More Goblins! Figures 67 to 69 of 265

      Over the past two weeks I managed to work on three more Goblins from the Dungeon Attack set, in between doing work for the games I'm running at the Cold Wars convention .  As I mentioned in my previous Goblin posts,  I didn't want to paint them the same old green that has become so common for Goblins, so I consulted the D & D Monster Manual, and read up on Goblins.  It said that their skin color ranged from yellow, to dull orange, to brick red...nothing about green.  So, I decided to go with the middle of the range and paint them a dull orange-ish.
      To begin with though, I prepped them in the usual way; soaking in water with a bit of dish soap added, giving a gentle scrub with an old soft toothbrush, then rinsing and drying.  Afterwards, I primed them with Krylon Camouflage Flat Black with Fusion.  I then glued them to 1" fender washers with Aleene's Tacky glue, and then glued the washers to a tongue depressor with a coupe small dabs of Elmer's white glue, for ease of handling during painting.

Like last time, I began by painting all their exposed skin areas with Accent "Golden Oxide".  Next, I painted their Tunics with Folk Art "Butter Pecan", and the padded jerkin on the archer with Anita's "Burnt Sienna".  For the fur areas on the neck of the mace Goblin, and the boots of the spear Goblin, I dry brushed the areas with Folk Art "Medium Gray".  I then painted their hats with GW "Scortched Brown".

 I  painted the shields with Americana "Cadmium Red" and with Black; doing a striped pattern on the mace Goblin's shield, and a primitive grimacing face on the spear Goblin's. Then I did the backs of the shields with Ceramcoat "Walnut", and then all the straps and belts with Americana "Asphaltum".  The Quiver I painted with Accent "Real Umber" and the arrow shafts with Crafter's "Spice Brown". I then painted the handle of the mace, bow, and spear shaft with the "Spice Brown". Next, I painted the fletchings by dry brushing them with the "Medium Gray."

My next step was to work on the stonework bases they were standing on.  I painted these with Duncan "Slate Grey", and then painted the blobs of vegetation sitting on the stones with DecoArt "Forest Green".  Lastly I painted most of the metal armor, weapon and shield parts, and buckles with Accent "Princely Pewter". The buckle on the archer's belt, the band on the spear Goblin's right leg, and the shin guard on the mace Goblin's left leg, I did in Ceramcoat "Bronze"

 Lastly, I painted their teeth and the claws on their feet with Americana"Buttermilk". When all the paint was dry,  I washed the figures completely with some watered down Winsor-Newton Peat Brown Ink.

When the ink wash dried, I added highlights to their skin and clothing by repainting some of the raised areas with the base color.  I also added some highlights to the metal parts with Ceramcoat "Metallic Pewter", and highlighted their teeth and claws with the "Buttermilk". I also painted their eyes with the "Buttermilk", and added black pupils.  Then, after everything had time to dry, I painted on a coat of Ceamcoat "Matt Varnish".  When this had dried I flocked the bases.  Even though they were sculpted to look like dungeon floors, I wanted to use my Goblins in outdoor settings, so I flocked them to look like perhaps the Goblins were standing on parts of old ruins or an overgrown path.  After the flock had dried, I sprayed the figures with Testor's Dullcote.

As I wrote before, I'm pleased with how these are turning out. I can't wait to see them all grouped together.

 Now there's only 3 more Goblins in the set to do.

Figures 67-69: Complete

Converting Yephemia the Cloud Giant to use with Uncharted Seas.

     I'm sorry folks, but due to me being in full preparation mode for the Cold Wars convention, I was unable to finish any Bones painting this week.  I was however able to whip up a quick conversion piece.
      As some of you may remember, last July at the Historicon gaming convention, I traded my Griffon from the  Bones Kickstarter to a friend who wanted a pair of them, for two of his Kickstarter minis: the Deathpriest, and the Female Storm/Cloud Giant.  (See: A Change in the Numbers for details ) I had been playing around in my mind, for a while now, with the possibility of converting the Cloud Giant for use with my Uncharted Seas collection.  Uncharted Seas is a game of Fantasy naval combat, and one of the elements in the game is the use of Giants, who can wade out into relatively shallow coastal waters and attack the ships.  To do this I would need to cut the Giant in half to make it appear as if she was standing in water.

      As I considered the figure, I had a couple decisions to make.  First was where would I cut the figure in half, and the second was what would I do about her weapon: keep it pointing down, or raise it so it would be above the water.   I decided I would make the cut right below where her hair hung down, that way I wouldn't have to deal with modeling the hair in the water.  I also decided I would re-position the mace, so it would be raised up as if she was threatening a ship.  This required I carefully cut it away from where it is molded  into her clothes near the base.
      So, to begin with I cut the mace free from the bottom of the figure with a hobby knife, trying to retain the shape of the mace as best as possible. I had to go back and trim and shape it a little, so the end looked like it was fully sculpted.   I then cut her in half with a jewelers saw.   Finally, I cut her arm right at the point where her wrist protector meets her elbow to help disguise the joint.

I then prepared the arm for reassembly. I had to trim a little bit off the upper arm to make sure the mace would be raised at a good angle.  I also realized I had to make another cut, this time in the mace itself,  as when the forearm was flipped around to make the mace go upwards, the fancy carving of the woman on the mace ended up facing towards the back of the figure, and I wanted it to face forward.  So I cut the mace just above the handle, so I could rotate it around and have the beautiful carving of the lady face forward. Luckily, the Bones material is very easy to slice through.
   I next drilled small holes in both parts of the arm, and both parts of the mace, so I could pin them, thus making the joints stronger.  For the pins, I merely cut small sections of wire from a paper clip.  To glue the parts together I used Gorilla gel super glue.

     After I had glued all the parts together, I glued the figure to a 1.5 inch black-primed fender washer using Aileene's Tacky glue.  Now the figure is all set to paint.   She is shown below with the Giant that is sold as part of the Uncharted Seas line of miniatures.

And here she is shown with a Dwarven battleship.

Goldar, Male Barbarian: Figure 66 of 265

     This week I painted Goldar the Barbarian from the 30 New Bones set.  With the completion of this figure, I am now officially at the point of having less than 200 figures to go.
       I prepared this figure in the usual way; first soaking overnight in water with a little dish soap added, and then giving a light scrub with a soft toothbrush, and rinsing to remove any remaining mold release agent.  I then glued it to a black-primed 1" fender washer using Aleene's Tacky glue, and then glued the washer to half a tongue depressor with two small drops of Elmer's white glue.

Yes, I accidentally got some red paint on the figure while working on another project.

I began by painting his upper body with Americana "Shading Flesh".  I wasn't sure, from looking at the sculpt, whether he was supposed to be wearing pants or have bare legs.  The creases in his thighs looked more like folds in cloth than muscle to me, so I painted them as pants with Apple Barrel "Apple Black Green".  I then painted his waist cape Folk Art "Poppy Seed". And finally, I painted the little fur loincloth, and what appeared to be areas of fur lining sticking out from under his bracers, with slightly thinned Duncan "Slate Grey"; and his ax handle I painted with Ceramcoat "Walnut".

Next, I gave all the flesh areas a wash with thinned Winsor-Newton "Peat Brown" ink.  When this was dry, I gave his skin areas a drybrushing with some of the "Shading Flesh" with some lighter-toned Apple Barrel "Apple Flesh" mixed in to lighten it.  I then went back and added some specific muscle and facial highlights with the plain "Apple Flesh".  I also painted on two nipples using some of the "Shading Flesh" mixed with some GW "Terracotta".  I then added stripes to his pants with GW "Golden Yellow"

My next step was to paint all the areas that appeared to be leather; the bracers, belts, straps, parts of the boots, and the upper shoulder guard, with plain black. Then I painted all metal bits with Ceramcoat "Metallic Pewter". I also, at this point, painted the white base with the "Walnut"

Lastly, I gave everything that wasn't flesh a wash with thinned Vallejo black ink.

When the ink wash was dry, I went back and added some highlighting to the pants with the base colors I had used; and on the black areas, I added some highlights with GW "Shadow Grey". The metal parts I highlighted with GW "Chainmail".  I painted in eyes with white and then black pupils.
   When everything had dried overnight, I painted the figure with a coat of Ceramcoat "Matt Varnish".  When this had dried, I flocked the base. Finally, I sprayed the figure with Testor's Dullcote"

I'm pleased with how this fellow turned out.  I needed a good fighter figure for my Song of Blades and Heroes games, as it seemed most of the figures I had painted so far were archers or magic users, and this guy should fit the bill nicely.

Figure 66 of 265: Complete

More Goblins: Figures 63-65 of 265

This week I worked some more on my Goblins from the Dungeon Attack set; completing another 3 of them. With big groups of similar figures like the 12 Goblins that came in the Kickstarter, I often paint them in small batches, (like with these goblins, doing them 3 at a time) doing all the clothing and accessories in each batch with the same colors; then when you put all the little batches together into a big group, the similarity becomes much less noticeable, and it looks like a nice hodge-podge mix of figures.  The completion of these 3 Goblins mark the milestone in my painting efforts of having completed 65 of my 265 figures, leaving exactly 200 Bones from the first Kickstarter left to paint 
   As I mentioned in my previous Goblin post,  I didn't want to paint them the same old green that has become so common for Goblins, so I consulted the D & D Monster Manual, and read up on Goblins.  It said that their skin color ranged from yellow, to dull orange, to brick red...nothing about green.  So, I decided to go with the middle of the range and paint them a dull orange-ish.
   To begin with though, I prepped them in the usual way; soaking in water with a bit of dish soap added, giving a gentle scrub with an old soft toothbrush, then rinsing and drying.  Afterwards, I primed them with Krylon Camouflage Flat Black with Fusion.  I then glued them to 1" fender washers with Aleene's Tacky glue, and then glued the washers to a tongue depressor with a coupe small dabs of Elmer's white glue, for ease of handling during painting.

Like last time, I began by painting all their exposed skin areas with Accent "Golden Oxide".

Next, I painted their Tunics with Folk Art "Dapple Grey", and the padded jerkin on the archer with Aleene's "Dusty Khaki".  For the fur areas on the neck of the mace Goblin, and the boots of the spear Goblin, I dry brushed the areas with GW "Codex Grey".  

I then painted their hats with Folk Art "Barnyard Red". I also painted the shields with Ceramcoat "Bright Red" and with Black; doing a half and half pattern on the mace Goblin's shield, and a quartered pattern on the spear Goblin's. Then I did the backs of the shields with the "Walnut", and then all the straps and belts with Americana "Asphaltum".  The Quiver I painted with Accent "Real Umber" and the arrow shafts with Crafters "Spice Brown". I painted the fletchings by dry brushing them with GW "Fortress Grey"

I then painted the handle of the mace, bow, and spear shaft with the "Spice Brown". Lastly I painted all the metal armor, weapon and shield parts, and buckles with Accent "Princely Pewter".

My next step was to work on the stonework bases they were standing on.  I painted these with Duncan "Slate Grey", and then painted the blobs of vegetation sitting on the stones with DecoArt "Forest Green".  Lastly, I painted their teeth and the claws on their feet with Americana"Buttermilk". When all the paint was dry,  I washed the figures completely with some watered down Winsor-Newton Peat Brown Ink.

When the ink wash dried, I added highlights to their skin and clothing by repainting some of the raised areas with the base color.  I also added some highlights to the metal parts with Ceramcoat "Metallic Pewter", and highlighted their teeth and claws with the "Buttermilk". I also painted their eyes with the "Buttermilk", and added black pupils.  Then, after everything had time to dry, I painted on a coat of Ceamcoat "Matt Varnish".  When this had dried I flocked the bases.  Even though they were sculpted to look like dungeon floors, I wanted to use my Goblins in outdoor settings, so I flocked them to look like perhaps the Goblins were standing on parts of old ruins or an overgrown path.  After the flock had dried, I sprayed the figures with Testor's Dullcote.

Overall, I'm pleased with how these are turning out.  As I said before, I think the dull orange skin really works on these figures.  Especially in contrast to their drab clothing. 

 Now there's 6 more Goblins in the set to do.

Figures 63-65: Complete

Devona, Female Wizard: Figure 62 of 265

This week I worked a little more on trying to complete the original 30 New Bones set, by painting Devona, the Female Wizard.  This is another one of those figures that baffled me as to what exactly she was wearing. It appeared to be all frills and bows, but then there was distinctly what looked like a chain-mail skirt hanging down, and her legs looked like they had plate mail joints??? I thought at first she was holding a spear (which was miscast, by the way.) and was surprised to find out she was supposed to be a wizard...so I guessed it was supposed to be a staff, not a spear?  That made the miscast spear-point (staff top?) a little less worrisome.

    I decided I would paint her to accent the Little-Bo-Peep look of the sculpt and use a lot of pink and white. To begin with, I soaked the figure in dish soap and water, and then gave it a light scrub with a soft toothbrush and rinsed it. I then glued it to a 1" black-primed fender washer with Aleene's Tacky glue.  When dry, I glued the washer to a half a tongue depressor with a couple small dots of Elmer's white glue for ease of handing during painting. So, getting started, I gave the whole figure a wash with some diluted black ink with a tiny drop of dish soap added to help me tell exactly what the details of her outfit looked like.  I then painted whatever I thought looked like armor with black.

This was followed with drybrushing the armor areas with Ceramcoat "Metallic Pewter".

I then painted her skin with Apple Barrel "Apple Flesh".  Next, I drybrushed her cape and gloves with white, being careful not to get any on the armor.  The cape and gloves already had nice shading on them from the black ink wash, so the white drybrushing gave them  nice highlights.  This was followed with painting her top, and the trim of the chain-mail, with Apple Barrel "Apple Maroon"; and her big bow, and the two scalloped hangings down her back, with Apple Barrel "Apple Light Pink". Lastly, I painted her hair with Accent "Mustard Seed", and what appeared to be straps running from her breastplate around her torso with Accent "Real Umber"

Now, I gave her skin areas, and her "Apple Maroon" top a wash with slightly diluted Winsor-Newton "Peat Brown ink. When this was dry, I gave all the parts of her that were painted "Apple Light Pink" a wash with slightly diluted Iron Wind Metals "Red" ink.

    After the washes had time to dry, I went back and added highlights to her skin, and her top, and her bow, and the hanging s down her back, with the original base colors.  I also added some white details to her bow, and the fringe at the top of her sleeves. Next I carefully drybrushed her hair with, first, Accent "Golden Harvest", and then highlighted with Americana "Moon Yellow". I then painted her eyes, and lips. I then added some highlights to her armor with GW "Chainmail". Finally, I painted the heart buckle on her bow with Ceramcoat "14K Gold"
   Next, I worked on her staff.  First I painted it with the "Real Umber", and then the ribbons on it with the "Apple Light Pink". I then gave it a wash with some slightly diluted "Peat Brown" ink. I then went back and added some highlights to the staff ribbon with the "Apple Light Pink"

     Lastly, I decided I'd try to paint the stone in her staff to look like a hunk of unpolished Rose Quartz, so I first painted it GW "Tanned Flesh", and then gave it a drybrush with the "Apple Light Pink", and then added some highlights with white.   

    When everything had dried, I gave the entire figure a coat of Ceramcoat "Matte Varnish", and then when this had dried, I flocked the base.  The next day, I sprayed it with Testor's Dullcote".

   I'm pleased with how the paint scheme worked out on this.  It certainly makes for an eccentric figure!

Figure 62 of 265: Complete    

Test Goblins: Figures 59-61 of 265

As I mentioned in my previous post, the "Song of Blades and Heroes" battle report; two weeks ago I finished the Spirit translucent figure quickly enough, that I was able to also paint up 3 test Goblin figures for use with my Orc warband for the SoBaH games I was playing that weekend.  The Goblins were from the Dungeon Attack set, and I chose one of each pose to begin with.  I didn't want to paint them the same old green that has become so common for Goblins, so I consulted my old beaten-up copy of the D & D Monster Manual, and read up on Goblins.  It said that their skin color ranged from yellow, to dull orange, to brick red...nothing about green.  So, I decided to go with the middle of the range there and paint them a dull orange-ish.
   To begin with though, I prepped them in the usual way; soaking in water with a bit of dish soap added, giving a gentle scrub with an old soft toothbrush, then rinsing and drying.  Afterwards, I primed them with Krylon Camouflage Flat Black with Fusion.  I then glued them to 1" fender washers with Aleene's Tacky glue, and then glued the washers to a tongue depressor with a coupe small dabs of Elmer's white glue, for ease of handling during painting.

To begin, I painted all their exposed skin areas with Accent "Golden Oxide".

Next, I painted their Tunics with Apple Barrel "Burnt Sienna", and the padded jerkin on the archer with Accent "Mustard Seed".  For the fur areas on the neck of the mace Goblin, and the boots of the spear Goblin, I first painted the areas with Ceramcoat "walnut" and then dry brushed with Americana "Sable Brown".   I then painted their hats with Americana "Mississippi Mud"

I also painted the shields with Ceramcoat "Bright Red". Then I did the backs of the shields with the "Walnut", and then all the straps and belts with Americana "Asphaltum".  The Quiver I painted with Accent "Real Umber" and the arrow shafts with Crafters "Spice Brown". I painted the fletchings by dry brushing them with GW "Fortress Grey"

I then painted the handle of the mace, bow, and spear shaft with the "Spice Brown". Lastly I painted all the metal armor, weapons parts, and buckles with Accent "Princely Pewter".

My next step was to work on the stonework bases they were standing on.  I painted these with Duncan "Slate Grey", and then painted the blobs of vegetation sitting on the stones with DecoArt "Forest Green".  Lastly, I painted their teeth and th claws on their feet with Americana"Buttermilk". When all the paint was dry,  I washed the figures completely with some watered down Winsor-Newton Peat Brown Ink.

When the ink wash dried, I added highlights to their skin and clothing by repainting some of the raised areas with the base color.  I also added some highlights to the metal parts with Ceramcoat "Metallic Pewter", and highlighted their teeth and claws with the "Buttermilk". Then, after everything had time to dry, I painted on a coat of Ceamcoat "Matt Varnish".  When this had dried I flocked the bases.  Even though they were sculpted to look like dungeon floors, I wanted to use my Goblins in outdoor settings, so I flocked them to look like perhaps the Goblins were standing on parts of old ruins or an overgrown path.  After the flock had dried, I sprayed the figures with Testor's Dullcote.

Overall, I'm pleased with how these turned out.  I think the dull orange skin really works on these figures.  Especially in contrast to their drab clothing.  And, they were nice and quick and easy to paint.

Now to work on the other 9 Goblins from the set.

Figures 59-61: Complete

Song of Blades and Heroes: Bones Battle Report

This past Saturday I went to Rob Dean's house for a couple games of "Song and Blades and Heroes". Rob and I decided to hold these game days using SoBaH to give us an opportunity to use our newly painted Bones figures. Like me, he bought into the first Reaper Kickstarter, and has been busy working on painting the figures from it.  He has also purchased and painted a number of Reaper's non-Kickstarter Bones figures as well.
  Rob set up a nice looking table with some sort of ancient stone heads guarding a hilltop.  Perhaps some ancient burial ground I was guarding from treasure hunters?
     For our first game I decided to build a warband around some of my newly painted translucents.    So I decided on a force consisting of: 1 Spectre, 1 Ghost, 2 Superior Skeleton Archers, 1 Skeleton Warrior, 1 Superior Skeleton Warrior (I used the Lionman skeleton stats from the rulebook), and 1 Fire Elemental.   This gave me a group of rather mediocre troops, most having a Combat score of 2, and Qualities of 3+ and 4+.  My best weapons were the Spectre with its Terror attribute and the Fire Elemental with it's 4+ Combat score, and short range shoot.
  Rob chose a warband of assorted Human fighters, archers and a Magic User.  He had one figure with the Leader ability in the mix, who effectively brought his warband's Quality down to a 2+ (Lower Quality is better in SoBaH).

Team Undead: Spectre, Ghost, a pair of Superior Skeleton Archers, a Skeleton Warrior, a Superior Skeleton Warrior, and a Fire Elemental

   It didn't help things that I badly mishandled the warband from the get go.  The Ghost proved to be useless with a Quality 4+ and a Combat of only 1.  It seldom activated, and lingered about waiting to pile on to another combat, which never happened.  I really didn't know what to do with the Spectre  either, with it's Combat score of 2+.  It wasn't until halfway through the game that I realized the way I should be using it was to pin an enemy with one of my other units, and then charge it with the Spectre; thus forcing it to take a morale check (because of the Spectre's Terror attribute) and possibly causing it to flee from combat giving the figure it was fighting a free, and lethal, hack.

Rob advances his troops. 

   The Fire Elemental I sent on a foolish flank march to get at Rob's wizard, but the hill slowed it down to a point where it had hardly got halfway across before the rest of my force had been decimated...which is what happened.  While my Spectre and Ghost flounced around being ineffective with their Quality 4+ activations, Rob was able to efficiently start taking out my skeletons with melee attacks. When I did try to get my Spectre into combat it rolled miserably and lost the fight, falling to the ground.  At which point it was swarmed and dispatched by the enemy.  In a matter of a few turns I was reduced to below half strength, and we called it a game.

My Spectre's big chance.  It knocks the enemy down, but subsequently has such poor activation rolls that the enemy is able to stand up and knock it down in return before it can react.

Next up, I had prepared an Orc and Goblin warband.  I was able to paint the Goblins up quick after the Spirit figure this past week, as the Spirit didn't take that long, and I will feature them in an article on Monday. Rob reused his warband of Humans, and who could blame him after their great success in the first game.  So this time I was tasked with defended the great Orc holy stone head alter from Human interlopers.
  This will be a short report, as I must say up front, I do not think I have ever had a game go bad for me so quickly.

Team Orc: (Back row) Orc Warchief, 3 Savage Orcs, 1 Superior Orc Archer, (front row) Goblin Elite Archer, 2 Goblin Warriors, and 2 Spider Swarms (I used the centipede swarm stats from the rulebook) 

The Orcs, like my previous warband, suffered from less than average Quality of 4+. I had learned enough from Rob's last outing with Orcs (See: Bones Battle Report ) to include a figure with the Leader attribute to effectively bring my Quality down to 3+ .
     So, on my first turn, I get about half of my stuff activated including an Orc Spearman who is pointed up as a Savage Orc.  He gets two successful activation rolls and races forward.  After my second mixed result activation, the Spearman is about a move out front, with everyone else following up at various stages.

The beginning of the end:  the Orc Spearman goes charging forth.

At this point, two of Rob's fighters who have also been racing forward, reach him.   With their better Quality, they roll and get 3 activations each, so they still have the ability to strike the spear-wielding Orc when they get to him.  The first one knocks him down, and the second manages to inflict a Gruesome Death on the poor Spear Orc.  About 5 of my figures are in range to see this and must test morale.  Since most have hardly got two moves onto the table, when they fail their morale they are close enough that the rout carries them off the edge.  So, four end up running off the table.  This immediately reduced my strength from the 10 models I started with down to 5 remaining by the third turn.  Rob, easily enough, gets one more kill on me by plugging my archer with an arrow, which drops me below 50% strength. In the ensuing morale check, everyone else, but the swarms, run away.  

The end.  The spear Orc meets a Grusome Death as his clanmates look on in horror, possibly wetting themselves and crying like babies, before running off the table.

  So, it was not a good day for my warbands.  Rob and I discussed afterwards that we really need to figure out a way to make lower Quality and high quantity warbands work; since in the games we have played so far, the warbands that have the superior Quality always win.  I look forward to our next rematch.

To read an account of the battles from the other side of the table, visit Rob's blog: The Sharp End of the Brush