Reavers are finished!

As mentioned last night, i'd almost finished the reavers and so i wanted to finish them this morning. What i thought would take 30mins actually took 2-3 more hours as i did the gems, touch up's and basing.

Either way they're now finished and i'm really quite happy with how they've turned out. I think they look better in person than i've managed in a photograph and are probably painted better than the swordmasters!

If you're in Sheffield then you should see them this thusday evening at the gaming night on the moor!

Next up, i've just based (glued sand to) and undercoated the 20 spearmen from the HE battalion box set. Having seen that fella's big Ogre unit last week, i think it looks really good to have a nice chunk of models painted at the core of your army (and his were painted very well!).

How do people generally paint large numbers of troops? So far, everything has topped out at 10 which has been fine since thats what i used to paint the ultramarines in. I had originally thought of breaking them down into 2 sets of 10, but now i'm planning on just bulk painting them all at once. Pro's of this train of thought are that i reckon it'll be quicker. Cons being, i reckon i'll be sick of the sight of one colour by the time i'm done! Ah well, bolt thrower after these!

Elyrian Reavers (IoB) and my first taste of a game.

So, two things happened last week:

1) I started painting the Elyrian Reavers from the Island of Blood Kit.
These are really nice models. Like the swordmasters, they're detailed enough to be interesting but not so detailed that it becomes a frustration! Since there's only 5 of them, i've found myself taking a bit longer with them.

Here's a picture showing the basics on. Once again i'm sticking with the GW look for none other than it's simple. Main colours on the model are Blue and White (being a Sheffield United fan. this amount of blue and whit is hard to swallow sometimes). The horse will be black since i want the rider to stand out. Aside from the silver and gold parts and the legs being leather. The only new colour introduced on these models will be bleached bone on the bows and feathers

I always hate seeing a model in this state as it's so one dimensional. Here's the unit after a wash of Badab Black and Chestnut ink on respective parts:

There's more to this unit as explained below and should be up tommorow...



2) I went down to my local GW (Sheffield) and managed to get a taste of the rules with my own army. I wouldn't call it a proper game as such. Basically, guys had already set up a 2500 pt game just as i arrived and kindly allowed me to set up my 1500pt list on one short edge. The other guys were Dark ELves and Ogre Kingdoms. I think this would have been a brilliant game but sadly, the Dark Elves player had to leave on turn 2. Rather nicely, the other fella carried on just so i could get a feel for the rules.

I wont give a full battle report as it was ratehr disjointed and so will just note down the things i learnt this week

Things learnt:
1) Dark Elves - more shots than Pete Doherty at a free bar! Also, mental note: Dont charge swordmasters into big unit of crossbow elves - when they panic, they tend to release death!

2) Ogre Kindoms - Hit. Fucking. Hard! There are some units that i could just never feel bad about dropping dwellers on. These have many of those units!

3) Folariath's Robe - i had this. opponent didn't have any magical attacks. Felt kind of bad. Mage ended up blowing himself up with a miscast of dwellers anyway but food for thought ...which leads to...

4) Dwellers - Fun! Considering my Swordmasters got shot to shit fromt he Dark Elves before reaching anything, i didn't feel so bad about returning this on one of his large units!

Today
So today, i've been adding more to the reavers. I've not managed to photograph the updates as i really wanted to finish them, but between the grand prix early start, cooking a roast and writing a dissertation all week, i'm spent! Hoping to finish them tommorow, so will hopefully have an update on that then. Reckon the spearmen are up next so need to get them based!

Lastly, i intend on heading down to Sheffield GW with my 1500 list again this Thursday (21st) so if you fancy a game - let me know.

Lothern Sea Guard brushed aside!

After two weeks of find time here and there i've finally done it - i've finished these buggers!

I must say, i started off with the best intentions! I did! But half way though i came up with my army list and decided i wasn't even giong to use them! (i'd originally wanted 2 x20 units of LSG - now giong with 1x30spears and 15xarchers).

This was a rather annoying revelation in itself but was compunded by the annoying fact that...these models are annoying as fuck to paint! Seriously! There's far too much detail on them! I never thought i'd say that -but come, these are CORE troups! I didn't want to spend 2 weeks painting 10 damn models!

I managed to trade a shed load of my old Xbox games in this weekend and managed to get 3 new brushes and the High Elf batallion box for my trouble. The brushes are amazing! I didn't realise my old brushes were as bad as they were until i used these new brushes! (Kinda like the drunk who never realised he was a drunk until the day he wole up sober!)

As the HE batallion box set allows me to create my core, my lion chariot and the RBT that only leaves me with needing to buy a mage, BSB model, 15PG and 5 SM...oh and 10 more spears -

...which brings me back to the LSG - i figure after all this trouble - they'll be proxying as spearmen for a while!

So here's the pictures. I've not based them yet and only just finished them so had to try and get good lighting with a bog roll backdrop and a table lamp! I'll post some better pics in natural daylight when they're based!

My challenge now is to somehow paint up the HE batallion and the IoB Reavers in time for a game at easter...any takers?