Category Archives: Orc and Goblin Army

Orc1 Warrior Orc/Orc Champion (Kev Adams, 1987-88 or thereabouts) Part 1.

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The earliest I can find this particular orc is in the 1988 “blue” catalogue listed as an Orc Champion, though he’s an alternate sculpt of “Mannik” from the ORC1 Warrior Orc range, found in the 1987 Citadel Journal, so it’s likely he was originally part of that range, given his dodgy facial sculpt. The catalogues get pretty ropey from 1987 and back. Anyway, he’s a duplicate of a figure I painted myself way back in the period between ’88-90 who I found and reburbished recently, with a small touch-up and a new base. The plan was to complete the pair and post them together, but I lost the original shield from the original Orc, so until I find it and remount it, this guy stands alone.

I’ve gone for much the same colour scheme as I did with my other older orcs (that came later, circa 4th edition WHFB), and painted both the red of and the the skull on his stomach guard as a reference to those figures. The highlight of this figure though, is his shield. The freehand orc-face design was originally painted way back in my early days – I think I originally planned for it to go on a war machine – but when I saw it sitting around after all these years, I decided to get it onto a figure, and this guy fit the bill perfectly. All I really did besides the rim was add the upper level highlights.

With his not-especially-interesting front, and cool looking shield on his back, this guy is a shoo-in to be in the rear rank of any force on aesthetic value alone. 😉

A Trio of Classic Kev Adams Citadel Greenskins

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Just as with the dwarves I’ve slowly been cranking out, I’ve been trying to keep a few old-school goblinoids on my painting plate. I’ve tended to choose them based on the criteria of how easy they look like they would be to get painted, so simple clothing and/or lots of armour drives them to the top of the list when I browse my box of metal greenskins.

C12 Goblin, Oldhammer Orcs, Kev Adams

The orc on our left is one from that crossover period between WHFB2nd and 3rd editions. A Kev Adams sculpt with the fetching identifier of “Orcs with Dual Weapons 05”. Despite his rather awkward posing, it’s a decent model. I used some ochre brown in the skin mix of the two orcs here in an attempt to start varying the skin tones of these guys a bit. While it (obviously) adds more yellow to the overall look, I’m hopeful that it’s not too garish. I’ve opted to use a metal Foundry Viking shield instead of a plastic, though I’ve kept the design to simply block colour.

C12 Goblin, Oldhammer Orcs, Kev Adams

Speaking of garish… the Goblin is from the C12 range circa the mid-late 1980’s, though I’m not sure of the exact year as the catalogues are spotty from that era.the cast I have here is pretty rough, so it was a matter of doing the best I could within a reasonable amount of effort for a tiny model. It’s a Kev sculpt, but predates his “signature” goblin look, with smaller, tighter facial features and an integral shield rather than a boss for plastic ones. He actually sat in a case half-painted for many years before I noticed him recently and decided to get him done. Which also took awhile…

C12 Goblin, Oldhammer Orcs, Kev Adams

The central model on the 32mm base is the newest of this trio – a 4th Edition Orc listed in the Black Catalogue 4 (1994 filled with 1993 models) as “Orc with Sword 3”, though he’s a bit bigger in stature than his fellow, “Orc with Sword 3” painted awhile ago which is what led to me mounting him onto the larger base. He’s not as big as the actual Big’Uns, but he’s not far off.

…which kind of leads to my question for you, dear reader. While I’ve been working casually on these Fantasy Orcs, With the promise of 8th Edition looming, I’ve also been eyeing off my old-school RT Orks and the more recent 40k Brian Nelson Orcs that I started working on in 2005. (OK, recent is relative). The 40k plastics I mentioned, being larger certainly overhang their 32mm bases, though the “official” size remains 25mm. I feel that they’ll look better on the 32mm bases, just as their classic counterparts, Space Marines do. I’m not yet convinced either way on which way to go – the better aesthetic choice? The “official” choice? Wait and see what conventions on basing that 8th brings on release? At this stage it would not involve a terribly large amount of rebasing. Any thoughts?