From GeoffT: More fantasy miniatures (68 points)

Hello Challengers,

Here are some more fantasy miniatures, and one historical one.

We have a French looking napoleonic officer, three ‘hue-eaters’ by grenadier miniatures and six harpies by reaper bones black.  The hue eaters and harpies are closer to 40mm than 28mm to the eyeball, so will round up in scale.  I got the harpies for ‘cathaka’ or buzzard men in ghost archipelago, but they really don’t look quite right for the role, so I had not painted them earlier.  However, they will be perfect as harpies for the impending game Warriors of Athena.  The hue eaters and harpies all had integral bases which I made bigger with milliput so they would be steadier in game.

Nine x 40mm figures at 7 points each and one 28mm figure for 5 points brings the total to 68 points.

Kind Regards

Geoff

From Millsy:

More lovely fantasy goodness from you Geoff!

I'm really impressed by the vibrance of your paintwork, in this instance the hue-eaters. It's giving me a great deal of pleasure getting to see plenty of old lead getting some love and such wonderful work it is too. Those harpies really look the business and would be right at home in any Old School Renaissance dungeon.

Cracking stuff mate. 68 beautiful points added to your tally.

Cheers,
Millsy

From GeoffT: Fantasy miniatures (67 points)

Hello Challengers,

This week I have a group of varied fantasy miniatures.  They are a mixed lot scavenged from bargain bins, nice miniatures left over from the 90s.  I collect and use these in miniature agnostic skirmish games such as Frostgrave and its variants.

We have three K’dillians by Harlequin miniatures.  These are Egyptian style crocodile men, close enough for snake men in “Ghost Archipelago” game.  There are four “Avalanche men” from Legends of the five rings game, not quite sure what they will be for yet, I did their skin like blue scales, but is supposed to be rocky.  A Gnoll by Reaper miniatures, a quite a big one, will be a great Gnoll chieftain for “Rangers of Shadow deep” which features Gnolls as the predominant bad guys.  Then we have five figures from Grenadier miniatures.  There is a hatchling dragon, a devil, a sea troll, a troglodyte, and finally a shape changer, who is a wizard/cleric on the front and a lizard man on the back.  I don’t know if the shape changers natural form is be the lizard thing, or if it is changing from a lizard to a wizard or something. Will be useful figures for sure, and I am glad to give these long forgotten beauties some life.

There are 13 figures, 12 of them are 25-28mm sized for 5 points each, the Gnoll is 40mm for seven points, making a total of 67 points.

Kind Regards

Geoff

From Millsy:

What a cracking collection of fantasy miniatures Geoff! A real mix of old school and newer models which all look equally good and which demonstrates how a top paint job can elevate a miniature and help it mix with others from different lines and even ages.

I really like your saturated colours on these especially the blues and greens. The red vs. green on the shape changer is an interesting way to represent the ability. Mostly you see before and after representations of shape changes, not captured mid change. So cool!

Lovely work all round and well done indeed mate.

Cheers,
Millsy

From TeemuL: Classic Adventurers (40 points)

Time to gather another squirrel, this time let's call it "Classic Fantasy Squirrel". It's Tuesday morning now and the flu has gone, but I have had some after symptoms of other infection, so sick leave continues. The weekend was rather bad, the constant mild headache and tiredness kept me pretty much out of painting form, but these were started before and on Monday I was able to finish these. I got some new medicine, which might have helped or the disease is just naturally going away - who knows.

These are old metal miniatures probably meant for RPG use and come from the Julie Guthrie Personalities range by Grenadier Miniatures. I don't really pay attention to eBay offerings of prices, but at least in Finland the second hand prices of old minis are quite divided - asking price of metal GW slayers is 10-15 euroes, but these characterful classics are available roughly at 1 euro per mini with remarks "if you really want them" and "you dont' have to take them all." So I get them all. There are lots of slayers (and other metal minis of that era) in people's boxes, but these are quite rare. But I guess the want is what sets the price. But let's get to these minis, right?

This is a group of eight minis I bought last year, being quite a random selection and some time were spent to deciding the colours, since these are not uniformed of course. There are two identical minis, the two devils on the right. I decided to paint them a bit differently, because who needs two devils? I came up with an idea to paint a human like devil and a devil in his natural form. The human like devil got orange hair because why not.

They are painted with traditional acrylic paints with different approaches, some have basecoat, wash, drybrush and highlight, but most of them don't have all of those. In the end I think I managed to get them all look similar - meaning that they all could meet at the same point and all would look like belonging there. What I'm trying to say is, that one is not darker than others for example. they all have the same sun shining on them. They are all glued on plastic round bases from some Perry box, so not the usual 25mm bases, but smaller ones, which look quite nice on these. Then some glue and brown paint and small tuft to hide the join between miniature's own metal base and the plastic base. Compare the photos from front and back and you understand - probabl should have put another one on the back, too. Let's take a closer look now.

These are two devils I mentioned earlier. Julie Guthrie Personalities 897 Devil. It would be nice actually collect these minis, since each has a unique number and you could have a nice checklist for them - unlike old GW minis. Yes, the human like devil is in red cloak with purple details. Orange hair and orange highlights were partly chosen to have fiery, if not hellish, appearance. The devil in Hell was given dark red skin and yellow cloth to mimic the flames. I was actually thinking about some free hand flame pattern on the clothers, but dropped the idea quite soon. The horns are more visible on the Hell deamon, but both have them.

These two guys are Julie Guthrie Personalities 826 Fighter w crossbow and 835 Knight w lion shield. I decided to paint them in similar colours, so they might be on the same side. Red was chosen, because it is such a striking colour, widely used historically and Finnish Coat of Arms has a yellow lion on red background. I used different metallic paints on different kinds of armour and weapons, but I'm not sure how visible it is on these photos. Similarly I used different browns on different areas of wood and leather. And the lion on the shield is of course sculpted, no bonus points from there, but I'm extremelly happy about it, the colours work and I managed to highlight it quite well.

This lovely couple consists of Julie Guthrie Personalities 813 Female assassin w cup of poison and 845 Half-Elf fighter thief. With the assassin I decided to give her a brown cloak to help him hide in the shadows, but she still has a white dress and a golden belt. The green poison is maybe a bit obvious, but I couldn't resist and the colour pops nicely. The half elf is another story, he hides himself in the front of the people where anyone can see him and then surprise them. I bet these two would make an awesome duo! Light green and purple worked out well together and brown pants give him some practionality. He clearly has two sides in many ways - he is half elf, he is fighter and thief and he is fancy and practical.

Last but not least we have Julie Guthrie Personalities 890 Young Mage and 895 White Witch. Both of them have white and blue colours, unintentional, but reminds me of Finnish flag. Young mage could be male or female or something else - if someone wants to put mages in the boxes. This group is may be not as diverse as some other D&D groups seen on this Challenge, but at least there are some male and female options here, so I'm tagging this post with Sarah's Choice -label, even though I'm not sure if it is a thing this time. :) Young mage has a bit gandalfy look on him/her, but I guess that's quite normal. I especially like the blueish dress of White Witch, heavy drybrush on light blue looks like light is dancing on her dress when she storms into the middle of action. Green belt looks very good, too. Yes, here I'm admiring my own work, humble right? I'm just pleased with my colour choices, because there were no painting guides and all these were different, so an extra effort was needed.

Okay, the summary. There are 8 miniatures in old school 25mm scale, so 40 points in total. No skulls this time (but they are coming) and 1 new squirrel (25mm Classic Fantasy) making it 8 in total I guess.

Teemu, these are a welcome bunch of character figures or even NPC's for any RPG. I do approve of your excellent choice of colours! Another well earned 40 points indeed!

 

Cheers Sander 

From GeoffT: A mixed bag (75 points)

Hello Challengers, 

Today I present a mixed bag of miniatures.

There are two Grunch Warriors, I don’t know what an Grunch is, but they look like Blemmaye with birds feet.  I have four Napoleonic undead, two skeletons and two vampires for “The Silver Bayonet” an Oriental Ogre,  four British Paratroopers and Harry Flashman himself.

In total there is 11 x 28mm infantry, one 54mm figure and a 28mm scale gun.  That is a total of 75 points.

Kind Regards,

Geoff.

From Millsy:

I love a good eclectic collection of miniatures and this is the perfect specimen! I'm intrigued by the Grunch which I've not come across before. A quick bit ot Google Foo has properly educated my on them and I agree they have a definite blemaye feel to them.

Very nice work all around Geoff. Rich reds, saturated blues and bright whites. What's not to like?

75 Challenge shekels for you mate.

Cheers,
Millsy

From GeoffT: Four Spheres of Paradise (115 points)

 Hello Challengers,

This week I have a small number of miniatures claiming a large number of points, courtesy of them representing four of the Sphere of Paradise.

Some of these have been waiting painted until I got the miniature for the preceding spheres complete.

First we have ‘warriors of faith’, these are fantasy minis that are based of Christian knights.  Knights being the arm of faith used to kill infidels. I painted them in a French type of scheme. Think these minis are from Harlequin.

Next up we have ‘the just rulers’.  In my youth, the TV show ‘the bill’ portrayed the English Bobby as a paradigm of honest justice.  This bobby could be Hollis himself.  Miniature by Reaper.

Meanwhilst on the foreign language channel, Ronins demonstrated being ‘Contemplatives’, silently and mysteriously arriving in town, thinking about stuff using no words, then killing the bad people with swords, then wandering off.  This Ronin is by exmanus studios.

Next, we represent the fixed stars of Faith, Hope and Love.  In this case, I am representing Hope, which is symbolised by Unicorns, according to random wikis that cover symbology.  This is an old Grenadier miniatures model from the 90’s

So there we have four themes for Dante’s comedy = 80 points

Two mounted 28mm miniatures = 20 points

Three 28mm foot = 15 points.

No squirrels.

Kind Regards

Geoff.

From Millsy:

You've shared some wonderfully eclectic posts over the Challenge Geoff and this is no different. This is another great cornucopia of minis, painted in a range of different styles and colours.

The knights are particularly good, especially the spiral decoration on the lances which I can attest from personal experience is really hard to execute. Cracking work mate!

115 awesome points!

Cheers,
Millsy

From GeoffT: Wisdom, Feathered Serpent (55 points)

Hello Challengers,

For the theme of Wisdom, I’m claiming a feathered serpent, which is symbolic of wisdom in several cultures.  This one is a very old model by Grenadier Miniatures from their Shadowrun range.  When I prepped it, I wisely wore gloves as it had some lead rot which I leached off with vinegar before applying a heavy coat of primer.  Ideally I should have used a rust converter or electrolysis to fix the lead rot, but the wisdom extended only so far.  I don’t know much about the Shadowrun genre, but I think the lady is a shape changer and turns into the serpent.

This week, but not in theme, is two Weird war 2 miniatures by Eureka.  They don't look that weird to me, so think will be good for US in pacific theatre.  Currently my US ww2 miniatures are in an Ardennes campaign in winter, so the bloke with 30cal will be a bit cold, luckily his friend has a flamethrower to warm things up.

For the scorecard, all in 28mm

Feathered serpent = 20 points (on vehicle sized base)

Other Shadowrun figure = 5 points

Squirrel for Shadowrun faction

Wisdom theme = 20 points

US blokes = 2 x 5 points

Net = 55 points

Kind Regards

Geoff.

From Millsy:

Very nice indeed Geoff!

The feathered serpent may be my favourite of all your posts to date. The colour choices and the shading (particularly the blue) are wonderful and it has a really striking feel to it because of that. I'm not familiar with this particular miniature but having seen yours I am tempted to add one to my collection if they can still be found.

The two Yanks are cool too. The chap in just a singlet looks a little tanned for Europe in winter but he clearly means business and doesn't have time to be cold!

Great stuff. 55 awesome points mate.

Cheers,
Millsy

From TeemuL: Greedy Drake [Greed] (30 points)

If there is something which is pure greed, then I'd say it would be a dragon. Dragon gathers gold, jewels and treasures just to have them, not to use them on anything or investing, just having them around and use as a bed.

Wikipedia has both drakes and dragons on the same page and I don't know if they different words in Finnish either. So here is a Grenadier Black Drake from 1986 as my entry for Circle of Greed. He is from their Fantasy Classics set, number 339. This was part of a small haul of old metal minis I bought just after Christmas, a dozen metal minis from Grenadier, Ral Partha, Games Workshop and Mithril for 50 euros including posting. Not ridiculously cheap, but cheap enough.

Black Drake is mostly black, highlighted in many ways similar to the pegasus of Morathi last week. I planned to paint his belly rather pale, but it is quite dark in the end, but has some rather nice highlights. The tail looks ok, as seen above, but I should have use lighter colours wider especially in the belly and throat areas. The red wattle(?) started from the same dark brown, but I went to red and orange there. And the lone horn shifted to yellow, just to bring some colours to him. Eyes are yellow, too.

The photo above shows the drake with his nemesis, fearless dwarf slayer, roughly from the same decade, I think. Dwarf painted previously, no points for him. The above photo also shows the size of the drake, so not that big.

I ask 10 points for the drake, he is quite small, but still bigger than a regular human or horse in 28mm world. Model is available from Mirliton, who describes the drake as 40mm tall. And I wouldn't dare to anger a drake by asking too little... :) And then 20 points for theme. I seem to be walking on thin ice this week, asking more and more from my minion...

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Good Morning!

I love dragons and I particularly like Black Drakes colourful red wattle and yellow horn. The bright colours are a really nice contrast to the dark greens of his body. But where's his treasure? Has the treasure already been stolen by the fearless dwarf?

 Well done on finding these lovely  vintage models I think all the Challengers will be keen to see what else from this trove will make it into the Challenge!

28mm Dragon  = 10 points

Location bonus Greed = 20 points

30 points to your scoreboard Teemu!

From GeoffT: Greed, Zombie Dragon and Zombie Troll (50 points)

 Hello Challengers,

Here we have a pair of greedy monsters.  Dragons and Trolls typically hoard piles of treasure in fantasy fiction and games.  It is hard to comprehend why they horde treasure, as despite its monetary value, they are unlikely to be able to spend any of their gold.  

The dragon is by Ral Partha and was also sold by Citadel, the troll is by Grenadier. 

They are both undead, so I think I will add them to my Warhammer Fantasy 3rd edition undead army.  

Points:

The dragon is basically a vehicle as it the size of a chariot, and a troll would be cavalry sized.

1 x 28mm vehicle = 20 points

1 x 28mm cavalry = 10 points

Greed theme = 20 points

Squirrel for Warhammer Fantasy Undead.

Kind Regards

Geoff.

________________________

Love how you've done up these venerable minis, Geoff (old Ral Partha stuff is just sooo cool). The skin on the troll is excellent and the exposed bone and gristle on the dragon is suitably creepy. Great additions for a 3rd edition undead army. 

Well done!

- Curt