Tauriel

Tauriel, from GW's Hobbit Line.

I entered this model in the "Hot" Bonus theme round for the Painting Challenge.

Here I was loosely or laterally thinking Hot as in hot babe!

OK she's not quite Xena, but has a certain charm without exposing acres of flesh, and is certainly more dynamic than Arwen, though credit where credit is due for Arwen, for standing up to the Ringwraiths, at least in the movies!

The model is 28mm scale and a plastic kit, which goes together easily and has no resin 'issues'...

I painted her up taking as much colour references I could from the various movie stills throughout this post.

I had a little difficulty with the rear scabbard, trying to figure out exactly how to paint it, but the above shot helped...

I know there has been mixed opinions of Tauriels inclusion in the movies, as she is not in the book, but I like the story arc shes weaves with Legolas and Kili, and it provides a little love interest for non-Tolkien-canon versed female viewers...

The story could perhaps have been a little dull if it were just about 13 dwarves, a hobbit and a wizard trudging across Middle-Earth... so I am happy for her inclusion and her part in the developed and expanded story line by PJ...

I did find the sculpt of the face a little too rounded perhaps for her slim elfin features... so tried a little shading of the cheeks to try and reduce this appearance... and the trousers I did in a maroon/brown, and her boots as brown, as in the above picture, rather than the green colours used by the 'eavy metal team at GW...

I also decided to to use some WS scatter flock, rather than the static grass I normally use as I thought it looked more like the mossy undergrowth of Mirkwood...

The little toadstool adds a little contrast to the whole...

Hope you like it.

Oh!, and she's pretty shit hot in the game too ;-)  Looking forward to giving her a whirl...

reade more... Résuméabuiyad

To the Death ... LOTR Four player doubles fun...

Last night, four of us gathered for a game of Lord of the Rings... with Bryan, Ste and Roly joining me for some Middle-Earth fun...

We played the game as a 2 vs 2, 500pts per player, with Bryan leading his Rivendell Elves, and Ste bringing his Uruk force. I added Mordor for myself alongside Ste, and put on 500pts of Gondor for Roly to command, alongside Bryan's Elves.

Bryan had Glorfindel and Gildor leading his two warbands on foot.
Ste had Lurtz and an uruk captain leading two blocks of Uruk warriors, with a warg mounted orc captain leading some warg riders.

For Mordor, I had a full power Generic Wraith on horse, Grishnahk and a warg mounted Shaman leading the orc soldiery.
Boromir and Beregong led the Warriors of Minas Tirith on foot, with Damrod leading a small group of rangers, for Roly.

We rolled off for mission and got To the Death, so a straight up fight ensued.

Deployment as below.

We didn't have long to play with it being a weeknight evening, so all deployed forward to get into the scrap quickly...

There was enough terrain to make the game interesting, without it over impeding game play, the ruins providing an object for the warg riders to make a flanking move around, as the rest of the battle lines formed up, with the rangers holding a small wood on the opposite flank.

And thus battle was quickly joined...

The evil force won initial priority and charged headlong in to the fight, with the Warg riders commencing their flanking move. Boromir was lashed by a Sap Will from the wraith and lost 2 of his 3 Will points... Whilst Lurtz found himself targeted by an Immobilize from Gildor, but shrugged it off...

The Orc shaman channelled Fury...

Initial bow fire from the Elves and Rangers was ineffective, and melee commenced...

A steady toll started to wrack up the casualties, though with the shamans fury saved some orcs and Grishnakh.

The combats raged back and forth with holes appearing in the lines. Boromir was the typical combat beast in the centre, blasting through the evil lines...

But with the warg riders threatening to envelope the good guys left flank, the elves and men there started to pull back trying to form a battle line between the ruin and woods...

Grishnahk found himself fighting Glorfindel... not the best place to be, especially when both sides roll a 6 and Glorfindel wins on Fight Skill, but the 2 wounds he received were saved by the Shamans Fury!

Elsewhere Lurtz suffered another immobilse from Gildor, and was slain, though this only seemed to enrage the surrounding uruks who then cut down several elves...

The wraith hit Boromir with a Transfix, on a 6 , but with his last will point Boromir rolled a 6 too to resist it! Shaking his ethereal head in disbelief the wraith then charged a lone WoMT to try and get involved in the fights too...

The rangers closed in, looking to pick off supporting uruk pikemen and managed to drop a couple...

Boromir, having broken right through the evil lines, was thus then surrounded and trapped there by orcs and uruks!

Grishnahk was still looking at the glowing elf lord, and nervously looked sideways to the wraith who obliged with a 4 dice Transfix on Glorfindel, getting a 6, but who then resisted with 3 dice and used a point of might to boost a 5 to a 6 and resist the spell!

By now the warg riders were breaking round the flank and back of the retreating WoMT and Elf line starting to threaten their rear...

With time drawing to a close, the final combats were fought with Grishnakh again surviving the Elves attention to the cost of a Fate point, Fury saves keeping him alive...

Despite being surrounded Boromir triumphed again and slew more orcs for the fun of it...

The wraith charged in against the same WoMT as last turn, and killed the brave warrior.

The remaining melees were resolved and the game concluded.

Final positions...

A quick tally up of VPs, found neither side yet broken, neither commander (Boromir or Wraith) wounded or slain, and both sides each having 1 banner... resulting in a 1 - 1 Draw.

With the game being a draw, we had a fun little fight off between Boromir and the Wraith, with Boromir winning, but failing to wound the wraith...

We only had time for 3 turns. Ste, coming to chez-moi for the first time, got a little lost, with me living a bit out in the wop-wops, and upon arrival enjoyed introductions and chat too, so we didn't get started till 8pm, with a 10pm finish scheduled.

But no matter, we all enjoyed the game none the less, and some spicy snacks from wifeypoos were a nice accompaniment.

The game was left in one of those poised positions, as both sides ponder on what might have befallen next... The evil right flank looked to be doing well against the faltering good left. The Uruks on the flank were pretty much even with the elves there, but the rangers were approaching... and Boromir was still loose in the evil backfield, though now with no Will remaining and at risk of Transfix and being surrounded by the orcs and wraith. If I could get the wraith in too, the wraiths high courage would hopefully have nullified Boromirs Horn of Gondor...

But who knows, we can ponder the ifs, buts and maybes forever...

I always enjoy these sort of doubles games as they are always great light hearted fun... looking forward to another adventure in Middle-Earth.

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Middle-Earth medley... Wood Elves, Ale Carts and Durin's Causeway...

A bit of a mixed bag this blog post...

First up... I finished the four Wood Elf models that were part of Tim's transpacific parcel of goodies I previously received. Tim had used them as a paint test scheme I believe, and whilst perfectly serviceable, I wanted them to match in with my existing figures, so into the stripping jar they went. The original wood elves came in for a fair bit of criticism, being considered rather naff sculpts, but I think they have a certain charm of their own and still paint up reasonably well...

I like them anyway! I still want to get some of the new Mirkwood figures from the The Hobbit of course, the Rangers and Guards look great. Oh, and Tauriel is of course on the wants list - babe! As much as I liked Arwen, Tauriel has a bit more 'Xena' about her, if you get my drift!?

Next up today...whilst rummaging through old figures with a view to selling stuff off... I came across an old Dwarf Bugman's Beer Cart, that I had got to go along with my old Warhammer army... looking at it I was immediately struck by the similarity to the Southfarthing Beer Cart at the Hobbiton set:

South Farthing Ale cart at Hobbiton set

... and so a seed of a plan began to germinate...

A little while later whilst Chris and I were looking through the series of Journey book scenarios, with a view to models we would need to get to complete all the scenarios, one scenario Chris looked at and proclaimed, "We'll never be able to play that one properly!" ... "Why not?" I replied..., "You need Treebeard, but without the hobbits riding on him. You already made ours with the hobbits on him..."

Right thought I, not to be outdone...I later came across a new unmade Treebeard set on ebay and managed to win it for a small amount, compared to new...

And so the kit arrived with all parts complete and now I can make Treebeard by himself without being bothered by hobbits along for the ride. But it did give me a spare two seated hobbit models...Perfect, just what I needed...

And so Bugman's Beers cart went in to the stripping jar, after the dwarf driver was snipped off... a little clean up, filing and greenstuff and here we have a Hobbition Ale cart...

Complete with two hobbit drivers...

It was rather interesting to get it stripped back, it just showed how much I was still learning back then... several mold lines hadn't been filed away! So I had a bit of work to do. Also interesting seeing the copyright date on the pony's base tab ; GW 1987 I think, the last number was a bit deformed, fairly sure it was a seven, it couldn't have been a 1 as I was only 11 then and hadn't started gaming... ah well, a brief return to my youth and nostalgia!

... I'm rather looking forward to painting this up. I'll mount it on a 60mm round base in keeping with the rest of the basing for the LOTR SBG game...

Lastly for today... I couldn't resist doing a bit here and there through the week on my Durin's Causeway... adding a extra width panel throughout. Its given the whole a far more robust feel, more solid, more dwarf like!

Of course still a long ways to go, but I feel the foundation is now well made.

I am now pondering ahead to the best way to effect a sense of flame and fire below...

... and was pondering recessing a load of the those yellow twinkle LEDs into the base and covering with some diffuser and resin.... or perhaps I am going a bit over the top again???

Food for thought anyway :-)

Right, enough blogging for now, back to painting the Hobbit Dwarfs... I have a free arvo as my son is with a mate at the cinema watching Spiderman... not my thing!

Till next time...

reade more... Résuméabuiyad