… and his name was Guthrum Mane

As you perhaps may have seen, I have been very slowly painting the miniatures belonging to the Orc’s Drift campaign and in fact, I was really considering this project finished as I have finally given up on finding the Hagar Sheol miniature. While painting the minis for the campaign my little gaming group has played all scenarios except the last one. The first scenario I think we even have played three times and I have been using a very nice old, giant for this, serving as the drunken Guthrum Mane.

There is little chance for me playing the scenario again anytime soon, but some time ago I got hold of the mini suggested for the campaign as Guthrum Mane and he has now been staring at me from his cave in the lead mountain for a while. Finally I succumbed to temptation and painted my Guthrum in order for him to join his fellow minis from Orc’s Drift.

The mini, as you probably all know, was one of the first, if not the very first miniature sculpted by Kev Adams to be put in production by Citadel back in 1985. It is listed as a ‘giant hill troll’ and despite the rather crudely sculpted face I really love this mini. It has so much cool old school oddness to it. I love the lumbering pose and general dismal look, topped by the mask-shaped knee protector all kept in a not too cartoony style.

Guthrum has been painted by many and you will find a lot of great Guthrums on the web. I followed the idea of others and put him on rocky ground. It suits the model nicely. all in all i am very pleased with how he turned out. Now he can return to his cave and wait for some action to come his way.   

I hope you like him.

 

Ghouly trolls… or something

These three, large chaps are trolls from the illustrious Canadian company RAFM Miniatures, a company whose miniatures until the age of the Internet was something I solely knew from the pages of Dragon Magazine where they would usually be promoted and scrutinized in the “Through the Looking Glass” section. All three trolls were, to my knowledge, produced around 1988-89, but here I may be mistaken, as my knowledge about the company is a bit sketchy.

In September we’re going to play a scenario entitled “In the Hall of the Ghoul King” (more about this later) and the lads you see here will be serving as ancient, gargantuan ghouls who over the centuries have grown to enormous size on a diet of flesh, bone and marrow supplied by their elusive king.

I rather like all three models very much, but the horned one is my favorite. The miniatures is perhaps a bit crudely sculpted, but his face and oddly hulking posture combined with the long, thin limbs gives the mini a scary, almost surreal look. The two others though are great as well. I love the face and fat belly of the club-wielding one and the last, crouching troll-ghoul looks perfectly rotten. Nice! All of them had quite a lot of flash and some very obvious mold lines and they thus demanded quite a lot of prep-work before I could paint them, nevertheless I must confess, that I’m pleased with the result.

 

My favorite of the lot sold as a Plague Troll

 

This one is sold as an Undead Troll

 

This last one is simply sold as a Troll Warrior

 

A close-up of the bases

Something Wicked This Way Comes

This is my latest project – the dark elf witch Ismara riding her undead troll Gark. The miniature is sculpted by Kevin White and sold by Hasslefree Miniatures where she goes by the name Deth. The mini was quite nice to paint – the witch is a bit small and the details minute, but not too much so, whereas the troll was a fairly simple job. However I kept wondering what an undead troll would look like – what is the colour of rotten troll flesh? The model required quite a lot of green stuff to assemble and took some time to prepare. Even so I overlooked a massive mold on the one side of the troll; a stupid mistake I discovered too late.

I added what is supposed to look like the face of a china doll to the base in order to give the miniature a bit of chaotic weirdness. I’m quite pleased with the result and although Gark the Troll looks rather cartoony, the miniature has a really cool 70’s sword & sorcery-vibe i like very much.

Ismara is currently roaming the Chaos Wastes and will be one of the stars in a scenario I’ll be playing with Claus and Anders next month.

Well, what do you think?

 

 

 

We played ’A Bridge over Troubled Water’

This Thursday I finally got around to play Paul’s ’A Bridge over Troubled Water’ scenario. The game has been a long time in coming and it certainly was worth the wait. I played with my pal Rasmus aka The Mosh-Pit Maggot at house in Jutland. Most of the minis used were mine, while we used most of his terrain as well a few of his models (the mounted ones).

We played the scenario with WFB3rd rules and adjusted the scenario and the names slightly to fit our ongoing series of battles revolving around the robber baron Alban von Edelhahn dwelling in the Black Mountains. I dare not call it a proper campaign, but it is certainly slowly getting to feel like one. This was the fourth skirmish we have played with Alban as the central character.

The lighting in the room where we played wasn’t particularly photo friendly and midway through the game I forgot to take pictures. The fog of war and all that! What I can show you here is thus mainly some pics for the sake of atmosphere. I also need to get better at taking these battle-pictures. My close-ups ended up completely blurred or overexposed due to the flash.

The greenskin forces of Ozgut – the up-and-coming orc champion

The scenario worked very well I think. The table looked a bit empty due to a limited amount of terrain, but once we got started it came together nicely. We agreed that crossing the river reduced movement to a quarter; this was perhaps too harsh as my orcs would experience. That being said I would certainly include more bushes and trees on the table to make it come more alive, if I was to play the scenario again.

The actual combat was a pure massacre. Alban von Edelhahn and his retinue had entered the valley to slay Durk the Troll living under a bridge over the river running through the area. They arrived in the valley just as Ozgut, an orc champion, was approaching the very same bridge in order to tame Durk.

The battlefield

Seeing the greenskins approach Alban ordered his men to take up a defensive position and then began firing volleys of arrows on the approaching orcs and goblins. Ozgut send his two wolves, Snapjaw and Snagtooth, across the river in an attempt to outflank Alban’s men and create some havoc among the humans. At the same time Durk got a whiff of the approaching human archers taking up their position next to the abandoned toll house by the bridge.

Durk charged out from underneath the bridge but was hit by several arrows causing wounds he failed to regenerate. Badly hurt Durk charged Alban von Edelhahn, but failed miserably in the attempt to wound him. After this Alban served a single blow to the troll and surprisingly killing the beast. This of course was a major and rather sudden setback for Ozgut and his greenskins.

The greenskin forces sneaking out through the thickets

The wolves crossed the river and were met by the ever-busy Alban and his hot-blooded nephew Heinrich von Edelhahn who had charged the two wolves head over heels. Snapjaw caused a wound on Heinrich before the wolf was slain by Alban, where after Snagtooth turned around and fled the combat.

Meanwhile Alban’s astronomer and counselor, the alchemist and mage Simon Rotkopf had positioned himself in front of the bridge, waiting for the approaching unit of 20 goblins led by Frinkelgob. Ozgut and his orcs were following right in the heels of the goblins and steadily suffering casualties from the arrows raining down on them. Even Alban was amazed by the success of his five archers and five men equipped with crossbows!

Alban von Edelhahn and his men taking up their defensive positions

Once the goblins set foot on the bridge Simon Rotkopf released his Windblast spell and not only incapacitated the goblins, he also blocked the bridge for the orcs, leaving them stranded while the arrows kept striking home. He result wasn’t pretty. Ozgut lost all but one of his orcs and fled the table. Once Ozgut took to the hills the goblins turned around as well and Alban could celebrate his victory.

Well, as it perhaps shows, Rasmus was incredibly lucky during the game. He kept making every roll and I failed equally often when rolling for the greenskins. At least Ozgut survived to fight another day and he is certainly looking for a chance to get back at Alban.

Orcs snaking out of the forest while Snagtooth and Snapjaw are heading for the river

The entire thing took about three hours to play, which includes setting up the table and making all the initial rolls etc. Not bad for a Thursday night.

Thanks to Paul for writing the scenario!

Alban von Edelhahn’s troops

 

The slow approach of the ords and goblins

The goblins still have a way to go in order to reach the bridge

 

Snapjaw and Snagtooth by the river

 

Alban’s forces are ready!

The terrible troll Durk emerges from underneath the bridge

Durk the Troll – soon to be Durk the Pincushion!

Durk with one wound left!

One wet and grumpy troll

I finished working on my Citadel Marsh Troll this week. An absolutely splendid miniature. It was such a pleasure to paint. Obviously the base still needs to be done. I love the idea about a marsh troll and I’m inclined to get Bob Olleys giant marsh troll as well. They would male a fine team.

While choosing the colours I was of course thinking along the lines of earthy, swampy hues. However, I also kept returning to Puddleglum from C. S. Lewis’ The Silver Chair and the way he is portrayed in most illustrated editions of the book.  Here you have one particularly shifty looking version of Puddleglum painted by Rodney Mtthews. Great, right?! It almost has hints of Ian Miller and Tony Hough.