A few more Tomb Kings

Here's a few more Tomb Kings units for you.  First, some scratch sculpted Carrion.  Two headed and multi colored to match the story that I wrote for the army.

Also, the columns were sculpted by carving baked sculpey.  They tell the story of the Second Fall of Pseusenes.

It was not easy to carve in those textures around the cylindrical surface, that's for sure!

My hands hurt a little bit afterwards, but the results were worth it!

This unit of Ushabti never was included in a game.  They were extra decoration on the army board to fill in a few alcoves.

They were fun to paint, just like the bow wielding variety.

Glowing weapons, just like the rest!

One more look...

And some individual shots.

One more Castellax

Now for the next one!  And you guessed it, more on the way.

It was a bit of a challenge to get him onto the base... mostly because I was trying not to cover up so much of my icon that I painted on the base :-)

The view from above...

And a different look on a different backdrop.

Waiting for fall...

With the crazy way these last few weeks of summer have gone, I will certainly take fall... if not winter, over this.

Between many tasks today, a few layers of paint were applied to that base set.  I decided to go with a darker red to contrast the previous marble color.

I also brought out a few weathering powders to tone down some areas and smooth out some textures.

Not quite done with these yet, but I may wait until I have some minis to put on them first.

They were more for testing some things than anything else, but I'm sure I can find some fun Reaper or Dark Sword minis to put on them!

You may not remember that huge batch of Mica texture forest bases, but I had some colors out already for something else, and I wanted to use them up!  This is the benefit of having those million and one simultaneous projects :-)

Painting the Mica is more art than science.  Sometimes the layers don't separate quite as much when you apply them, and you have to "paint in" the leaves a bit more.

This can be done by either painting some darker colors under those 'edges', or doing some brighter highlights along those edges.  I try not to get too crazy with those highlights, as the goal is to enhance the miniature, and not detract from it!

Doubling Down

All right!  Time to see the Castellax side by side.

Soon a third will join them!

It will also have a different set of markings...

Marching away...

Lots of shooty stuff here!

Adjusting on the fly

As I show the images of the other unit of Elves, I will bring in a few links to battle reports where Rich and I play tested the army for Bilbo's Bash tournament.

In this unit, I used a few Reaper figures for characters such as the Stormcaller and the captain.

The army ended up being mostly infanty, with less cavalry than the original build.

To demonstrate how desperate these guys were to hang onto their lands, I wanted to incorporate the Army of the Dead in some way.  They would go so far as to ally themselves with the Army of the Dead.

Plus, I was having a lot of fun painting the Army of the Dead minis!

http://wappellious.blogspot.com/2012/09/first-army-of-dead-grunt.html

I think the original list even had Radaghast the Brown.  I know I was including him in the regular army that Rich and I used in our games all the time.  He hated that guy :-)

However, the Army of the Dead would just not work as we play tested it.  While the defense value was high, the fight skill was too low.  Even the terror factor could be easily overcome.  The original intent for them was not meeting practical results.

I think this was the last time they were included in a test battle:

http://wappellious.blogspot.com/2012/09/lord-of-rings-last-days-of-king.html

This battle shows something much closer to the final list.  Gwahir was added in place of the AOD, since the enhanced power, speed and fight skill worked with the offensive style of the elves.  Lots of movement, hitting from behind and above, and so on.

http://wappellious.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-blood-rose-go-to-war-to-death-part.html

Check this out

Now for some images of the second Castellax!

As I mentioned with the first one, these are certainly a different type of Imperial unit to paint.

After painting all the 'current universe' dreadnoughts, these rounder, more organic Castellax seem like they belong somewhere else :-)

Another one on the way soon!

Anzac Day

Well, actually that's in April, but you get the general idea. :-)

Marty managed to dig these gems up to improve our variety for the Pacifi theatre.  The sprues offer some nice options for special weapons and the potential to create our own scenarios.

The mould lines are excruciating to remove, so I didn't get too crazy about that.  I did want to get them on some bases which would be similar to the Memoir bases.

A bit of rocks...

Ready to paint up.  I figured the first batch would be like the box cover.

Putting down the most basic of light colors for some tiny shaded basecoat.

Glazing time!  Again, very simple colors.  If I have too much variety here, these tiny minis won't be able to handle it!

Once the darker glazing and tinting was done, it was time to get back into those middle tones

Some quick images of what I cane up with...

Once again, the idea was just to see how these lads would take paint.  They should be pretty nifty!

I still have to paint a unit of Japanese now to complete the set.  Oh yeah, and there are some surprises coming there as well!

I tossed the unit into a few "accent" forests that we made for the Pacific campaign.  I am also creating some bamboo forests.

The Anzacs fight side by side with some US Marines!

Advance Australia Fair!