ROUND 4 Averland gunners vs. Manwolfhyenas

[Captain Blood]

[Steam Flunky]

This was difficult to choose.

[mikedemana]

I love the realistic pattern of the fur, Dolmot. Nord, it is amazing how you can take one color and apply it so realistically and with such variation to a group of figs!

Mike Demana
www.firstcommandwargames.com
http://leadlegionaries.blogspot.com/

[Hawkeye]

That's a lovely collection of were-beasties, Dolmot! Whether he's supposed to be vaguely skunk-like or not, I love the black and white guy front and right! Who makes him?

[Keith]

Great match! Well done to both of you.

[tomcat51]

The Were-Skunk got my vote.

[Dolmot]

Right, now with this round's voting and next round's entry sorted out, I can ramble a bit...

This team has been brewing for a couple of years. I think it started from filling the gaps in my Strange Aeons menagerie. There is a roster entry for Degenerates, roughly man-sized but half-bestial. For that purpose, I bought the West Wind werewolf pack. Then I considered painting them as an LPL entry. There was just one problem - only four minis! I had already painted the big guy from the same range before so that wasn't an option, because a proper LPL team should be newly painted. With no really suitable filler, that plan was scrapped. At some point I undercoated the minis but didn't get any further than that.

However, last year I spotted a few "Wolfshyäne" minis (the two big guys here) by Masquerade Miniatures for a bargain price. They looked like a nice match so I grabbed them. There was no time to assemble them for LPL10 and I already had other stuff prepared, hence the plan was postponed once more, but this year I finally managed to put it all together.

But how to paint them? I had already painted a bunch of wolves - normal, giant and were-. I felt like some variety would be nice. What were those big guys called again? Hyenas...hmm...that would be an interesting, a bit filthy alternative for wolves, which are often considered quite noble creatures. I ended up studying the whole canine family and picked up various ideas from species including brown hyenas, striped hyenas, aardwolves, maned wolves, maybe even dholes (Asian, not Lovecraftian). The guy on the right is inspired by African wild dog, although I didn't aim at perfect accuracy. After all, the anatomy doesn't quite match when the models are bipedal and in some cases wearing pants, you see... Studying and implementing all those schemes was quite laborious for this time slot, but I'd say the end result is more interesting than just slapping in a uniform wolf-like scheme with two colours or something.

(As an unrelated note, I felt like listening to 80s rock while painting these. No idea why. I never do otherwise.)

So, that's the story. Thank you for your interest. Skunk is fine too if it brings in a vote.

If you ever face this pack, bringing some Averland gunners wouldn't be the worst of ideas. Remember to take your silver bullets.

[moiterei_1984]

Really nice work on both entries! The werewolves are nice and I really like the work on the manes.
Also very nice work on those GW minis. Especially the yellow turned out quite nice I'd say.