No bats in the belfry

I’m off Oldhammering tomorrow where we’ll be playing the scenario Marktag Blody Marktag I’ve been babbling about for some time. All the preparations are now done, all the minis I had planned to paint are painted and the scenery built.

What you see here is the three pieces of wall I already presented in a previous post but now painted. They have the same brownish colour as the shrine and the belfry. Concerning the belfry I was arguing for some time with my self whether it should be possible or not to put minis on the top floor and I finally decided against it in order to keep it simple and reduce the size of the thing.

All of it is made from Styrofoam, as you can see below somewhere. Although somewhat less hurly-burly I was still aiming for a battered, almost ruinous look of both walls and tower.

All in all it has been quite a fun project to work on.

Stay tuned for some pics from the event next week.

Cheers

A bunch of fantasy characters

I finished a batch of vintage goodness this week. Two wizards, a gypsy and a halfling all produced by Citadel and furthermore a Marauder elf.

I really like both wizards, especially the one in green. I have painted this mini three or four times over the years and this time I went back and used my first colour scheme from way back. The other wizard, the one holding a bird, is also very nice, although I must confess to having no idea what bird he’s holding. He has a glove on his hand, indicating some sort of bird of prey, but the bird’s beak looks like something on a water fowl – a duck perhaps! It’s very likely a joke that went over my head. Anyway, I ended up painting it in crow colours.

Then we have the very politically incorrect gypsy with the shifty look and a short sword hidden on his back. I love it! His face is slightly distorted but it still has a lot of character. The mini is perhaps not a masterpiece but still incredibly cool.

Then we have the Halfling – or should I say Hobbit. It’s Merry from the Fellowship of the Ring set released in 1985. A nice little fellow and great fun to paint.

The last mini is the Marauder elf. A slightly boring sculpt which I choose because I need an elf and he was at the top of my pile of unpainted elves. The face of the mini is also skewed or contorted, which adds to me slight irritation with the mini.

Absalom Herlich – wizard and sage

Bela Ustapur – thief and adventurer

Luthviel – outcast and loner

The halfling Jeremias Halla

Gabor von Stefansberg – diplomat, spy and libertine

WIP: The Shrine of St Gotthart and some walls

What you see here is some quick, slightly blurry pics of the shrine of St Gotthart – a temple which is probably going to see some fierce fighting in two weeks’ time. It’s WIP pictures and the shrine still needs some work on the details – such as the altar and the door – to be considered finished. However, you’ll probably get a good idea of what the shrine will look like once it is done.

Basically I wanted the temple to appear old and decrepit – illustrating the declining splendor of St Gotthart’s cult. While the outside looks as if the building is barely holding together, the inside was painted like damp, whitewashed walls. I still need to add some green here in there – both inside and outside – to illustrate mold and moss. The shrine was constructed around a children’s shoebox which worked fine, but I didn’t realize just how big the thing would end up being! Otherwise I guess it’s easy to see how the building was made.

The walls enclosing the small monastic community were slightly simpler and somewhat less rough-and-ready. They will be painted in the same colours as the shrine and they’ll work fine together I think.

I’ll keep upload some pics once the whole thing is finished.

Cheers

Slime away

Here you see a slimy monstrosity I finished a few days ago. It’s a Green Slime released in 1992 from Ral Partha’s AD&D line.  The mini is not the greatest slime creature ever sculpted. It suffers somewhat from being constricted by the size of the base, making the creature very slim and lacking a sense of motion. A more triangular shape of the mini would have made a lot of difference but in the end that’s just nitpicking. Basically the mini is fine and I’m happy to have it in my collection. The paintjob is straight forward and not much to tell there.

The creature will serve soon as the giant homunculus of the necromancer Peter Luther in our coming scenario in a few month.

 

Marktag Bloody Marktag 1

I’m preparing some new terrain for the scenario we’re going to play by the end of this month. A story of brutal revenge entitled “Marktag Bloody Marktag” where an undead force is attacking the small monastery of St Gottharts Freude on the south eastern slopes of the Black Mountains. The undead, led by the vampire Anne Lustig, are looking to slaughter as many monks as possible, burn the buildings and rob the relics of St Gotthart stored in the shrine for future use in the black arts. I drew this small plan as part of the preparation and I’l try to introduce the scenario properly at some later stage this month. Well, back to my Styrofoam. I’m building the shrine and belfry at the moment. Good times!

Cheers

More monks – now with donkey

Yep, I finished more monks. After having painted chaos for a while it’s rather soothing to work with a limited range of muted colours, and I thus found the monks a great fun to paint. The fat monk on the donkey is from Conquest Games, while the young, goofy chap with the axe is from Gripping Beast. The monk with the hands on his back is one of Foundry’s ‘Jolly Monks’, while the anxiously praying one is by Black Tree. All very fine models I think.

Finally we have a dear old friend of mine – the cleric from Citadel’s Adventurer Starter Set launched in 1985 to the joy of countless young collectors. This mini was very likely the first one I ever painted, which perhaps was during the Christmas of ’89. My memory fails me on the exact year, but I still remember how I painted the cleric bright green. Ahh, those were the days of Humbrol enamel and turpentine!  The cleric is not the same model but one I have purchased at a later stage. Sadly I parted with the original one at the stage of early adolescence where minis became slightly embarrassing and uncool among ‘serious’ role-players.

Sorry for my blurry image of the minis by the way. I’m still having some trouble with the lighting at the moment.

Well, no more monks for now. Up next is a slime monster and then a party of adventurers. Stay tuned!

Cheers