J? I said how many will you give me? He drop kicked a packet of a thousand over to me and said “it’s funny what can happen to stock ennit? Those got too damaged for us to use….”

Super glue them around the edge of the card, being careful to keep it flush to the bottoms of the tray. I use big industrial grade super glue, big bottles of the stuff for £4. It’s no different to the 5/10ml tubes you get in DIY places, It’s just 50 times bigger with a different label.

On some trays, usually the thin ranked missile troops, I leave a short edge with no stick. This allows me to put multiple trays together to form bigger or smaller lines of troops to suit my needs. Arrow boys on 10 man trays of 5 per rank with one short edge missing so I can make 20 or 30 man units in 2 thin ranks.

Next is the unusual step. Buy an imperial Tonne of sticky back magnetic sheets at 1.5mm thick and 0.4mm thick. Mostly 1.5mm thick. Stick the 0.4 to the inside of the movement tray directly under the models bases. The models bases should have magnets in them.

Then stick some more to the underside of the tray, you know, the bit touching the table during play.

Any off cuts are ideally used on miniatures whose bases are solid plastic or Mdf and inconvenient to put magnets on. Just stick the sheet over the entirety of the underside of the base.

The rest of the sheets will have been stuck to the inside of the lid and the bottom and sides of your really useful box company 9 litre or 4 litre storage boxes. The best way of storing miniatures ever! Can get 9 boxes from RYMANS online shop for £30 odd. The magnetic sheets come from eBay shop ‘the magnet shop’ 10 or 20 sheets for £15-30 dependant on thickness. And the 4x2mm N35 magnets can be bought in the 500 pack! I bought the magnets from some American company for around £25. So overall I got ten storage boxes with magnetic sheets for movement trays and box storage with enough magnets for 1000 miniatures of various sizes for £125. I wouldn’t buy 2 or 3 army cases for that. And they couldn’t be as convenient as my storage boxes. I can rock up to the game and get my regiments out ready from the box. Good to go. During game play the trays are great too. Those nuisance figures that fall over like a French footballer as soon as you look at them? Magnetised down. Take that you bastard metal standard bearer! Cry all you want, you’re staying put.

The final reason I do things this way is I can make trays for other gaming systems than my core Warhammer. Like Kings of War or War of the ring but without stir sticks for War of the Ring. Just magnetise the relevant troops to the tray and away I go without having to paint extra armies. I use my lord of the rings goblins and orcs for all the above systems and the skirmish versions of them. I don’t care about round bases! It makes no difference to game play in skirmish.

But if you do happen to play against a sadist pedant, then purchase a pack of 1000 penny washers from a fixings company like ‘Orbital Fasteners’. They will cost a penny each for a 0.5mm thick 25mm diameter washer with a 5mm aperture. Now the magnets will stick to them and you have round bases, then upon seeing a difference of Feck allllllll! You will forget the penny washer option or simply bludgeon the pedant to death (I favour the wet end of a toilet brush for such work) and find someone else to play.

The model shown has 0.4mm of self adhesive magnetic sheet on its flat Mdf base. This standard is going no where.

I need more wolf riders and more ordnance. Oh and Lee needs a mate, so here is Bug’Rit. Lee’s brother giant.

All magnetised and magnetic movement Trayed. All cleaned up, green stuffed and spray primed.

My favourite pieces are the shamans on wargs and the warg chariots, the chariots are a blend of warg/lotr orcs/Victrix Celt chariot.

Watch out Empire! Your cannons are gonna have something to think about.

What a day of gaming was had! Got out my full, knock down, set of gaming tables. Providing us with a 12 foot by 6 foot gaming area. Loadsa hills and spits with valleys. Loadsa rocks trees and a village to capture!

We set up the Orcs first, but only one third of the army. Then the empire set up one third of their forces. We then alternated for the remaining two thirds, a third at a time to give some measure of surprise at the setup without letting go of a reactionary setup opportunity for both players.

The Empire decided to let the orcs go first. Of course! “Stand and shoot gentleman!” So I barrelled down the centre with my Orcs to occupy the village. I sent my trolls and Rugluds armoured orcs out on my left flank to try and take out a unit of Knights and that flipping Hellblaster volley gun.

And to the right flank I sent my wolf boys out very wide and let my artillery open up on the empire knights panther!

The Empire decided to move their knights and stand and shoot everything else…….Surprise!!?

Cannons took out my rock lobber. Bastards. But that’s not the worst of it! That demon possessed Hellblaster set the tone with which it was to engage throughout the entire battle and destroyed a whole unit of orcs in one go.

Sorry!?! You’ve just done what?!?!?! Yep, all jam on the field. I see.

My bolt throwers continued to do what I hoped they would and take out swathes of heavily armoured bastards! And ranks and ranks of state troops. Not enough to break anyone but on it went.

The empire Contemptuosly ignored my wolf boys on the flank, judging them no threat. Instead the knights surged forwards, pistoliers heading straight for my bolt throwers.

Loadsa of casualties from empire gunnery! To be expected though, keep moving forward lads!

It was turn 4 that killed me though. I should have holed up in the village and forced the empire to come and rout me out while using the buildings for cover from their guns.

Instead. I ran forwards to assault their lines. Sigh.

Good fun though. My fanatics wreaked havoc and stopped some of the empires key units from being able to manoeuvre. On goes those wolf boys behind their lines! Bye bye empire cannon, bye bye knights panther.

Wait, what’s happened to my bolt throwers? All 4 dead from pistoliers!!!! I left them undefended!

In the centre and left, the empire had destroyed my trolls. Hellblaster. Sent Rugluds orcs running. Hellblaster. Destroyed 2 units of goblins. Hellblaster.

And softened up my main unit of big uns’ so that they ran and where destroyed. Their was enough empire detachments left to counter charge (everywhere it seems!) and send my lads panicking and being run down. Last turn, a coherent empire unit moved into the village.

Magic was dominated by the orcs. Who had twice the number of magic users than the empire. The lads took out those pathetic human wizards, no problem. Then got shot. ??‍♂️.

Oh, and the giant managed to get to the enemy. Then slipped over and was stabbed to death. ???

Smashing gameplay though. Real fun had over the 7 hours we played! And such a visual and tactical treat with a large densely terrained table. Looking forward to our Easter game where we shall aim for 5000 points a side. Maybe even a siege!