Happy Halloween!! (circa 1989)

Once an Orc always an Orc.

Happy Halloween!

Merry Christmas!

My Orctober showcase!

So it looks like this Orctober has been a banner month for me. I think I've painted more this one month then I have in that past two years.

So here's a quick review of what Ive finished this month.

First up an Orc hero. One of my favorite Orc heroes I might add. He's got everything you'd want from an 80's Orc- leering grin, gangly limbs and an awesome helmet.

 

Next up is an Orc champion. Originally intended to be the leader of my Orc crossbow unit but  usurped by another.

A mighty unit of 28 Orc Crossbows.  Hopefully I'll have more pictures and an actual story to go with them coming up next month or so.

I ended up using Mr pointy finger as their leader. I figured crossbows are a bit complicated for Orcs and they'd need a disciplinarian with a whip to keep them on task. But honestly this is one of my least favorite Orc models, he's a bit static and the modern looking books and big shoulder pads look a bit too 40k, he may end up being replaced at some point.

One of the odd ball models in the unit. I believe he's from Citadel Ad&D line.

A quick pre-slotta Orc. Didn't turn out too great, the skin tone makes him look frog-ish. One of the crossbow orcs was pulled from the pre-slotta The Ol' Rusty Axe Gang so I need to paint up a replacement.

Last off I finished a couple Orc villagers that have been pushed around my desk half painted for a couple years.

So that's it for this month. November is an extremely busy month for me so I doubt I'll be able to get much done and I'll probably go dark for at least the next three weeks.

I'd also like to mention that I was not able to join the Oldhammer Army Painting challenge as I previously had posted, so ignore that. Apparently I didn't squeak load enough to enter.

However I do like the idea of painting 200 points worth (3rd ed) a month and I will continue to endeavor to do so.

November being tight month I'll give a shot at finishing these nice classic trolls which rounds up to 200 pts.

Bye for now-

Crossbow Orcs almost done

I'm still plugging away at the Orc crossbow unit. Just wrapping up the leader and the standard so hopefully by the weekend I'll be done.

Several years ago I fancied collecting all the Orcs from the 1988 catalog with the exception of the Orc villagers which I deemed too collectable to collect. Partly inspired by Mr Chumley Warner's endeavor to collect ever Empire mini: http://warhammer-empire.com/theforum/index.php?topic=36445.0
I actually accomplished it quicker then I would have thought with only a couple odd ones taking forever to show up on e-bay. I even managed to acquire at least one rare gem.
As I paint through my Orcs over the following years hopefully I'll manage post corresponding painted examples matching the catalog.

So for now here are the crossbow orcs from the 1988 catalog (or catalogue if you prefer) and their painted counterparts:

Bye for now,

LA's Totally Awesome follow up.

So yeah this stuff is great, at least when compared to Simple Green.

I actually checked on Ugezod after only a 3-4 hours of soaking and could see the paint was already blistering.  A little scrubbing took it off with just a bit left in the crevasses. This is already better results then I get with Simple Green which needs a couple days to soak and a lot of elbow grease in scrubbing.

After 3-4 hours paint easily stripped off:

The other three I left in over night. Much of the paint had actually dissolved on its own.

Before and after:

So that's it, it may look like piss in the bottle but its definitely my replacement for Simple Green.

Bye for now.
   

Step aside Simple Green

For the past several years Simple Green concentrate has been my go to choice for stripping miniatures. Unfortunately I think they must have changed the formula a few years back, I've been really putting in a lot of work scrubbing the miniatures after they've soaked for several days and the results just aren't what they used to be.

Somebody on some forum or blog mentioned stuff they picked up at a dollar store, I don't know if this is the same stuff they were referencing but the other day I picked up a jug of LA's Totally Awesome concentrate cleaner at my local 99 cent Store. I wish I had documented my first trial but wow so far so good!

I soaked these goblins for about 48 hours and the paint literally sloughed off and they cleaned up with a minimum brushing. No paint left stuck in the nook and crannies.

So I'll try and document my second test here. Ive got a couple more goblins and a heavily painted space marine. I'll give them a day or two and post the results.

It turned very milky after soaking the first two gobbos so I'm a little concerned about how re-usable it is. To that end I've dropped an old Mighty Ugezod (sorry no before pic) into the used stuff and the other three into a new pour.

OK, I'll be back in a few days with results.

1000 Point Army Challenge: The core

So here's what I'll be working with for the first couple months.

The first unit choice was actually quite easy. This is the perfect opportunity to finish a proper crossbow unit. This Orc troop choice is unique to "Oldhammer". I believe by fifth edition these guys disappeared as a troop choice all together.

I painted about a dozen of these guys maybe 25 years ago but they're in need of a re-paint and proper basing plus I've added about another dozen that need painting. Add a couple command models and here's a nice 25 orc crossbow unit for me to chew on for the next few weeks.

Next is about 25 Boyz. Just regular old Boyz looking for a fight. A nice mix of classic citadel Orcs.

And I'll need a nice hero to lead them. Judging from the size of his hat he's at least a Lvl 10.

Fluff incoming...

1000 Point Army Challenge: 1000 point dilemma

-Disclaimer-
Likely my rambling thoughts are nothing new to the old guard of real Warhammer, so please forgive me if this post (and the posts soon to come) seem a bit trite and superfluous.  I've been out of the  hobby for well over a year now and this is meant more to help me refocus my hobby energies back to old Warhammer. In that same vein of keeping me focused I plan to post a couple times a week whether I really have anything worth posting or not.
-end disclaimer-

So the challenge is to make a 1000 point Oldhammer army over the next six months or so. As I'm going over the Warhammer Armies book I'm faced with a little conundrum (although not really).

You certainly can't squeeze everything you want into a 1000 points. The main problem is the mandatory troop choices eat up your points. Old Warhammer troop choices wasn't based on any percentage so in theory if there's minimum choice such as for Orc Boyz 20-100 then you need to field at least 20 Boyz in your army regardless of point size.
So in the case of an Orc and Goblin army I suppose you're supposed to have at least 20 Boyz, 20 Arrerer Boyz, 20 Stickas and 20 Gobbos at minimum before you can start looking at other troop choices.  This of course means about half the army points are already spent by default.

So how do I get around this?

One is to ignore it, this is real Warhammer and the rules were always meant to be a bit open to interpretation hence the strong recommendation in the old rules for using a GM. Warhammer Armies is more like a really good set of guidelines to follow rather then a strict set of rules to be adhered to. Keep that "RAW" crap to your age of whatever nauseating edition.

Alternatively if I feel I need to stay a bit "competitive" then I could cut the minimum troop choices down by half or so. Flipping through Warhammer Armies it appears all the example army lists are based around 3000 points and although I haven't come across anything explicitly saying so I suspect the army choices were intended or assumed to be built around 3000 point armies.  So I think you could reasonably shrink the minimum requirements accordingly.

But I think what I really have to keep in mind is this is real Warhammer. We don't build real Warhammer armies by choosing the best most effective troops, wasting hours of time looking for that rules loop hole or perfect combination to defeat everything. We build armies around a narrative, a story line and personality.

Now that said, in the case of my 1000 point army I'm building (at least in my mind for now) everything I said above is actually pointless since I happen to love the mandatory troop choices for the Orcs and Goblin army.  I can't image an Orc army leaving home without a few dozen Boyz and their gobbo lackeys. Though I could probably do with out the Arrer boyz. So oddly I strongly suspect I will be following the army book as written for the most part.

Anyways, build your armies as you see fit is what I say.

Oldhammer In The New World: Army Challenge

Hi all, long time no see.

So the fellas over at Oldhammer In The New World are organizing an army painting challenge.
Look pretty simple so far: Paint a 1000 pt army at 200 points a month for six months with a start date in November (I'm not sure if that's the start date of the challenge or the date to finish the first 200 pts)...  Although that doesn't quite math out that's OK its Oldhammer.

So will this finally pry me out of my hobby slump? Things haven't exactly slowed down at the  Nelson compound. For every DIY project I finish around the house two more pop-up and November is an extremely busy month for me with deer season and holidays and all.

But I'm in!

I've shuffled my crate full of Greenskins to the top of the pile. Notice I have had to add plywood boards between each box as the weight of the lead was crushing them.

Like prying the lid off the Ark or the Covenant revealing all the holy green goodness.

Now to sort through the lead goodness for some choice troops.

That's it for now. Hopefully I'll be back shortly.

Happy Halloween (Or Happy Zombtober)

Trick-or-Treat!!!

Latest ebay score.

It seems like getting good deals on eBay is getting harder and harder to come by these days, but just as I'm about to give up eBay always pulls through for me in the end.

So I'd thought I'd take a second to brag about my latest score.  I picked a few lots up for 30 dollars including shipping the other week.  Not super cheap, not as awesome as the 99 cents plus free shipping deal I pulled off in 2012 but very awesome none the less.

The item description was "24 Kobolds" but I recognized the little fellows as 'Mudat's Mercenary Half-Orcs'.


You know you've got something good in the mail when it comes packaged in a Citadel 'Monster Paint Set'.

And here's what I got- a nice whole unit of 24 Mudat's Half-Orcs, 5 more Orcs for my Ol' Rusty Axe gang, a Dark Elf sorceress a few odds and ends and my very own Slann warrior on Cold-one.  Sorry for the hazy phone pic.

Combined with my handful of other citadel Half-Orcs I should now have a nice healthy unit of 30 or so.  This will be a back-burner project for now, got a few others things ahead so the little dirty bushwhackers will be soaking in Simple Green for a bit.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I thought this old mug was lost years ago.  Until I just caught aunt Marry poring turkey drippings in it.

Happy Thanksgiving!

M.U.S.C.L.E. (Millions of Unusual Small Creatures Lurking Everywhere)

Well it finally arrived earlier this week.  My Reaper Kickstarter! and as I opened the box and dumped the contents out on the living room floor I had one of those nostalgic deja vu moments going back to my 11 year old self circa 1986 dumping my box of M.U.S.C.L.E.s out on the patio and marveling over the zany uniqueness of each little guy.  Even the hard rubbery plastic they are made from feels similar.  All and all these Bones miniatures are pretty amazing a few noses and fingers seem to lack detail but still far superior in price and quality compared to GW's Finecrap (certainly no bubbles, holes or missing limbs to fill).

Anyways, lots of fun sorting through the little guys and the first thing I did was set aside all the Black Orcs and boxed them up with my growing unit of non-GW Black Orcs. I'm up to about 30 or so now of various manufactures and relegated to the back burner for now.  These Reaper Orcs are kind of pin-headed though, I'll have to make a few head swaps when I get around to them.
Hopefully some day soon work and real life will let up a bit so I can really start cranking on these guys.

Oh yeah and the Cthulhu figure is awesome! Especially as he was only 10 bucks.  If this was one of those resin kits, he'd easily go for a hundred bucks.

 

Bargain Boxes and the Citadel Troll

I was rummaging around my parents attic and found this little jem.  Yes its just an empty box.  But what caught my attention was prophetic yet ironic allegory on the back.

I picked up three or four of these boxes probably no later then 1990' so at the time the miniatures contained therein would not have been more then a few years old.  But I believe the little back story can be appreciated more so by today's collector.

In case you had trouble reading the fine yellow on read text:

As far as the eye could see, stretched dune-like landscape of 25mm figures. Something shifted. An arm appeared above the sea of metal, green and scabrous. Then a foot. Finally a head. At last, a severely bruised Citadel Troll pulled itself free.

‘Cor’,’ it mused, scratching one of its heads, ‘what `it me?’ It looked around cautiously.

Figures,’ said one head to the other. ‘ `Undreds and undreds of `em.’ It scooped up a handful and let them run through its fingers like sand.’

`Old, too’, said the other. ‘Rare. Be worth a fortune these days. Don’t make ‘em like this no more.’ Both heads nodded sagely….

`’Ere,’ said the first head. ‘Worth a fortune, eh? If nobody knows they’re `ere…’

`Only, them what’s under `em,’ put in the second head.

`Then maybe we could….’

‘You mean just us?’

‘Well, they do need shiftin’, an’ no mistake.’  Suddenly, the dark dungeon was flooded with a harsh multicoloured light.

The troll cowered in terror against one wall. ‘Cripse!’ said both heads, almost simultaneously. ‘It’s `im!’

 `So this is where the timewarp hit,’ said a harsh, echoing voice. ‘You!’ –the troll cringed- ‘Break out some Bargain Boxes and get this lot shifted!’

‘Well,’ said the one head as the troll began to shovel the ancient figures into boxes. ‘Just goes to show what a good idea it was if  `e `ad it at the same time.’ The other head glowered.

‘Shaddap an’ keep shovellin’,’ it snapped.

Oh what I would give to be a two headed troll buried in lead!

 

Hungry Troll and Gobbos.. ere we go er we go ...

I seem to have had a upsurge in followers today thanks to http://old-hammer.blogspot.co.uk

My current pre-slotta Orc unit is still in progress, about half way done.  Hopefully in the coming weeks I'll get the completed unit up.

But I did "find" some oldschool tunes for you all.  Enjoy a little GW goodness from the late 80's.

John Blanche did it

Ok as Im painting up these old Orcs I just couldn't get over the nagging feeling I'd seen them some place else.  That sent me routing around my old warhammer literature and I rediscovered my old copy of Heroes for Wargames by Stewart Parkinson (I actually have two copies).

Despite the generic title the book itself is a window into the machination of Games Workshop/Citadel miniatures circa 1986.  A must have for anybody into that nostalgic Golden age of Citadel miniatures.

But I digress.  Within its hallowed pages they have several concept drawings for miniatures... and there they are the Armoured Orcs by John Blanche.  No wonder these little guys have such a different feel to them.  This is one of the rare occasions were John's imagination actually made it past the concept board and allowed to live as something more then just a bizarre painting tucked in the footer of an Army Book.

John Blanche is a bit of anomaly for me, I can't quite grasp what he does at GW.  As far as I know he's been the head art guy down at GW since forever.  You would think more of his influences would be noticeable on the Warhammer world but yet I just can't think of much, at least not outside the 80's.  His art is chalk full of bizarre and exaggerated landscapes crazy and exotic looking peoples. He can leave nothing well enough alone, if you ask him to draw a Warhammer horse he'll turn out a steroid laced zebra breathing fire.  But yet at the end of the day after all the imagination spent the only thing that has trickled down from him to main stream Warhammer is the leering Evil Sun and the servo skull.  Its as if all his ideas are processed, scrubbed, neutered and made sanitary for public consumption. We only get the occasional glimpse of his mad artwork sprinkled in rulebooks and White Dwarf, presented as 'artwork' when it should be presented as the reality of the Warhammer world.

Oh dear I ranted I'm not sure where I was going with that.


Anyways at the end of the day all things warhammer were just so much cooler back in the 80's.

Here's a bit of John's concept art for the Armoured Orcs.

Thoughts on the old boyz.

I thought I'd offer a few thoughts on these pre-slotta base Orcs while I'm waiting for myself to finish painting the Ol' Rusty Axe Gang.




These guys seem to belong to two different series; half seem to be from the old Fantasy Tribe's while the other are from the 'Armored Orcs' all of which were sculpted by the Perry brothers I believe.

Character and charm gets tossed around a lot when describing old miniatures and these guys are certainly packed with loads of it.  Nothing says charming like a couple severed heads hanging from your belt! The faces all display a myriad of expressions from stern to malicious joy. What really makes these guys stand out is all their little oddities especially on the armored Orcs.  The armor itself has an exotic quality and forces your mind to wonder off imagining where these dirty Orcs acquired such fine armor… no doubt torn from the corpses of defeated warriors from exotic and strange lands… but who were these strange warriors with helms sporting avian beaks or with curled horns and nautical crests?

Here is an example of the more basic Orcs. Obviously they are variations of the same body with heads swaps and extra bits of armor added here and there.  The one on the left is the worst of the bunch, his head is angled awkwardly and his right arm looks almost as if it’s in a shirt sleeve but he has no shirt on under the chain mail, a bit of a rush job by the looks.  But still only the one bad apple out of the lot so I shouldn’t complain.

Now back to painting…