Raging Heroes Berserkers and Warriors

I've been a follower of Raging Heroes for many years now and have been an avid collector of their 3D print file Patreon, and now through their in house service, even though I didn't have a 3D Resin printer until now. I've done a fair bit of FDM Printing but that is really limited to terrain or accessories and I've never had any luck printing humanoid figures in any game scale. With the addition of the Photon Mono X printer to my workshop all of that has changed! I still have a lot to learn but the earliest results are now making their way to the paint desk.

First up are the troops from the Raging Heroes Viking Gods and Heroes theme from the Patreon.  these models have really heroic proportions and are quite beefy models in line with RH's more recent offerings.

I'm hoping to use these in Frostgrave and Kings of War. The bases are also printed from the set and painted in a winter theme. The set has bases sized from 25mm to 50mm. These are 30 mm bases.

I thought the cloaks to be made from the hides of Black Bears for which I imagined this fraternity to have traveled to the wilderness of North America to obtain.

I also had a stab at a unifying tartan for their kilts. These will be repeated throughout the warband.

Flesh tone: are Dark Flesh (Vallejo (V)),Flesh Wash (Secret Weapon (SW)), Dark Flesh (V) Layer, Sunny Flesh (V) Top Layer.

Bear Hide: Carbon Gray (Reaper (R)),Cobalt Grey (R) drybrush, Soft Body Black Wash (SW),Sunny Flesh (V) weathering. 

The Kilts are a bit more complex and I'll likely do a post on just that as I get more comfortable with the process. I think these were a good first attempt and should improve with more iterations.

Hair colors: A lot of red heads a couple of blondes and a guy with black hair... Vikings.

From a printing perspective some of the weapons, particularly the two handed axes, have a bit of a curve to them like they are flexing with the swing. I like the look as it implies motion but I don't know if its an intentional effect or just fortuitous.

The regular Warriors have much more tartan visible so it was easier to get a flow going. 

You'll notice that these guys are in super wide leg stances. So wide, in fact, that it was difficult to contain them on the 30mm bases. Since I want to use these as gaming pieces I really did not want to make the move to 40mm bases because that is usually more of a monster or crewed weapon size. The result was some creative mounting...

The first of these has a stance so wide it literally cannot be contained on a 30 mm base. I decided to mount him with one foot firmly planted on the ground and his kilt attached to a rock to support him solidly. I think its a passable look of a warrior leaping over the rocks to press the attack.

The next fellow had a ...slightly... less wide stance and has the insole of one foot and the very back of his heel touch the base... it was a little dicey and one foot has an extra bit of support on the bottom to insure continued contact.

This guy is more less aggressively spread and you can see the shield design. I kept to the same general colors as were used in the tartan to strengthen the theme.

The group Leader is, ironically, the only one that fit easily onto the 30mm base.

The group shot. One thing I'd love to see RH do is increase the number of troop poses. typically there are 3 troopers and one Troop Leader for a total of 4 discrete poses. Many games use unit sizes that range from 5 to 10. These print as a single piece so it would be nice to have a couple more unique poses. With 5 poses they could be printed as mirrors giving the feel of 10 different poses. Just a thought.

Overall I am super happy to finally be printing these out. The themes are lavish and include Centerpieces and Terrain bits that make the journey from imagination to physical model only because they can be 3D printed. 
 

Atlantis Miniatures Wood Elves WiP

 

I'm really excited about these Wood Elf minis from Atlantis Minatures. They are part of a Kickstarter fullfillment so might not be up in the shop yet but they historically move pretty quickly from Kickstarter to regular product.  Very nice and kinda rare!

The models came with an assortment of bases. Some are fully detailed resin some are beveled plastic rounds. There was a good supply of basing bling to add details like forest critters, mushrooms, vines, big stones, and the like. This really inspired me to dive into the greenstuff and get to sculpting!

There are four different types of mounts in the set. A giant elk for the Male Warlord, a big panther for the Female Warlord, large Stags, and smaller Deer.

There are male and female versions of all the elves so this will make for a very thematic, and very scary, wood elf Kinband Warparty. You'll be seeing more of these soon but I wanted to say these are not your kinder, gentler type of "Wood Elf"... they are more like "Feral Elf"... many have horns themselves... they look like the sort of merciless forest guardians that might even eat any trespassers they find! They are gonna be fun! 

Gloomhaven Starting Characters and some treasure chests

Being anxious to explore the enormous Gloomhaven board game it was time to knock out the characters that are initially available to play.

Also migrated into this are a couple of treasure chests from Mantic's Kings of War Strategies and Objectives set.  I think they'll make perfect replacements for the cardboard counters included with Gloomhaven so one is presented as "Gold" and the other as "silver"

I decided to do these fairly close to the box art because Gloomhaven, while ambitious for a board game, is not a full blown RPG and the characters are predefined. I wanted players to be able to identify them easily.

If I'm honest the character models are not of the same quality of a lot of the new boardgame offerings like Kingdom Death Monster, Etherfields, Chronicle X, or even The Order of Vampire Hunters but is higher than RWBY: Combat Ready and Dark Souls (Player Characters... Dark Souls does have some very nice Boss models and Gloomhaven has zero Boss models).

I think most of the effort was put into other kinds of presentation in Gloomhaven. For example the little tuck boxes that conceal the locked characters gives a great sense of anticipation so I look forward to seeing them... no advance peeking!

I used that new basing scheme I stumbled on while doing RWBY: Combat Ready except for the Mindtheif and the Spellweaver because they were just stuck awkwardly on the base and required some greenstuff to transition.

The characters are primer white with most colors achieved via washes and layering using mostly Secret Weapon washes and Reaper Paints.

 I've finally located my actual camera following the big move and am setting up the lightbox ... so I'm hopeful that the next batch of pictures will be better quality.  These, as have been all my posts since the move, are just taken at the paint desk with the iPad camera and I've struggled with lighting quite a lot.

Back to the desk!

Post Apocalypse Military Checkpoint, Void Elf Executrix Troop, Kings of War Objective and Scenario Markers.

Busy and eclectic week! First up is the WiP tray drying off after a quick sealer. On deck is a Military Check Point in MDF from Antenocitis' Workshop, a goblin casualty from The Battle of Skull Pass (WFB 7ed. Starter set), and a double dose of objectives and accessories terrain from Mantic's Kings of War 3rd Edition Scenarios and Objectives Pack.

The objectives pack will also be handy to replace some of the cardboard counters from Gloomhaven... stay tuned for more on that!

The Army checkpoint is part of the Post Apocalypse, pre-painted, line of MDF terrain from Antenocitis' Workshop. The little guard hut is presented in its pre-painted and weathered condition but I decided that the road barriers needed a spot of paint as they were plain black out of the box.The alternating red and white striping was aided by the barrier arms being pre-scored.  A yellow work up and a red cap tops of the post.

I've been particularly addle-brained the past couple of weeks and, when constructing the barriers for the Army Checkpoint I used some included spare parts to double the size of the counterweight in spite of the instructions being rather clear that only one plate was required... the more the merrier right?

 

WRONG!

As you can see the extra bit makes the barrier arm non-functional as it impacts the support post very early in its lift... woe is me!

Since there was nothing else for it I decided to have a crack at removing the extra bit with a pair of side snips.

Cha-CHING! the offending bit popped right off and took the glue with it.  One of the advantages of having sealed the part before construction began. Fortunately this was the case with all four arms.  They came away clear and I was able to finish the assembly without further mishap.

The finished barrier arm ready to control movement on the tabletop!

An observation... this kit was more difficult for me than most of the kits from this range... The parts did not go together quite as seamlessly.  I think I needed to build a jig to help with that but part of the problem was that I had to use a different glue than I am used to.  For the other MDF projects I have been using Super-phatic glue which is kind of like the superglue of wood glues. Since it sets so fast I've been able to skip a lot of clamping, banding, and jig making.  I built this kit with Gorilla PVA.  Its a good glue and sets up reasonable quickly... about like a tacky glue... bit not the fast hard set that I was used to so I ended up collapsing the posts a few times and having to rebuild the whole thing on the fly.  Unfortunately it shows on some of them.  I started clamping after the second collapsed assembly so half of them are ok and half of them are a bit ragged.  But they are post apocalypse and have not yet been weathered so... they may yet be battered into submission!

Here is an assembled checkpoint being willfully ignored by a troupe of Void Elf Executrices from Raging Heroes.  I've been using them as Ynnari but continue to refer to them as Void Elves. 

This is the Executrix troop that completes the Executrix command unit I did about a year ago. Fortunately I had done the base coat before the big move so I didn't have to do a lot of color matching... that won't be the case going forward though!

Who said death worshiping Dark Elves have to wear black or red anyway! I mean the power weapons have that Dark Side red light-saber glow... that should cover it!

Mantic's Kings of War objectives... Dragon Egg, Weapons Cache (dead gobbo by GW! 'ow did that git in 'ere ennyway!?! ohh cool static grass)

Runestone and messenger/courier bag... against a stump... with a pistol and a musket... that looks to have ended badly...

Supply crate and ammo pile for a cannon.

Thats all for today...

Next time the Gloomhaven initial unlocked characters and the Kings of War objective treasure chests that didn't make it into this post.

Back to the desk! 

 

Oi Ladz! Dat's me leg!

 Finally wrapping these guys up!  This was a project interrupted often due to a move of house from Germany to Romania... and I just got word that next year I'm headed to Alaska...  Yeee HAW!  I'm getting whiplash here!

 Anyway here are those fun loving Orks from Kromlech!  The Dok making certain that those lazy Grots keep him in a good supply of "spares" which the little monsters are quite happy to cop from fellow greenskins that might still be "using" them.. such is the life of an Ork physician!

The resin was hard but a little brittle giving good detail but don't drop them!



On the Kings of War front... Bevie can add this Dwarf Drill to her ever growing Throng!  The mini is cast in metal and has the rough-hewn look of the Mantic dwarfs.  The drill is purchasable with Mantic points so can be had as a side effect of building the army.

 As Warmachines go this is a tiny Model.  Based 25x50... same as cav.  But that does make it a bit more handy in maneuver as it scurries about the battle looking for a flank or rear aspect to harry.

Grind 'em up!

 Then comes some odds and ends to finish up a set of terrain and accessories from Tabletop Art.  These are resin and are really top quality.  Good detail and hardness but not brittle and takes paint well.  These will add great atmosphere to the Tabletop World buildings... once I get those unpacked... probably in Alaska! 

Next week I should finish up the Mantis Warrior unit from Raging Heroes and the Legacy Servitors from GW.  I've had good progress on them this week and am ready to start looking for the in line!

Oh... and I just got word that my Forward Base pledge from Atenocities Workshop is shipping!  I'm really excited to see that so... an unboxing of that *might* also creep into the queue...

Mantis Warriors and Ork Dok & Grots WiP

We've been living in a hotel room for the past month which has played Havoc with my Hobby time!  I've got a few bits of work done but have mostly been consumed with the moving process.

Anyway I did manage to build and prep some of the new Mantis Warriors from Raging Heroes TGG 2, a Dwarf Drill from Mantic's Kings of War bonus points program, and an Ork Dok with some Grot assistants from Kromlech via Bits of War.  All are still very much WiP.

The Mantis Warriors are brilliant sculpts with fixed leg poses and ball joint shoulders.  There are, as is typical with RH kits, a fair amount of spare bits... in this case mostly claw arms in different poses, or heft. 

 I'm using the basing scheme I used with The Blood Rain and painting these in sort of an earth elemental style with the idea that I might use them as alternative Wracks for Dark Eldar, as Wood Elf Dryads, as part of a Forces of Nature collection for Kings of War, or Daemonettes.

I've based these Vallejo Foundation White and then base coated Vallejo Dark Flesh. In the test model I've followed that with an application of Secret Weapon Green Wash to hair and clothing bits then washed the whole thing with P3 Flesh Wash... which is a purplish flesh and seems to sit well with these colors.

The Kromlech Orks are hilarious sculpts and easily large enough to stand with GW Orks. they cleaned up well and take paint quite well but are a bit on the brittle side, as resin goes, so there was some breakage, particularly among the tools, that I'll have to patch up.

I've been experimenting with an ultrasonic cleaner on these new models with mixed results.  Hopefully that will improve as I get more practice using it.  Basically it does a great job on metal but resin is still hit and miss.  The Kromlech stuff came out clean on the first bath but the RH models took about four baths with some good scrubbing in between.

Supreme Ironcaster on Greater Abyssal

Its a Mantic kind of day.  I'm trying to clear the stuff that is currently on the table while I begin preparing to move at the end of next month.

I started this guy a while back when my wife, my nephew, and myself went on a Dwarf jag!  This is the first of the Mantic Abyssal Dwarfs that I painted as a result of my participation in the Kings of War 2 ed. Kickstarter.

The model is huge and based on Mantic's Dragon.  It uses the plastic body and wings of that model and marrys it to a huge metal head/saddle/Ironcaster.  It's a good thing the base is so large as the model is tres top heavy!

 The model was painted in sub assemblies, sprayed black and brushed up with basic colors then washed and highlighted.  The saddle area got some patterning that was buried under a few layers of red glaze.

The Ironcaster himself has filed teeth and looks to be wearing clothes made out of large bits of material roughly stitched together.  A very... evil cannibal... kinda vibe. I elected to treat it as the tanned hides of fallen foes... possibly used in the process by which the Greater Abyssal, which is a denizen of The Pit and not actually related to Dragons, was bound to the Ironcaster's service.

 The Model will also Serve in my WHFB Chaos Dwarf army... which exists in my collection mainly as an allied contingent from 3 ed... I've been collecting for a bit and will update to the Tamurkhan list using an appropriately heretical mix of Mantic and GW models.

I still have not made the transition to Age of Sigmar... and I may not for mass Fantasy Battles.  I understand its a good, fun, game but its not Warhammer as I know it so instead of leaping directly into something Nothammer from GW I'm looking at a lot of different rule sets.  So far I've investigated Kings of War, 9th Age, Shieldwolf, and Warthrone to fill that Mass Fantasy Battle slot.  Of that group, so far, I prefer 9th Age and Kings of War.  Warthrone seems a bit twitchy with leadership and Shieldwolf isn't as far along in development as the rest. It's also entirely possible that I'll just fall back into a modified WHFB 3 ed. updated with the models and some the rules improvements of the later editions.

Rats old and new, undead musician discovery, and a basing a Kings of War Dwarf Host

 Since I really am a bit OCD about painting stuff that is out of the box before opening something new... I thought I'd better tune up these old Skaven Models, acquired in a partially painted state some time ago, while I was doing the Bones Ratmen.  Imagine my surprise when I discovered that one of the Skaven was actually some sort of Undead Goblinoid Musician!  Worse still... it was originally painted goblin green as though the previous owner was conscripting the unlucky guy into a regular goblin unit!

 If anyone recognizes that fellow post a comment or send me a PM.  I haven't got round to researching him but I'm dead curious.

There was also an incomplete Skaven Warlord, or hero of some sort, that I touched up quite a lot.  I left the banner peg in place because I'm certain, at some point, a back banner will show up that is suitable for him.

 The bases are relatively neutral and void of fiddly bits because I'll want to make a coherent theme for them and haven't yet settled on one... although with a few weeds and bits of junk these might work out fine there is a small Skaven ally force around here somewhere and I'll want to combine them up with these fellows and rationalize the basing.

 The new rat!

This is from the Reaper Bones I Kickstarter.

Looks like it might actually be a ginormous Were-Rat.. 

I based it for use as a Rat Ogre.  This guy is actually a bit larger than the legacy Rat Ogres and will make a great 'Hero' for the unit. 

The Reaper Ratmen have very long snouts and, except for the tail, look rather more like wolves to me than rats.  I'm working on some Ratmen assassins and the wolfish look is very pronounced on them.

 Basing was Grey Pumice which gave a good heft to the figure and stabilized it.  The miniature is made of the light, soft plastic like, bones material and took some convincing to stand in all but the most ideal circumstances. 

 Size comparison with the Skaven and the Reaper model.  Its a good size for a Rat Ogre and much more dynamically posed than its legacy companions.









After a series of Kings of War games it became clear that King of War was written more for movement trays than for miniatures.  There are no pesky formation changes and its even recommended to mount you miniatures, in a visually appealing density, directly onto the movement tray.

With that in mind, and under the direction of Bevie to "Create a Dwarf Host for Bevie! STAT!", I decided that the best approach was to make an army of 17 movement trays painted up in a dwarf theme so she'll have a fun looking army of movement trays to keep her entertained while I get to work on the actual dwarfs!

These are made by Customeeple and are avilable through the Mantic Website.  Once the braziers (really good for holding a die showing the morale status and to provide a kind of handle to move the tray more easily) and any of the curbing is added the trays hold slightly fewer than a full unit number of models while still looking great which allows us to swipe a few minis here and there to generate an additional unit.






The prototype base is the one with the blue, orange, red, and gold.  After looking at this it seems a bit busy so the production bases will be this blue, mauve, and gold (not yet painted).  I think its less busy and the orange was kind of jarring for something on the floor. I will likely match the prototype to the new scheme but I'll wait till the end to see how the new one turns out.

Back to the bench!