More 1/72 Fantasy Campaign Figures

 With the week off from work, I was able to make some progress on painting.  I have been wanting to get some orcs done for my 5-country fantasy campaign, and started with a Hordes of the Things “Blade” stand:

These figures are all Caesar orcs, a mix of Set 1 and Set 2.

I also had some archers primed and ready to paint:

The final orc army will include the larger Caesar orcs as the “blades”, the smaller Dark Alliance orcs as the “warbands”, and Caesar goblins as “hordes”.  The warlords of the orcs are apparently pragmatic, and group together for field service anyone who shows up at the muster with a bow, so there are three Caesar orcs, a Caesar goblin, and 3 Dark Alliance orcs on the stand.

Having accomplished what I set out to do, and inspired by a recent stand painted by my son Norman, I decided to paint a HotT “Magician” stand with three figures from the Caesar Adventurers box as a reward.

Unfortunately, the fantasy vacation is over, and it’s back to the reality of work tomorrow.  My original plan for the project involved about 100 stands, and I’m at ~57 of those now.  As with any gaming project, the plan has had a tendency to expand, but may be revised back down a little as the completion approaches.  A few more orc stands would be desirable before getting on with the second year of the solo campaign, and the month isn’t over yet.

Zombie Jamboree and Trollfest (more 1/72 plastic fantasy figures)

 I am making some progress on the Rangers of Shadowdeep goal this week.

As mentioned yesterday, I finished up a quick subdued paint job on the zombies, using a lot of dry brushing and washes.  

Yesterday’s task was to finish the troll.  Some years ago (2014?) I used a Reaper Bones “ghast” as a troll in the early stages of the Portable Fantasy Game project.  Therefore I intended to use another, but I had three of them ready to go pursuant to a wish list for general role-playing game support.  Since they were getting a pretty simple mostly monochrome paint scheme, I decided to do all three.  I was also well along with a Dark Alliance War Troll, based on the usual 60mm by 40mm mass battle stand, so I finished it off too.  I had recently unearthed a primed (but otherwise unpainted) Caesar Miniatures big monster, dubbed a bunyip by my elder son, so it got painted, too.  That’s how it turned out to be Trollfest…

The whole group is shown here with a Strelets medieval city militia axeman for relative scale.

I also based up some expedient plastic spiders last night, so that just leaves me with a vulture to paint and some flies to base, and the Rangers of Shadowdeep will be ready to go, at least as far as figures are concerned.

October Overview — Almost All 1/72

 October was an interesting month.  I ended up taking an unexpected work trip, and found myself sitting in a hotel room halfway across the country for a weekend.  This is something that hasn’t happened to me in a while.  Knowing this was the plan, though, I packed my travel paint kit and a box of 1/72 plastic miniatures (plus a few smaller Reaper Bones to become 1/72 monsters).

I mentioned in the last post that I had been in a Rangers of Shadowdeep game at Barrage in September, and that I was inspired to work on getting that put together.

I paged through the book and drew up the order of battle.  My plan is to substitute Caesar Miniatures orcs for the gnolls, so I concluded that I needed a bunch of those, a troll, a “burrow worm”, a flesh golem, some zombies, some flies, and some spiders.  The last two categories will be simple plastic toys, for expediency.

I selected a Reaper Bones 5 Kickstarter figure as the burrow worm, and took that and the orcs with me, as my main objective for the trip.

When I got home I had nine orcs, some additional human adventurers, the burrow worm, the flesh golem, and a mounted knight (for other games) done, and managed to paint up two more knights to complete the stand before the end of the month.

The total production for the month was 31 figures, including 16 individually based figures for Rangers etc., an eight man city militia stand and a knight stand for the Portable Fantasy Campaign, and the first two stands of the Bronze Age Nubian DBA army for the Bronze Age project that I am failing to keep up with in conjunction with my son.

So it turned out to be a good month for painting after all.

The 30th of October was our monthly Stargrave campaign day. Captain Toby and the crew of the Herbaceous Backson were not having a particularly good day in salvaging the useful gear from the wreckage of a floating sky refinery.  However, the crew did manage to deploy a holographic wall for the first time.  As can be seen in the picture above, the holographic projectors appear to have been salvaged from a variety of Before Times advertising campaigns, with this one exhorting viewers to Eat More Empire Biscuits from Imperial Bakeries…

I had vacation time to take (or lose), so I am off from work this week and settling in for a poush to finish the Rangers of Shadowdeep preparations.  I’ve finished the zombies, so I just need to finish a troll and base the flies and spiders.  I am also settling in to reread The Eagle of the Ninth by Rosemary Sutcliffe, so if plans take a sudden turn and things Roman find themselves on the table, it won’t be a complete surprise.