From HerrRobert: Dragons Dancing at the Black and White Ball (40 points)

Deep in the frozen northern wastes, the young white dragon Othimmalaeagkar stood proudly on a hunk of rock staring out over a frozen sea of ice. Whisps of cold escaped her nostrils as she surveyed the domain she would make hers, establishing a lair and asserting dominance, contemplating the treasure soon to be mined by her captive deep gnomes and hordes of succulent caribou to feast on.

Meanwhile, deep in the fetid swamps hundreds of miles to the south, a young black dragon Thriingaulzundae snorts in deep satisfaction over his acquisition of a ruined and flooded chapel, sacred to gods long gone. Having secured the loyalty of a pirate band and the fealty through fear of a tribe of orcs, he contemplates the riches he is sure to amass, the magic to hoard, and ancient knowledge to covet.

For my third entry to Challenge XVI, I take you on a trip back down memory lane, to the Analogue Hobbies Studio of Challenge XIII. While my progress through the studio was extremely limited, I did amass several projects for the various themes throughout the studio. One of these was the "Black and White" section, which seemed eminently suited to digging something out of the pile of shame.

Black & White: Paint something in grey-scale, with black and white being your colours of choice. Reconjure the elegance of the silver screen! 

What could possibly be more suitable than some chromatic dragons?

From D&D Beyond, we have the necessary descriptors:

Black Dragons: Black dragons dwell in swamps on the frayed edges of civilization. A black dragon’s lair is a dismal cave, grotto, or ruin that is at least partially flooded, providing pools where the dragon rests, and where its victims can ferment. The lair is littered with the acid-pitted bones of previous victims and the fly-ridden carcasses of fresh kills, watched over by crumbling statues. Centipedes, scorpions, and snakes infest the lair, which is filled with the stench of death and decay.

Don't you just love that sense of satisfaction sculpted into his face?

White Dragons: White dragons lair in icy caves and deep subterranean chambers far from the sun. They favor high mountain vales accessible only by flying, caverns in cliff faces, and labyrinthine ice caves in glaciers. White dragons love vertical heights in their caverns, flying up to the ceiling to latch on like bats or slithering down icy crevasses.

Fizban's Treasury of Dragons gives even more options for customizing these antagonists, from a dragon naming table, to lair designs, personality traits, dragon goals and even adventure hooks. 

Both dragons are from Reaper. Othimmalaeagkar is a Reaper Bones Young Ice Dragon, while Thriingaulzundae is a much heftier metal Young Swamp Dragon. Both are multi-part kits, with the wings cast and provided separately, which made things a whole lot easier to paint.

Reaper Bones Young Ice Dragon

The metal swamp dragon

I went with a pretty simple paint scheme for both, which doesn't really befit their status as dragons, but which worked really well. Both were primed and painted in parts, wings painted separately, and only assembled after all basing was complete. For Othimmalaeagkar, I primed her black, then completely covered her in white craft paint, followed by Game Color Blue Wash, and then dry brushed with Mondo Llama Snow Flurry, while her claws and teeth were Mondo Llama Winter Clouds. Mondo Llama craft paints are all a satin finish, which worked well for this dragon.

The base is where I took a lot more risks. I used a Reaper lipped base, and filled it with Realistic Water. I was sadly disappointed since I was unable to get the water to fog up or look like ice the way I wanted it to. Despairing a bit, I turned to AK Interactives Snow Sprinkles to cover the base of the miniature, and Ice Sparkles to try and create the ice effect over the realistic water. I was afraid I almost ruined it by putting watered down mod podge on the base to lock everything in, but when it dried it gave a very nice blending. I'm quite pleased.

For Thriingaulzundae, I used Mondo Llama Fresh Pavement over a brown primer. His scales were picked out by drybrushing Folkart Metallic Black over them, while I used Delta Ceramcoat Charcoal Grey for his skin. His claws are Mondo Llama Misty Grove.

I also used this as an opportunity to experiment with swamp bases. I started with my usual drybrush of Mississippi Mud and Teddy Bear Brown fraft paint, followed by a wash of Ghille Dew speedpaint. More realistic water followed, tinted using Woodland Scenics olive drab and brown tints to the realistic water. At first, I was concerned that I'd poured too much in, but it gave a really great effect of wet ground surging up on to shore. I then added Army Painter Swamp tufts, some Woodland Scenics foliage clumps, and lichen cut and torn to size. 

So there we have it, two young dragons ready to establish themselves in their new territories, and some solid celluloid from back in the vault.

Scoring is a bit difficult. Both models are a bit larger than a mounted 28mm figure, and comparable to an armored car I posted in a previous entry. However, a full 20 points seems a bit much, unless I can eke out 5 points per for the bases, so I'm going to claim 15:

Scoring:

• 2x 28mm dragons @ 15 points per = 30 points

That puts me at 70% of my very modest 100 points goal, with most of a month to go. I might just make my goal!

=============================

Sylvain: Very nice paint job on these dragons. The work you did on the bases really makes them come alive. The description of your painting method is really instructive. Since I scored 20 points per dragons for my own submission yesterday, it's only fair to grant you the same amount. This will also get you closer to your 100 points target. Bien joué! 

 

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 StuartL - Last minis of 2025 - 100 Points

Hi again,

    My second post for today, and hopefully a lot more positive than my previous one. 

    I'm lucky to have a long break over the winter period, and I have wasted very little time in getting pigment onto plastic. I have way too many projects on the go at any given time, so there is always something around for me to be working on. So, this post has a few small batches of minis that I had sitting in the (far too large) to-do pile. 

    First off, some Afghan tribesmen. Ages ago, I got a selection of Afghans and British troops for the 2nd Anglo-Afghan War from Artizan Designs. I've managed to get most of my forces done, but I still have a handful of Afghans to do. My plan is to play The Men Who Would Be Kings with them. These minis are all metal, and were really fun to paint. I went for simple colours for the clothes, but with some splashes of brighter colours for the turbans and sashes. Having done this batch, I kind of want to order more of them, Artizan do some amazing figures.

    The next set of figures from my work bench are some robots. I painted up a bunch of robot minis for This Is Not A Test for the challenge back in 2021. I have to admit that I haven't actually used them yet. But, that isn't a reason not to paint up more of them, right? These minis are all from Reaper Bones. The quality of them varies quite a bit. The big green one was super clean and crisp, whereas the robot at the back right is permanently leaning forwards, despite my best efforts to get it to straighten up.

    Being robots, painting was largely a case of base coating them in metallic colours, giving them a dark wash and then adding some highlights and spot colours for interest.

I'm going to be cheeky and claim these two robots' noggins look like skulls...

    My final entry for the year is a group of ten Anglo-Saxons. These figures are for Gripping Beast and will be joining my massive Saxon army (around 200 minis so far), for use in Saga, the new Pillage game from Victrix and possibly Hail Caesar once I get my Normans done. Having already done a lot of these figures, I can practically paint them in my sleep, so I blasted through these chaps in no time. While the sculpts aren't as pretty as the newer Victrix options, I find these very serviceable and they look good enough for gaming with.

      And that should see me done for 2025. I still have a lot more to do in 2026, so I will see you all then!

    Points wise, there are 20x 28mm minis, which should set me up for a nice, round 100 points. There are also entries for all 3 of my side duels.

My ongoing duels information:

Skulls - 141 (+2, assuming the robo-skulls count)

BSRoD - 5 (+5 for the robots above)

Squirrels - 6 (+3) - D&D Animals, 30K Militia, Plague Clowns, Afghans, Robots, Anglo-Saxons

____________________

A great way to close out 2025, Stuart. I really like the Afghan fellas with their coloured turbans and the not-Terminators with their creepy glowing red eyes.  A very tidy 100 points for New Year's Eve, well done!

- Curt 

From StuartL - Opening Volley, Wild Beasts and other things (130 points)

Hello all, it is good to be back.

After effectively dropping out of Challenge 14 midway through due to work and social pressures, and then being forced to drop out of Challenge 15 just before it started due to a family issue, I have been looking forwards to this year's challenge for a long time.

 

Sadly, about a week before the starting whistle, I was involved in a small accident and hurt my back. In the run up to Challenge 16, I had really bad sciatica and was unsure when I would be able to make it to my painting desk, and even if I could make it to my painting desk. If you have never had sciatica, it is where a nerve in your lower back gets nipped between bones and muscle. The lower back pain isn't so bad, but it feels as if my leg has been broken in a dozen places, while also being on fire. I do not recommend it.

    

Luckily, by Monday this week, the meds the doctors gave me started to kick in, and I was able to stagger to my hobby room. I am still limping around and can't walk for more than a couple of minutes before the pain knocks me sideways, but I am able to sit and hold a brush, and that is what really matters.

So, with all that out of the way, I figure I should show off some models.

First of all, I painted up some random beasties for Dungeons and Dragons games. They aren't for anything specific, but it is always good to have a broad selection of low level critters on hand to throw at the party.

In the front row we have a hunting dog, a 6-legged fox creature and a two-headed wolf. In the back row there is a dire wolf, a wyvern and another dire wolf. The wyvern was painted using the 'slap-chop' style and I hate it. No matter how many times I try it, I always find that I don't like how contrast paints turn out on my models. With a couple of exceptions (below), the models are from Reaper's Bones range.

This dire wolf is actually a friend's model. He got it out of a Gachapon machine (A common machine here in Japan that you put a coin into and get a random toy out of). He asked me to paint it like Gmork from Neverending Story, but as far as I can tell, Gmork looks just like a wolf except for the green eyes. So, I painted the eyes green.

This is an old GW model from Mordheim. As a GW model it is unnecessarily grim-dark and has a metal ring affixed to its hip. It is also wearing a collar with a skull embossed on a tag. 

    All of these should score me 30 points, which is enough for a Squirrel, and also 1 skull.

    But wait, I am not done.

In addition to these animals, I have also painted some Imperial Militia for the Horus Heresy. In the Horus Heresy, most armies are Space Marines. The genetically engineered super soldiers designed to conquer the galaxy. Armies that are not the Space Marines are either daemons, giant robots, or the cream of the crop as far as baseline humans go. Not so the militia. The militia are the regular human populations of planets that have the privilege of being where the other armies fight massive world-ending battles. They are the dregs. 

    

That said, I wanted to have a somewhat survivable core for my army, with a life expectancy longer than the time it takes for a handful of dice to come to rest after being thrown by my opponent. So, I went with some 'elite' stormtroopers. Basically dregs in slightly better armour, that might stop an incoming bullet if they are lucky. 

These models all come from GW's Tempestus Scions range. I have no idea what they are like in 40K, where they originate, but this will be my 10-man command group for my 30K force. The officer (just left of centre) is on a slightly larger base to show that he is more important than the rest.

And to accompany the command group, a 10-man squad of stormtroopers. (Sorry, I think the camera was a little out of focus for this shot). All of my 30K forces are on the same style of basing, torn up cork and sand painted to look like they are fighting in the middle of the most hellish warzone possible.

And a group shot of all twenty together. These models have a lot of trim on them and were quite fiddly to paint. That said, I am very happy with how they turned out. I had initially thought to give them quite dark armour, but as they are going to die to a stiff breeze, I thought that they should at least look somewhat glorious as they dash valiantly into the teeth of my enemy's guns. 

I don't normally like doing close ups, but I thought I should point out the sheer number of skulls these guys are packing. The buttons for his great coat are skulls. The straps for the buttons end in skulls. There are skulls on his coat cuff. The insignia on the shoulder includes a skull. These models are festooned with the things. 

Altogether, these should add 100 points, 1 squirrel and (checks notes) 138 skulls, with 25 coming from the officer alone.

    For this post, that brings my totals to:

130 points (26x 28mm minis. The wyvern is a little bigger, but one of the dogs is a bit smaller so...)

2 Squirrels (D&D animals, 30K Militia)

139 Skulls

I hope to see you all again by the end of the year. I'm off to lie down for a bit before I hit the brushes again.

________________________

First, welcome back to the Challenge, Stuart. While it's great to have you with us again, I am very sorry to hear of your health issues. I hope things get better for you soon.

You managed some great work here in the says since the start of the Challenge. Of your beasts, I have to say my favourite is that venerable Mordheim hound. So awesome. I really like how you did his teeth and muzzle.

Your Tempestus Scions, though essentially tarted-up cannon fodder, definitely look the business. I admire the green-grey armour chased in bronze. It has a nice baroque feel to it without being too fussy.

Great opening volley (and a LOAD of skulls!). Well done!

- Curt

From BruceR - Juan and Daisy; Owley Owl Bear; (30 points)

Getting some bits and bobs done.  Still hoping to finish my Eye-Ties, but did do some palette cleansing with these latest additions.  A friend sent around a picture of two Owl Bears he had done and I remembered I had searched and picked one up at ACon last year, so brought it out.  

I know we can get anything we want with printers and ordering, but sometimes just physically searching and browsing stores, etc... is a tonic.  I had found this Owl Bear and not even sure what I will use it for, but with 3 in the group either Frostgrave or Silver Bayonet will see some adventurers beaked or clawed out of existence.   

This is another Reaper Bones miniature monster.  I base coated him in a brown with the airbrush and went to work on his feathers, hide and face.  Some Iraqi Sand, White, Orange, and dry brushes later here he/she is.  I've seen some baby Owl Bears and that's my next search mission as why not, what makes an Owl Bear grumpy but messing with her young.  

I than went to the scatter bits for games.  I had picked up a horse, handler and cart from Wargames foundry.  I try to put out wagons, carts, crates, barrels, etc... for all games as it makes the table seem lived in rather than buildings, woods, roads, and armies.  So this is perfect for simply tied to a post or part of a convoy.  Juan is a relaxed dude as you will note two pipes sticking out of his hat (pipe holder) for those long drives.  Daisy is no speedster but can haul loads for miles.  All were base coated brown with the Owl Bear and brushed up from that base.  Juan is a little pink as I was away without a flesh color and needed to mix/create my own.  

Juan and Daisy looking for a load.

Points:

Owl Bear 54mm               10 pts

28mm foot + horse           10 pts

Wagon (treated like 

artillery or crew served)    10  pts

Total                                    30 pts

Not sure if I'll get another post in (I hope to)  if not I want to thank Curt and Sarah for once again putting on a great show.  I know, like many others, this gets me through the winter months and doing something I enjoy.  Everybody's feed back helps to keep us going and all positive.  Thanks also to minion Greg for taking care of us Wednesday'ers.  Be well and if you are at ACon I'm the old guy running Sharp Practice Peninsular so say hi and put faces to handles.  Cheers.

Bruce  

***

Constructive feedback can be useful, but for this one I'm just gonna go with OWL BEAR! OH YEAH! Really sharp painting on this entertaining monster. Dispensing grief and wisdom! Just wonderful, and your brushwork captured the effects beautifully!

It has been a tremendous Challenge for you, and I know I speak for all when I say we have enjoyed your efforts very much!

GregB

From BrianC: Zombicide, Halfling Wrestlers, Werewolves, Chicks and cloaks, and a BIG Baddie! (Heresy, Violence, Fraud, Treachery) (130pts)

 Hello all! There's still hope of making my goal! Ha! Awesome painted minis from everyone! Keep at it! Well, more of this and that again. Let's begin with the Dante's circles. 

The 6th Circle: Heresy

It was considered heresy to believe in witches and werewolves because only God can be the source of supernatural powers. So, this resin werewolf miniature from Next Level Miniatures will fit perfectly in this circle.

Next, my entry for the Seventh Circle: Violence is the Dungeons and Dragons 54mm miniature, Grey Render. I can't wait to add this Big Baddy to my fantasy tabletop miniature games!

The Eighth Circle: Fraud. Well, can't go wrong with the Reaper Metal Miniature Big Bad Wolf of Little Red Riding Hood story. "Grandma, my what big teeth you have."

The Ninth Circle: Treachery. One of my favorite backstabbers of all time is Walter White of the TV series, Breaking Bad! This is a Zombicide Promo Survivor miniature.

That will complete my Dante's The Abyss entries. Now, I must figure out what minis to paint for Dante's Paradise entries. Hmm. Ok, next are a couple of pesky Halfling wrestlers from the game, Rumbleslam.

Ok, I only painted one more Zombicide Black Plague Fattie/Brute. Ugh. I'm hoping to have more zombies soon!

Next, are some old plastic Reaper Bones Miniatures. Oof! 

Here is Nightslip:

Human Ranger, Mi-Sher

That wraps this turn-in up.

8 x 28mm = 40pts.

1 x 54mm = 10pts.

4 Circles   = 80pts.

TOTAL     = 130pts.

Why, hello Brian! That's quite a run through the Circles of Hell! You have chosen your entries well. The werewolf is great, I love his blood-stained paws, and the Big Bad Wolf hiding the head of its victim behind its back is rather hilarious, in a funny sort of way. I had never heard of halfling wrestlers before, but you have done a fine job with them. My favourite is the ranger though, I like the colour palette you have chosen and the dynamic pose. All these goodies bring you 130 points further towards your total, which I am sure you will achieve before the Challenge ends. Good luck!

Martijn