There were three of them. No. There were more - four bakemono, and then two larger forms, lumbering through the heavy snowstorm. Huge demonic ogres - Oni - one with a huge sword and the other with a pair of war mallets.
“There…. There they are. There’s six more!” Tomoyuki’s shout in the gale of the snowstorm was urgent and loud. “Give me more arrows”. Even so, the fierce wind stripped away his voice into the void. Tomoyuki’s retainer, Juzo, passed his master another sheaf of needle-pointed arrows: “That’s all we have left, Master”.
Tomoyuki looked at the eight arrows in the sheaf. Make every one count, Tomoyuki told himself, notching the first of the black arrows, pulling the bowstring back and focusing on one of the large demonic Oni thrashing forward in the snow.
Behind him was the howl of the kitsune which had followed him and Juzo to the temple earlier in the day. If only he had offered another prayer earlier, he might have been able to persuade the kitsune to help him in the moment of battle. But it was probably too late now.
The arrow was loosed into the storm, but the wind took it wide of the leading Oni. Tomoyuki took another arrow from the sheaf, and finally whispered another sutra. Perhaps the kitsune would hear his prayers this time…?
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A busy family Christmas, a week away at New Year and heading back to work has meant I’ve ended up in mid-January without posting in Challenge XIV yet. It’s time to correct that situation!
This Challenge, I’m adding a few more figures inspired by Japanese history and folklore. In this submission, there’s a selection of Dixon Miniatures bakemono and oni…. Japanese goblins and demons from the Legends of Nippon range. They’re lovely figures, sculpted by Mark Copplestone in the 1980s. Gosh, yes, they are that old, but I feel they still stand the passing of years very well as sculpts. So, with a little bit of History in the historical sense, and History in the wargaming sense, I’ve submitted this for the HISTORY entry in the Challenge XIV library.
The retainer is from the Perry Miniatures’ range of Sengoku era figures, part of the Civilian’s set. The kitsune is a Warbases fox. I removed her tail with a scalpel, and added two new (slightly bushier) ones from greenstuff. A kitsune can have up to nine-tails - the more tails indicate the greater powers that the fox-spirit has. Just two here, but enough to weave a little magical stardust into the skirmish..
The main thing I was trying out with these figures was Citadel contrast paints and shade paints on the bakemono and oni. The Snow Lord himself persuaded me to give these a try in the last Challenge, but I didn’t get around to it. The contrast paints were used on a white base, and supplemented by GW inks (shades). They certainly look vibrant on the (demonic) flesh, but I wasn’t quite sure I was getting the effect just right with the flow of paints into the creases of flesh. I’d love to experiment a bit more with these paints in the Challenge and beyond. Above all, I just thought they were fun, and something which looked very different from green- or brown-skinned goblins or ogres which I’ve painted before.
The samurai and his retainer and the kitsune were painted a bit more conventionally. Over the years, I’ve had this silly obsession with bowstrings. I’ve no idea how I picked that up, but when I see a bow on a figure, I feel I have to string it, as in this case with very thin wire. I use my figures at the local wargames club and for participation games at wargames days and shows, so I wanted something more robust than just fishing thread. Its fiddly to string the bow with wire in this way, but hopefully worthwhile.
Finally, there are some terrain scenics to be scattered over the snowy temple of the game, The terrain items are mainly 3D prints of trees, a smaller shrine, a miniature Buddha and a temple lantern. These are really here to help set the theme, and to give the combatants something to fight around and fall over or bump into at the least convenient times. I made the tiny dōsojin stone shrines with green stuff, carving the tiny stone kami (spirits) on the shrine stones with a nautical theme - hopefully the whale and octopus are just about visible. They were fun to do, and add that little bit of Japanese ‘feel’ to the tabletop.
- For the four Bakemono and two Oni, I’ll count the bakemono as 28mm (5 points each) and the Oni (which are bigger) as being 40mm (7 points each). That’s 34 points
- For Akiyama Tomoyuki and the retainer, 5 points each.
- One point for the kitsune (regardless of her two tails)
- For the terrain scenics, I’m not sure….It’s hard to claim the points for a terrain box worth, but how about three points for each? That's 9 points in total.
As for the points:
That gives me 54 points, plus the HISTORY library entry for 74 points. On the Big Board at last!
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