FromJimG: A Trio of Dwarves — Fantasy, Children's Books, and New Acquisitions (75 points)

Happy New Years all!

As the song goes, "All is quiet on New Years Day."

Today I have a trio of dwarves, all for different topics in section 1.

First up, we have the Reaper Bones model of Thain Grimthorn, the Dwarf Cleric.

My family has started working our way through the massive Frosthaven over the winter holidays, and I am tempted to paint up all the minis in the game. Thain here is an attempt to work out the simplified, moody style to match the character art on these minis. 

Basically this is just a simple slap-chop with contrast paints. I'm not sure whether I like the style or not. Particularly, I'm not sure how to get enough contrast in the face. 

Moving on. I have a second Dwarf in a chibi style from CMON's Arcadia Quest.

What's nice about painting chibi minis is that they have exaggerated features which makes it easier to paint their faces. I tend to work with NMM for chibis since they are already in such a comic style. 

I painted this guy up like slayer from the Old World. That might make "Children's Books" a bit of a stretch, if you know the lore; but his big baby art style just screamed kiddos to me. Hopefully it fits close enough!

Finally, my last offering of the week is for New Acquisitions: a Hearthkyn Theyn from the Leagues of Votann. I've been painting them up in a cyberpunk style with glowing green accents.

The Leagues of Votann (aka Squats 2.0) are the newest faction to Warhammer 40k. And the Hearthkyn Salvagers is an even more recent addition to the Kill Team line up. I picked these guys up in late October.

In November I painted up an entire Kill Team for a local convention. Unfortunately, I realized that I needed more flexibility than the models I had originally assembled. So that's where this most recent space dorf comes in—hopefully she'll give me some advantage on more open boards.

Again, happy New Years to all of you and yours!

-JimG

POINTS:
3 x 28mm footsoldiers = 15 points
Fantasy Books = 20 points
Children's Books = 20 points
New Acquisitions = 20 points
Total = 75 points

 

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Not two (or three?) dwarves are the same. and your submission is a brilliant demonstration of how different they can be, while still being called "dwarves". I like how you accentuated the unique personae of each figurine with its "natural" background. The zenithal highlights are well done and bring out lots of details and texture. Scoring 60 additional points with 3 sections of the library gives you lots of bang for your gang. Well planned!

Sylvain

 

 

From PeterB - Gaslands Vehicles - New Acquisitions - 165 points

Hello again from windy and rainy England.

In my rush to get my first post out I neglected to mention my enthusiastic support for Curt's choice of cost of entry this year. As a family we are avid readers here and love our local library. A few years back due to local government cutbacks a whole swathe of local libraries were marked for closure as the central government rules meant the only obligation was to keep open the main town library a bus ride away. Some of the sites marked for closure were then saved by local residents who now run them as volunteers and all stock is from generous donations.

Our local library therefore is now volunteer run and just before Christmas had a book sale to raise funds. I of course went down with a hefty bag full of book donations for selling or to go into stock (our bookshelves are creaking under the amount we have still, more than enough for to keep us out of mischief) and then promptly spent some money buying other titles when I got there! Just like my leadpile, the more I get rid of, the more seems to find its way back home! 

Anyway, on to the painting. This project is a mixture of recycling and new acquisitions. Just before Christmas I changed job roles at work and received a Bad Squiddo voucher as a leaving gift. So with some of the amount I purchased both versions of the Gaslands Implements of Carnage sprues. These combined with all the toy cars I could find in a trawl of the local charity shops resulted in the following fleet. Ready for a game when my local club starts up again next week.

The bikes and buggies are from the sprue and were a little fiddly, I had to paint some of the parts before gluing together.

The Formula One car I kept simple with just some guns added.

This VW is inspired by artwork in the book, although the artwork depicts an original Beetle.

These two trucks I am hoping will cause some carnage on the race track with a harpoon on one and a wrecking ball on the other.

These are RC bomb cars. They are deployed from one of the other cars and are remotely driven until they are near enough to an opponent before exploding. Hopefully they will cause some hilarity.

 

The Jaguar XJ is my favourite, with an air intake added to the hood, giant side exhausts and machine guns on the rear to discourage any tailgaters.

To the points:

7 x 20mm vehicles (15) = 105 points

4 x 20mm mounted (8) = 32 points

2 x 20mm remote control cars (2 for 6mm/8mm vehicle) = 4 points

New acquisitions = 20 points 

Additional points for customization = 4

Total = 165 points

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 Great looking vehicles! What I like about games in the vein of Gaslands is that each car and truck fits better if it is completely different from all the others and you did a superb job at customizing each of them.

I counted your small remote vehicles as 6mm/8mm vehicles, I threw in 4 points for all the customization bits and added the bonus for new acquisitions.

I'm sure these vehicles will be a hoot when you bring them to your club.

Sylvain

From TeemuL: A couple of adventurers (10 points)

Let's start the new year with the last minis I finished last year. These were finished in the afternoon of the New Year's Eve and they are now ready to conquer some dungeons.

The dwarf on the left is a Dwarf Champion by Grenadier Miniatures from 1987. He has been part of the 3 dwarf blister pack "189 - Dwarf Champions", but since I got this second hand, I'm not sure if I have the other two. He is mainly wearing a fur cloak and beard - and some red gloves.

The mysterious character on the right is a bit more of a mystery, but I have managed to track him at least to the Julie Gutherie's Boxed Set "7001 - Dungeon Party" from Grenadier, stamped 1983 on the bottom. I don't know if he is a man or an elf, ranger, assassin, scout or something else, but he looks good next to the dwarf.

No library section this time, but at least something to get me started on my traditional weekly posts.

2 x 28mm minis for simple 10 points.

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 Nice work on these miniatures from another millennia. They do, indeed, look good together and I am sure some other "archeological discoveries" in your pile of lead are waiting to join the party (or fight the party?). Keep them coming!

Sylvain

 

 

From SylvainR - Monday's Musée des Fossiles

 

 

 Today's special exhibits:

 

■ A presentation of  fantasy archeological discoveries dating back from the 1980s. Curated by Sir Teemu.

 

■ The art of salvaging from wreck yards, with intent to cause great destruction. Curated by Professor PeterB.

 

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[The Monday crew opted for "Musée des fossiles" as a theme, because it reflects the age of some of our miniatures, the age of some of our participants and the Frenchness of the Monday minion.]

And I would like to take the opportunity to wish all the Challengers a very productive year 2024!

 Sylvain

 

 

SkullWatch XIV 1

The sentient and self-aware Skull-o-meter™ Skully McSkullface has been reawakened and the cranial counting computations have commenced. We're back!

Skully McSkullface

For our new Challengers: the Skull Duel is a fun backroom part of the library which is open to all. The winner will be the Challenger who has painted the most skullz. These can be any skullz in any scale- Prussians, Brunswickers, Nazis, undead, pirate flags, base decorations, or maybe something from 40K.

As well as undying fame, the winner gets to keep the skull of last year's champion!

Hall of Skully Fame:

• XIII StuartL 1575
• XII CurtC 475
• XI StuartL 1363
• X PaulO'G 543

To enter, tag your post with 'Skull Duel' and state in the post both how many skullz you have painted, and what your running total is. Feel free to enter the duel at any time in the Challenge.

There will be regular skullicious updates throughout the gruelling months ahead, as well as a spotlight on skulltastic miniatures that have caught the unblinking eye of Mr S. McS.

Tally:

We're already underway!

• Barks 81
• StuartL 33
• TeemuL 10
• MikeW 3
• GregB 2

I myself have shot my bolt early with some scenery:

Reigning champ StuartL has this brutal emissary

Skull of the week:

MikeW's orcs

Happy New Year! May your 2024 be full of skullz.