Mertaal's Wip: Barrow Wights and Tom Bombadil p17

mertaal · **Posted:** Thu Nov 14, 2013 1:12 pm

I have finally got around to finishing my Goblintown platform, which means I'm only 10 dwarves and a throne away from having the whole set painted. I'd like to do a bit more work to the goblins here and there.

Anyway, the long story short: I managed to get the long suffering misses to play the penultimate scenario with me, and although I didn't record a battle report I did take some pictures, which I thought I'd share with your good selves.

The scene half way through- so far the Dwarves have had little problem keeping the Goblins at arms bay.

The Goblin King arrives, and promptly charges through his minions in order to get to Thorin.

A Thorin's eye view (yes, apologies, he's not yet painted)

Meanwhile, Balin and Dwalin are bravely holding off the chittering hordes on the second bridge.

After bravely fighting and wounding the Goblin King Thorin falls!

But in the end, the Goblins were too late. Thorin's noble sacrifice protected his friends for long enough for them to escape, and thus the game was won.

By her ladyship! I'll never live it down

.

cuchulain84 · **Posted:** Thu Nov 14, 2013 2:12 pm

Excellent! Great pics and the extra scenary adds a lot visually.

So I take it from your commet at the end you were playing as the Goblins?

mertaal · **Posted:** Thu Nov 14, 2013 2:58 pm

Indeed I was. She always wants to play the "good guys", whatever game we play, which in this case is a bit problematic since I think she'd probably have an easier time with the goblins.
Up until this scenario We've been playing "as intended", so without heroic actions. She was a bit intimidated by the extra layers of rules, but actually got on with them perfectly well, although had to be reminded a few times to get in a heroic move, so as to keep the goblins away from the corners and thus jumping distance to the main platform.

Also, I dub her "dicebane". Whenever I play the damned girl at any sort of game I loose the ability to roll above a 3...

Oldman Willow · **Posted:** Thu Nov 14, 2013 3:45 pm

The cut foam looks good. Nice models

Goldman25 · **Posted:** Thu Nov 14, 2013 9:47 pm

When I did this scenario, I found it always depended on which side the Goblin King went for. I'd send Dwalin up against him while Thorin took the other one, because Dwalin has Strength enough to avoid the Goblin King picking him up and throwing him off the side, as would happen if Balin or Thorin lost a fight to him in my battles.

Dorthonion · **Posted:** Fri Nov 15, 2013 3:54 pm

It is great to get family members involved - maybe she has some power of the dice but it's the participation and enjoyment that count.
Nice scenery and the painting looks great so far.

mertaal · **Posted:** Fri Nov 15, 2013 4:38 pm

@Dorthonion. Yep, you've got it spot on mate. There's a knack to enjoying a game regardless of what the dice do, win or loose. But having the right opponent helps 150%. I try to point out the story elements of what's going on, laughing at the twists and turns of fate, and making it as narrative as possible.

@Goldman. We were actually playing without the monster rules- I'm not sure the scenario is designed to incorporate them because yes, you can just hurl Balin or Thorin off the edge first time you win a combat, which seems a little overpowered (as if the GK isn't scary enough already! There's also "barge" to think about too!

I sent him up against Thorin because I thought that'd be the most thematic battle, and because Orcrist is pretty much designed to kill the GK with the d3 wound rule! However, next time I might send him the other direction and see how he fares. Thorin got killed in one lucky hit actually- i rolled 2 6's for damage, and Thorin fluffed both his remaining fate rolls. At that stage I couldn't hope to win though, my time had run out, so Thorin had done his job in any case.

We were also playing with only Heroic Fight and Heroic Move, as per the instructions. I really wanted to call a few Heroic Strikes with the GK vs Thorin, but I thought it was probably too much to throw at her all at once, and anyway, I wanted to give her a fighting chance at killing him. I was trying to encourage her to roll her normal attacks with Orcrist and burn some might to win the combats, but she felt happier shielding.
We've played through all the other scenarios, but she's still very much learning the game so the intro scenarios are perfect, introducing the more advanced rules one or two at a time. I don't think she'll ever be particularly interested in playing pitched battles, but narrative scenarios like Weathertop and Khazad Dhum are much more "her bag".

@Old Man Willow and all: Thanks for the compliments guys. I put quite a bit of work in to the painting, so it's nice to know people think they look cool. When I've got a coat of varnish on them I'll take them in to work where my digital camera is and try to get some closeups.

mertaal · **Posted:** Mon Nov 18, 2013 12:49 pm

As promised, some closeups of work completed:

A few of my goblins:

I still need to paint the bone weapons on all of those who have them, and add the red sores to 20 out of 30. I may also do a final pass in the deep crevices.

I don't want to think too much about goblin crevices…

Bilbo (sorry, slightly out of focus):

And good old Balin:

I have Gandalf, Dwalin and Gloin finished more or less, but they need a bit of TLC before I will call them completely done.

Currently I'm half way through Kili, but gone on pause a bit due to the painting competition. Currently painting my Sons of Eorl conversions. Here they are before I started on them:

I've entered them in the conversions competition, as conveniently the subject is "Kingdoms of Men". I planned on doing them anyway, and as it happens the painting competition subject this month is "war bands", so I will lead them with Erkenbrand- another model on my urgent "to paint" list!

Gandlaf the Grey · **Posted:** Mon Nov 18, 2013 1:30 pm

Very nice work. You seem to have a very smooth touch with your painting and the green stuff conversions look first rate.
I'm looking forward to seeing more of your work and watch you develop.

Rognarr · **Posted:** Mon Nov 18, 2013 2:37 pm

I probably did before somewhere else, but can I ask again where the heads are from? These conversions are fantastic!!

Dead Marsh Spectre · **Posted:** Mon Nov 18, 2013 3:39 pm

Love the vibrant colours.

mertaal · **Posted:** Tue Nov 19, 2013 3:49 pm

Thanks all. Nice to hear the word "smoothness". That's exactly what I'm trying for, although with varying levels of success at times. The Sons of Eorl are NOT going smoothly- I use a lot of water when I paint, and the washes really show off the imperfections in the finish of my greenstuffing. Ick!

But they are getting painted at least. That's the main thing.

Roggnar: A few people have asked the same, and general info about the conversions. Here's what I wrote in the painting contest thread:

""
I started with regular Riders of Rohan, and removed everything above the belt. I cut out little bits of paper to the size I wanted for the chain mail skirts on the horses and men, and then used them as a template to cut out the right size piece of greenstuff. I let the greenstuff semi-cure before i work it, and then use the end of a dental tool for the chain mail pattern. Then I used a colour shaper to define the borders.
Always with greenstuff I roll it out, using two thick pieces of card to roll against, so I get an even thickness, and use oil on my rolling surface and on the paintbrush I use as a makeshift rolling pin

.

Above the waist they are Wargames Factory's Viking Huscarls, and i used a similar technique for measuring out the size of cloak I wanted. I'm not very good with greenstuff, so I tried to lay it out with the folds i wanted rather than trying to work them in afterwards- that always results in my stretching it out of shape too much. Afterwards I did add a few "high" points and folds in the cloth applying small greenstuff "sausages" and working in the edges to the main cloak. This was all after the main cloak had fully cured though.
I used Pro-create (gray) for the fur on one of the SoE's cloaks, as it's less elastic than greenstuff, and not quite as sticky. For me it's easier to sculpt a fur pattern on it. I kind of wish I'd used it for the cloaks and horse barding as well actually, but I've got a mass of greenstuff to get rid of!""

I don't have huge greenstuff experience. When I've sculpted in the past I've used Fimo, and find it to be much much better to work with, but of course you can't use it for conversions, as it is a bake cure product. It's also not sticky, which is awesome for sculpting, useless for converting.

But soldiering on with the greenstuff, I'm in awe of people who get great results with it. But conversions are fun, and we all know what practice makes!

mertaal · **Posted:** Thu Nov 21, 2013 9:07 am

So, some WIP shots of the Sons of Eorl, led by Erkenbrand. Here's the obligatory group shot:

Having never really done much more than fill gaps with greenstuff, I'm finding it quite awkward to paint nicely. The texture of the GS means that washes tend to show up a gritty surface and interfere with getting a nice smooth finish. When I've used Fimo in the past I've used White Spirit to smooth it down. I brushed some water over the GS when I'd finished, but wonder if there's some way to get it really smooth after the sculpting is finished.

Here's the sort of thing I'm talking about, although crappy light conditions make it look better than it is:

And the worst culprit:

But I like the way he's coming along from the front.

Erkenbrand (no conversion work on him) still needs a fair bit of attention, but most of the base colours are down.

And a random shot of another of Rohan's finest.

Rognarr · **Posted:** Thu Nov 21, 2013 11:14 am

Great work man! I really like their look! (though the green is a bit too "colourful" in my opinion?)
And thanks for the hint with the wargame factory vikings.. I want some now

Crucium Giger · **Posted:** Thu Nov 21, 2013 12:19 pm

Great work on the conversions and I'm sure UKFreddy would be able to help you out on the green stuff front.

Dorthonion · **Posted:** Thu Nov 21, 2013 8:32 pm

The Rohan conversions are absolutely marvellous - these guys look as hard as nails! Lots of character.

Son of Fundin · **Joined:** Thu Sep 26, 2013 7:04 pm **Posts:** 258

Really cool conversions! Well executed! For smoothing Green Stuff I can recommemd clay sharpers. The are similar to brushes but have silicon ends, very good tools!

P.S.: I would change the name of your topic, there are much goblin town sets around here but not very much sons of Eorl. ;-)

mertaal · **Posted:** Fri Nov 22, 2013 11:02 am

Ahh, good point SoFundin, most people update their titles to represent the latest progress, right? Is now done. Thanks for the tip.

And to all: Thanks for the kind words of encouragement and CC. It's really nice to read, and certainly encourages me to keep up with this thread, and keep working hard!

Rognarr- you're spot on with the cloaks. The rest of my regular RoR have very "olive drab" or Kakhi cloaks, and I wanted the RoR to stand out as having richer coloured cloaks, but I totally overdid it by shading with purple instead of brown, which gives it a vibrancy instead of muddiness. i was also highlighting with white and not the skin tone/pale beige colour I did the others in.

What I should have done is use the existing emerald green base colour but the same highlight and shade colours as the rest of the cloaks, to tie them in better.
However, I still have a fair few layers on the cloaks to do, so I think I'll adjust the colour accordingly as I go.

I'm also undecided as to what colour I should paint the fur collar on the bald SoE. I'm actually quite liking the monochrome, so perhaps a very desaturated brown, almost a grey. Might look a bit wolf pelty, which would be no bad thing.

Or just keep the muddy theme of the army altogether and go a mid brown with a reasonably dramatic highlight.

Any suggestions?

Thermo · **Posted:** Sat Nov 23, 2013 12:36 am

Mertaal, you know how I feel about my Sons…

And yours are very very good conversions

Well done my friend and keep up the good work and may our Éored's meet one day!

mertaal · **Posted:** Sat Nov 23, 2013 9:30 am

Thanks Thermo- I now have visions of an epic Rohan charge in some crazed 2v2 game played on an 8x4 table

.

Here are some "Boys from da Westfold" just for you:

Mertaal's Wip: Barrow Wights and Tom Bombadil p17

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