Oldhammer Skeleton Command Group

Today we have just a few models. All three were painted recently, though the standard was completed last (week!), since I was a little uninspired by the cloaky nature of the sculpt and struggled to find a way to finish it to my satisfaction. In the end I decided that there wasn’t a lot I could do without getting unnecessarily ornate with the cloak which is really just supposed to be a darkened rag-cloak and that the head(skull!) and banner itself would serve suitably as the focal points

These Skeletons are from at least 1989, and I believe that all three of these were sculpted by Aly Morrison. I’ve kept to Marouda’s overall Undead army colours of Black, Red, old Brass and Steel (and bone!) Shields can be a bit of a challenge, in that I like to keep to smaller ones that don’t overpower/hide the rest of the model too much, but want to make them interesting in their own rights. I went with an era-appropriate smaller shield and gave it a half-skullface design, with a bit of an attempted depth painted onto it.

The unit they will lead does not yet exist, so rather than hold them back I decided to show them off now. The Standard bearer could potentially end up as one of the ASBs in the bigger undead army, but we’ll have to wait and see after the new KoW rules come out in a week or so. Of course, I can always use them in AoS in the meantime. 😀

D&D Monster Manual 11: Castle Ravenloft Wolves, Rats and Giant Spiders

I haven’t had much to show recently. A combination of work ramping up as we come to the middle of the year, new duties at work on top of my usual turning out to be a far heavier workload than expected and of course, the onset of winter – shorter days and bloody cold! All of these factors have combined to drastically reduce  my output and energy. This weekend I managed to finish some goblins, but it’s basically so cold right now that I’m concerned that spray varnish could wreck the figures, so they’ll remain 95% done and unphotographed until we get a day that’s both warm enough and one where I’m able to be home to spray.

So in lieu of something newly-painted, I have some more Dungeons and Dragons Boardgame models today. These three aren’t the most exciting or inspiring figures from the Ravenloft Boxed set, but hey – they’re done and they work on the table.

D&D Castle Ravenloft Giant Spiders

The Spiders. Well, they’re not amazing sculpts and didn’t exactly inspire me, so I decided to look to one of the “local heroes” of spiders – The Australian Redback spider. Of course, the sculpts look nothing like an actual Redback, but what can you do? These were simply painted to what I’d consider a basic boardgame standard.

D&D Castle Ravenloft Wolves

Next up we have the Wolves. These are also somewhat average sculpts – though better than the spiders. I tried to make them look a little bit realistic, though their awkward pose, soft detail and super-heroic-scale proportions don’t help. While I’ve given a little bit of extra effort to them in trying to give them somewhat realistic colouration and some facial markings. While it would have been easier to simply paint them black or brown, that would bore me to tears. Of course, when blown up this large, they look awful. Such is the price of zoom photography.

D&D Castle Ravenloft Wolves

D&D Castle Ravenloft Wolf Faces

Again, I’ve gotten to a point where I felt they were “good enough” – because again – boardgame models, not centrepiece wargaming or display models.

D&D Castle Ravenloft Rat Swarms

Finally, the bases of Rats. Or Rat Swarms. Whatever. They’re actually fine for what they are. But let’s face it – how much can you bring yourself to care about something like this? Once again – boardgame models that are “good enough“. I’m hardly going to detail the faces on these little ones, after all.