2022 Miniature Log

So I started going through boxes looking for old Warhammer rule books when I found the 5th Ed boxed set models still on the sprue. For reasons that still escape me I decided to put aside the Cursed City monsters and paint the Bretonnians. 24 Bowmen and 12 knights and I thought I’d try GW Contrast paints. 4 hours later (with lengthy breaks) I had 24 finished Bowmen. I wished GW had brought out Contrast paints before they blew up the Old World.

Tomorrow I’ll try doing the knights.

So I have the first batch of characters done. Still have the Wood Elf and Dwarf to finish but I got distracted by a caravan (for a Mordheim table) and the new Gotrex model (which strangely has 2 eyes, did one grow back?). And there’s a group of Chaos heroes pending.

Of course I painted the Cursed City Witchhunter and got distracted by the Hexbane Witchhunters for Underworlds too.

So I finally got around to starting Cursed City. Block colours on the heroes are done. Decided to throw in the Witch hunters from Underworlds too. Next will be shading!

So it turns out that watching House of the Dragon at the same time as Blade I-III will result in painting characters with white hair. One character led to another and suddenly I was painting undead characters from the 1990’s.

There was also a random Chaos Warrior of Khorne that I uncharacteristically painted with red armour. Apparently I did it so often it became a habit.

So in October I played some 6th ed Warhammer. Gods but I’ve missed it! I of course wanted to build a DoW army and so built 30 Duellists with pistols and a bunch of Ogres. I found a packet of Orc standards rgar looked suitably 6th ed. I also decided to paint them to match my old Golgfags Ogres BUT I couldn’t remember my old basing formula so Golgfags got new basing. Of course that led to me repairing and rebasing the Cursed Company, which led to …. Why can’t I stay on task?

People from the 6th ed tournament sceen  of yesteryear suffered many defeats from my DoW. Fate willing, they will again. I also took the opportunity to repair some damaged old RoR’s that I’ll post soon. If I remember, Which my project systems suggests I wont.

So September was the month of Warcry. Monsterous allies and the Dark Oath Savages (aka the Conan faction). I also got all the terrain done and I added a couple of  Realmshaper Engines (the Lizardman step pyramids).

So I haven’t posted for a few months. I wasn’t idle. Here’s the rest of August – ASOIAF Skinchangers, and Warhammer Underworlds Xandire’s Truthseekers,  The Crimson Court and Kharga’s Ravagers.

Well with only a few units to go I decided the Lannisters should get finished off. Another Knights of Casterly Rock unit but with different colours for armour and banner. I only realised afterwards that I had effectively painted them to be Volands Venators and changed the shield colours again (DoW players will know what I mean). 12 Pyromancers painted so that if I needed wizards in some other game if I wish, and the Kingsguard with King Joffery and his Uncle/father Jamie Lannister.

So I spent a couple of weeks after work painting some more Lannisters. Crossbowmen, City Watch, Redcloaks and some generic Lannister heroes. I put one of the heroes on a square base, just in case I get ideas later in the piece…..

Continuing on from my minor house obsession in ASOIAF I have done a unit of Clegane Brigands (shock cavalry) and Clegane Butcher (mounted hero) to back up the Mountain Men I did a few years ago.

So I’m very slowly adding units to 2 Empire armies using 3rd-5th edition miniatures, Averland and Nordland. This time it was Nordland Handgunners. Both armies have a regiment of handgunners, a detachment of crossbows, halberdiers, Averland has swordsmen and Nordland has spearmen.

Next will be a regiment of Knights Panther and of the Knights of the Blazing Sun to continue the yellow/black/blue theme.

This will be the basis of a house Mormont army. With some Mormont Bruisers, Maege and Lyanna Mormont in the post on the way to my hobby desk and 2 Mormont Veterans already painted I started the She-bears!

Like House Boltan I added another unit of heavy Cavalry, painted some Stark Archers in House Tully livery and consider this minor sub-faction done.

So I finished My ASOIAF Boltan Army. All the relevant characters plus, 2 Units of Game wrecking Flayed men cavalry, 2 units of Black Guards, 2 Units of Cutthroats,  a unit of Boltan girls (attack dogs) and I bolster the force with Stormcrow archers.  So much that it doesn’t all fit on one board.

I’ve put up pictures of parts of the army before but with the 2nd Flayed Men unit done I’m calling this army complete.

So it’s not that I haven’t been doing hobby stuff since January. I just haven’t been posting it in the project blog. I’ve painted heaps. Rather than post it all, here’s the May stuff which was all A Song of Ice and Fire. It’s a great game and highly under-rated. The only thing is that at the present min-maxing is a massive thing in the tournament scene which is why my friends and I only play friendly’s in a campaign.

To make campaign play more thematic we made non-faction choices cost +1 point (for example, neutrals in Stark lists) and lists led by minor faction leaders get a -1pt discount on their factions choice (eg Branden Tully would get Tully Sworn Shields for 5pts and Tully Cavaliers for 7pts).

I should have been painting the latest Warcry boxed set but these were calling me.

I had to remove the shield arm on most of these because they made them impossible to paint otherwise.

Hedge Knights from A Song of Ice and Fire Miniatures Game are a neutral faction choice so effectly mercenaries for every faction (so no uniforms!). These are poorer knights so their fantasy hearaldry is not too complex and based on late 12 century/early 13th century knights (who had similar armour).

So it’s summer in Australia at the time of wriiting. That means that my family and I head off to our holiday home by the beach. We have commercial TV but almost no internet signal so we take the opportunity to play board games. Last year we played Massive Darkness. This year we are giving Zombicide Black Plague a red hot go.

I got this game in a Kick Starter in 2015 so it’s well and truely past the painting due date. It took 8 days, for 71 minis. 2022 is off to a good start.