Curis' WIP Wipe

[Curis]

I've got three major themes to what I'm painting at the moment – Rogue Trader space pirate types, oldskool Warhammer Fantasy Chaos and Dark Age Historicals. I've got this thread as a place to keep track of what's on the go and how long it's been WIP.

These are the Rogue Trader space pirates currently WIP on the painting desk. These are a mix of Citadel, Cobalt-1, Crooked Dice and Colony 87 miniatures. I treat them all as individuals, though hope they'll hang together in a loose group for games and standing next to each other in the cabinet. It's very liberating painting things that aren't going to be a big army of identical figures in identical schemes – as you can constantly experiment without having to go back and repaint anything finished previously. Watching a lot of the Expanse lately, and reading Rogue Stars, and it's really feeding my imagination.

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Most recently I finished this old old Ironclaw chap. I love painting these old Bob Olley sculpts – you get lost in the flowing detail of the cloth and facial features. Though I appreciate they're an acquired taste.

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Go on, give him a vote.

Back in November 2014 I started a collection of Late imperial Romans. They're very subtle, realistic Perry sculpts from Wargames Foundry. Struggling to work out shield designs at the moment that ground them in Roman Britain in the Late Imperial period and is interesting to paint.

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I have just this week though finished one of the character figures! He is Late Imperial, though his armour style makes him look Early Imperial / Greek.

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Vote for this chap on CMoN.

I've also been painting up an eclectic mix of Warhammer Fantasy Chaos figures at the moment. Here's a Marauder Chaos Thug, Mantic Hobgoblin, Citadel Chaos Warrior and Wargames Foundry Time-Warped Wizard. They're gonna be for Age of Sigmar, Frostgrave, Dragon Rampant and allsorts.

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Most recently I finished this Ramshackle Games cleric holding an old hammer miniature. I did a headswap with an old Citadel Judge Dredd.

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Vote for him too.

 

[ten ball]

Some Great classic minis! Excellent painting also :good:

 

[BloodASmedium]

YOu do some very wonderful painting.

BAM

 

[KruleBear]

Awesome old school minis getting some well deserved loving.

 

[Kuribo]

These are some really cool minis Curis! I'm a big fan of Roman History and you've painted those Perry Miniatures really well. That isn't to take away from anything else in this thread either, all of these minis look great. I look forward to seeing what shield design you go with for the Romans and whatever projects you tackle in the future!

 

[Curis]

Thanks for the comments guys! Kuribo – I've tried several designs so far for the Romans, buy they end up looking like Amazon tribal designs weirdly. I'll nail it one day.

I've just finished the Mantic Goblin thing I had in the starter post! He's been painted with fire-motif robes as he will be joining my warband as one of Clyro Burns' assistant sorcerers.

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This miniature is out of production, which is weird as I still think of Mantic Games as the new kids on the block and not a venerable old company with the luxury of retiring its older offerings. Time flies. Only yesterday I was horrified to be told it was my tenth Twitter anniversary. Next thing you know I'll be off to a field to drink cider and watch Fairport Convention unironically.

In 2016 I had a weekend of Frostgrave gaming looming and was desperate for fully painted figures. I quickly rebased a Ruglud's test miniature and slipped him in with my Chaos Thugs with a matching shield. It established a precedent, and I'm now seeing what other greenskins I can paint as part of this multiculti force.

Though I'm working on these guys with Dragon Rampant in mind, I'm wondering how to get them onto an Age of Sigmar battlefield. Kairic Acolytes is my current best bet, but their compulsory weapon options don't make them a perfect fit. Suggestions welcome!

Clyro Burns and his acolytes in the City of False Idols.​

 

[KruleBear]

Great looking warband.

 

[Curis]

Thanks Krulebear!

New on my painting desk are these Goff Gretchin. I love all the details that Kev managed to put on them, toof earrings, eye motifs on the knife hilts, belt buckle faces...

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And I painted this goofy space cowboy for a game of Grox-herding at Wargames Foundry.

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Full blog up here.

 

[KruleBear]

That is a neat and whimsical miniature.

 

[Curis]

In the lands of the north, where the black rocks stand guard against the cold sea, in the dark night that is very long, the men of the north lands sit by their great log fires and they tell a tale…

Exploring Citadel Miniatures' pre-slotta ranges is a real journey of discovery and wonder for me. My knowledge of Games Workshop's miniature ranges starts with 1991's Catalogue 1 – which only goes back as far as 1986 and not right to the beginning of Citadel history (1979) as the name suggests. There's a great many pre-1986 miniature ranges I have no awareness of, and so I'd never painted any pre-slotta stuff until I found out about this Gnoll.

Gnollin the Gnoll.​

This is no ordinary Gnoll – his nasal helm, kite shield and hafted axe mean he's Fantasy Tribes FTG14 Gnorman the Gnoll. I picked him while I was trawling the net for 1980s Citadel Normans to reinforce my army. His giant nose and teeny legs do put me in mind of Noggin the Nog.

"Hello" said Noggin, cheerfully. "Very pleased to meet you."​

Gnolls in the Warhammer World are described as having ruddy flesh, but I thought that when placed alongside regular Normans he'd work better with green skin to reinforce his inhumanity. As I found out reading Goblin Lee's blog on Gnolls, the Fantasy Tribes Gnolls were later rebranded as C12 Great Goblins, so I can claim the green flesh is goblin rather than botched Gnoll.

Gnollin with more Normans I've painted since Salute 2017.​

I now have fifteen Norman Sergeants, which allows them to rank up pleasingly in a five-by-three regiment. Though these models have been primarily used in Saga where round bases are king, I do like the 20mm square bases to make them into a neat and imposing regiment.

Lord Weuere happy to let Gnollin in his shieldwall.​

Interestingly, Plastefuchs pointed out that Saga does actually have a fan-made supplement that introduces fantasy races to the game.

"The Fantastic Saga rules are not done by any of the Saga regulars but a small group from tabletopwelt.de. Depending on what you envision your Gnolls to feel like, maybe the Kobaloi rules could fit well. You can find all of the new rules on http://www.a-fantastic-saga.com/. The sub-forum for AFS is quite active and the developers are there as well, helping out with rules questions."

I really enjoy slipping this little piece of fantasy into my historical force; I want to push that envelope further. Watch this space!

 

[Curis]

I've got a soft spot for Peter Davison's Fifth Doctor. Probably because his run on Doctor Who started with a couple of very strong science fiction stories – Logopolis and Castrovalva. And I think Earthshock is the definitive Cyberman story. So I started my new collection of 28mm Doctor Who miniatures with him. It's the first time I've painted a representation of celery in at that scale.

"Books! The best weapons in the world!"​

The miniature was originally produced in or after 1996 by Harlequin Miniatures, and that company regenerated into Icon Miniatures and then regenerated again into Black Tree Design. I remember buying some in the mid-1990s when the Invasion Earth game was being haphazardly stocked by the geek shop in the centre of Manchester – the Coliseum. I'd like to collect the 1980s Games Workshop range of Doctor Who figures too, but the Harlequin ones are much more readily available and have a much bigger range of monsters and aliens to pit the Doctor against.

I really enjoyed painting his stripey trousers and cricket whites. There's another version of the figure actually holding the bat which I'll treat myself to at a future point when (if) I've found some other cricketeer figures. It would be the first time since being eleven-year-old nerd I would feel comfortable playing wargames on my Subbuteo Cricket pitch.

Doctor Who through Time and Space

The wonderful thing about Doctor Who is that this one figure can be used alongside most of my other wargames figures. He marries historical and science fiction, and even at a pinch fantasy. I can stick him with my ex-Citadel Normans to recreate scenes like The Time Meddler or The Real Herewad – though neither involved the Fifth Doctor. (Perfect excuse to buy the First and Sixth Doctors as miniatures though.)

"Careful now, you'll have someone's eye out with that."
The Doctor supervising some peasant archers in 1066.​

Games Workshop's early Imperial Army figures are suitably generic to stand in for future soldiers. I can use these Warhammer 40K figures as the Guild of Adjudicators from the 28th century as seen in Cold Fusion.

In the grim darkness of the far future, there is only Warhammers.
The Doctor supervising the peacekeeping force in 2766.​

So, what next? The Doctor Who universe has all sorts of weird and exotic aliens. I'm going to focus on the Fifth Doctor's adversaries and companions next so I can play out my favourite episodes in the medium of wargames.

 

[KruleBear]

The group shots are awesome.

 

[Curis]

Over at the Emporium of Rogue Dreams, Mark Elster organised a summer competition to model and paint a Rogue Trader mutant, judged by Warhammer 40,000 supremo Andy Chambers himself. Seeing other people get their entries together (like axiom's and asslessman's) inspired me to make my own mutant. Presenting Steppenwolf, Mutant Outlander.

"I am a man wolf. I am a wolf man."​

In my trades and trawls I'd picked up a duplicate Inquisitor from the Adventurers range. One had his right arm with its chainsword/shotgun/railgun badly chopped away by the previous owner. I couldn't save the arm at all, so removed it up to the shoulder.

The notorious Inquisitor Sixty Pence. He's gonna party like it's your birthday.​

Then I went chop-happy and removed the head, saving the stetson for a future project. Wanting to keep the conversion components Rogue Trader 1980s I found a spare wolf from the original Leman Russ. At least, I think it was spare, I definitely have three and I hope it's the duplicate I decapitated. I then added the tail peeping out the back of the trenchcoat. A wolf in a trenchcoat has a pleasing Shadowrun vibe.

"I have half a canine mind. I have half the mind of man."​

Mutation-wise, Steppenwolf has a "bestial face", which the Rogue Trader rulebook describes as:

"The mutation changes the facial structure so that it resembles that of a beast. It is extremely common amongst mutated humans and has spawned the sub-race of Beastmen. Apart from leaving its victim in a state of sickening ugliness this mutation is neither harmful nor beneficial."

Rogue Trader describes space pirates as particularly prone to mutation, so Steppenwolf will slot right into my Claw Nebula force. He will be a member of an Outlander squad, so I gave him a new arm with a bolt pistol to keep him compliant with the Book of the Astronomican army list.

Nebula Claw Pirates with the remnants of Squad Hawkwind.​

Since I was listening to Hawkwind's Steppenwolf while converting this figure, it seems only right to photograph him alongside the Imperial Army figures named after Hawkwind members in White Dwarf advertisements. Above you can see troopers Powell, Turner, Langton and Bainbridge. I hope to track down the other Hawkwind members to go full-on 1980s space rock.

Thanks to Steve at Eldritch Epistles for hooking me up with some more signature orange lichen recently.

 

[Curis]

I've got so many disparate Warhammer models knocking around I want to get painted that I decided to round them all up and form them into a hodge-podge force. Here's the wizard that is all centres around.

The band started taking to the field for Frostgrave, but have since reached Age of Sigmar size.

One of the things to get your head round for Frostgrave is that you're not really playing with a warband, like you would in Mordheim. It's about your wizard. And I agonised over different wizard models for a good long while before settling on the Citadel ME-56 Saruman, for reasons of:

- I want the warband to be built out of 1980s Citadel Miniatures
- I've got a couple of spare Sarumans ("Sarumen?")
- Importing the Lord of the Rings figures into Warhammer proper is pleasing.

"Tell me, friend, when did Saruman the Wise abandon reason for Tipp-Ex®?"​

I really do like the 1980s Middle-Earth figures popping up in mainstream Warhammer. After Games Workshop lost the the Tolkein licence in 1987 a lot of the not-character figures were rolled into the main Warhammer range, like the Noldor Elves into the High Elf range. Occasionally the named character miniatures pop up in artwork or studio photographs, like ME-1 Gandalf here in the colour section of the Ravening Hordes supplement.

Gandalf™ is a wise and powerful wizard.
Gandalf™ est un sorcier sage et puissant.
Gandalf™ ist ein weiser und mächtiger Zauberer.​

To unSarumanise the figure the Palantir hand was replaced with a suitably chunky hand from a Citadel Night Horror. Saruman's left hand was flipped over and had a flame effect added from a (gasp!) modern Tzeentch kit. This anachronism still makes me feel uneasy.

Despite leading a Chaos warband, I made no attempt to make him chaotic. The red scheme and the age of the figure ties him in enough.

A burning sensation in your palm – classic symptom of carpal tunnel syndrome.[/i]​

He initially had grey hair, but it looked bad. Too much like Saruman still. To remedy this I sculpted over his bald patch, and repainted his hair fiery orange. One of the nice things about figures so old is my own limited sculpted talent doesn't look as out of place as it would on a laser-crisp modern miniature.

I finished the figure with bone-coloured flames on his robes. I was hesitant initially as he had flames popping out of his hand – I thought both 2D and 3D flames together would be confusing. But keeping them a flat colour rather than the blended highlights of the Tzeentch-fire, and putting them in bone rather than a orange colour, keeps it obvious what's meant to be real and what's meant to be pattern.

Clyro Burns, looking a little like Donald Sutherland in Kelly's Heroes.​

There he is, Clyro Burns, alongside his 1980s Chaos warband.

I call them "Burns' Knights".

Sorry.

 

[Coyotebreaks]

very cool looking flamey dudes, nice crisp painting .

 

[Curis]

Thanks Coyotebreaks! I've got more of them on the way, aiming to have a whole unit of twelve done one day.

Time to kick off my collection of Doctor Who villains! Presenting Omega, the Time Lord who decided to name himself after his exam grades. It's the Gallifreyan equivalent of "F Minus", which now I say out loud does sound like a good rapper name

MC F Minus in da house, rappity rappity rap.​

This miniature is the 1983 Arc of Infinity incarnation of Omega. I've eschewed the bone and black scheme he was seen in the show, and went for a glowing red scheme – referencing the crimson bubble of time he became trapped in immediately between The Three Doctors and Arc of Infinity.

The classic pitfall of single-colour miniatures is it's hard to understand the overall form. To counter this I've lightened the red as it rises on the miniature, to draw attention to the chest and helmet.

Arc of Infinity Omega.​

The helmet design of the miniature isn't too close to the show, missing the bauble on top and having different placement of the pipes. The sculpt does capture the puffiness of the jacket nicely. I'd like to paint another version of the miniature to match the incarnation on the show, the freehand on the cloak would be a fun challenge.

Omega and the Fifth Doctor.​

Because he wears an evil cape and ostentatious helmet I thought it only fitting to give him a more dramatic base with a big slab of rock. He now towers over his foes and becomes the master of ceremonies in any scene.

Omega's minions lead the Doctor at gunpoint across a quarry.​

I'd also like to paint a third version with a headswap from the Fifth Doctor miniature to represent the Arc of Infinity scene where his helmet peels off and reveals he's become Peter Davison thanks to the bio-data extract he stole on Gallifrey. But there's plenty of other Doctor Who villains to get to.

 

[Curis]

Started these miniatures off! A Doctor Who "New Paradigm" Dalek I got free with some kids' magazine, a 1985 Dungeons and Dragons Grenadier Umber Hulk and a Games Workshop pre-slotta Dian the Thief.

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[Curis]

One day at Games Workshop HQ, Aly Morrison came up to me with a big bag of Talisman figures. “I found this bag of scrabby old models in my basement, and I was gonna bin ’em. Then I remembered you like scrabby old stuff.” I was over the moon. Here’s the first three painted.

The Chaos Brothers defending portal dolmens in the Mourning Wood.​

All three figures are from 3rd edition Talisman, which I originally owned as my Dad bought it for me and my brother in the mid-1990s . Until that point I’d been exclusively into Warhammer 40,000, and this was my first real experience of the Warhammer Fantasy world. My painting has improved since then.

THIN YOUR PAINTS.​

I’ve been quite annoyed at my initial choice of colour for my Chaos Warriors. Red and metal is very vanilla. To start stamping greater identity on them I’ve taken the flames from Clyro Burns’ robes and run them onto the armour panels. It does help break up the plain surfaces and make them less generi-chaos.

With the rising market value of the old metal Chaos Thug ranges, these muscly barbarians are welcome reinforcements to my Chaos Thug unit. I have played with them as Blood Warriors in Age of Sigmar, and Bellicose Foot in Dragon Rampant. The variety of designs and themes in the range means they can slip in, though they are noticeably beefier and taller. But hey, it’s Chaos.

3rd edition Talisman Barbarian and Warrior. Interestingly, one of these is a resculpt of the other.​

I’m looking through the rest of the Talisman range now to see what other figures will fit in my Chaos warband. The Minotaur, Skaven, Black Orc and Chaos Sorcerer are all potentials.

Thanks for the minis Aly!

 

[BloodASmedium]

Excellent ol school style!!! Right out of the pages of early white dwarf mags!!!

 

[Lone Lemming]

These are beautifully painted minis, maybe the axe blades look a bit flat.

But I agree with BAM, they would look nice in any WD!