Malacassa's Oldhammer Blog: John Blanche

Showing posts with label John Blanche. Show all posts

Thursday, August 25, 2022

200th Post needs a Superstar

Riolta Snow - Archer Extraordinaire

I recently managed to get Riolta Snow who has been on my Oldhammer Must-Buy list for a while. Along with a certain Chaos warrior Ultimate Oldhammer Figure, She is certainly in my A-list Warhammer figures. She shows up in not just the Magnificent Sven scenario but in the Lichemaster campaign as well.

Riolta in 3D glory

Riolta's as seen from 'The Magnificent Sven' introductory scenario in Warhammer 2nd Edition. I will just point out that this introductory scenario requires over 70 Slann, 150 villagers, hangers on plus the lead characters. The scenario very helpfully points out that most players haven't got enough figures to represent all the villagers!

Riolta in all her 2D glory

This the 2D figure provided with the 2nd edition rules. This gives an obvious colour scheme for me to try and follow. Riolta 2D as well as the rest of the main characters can be found on the Stuff of Legends website (Magnificent Sven Figures). The copy on the site is quite low resolution but this a scan (& tidy up)is of the one that I cut out a while ago from the original rules...

Back Story

Riolta makes her living as a professional tournament archer. She holds the titles of many of the Elf Kingdom's leading contests. Like many other successful 'pros' she is alarmingly rich.

At the time of this game she is taking a holiday in Lustra. As a female and sea elf she is allowed to travel freely in Amazonia, She visited Gemaine and even make a pilgrimage to Rigg's shrine. Lately she hired the 'Voltsvagn' (Sven's ship) for a hunting trip up river. She bagged several crocodiles, a giant turtle and a brace of Slann. Sven, Juggo and especially Karra were all highly impressed.

Riolta looks much like any other Sea Elf. She is tall, slender and enviably attractive. She is unarmoured and carries an Elf Bow with dozens of arrows, as well as a sword. She is an Elf Major hero.

Taken from the 2nd Edition rules.

Great Artwork from Warhammer 2nd Edition

This article started with rooting around in the loft for my battered copy of Warhammer 2nd edition rules in order to look up the background on Riolta Snow. I had forgotten how good the quality of the art was on the covers of individual books. The first two in particular. Now I am pretty sure both of these covers are done by John Blanche. But John & Tony Ackland are credited for the three covers.

Book 1

Book 2

Rob

Sunday, November 14, 2021

Salute in a Day

A Day Out in London

Most of my Salute Hoard

A friend and I managed to get to Salute yesterday for the first time in about four years. And a great time as had by all. Obviously there were some differences from normal years but they were not all bad - Salute 2022 is now less than 6 months away! Salute is normally the same weekend as the London marathon, so there are normally lots of fit types wandering about getting registered however this year as it was in November, the other main event at the Excel centre was ' Destination Star Trek' so there were many people dressed in Star Trek costumes and a randomly, a couple of people from the film Aliens. Sadly I wasn't able to get any photographs but some were extremely well done.

The event looked well attended and was spread out over a much bigger area, so we were able to wander around without bumping into people. Most of the traders listed on the map were present but there did seem to be a couple of last minute cancelations. However we found more than enough traders and games to keep us entertained for the whole day.

My biggest gripe of the day was that in the conference hall, the lights had been turned down so it was dim and a bit straining on the eyes after a few hours. I have no idea why as the all the sections outside the conference hall were well lit.

Managed to get some bargains and show specials including good selection of paints for £1 and the set of fine detail brushes for a fiver. I particularly impressed by a number of companies doing laser cut MDF scenery for good prices which seems to have expanded greatly in the couple of years that we have missed Salute. I picked a Rohan style watch tower for £7.50 from Blotz which I thought was a cracking price. Plus stocked up on MDF laser cut movement trays and bases.

Salute 2020 - Battle of Britain

Spitfire & Hurricane Displays

The theme this year was Battle of Britain anniversary (1940-2020) and there were full size replicas of a Spitfire and Hurricane in the display hall. The Salute mini is sculpted just for the show and there is a short article on its design and commissioning in the Salute magazine. In keeping with the theme it is a 1940's school boy holding a model plane. As usual it well sculpted but I just can't see me painting it as doesn't fit in with any collection I have.

The Salute 2020 Mini from the magazine

Random Oldhammer

On a random Oldhammer note, I picked a very attractive A5 flyer advertising a display of John Blanche's work at Foundry Miniatures. Its a long way up from the south coast, so it is extremely unlikely that I will be attending but Flyer alone is work displaying.