The Giant Killers of Hambrook - Part 2

 The Unexpected Victory

The Giant Killer of Hambrook

Dimluk Grimtooth watched as the halflings drew closer around the hill, he was ready for the final blow. He had been fortunate to find a hill giant willing to join his raids on the ripe halfling lands. There had been plenty of easy pickings, but this was the first time his warriors had faced a real battle. By skirting far to the east of the Darkling woods he had avoided the dread queen Morgana. His cousins who served the dread queen had warned him she was not to be treated like rotten meat.

-----

The queen studied the halfling messenger. He looked wearied from the road and agitated by the delay.

The queen turned to the chamberlain ‘Fetch Maeve I have need of her spear and her wings.’

-----

‘We cannot stand against this giant much longer’   stated the Mayor.

‘But at least I can look him in the eye on this hill ‘ said the bloodied sergeant at arms Tolman Grout and he swung his sword to show he was still ready to fight.

‘How many arrows do we have?’ asked Brock.

‘Enough for one more volley’ said Tolman.

‘Good, we will give the giant a volley when he gets close and hope that will be enough.’  

There was a snort from banner bearer Sam. ‘We will not go down without a fight’  he said with as much gruffness as he could muster.  

The giant had stopped to examine a dead pony and poke it with his bloody tree branch. Dimluk ordered a couple of his lackeys to get the giant moving and finish the halflings. He wanted this battle finished so he could get to the plunder and the slaves before anyone realised, he was here.

-----

The faerie captain Maeve skimmed across the treetops and looked back at the elven war runners following her towards the goblins. She could clearly see the giant  and the few remaining halflings on the hill. They would be too late to save the halflings, but they could at least avenge them.

-----

With a bit of prodding from his helpers, the giant turned to face the last remaining halflings and the goblins made way as he approached the hill. The goblins started chanting ‘Stomp! Stomp! Stomp!’.

‘Get ready lads, fire when I give the command’ ordered Brock.

The giant trudged up  the hill with the goblins still chanting. ‘Fire’ yelled Brock and the volley of arrows hit the giant. The giant tried to swat the annoying arrows and took a forced step back. As he stepped back, he tripped and fell. Tolman sensing his moment leaped forward and landed on the giant’s chest. Not wasting a moment, he drove his sword through the giant throat.

The goblins fell silent and Dimluk stepped forward and roared ‘Who’s spoiling my fun?’  

In reply Brock picked up a bow and shot straight at Dimluk. It hit him in the eye, and he fell back reeling.  Before the goblins could react came the unmistakeable war shouts of the elves to rear of their line. The goblin line wavered and rippled before it suddenly broke and every goblin was running for his life.

-----

Mayor Brock sat smoking his pipe as Maeve landed nearby.

‘The goblins are on the run, but I could not find Dimluk. You must put more rangers to scout the Downs to guard against further raids.’ Said Maeve.

Mayor Brock nodded, ‘I think the other Shires may listen now’.  

Budding Halfling contingent

Painting Practice

Finished the Giant Killers for now as I have run out of halfling archers. The other halfling archers will keep their existing paint jobs. But will be rebased to match in.  Now on the militia and some scouts.  Both of which will need a bit converting and modding. 

Rob 

A Very Rotten Bandit

 A Bit of Rot and Rustling

Early evening rustling

The latest of my Lone Wolf figures has been the bandit. Unfortunately he seems to have suffered a bit lead rot. He was a figure that I purchased off of eBay already painted and sat on the shelf for a number of ears before painting.  He had the paint removed and I did attempt to paint him as part of the duel series however I gave up because at the time I thought was unremoved paint but I now realise was lead rot. Which was giving a rough surface around the recesses of the model. 

When I painted him the first time, I did think the paint removal (lead rot) wasn't great but it really showed up as I painted the model. Interestingly the figure was a very dark metal colour which i assume means the lead mix was bit off. As most my other figures from the same period are a much light metal colour. 

This is the only one of the Lone Wolf figures, I can't find the a Gary Chalk picture on which it is based. 

Pre Paint Stripping!

The paint was removed again, any light scraping to remove the remaining paint just damaged the figure.  So figure was cleaned with soap/water/old tooth brush and an loose material removed. Fortunately it  is still be mostly in the recesses. The figure was then  re-undercoated.  I decided to go for a darker scheme to try and hide some of the damage. Overall I am ok with the final result given the state of the miniature. 

After all this excitement! There is only one solution...

Rob

The Giant Killers of Hambrook

Home Brew Regiment of Renown

First group of four of the Giant Killers

The Story so Far (Part 1)

After the brassy note from sharpshooter’s horn came the cries of ‘Too Me’ as the shattered halfling warriors rallied around the blue and white banner of Hambrook on top of a small hill. The hobbits retreated, as the goblin warriors snapped at their heals. Mayor Brock ordered another volley of arrows to drive the goblins back and give the few stragglers enough time to reach the relative safety of the hilltop.

The militias from all the other villages had been scattered and it was left for the halflings of Hambrook to make the last stand. A few brave hobbit scouts harried the goblins at the edges but it was not enough stop the goblin’s  advance on the last remaining enemy still left on the battlefield. The black skull banners of the goblins advanced warily. None of the goblins wanted to miss the post battle feast due to an unlucky arrow.

------

The halfling messenger bowed so low that his nose almost touched the ground as he greeted the Fae queen in her summer court.

‘The goblins have been raiding all of homesteads along the northern borders of the three shires  and have now gathered to strike at the Winter stores.’ He announced in a hurried tone.

 ‘This cannot be allowed or will not just the halflings that will go hungry,’  the queen’s chamberlain interrupted. Morgana fixed the chamberlain with a stare, and he fell silent.

‘Who leads this goblin rabble?’  the Queen demanded. 

 
Painting & Repainting Notes 

After repainting the halfling knight. I had a look at other some of the other old halflings. I still have a enough for a  sizable allied contingent. So after searching in the loft. I pulled out several boxes of halflings. Mostly Mark Copplestone's Grenadiers figures from the nineties. Most of them have decidedly dodgy paint schemes and I want to pull the contingent into a more cohesive looking group. 

Quality seems to have varied quite a bit!

So the plan is to repaint them as local militia  units. First up will be a group of archers. They all needed paint stripping and rebasing. They will go back to the classic 20 mm bases so they can be ranked up properly and offer a bit support to my Fae army.  After thinking about a colour scheme I settled on a blue and white scheme. Which gives a unified look and speeds up painting. 

Test paint scheme

I also want add a bit of background to the main units and characters. So I have decided to have a go and write a few background pieces. So the archers have become the Giant Killers of Hambrook. I still need to work how I am going use the giant skull (from the Citadel Skulls set) but the most obvious seems as a top for the banner. 

Rob 

Custom Movement Tray

 Ugezod takes to the Field

Ugezod's Mighty Death Commandos

Because I chose to mount Ugezod on a larger base (30mm) he didn't fit with the rest of the Death Commandoes who were on 25mm bases. So I wasn't able to fit them all on one movement tray. So I made a movement tray just for them. After hunting around for 25mm and 32mm drill bits I cut out the required number of holes in a thin piece of plywood. I wanted the battle line to be a bit irregular so made sure that the holes did not line exactly. Ugezod was at the centre naturally as befits an orc of his importance. 

One down...

Making sure the drill didn't wander was the tricky bit. 

One the joining pieces did get damaged by a bit of over enthusiastic drilling but this was easily fixed by a bit of Milliput. Also because I used a 25mm drill bit, I had to sand out the holes a bit bigger so the bases did not stick. The 32mm hole was already big enough.  The tray was glued to a thick piece of card to provide a base. The top was then covered with builders sand and undercoated black.  My method of painting bases has changed since I did the Death Commandos but I wanted the tray to match with them. So once dry it was dry brushed with layers of brown with a little white added gradually. A bit of battle scenery was added in the form a broken shield and a arrow. The movement tray was then finally toped with some static grass.  This static grass looks a bit electric green  now but it does match  orcs. 

I now realise than I really need a standard bearer and musician to finish these guys off but I may add the ex-Grenadier ones done by Nick Lund rather than the other Ugezod ones.

Rob

Warrior Part 5

 Highlights from Issue 10 of Warrior

Rob

Duel 6 - This Time Its Personal

 Finally Finished Duel No.5 

Sea Elf & Goblin Wolf Rider

The idea of painting a pair of odd figures has certainly  helped me get a few extra figures finished. This duel has taken the longest to finish. Which mainly due to the need to re-strip the goblin wolf rider and mount before actually starting to paint.  I am not particularly motivated to get to do the paint stripping step so it normally waits until  there was a little pile of figures to do. As it was in this case. Anyway with the goblin and wolf stripped clean I could finally get round to painting them. Not really repainting as neither were ever finished.  The moulding on both was bit soft so it was hard to get fine detail. Particularly on the wolf fur but he looks ok. And this duel finally got finished after a couple of months. 

The first 5 Duels

Duel No.6 Arthur & Mordred

I was looking for something a bit different and I came across Arthur and Mordred from Salute 2006. Still in their original packaging. This seems a bit of a natural choice and a ready made duel. I mount them separately so they cam be used on the gaming table. 

The image for The official Salute 2006 Painted Figures

Rob 

Flight From the Dark

 Lone Wolf Returns

I'm on a bit of a Lone wolf Miniatures roll, having painting  more figures this year than the last twenty years put together. So with Lone Wolf painted, I have four figures left, so I think its time to finish painting the rest. It would be good to get the rest of the set (& I will keep my eyes open) but the prices are just to high to justify spending that much on just four more figures. Especially when there are many other great Oldhammer figures for much less money. I am glad I got these ones when the prices were ok. 

I tried go for a colour scheme which fits a ranger. With a bit of dirt as he can't he too clean living in the wilds. The original drawing has a bit too much green, so I decided to limit the green to the cloak only. Using browns instead.  

Almost alone in the wilds

The Classic Gary Chalk Lone Wolf drawing.
Its is pretty clear to see the drawing
was the inspiration for the figure. 

A bit of mud on the cloak

Fighting off Giak raiders

My entire Lone Wolf collection

Rob

Oin & Dori

Dwarf No. 2 Finished  - Oin the Pain

I have finished Oin (for the moment) but not entirely satisfied with him. The flesh wash seems to have obscured his features rather than highlighting them and the staff always seemed to be in the way of whatever I was trying to paint. In short (no joke intended) a real pain to paint and I have been tempted on more than one occasion to strip the paint off and start again. However the issues I have had with the staff have definitely put me off. Still I think it is time  to move on to the next dwarf whilst, I stew about what to to with Oin. 

However, I have decided to use a mix of Stirland mud and small slate pieces on the bases. To simulate the Wilds. 

Dwarf No. 3 "May I tempt you with a cup of chamomile?" Dori

After the dull greys of Oin, I am hopefully moving onto the deep reds of Dori. 

Rob 

LW1 Giak Attack Finished

 After not painting these figures for years (decades), I sudden found the motivation to finish them. I know it was not many figures but they never seemed to get to the front of the queue until now. It is probably because I am not rushing to finish an army at the moment. Just adding bits as they come along.

So the last two

Maniac Giak

Giak Warrior

Gourgaz was the first to be painted (in the nineties) a and I would like to have another go at him as my painting style/skills have changed significantly. But I am not going to strip this figure But I might be able to get one more...

Anyway with the Giak Attack finished, I have a few other Lone Wolf figures left to paint and in particular Lone Wolf himself. 

Rob 

White Dwarf 52 Extra

 Talisman Rolls a 6

Whilst looking through WD52, I noticed it had a review for the original version of Talisman. Once I got my scanner working again. I though I would add it as a quick follow on to the previous post.  Interestingly it only gets a 6 out of 10, so I suppose it was a fairly independent review.  But I am guessing the reviewer didn't know he was reviewing a classic!

Rob 

A White Dwarf Milestone

Here Come the Miniatures

Cover by Alan Craddock

Whilst looking for the White Dwarf with the Lone Wolf figures issue. I came across this copy of White Dwarf  (52) from April 1984. It is the first issue with a regular miniature feature - Tabletop Heroes. It seems Joe Dever and Gary Chalk were both regular contributors to this feature. This set the format for several years with one page of photos and one page of hints and tips. Each  month tended to have a theme with photos and feature trying together.  In the first issue - fantasy knights. 

A high quality and typical artwork for the cover of this era. Most of the artwork I haven't seen elsewhere. Which suggests it was commissioned for White Dwarf. Anyway on to the article.

There wasn't much else miniatures related in White Dwarf except for an advert for new Citadel miniatures. Both boxed sets by Aly Morrison. The miniatures can be seen on Stuff of Legends. 

Rob