15mm Orc Horde w/ Every Orc Unique

[LoxIslay]

Thanks Mr.Marx! The tribal worrier from croms anvil helped a lot to compare the size.

Cool start for the Project!

[Frostie]

Enjoy the ride!

I have a very large and varied collection of Orcs and Goblins

Eureka- Sauron Orcs, pale green/grey flesh
Demonworld- two different clans of orcs and goblins, standard GW green type
Alternative Armies- I have painted as Desert Orcs, lots of bow and warbands and their riders on desert wolves and scorpions, painted with 'buff' skin
Battle Valor-Big scary orcs with shield breaker riders and mammoths, painted red brown
Blood Moon-Black Orcs, painted dark green. These are very big minis

I think that is all for now.

I will be getting Forest Dragon Night Goblins as I think the 3D minis are very cool.
I would love some Khurasan but they do not have a UK supplier
 

[Mr.Marx]

Some words on Goblins.

I’ve not got as far as I’d intended with my goblins. I have managed to get some painting time in, but things have been a bit weird of late - with people I care about having strokes and heart attacks and dicey open-heart surgery, and one person who I frankly don’t care for one bit breaking into my house and trying to rob me at knifepoint.

But I have managed to paint a few goblins. I’m up to eleven in total. I’ll post some pictures probably tomorrow of the new ones. I’m rather happy with how they’ve come out.

I’ve also acquired rather more than eleven more goblins for the project. The proprietor of Battle Valour Games was happy to sell me one of each figure in his Orc and Goblin ranges, and every other figure in his 15mm fantasy range that looked like it would look at home in the horde. It turned out to be a really rather large order in the end, as it turns out the Battle Valour range has a lot of unique orc and goblin figures. They are still yet to arrive, but when they do, I will probably have enough goblin-types to fill out the horde. I’m still looking around to buy more, though.

Weirdly, it’s been the 10mm figures that’ve come up stumps. Pendraken was happy to sell me figures outside of their usual packs, which was very handy, but no other company seems to want to split up their packs, which is entirely reasonable of them of course, considering the economics of the situation, but it does inconvenience me slightly. I still really like the idea of including some 10mm imps and such scurrying around the feet of the larger orcs and ogres, but I just can’t bring myself to buy whole packs of 10mm figures to use 1/10th of them and relegate the rest to the spares heap.







If anyone reading this happens to have some 10mm figures going spare, I’ve got a Wanted post going over in the Bazar, and equally if anyone would like to buy 9/10ths of the goblins in Magister’s Lesser/Wild range, drop me a PM.

I’ve also given some thought to the elements of this force other than ‘The Horde’:

For leadership, it occurred to me that I should probably have David Bowie in charge, and after a lot of searching about I’ve set my sights on the miniature below from Splintered Light Miniatures.


The one in the middle.

It works for me on several levels – there’s clearly plenty of Jareth vibes going on, but the hair and the waistcoat hint towards The Thin White Duke. I was particularly taken with how the figure leans on the sword in a way that echoes the way The Duke posed with his mike stand. I didn’t notice the ponytail on the shoulder until I’d already been enraptured by the idea, but in a happy coincidence it turns out that Bowie gave sporting a ponytail a go just prior to his Glass Spider tour, which fits this project’s late 80’s setting really rather perfectly. I’ll finish the figure off by adding a cigarette dangling out of the right side of his mouth.

That is if I can get one. The only part that’s not working out is ordering the little guy. Splintered Light Miniatures’ UK distributer is currently having significant health problems, and Splintered Light’s Orcy offerings are relatively thin on the ground as regards to individual figure variants, which makes it dreadfully difficult to justify the slightly absurd cost of intercontinental postage that buying direct from the manufacture would require. If anyone happened to have one (or preferably two, to cover myself against buggering the face up with a pin vice while trying to add a tiny cigarette) of this particular vampire miniature going spare, please do feel free to drop me a PM.

I’d like to have both a Sauron and Saruman type to act as Bowie’s Lieutenants. There are plenty of Wizard types available (though I might go with a White Witch, ‘cus, you know, Bowie in the 80’s), but I’ve not definitively decided on one figure in particular yet.

For the Sauron, well, that’s a whole thing too. There was this figure that I remember seeing a while back, which, at least as I remember it, feels like it’d be the perfect fit for the job, but I can’t seem to find it again. I’ve spent far too long looking. Far, far too long. I can remember that it was from a small independent looking European manufacturer. It was one of a range of assorted 25mm/28mm fantasy types sculpted nicely in a slightly old-hammer style. It might have been advertised as an anti-paladin or a dark cleric or some such. It didn’t look particularly Sauron like to be honest. I recall that it had a particularly tall helmet that looked as though the armoured knight figure had a freakishly long neck. I vaguely remember it being armed with a mace, but I might be wrong. If anyone could point me back to it, I’d be awfully grateful.

I’m also ruminating on some kind of giant improvised cannon in support. I’ve got a fair few orcy-goblin types of all different heights clasping rocks of different shapes and sizes. I like the idea of them all standing around the Lead Adventure Miniatures Death Bell cannon crammed full of rocks and miscellaneous metallic bits and bobs, which used at 15mm would make for a very large gun indeed. If anyone has a bell going spare, again, please PM me.



Oh golly, that’s a lot of words. Got a bit carried away there. I should probably go to sleep.

Goodnight.

MM.

[Mr.Marx]

Slowly, slowly painty goblins...

Here are the meagre few goblins that I have managed to paint since last time, in super close-up so that you can see every imperfection in my brushwork :

↑ A 25mm Goblin fellow from Alternative Armies. He is rather large, but his spindly limbs and downwards acing pose help sell him as a big guy in a 15mm world. ↓



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↑ A 20mm Goblin from one of CP Model's ranges. An ideal Goblin. ↓



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↑ One of Alternative Armies resin sprue recasts of their 15mm Metal Goblins. It was something of a pig to clean up and paint, if I am to be honest. I'm in no rush to get to his resiny brethren. ↓



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↑ The first of the Deamonworld Orcs I have from Ral Partha UK. It's an excellent sculpt, particularly for 15mm. The whole Deamonworld range seems to be fantastic, but the Orcs are a bit too cartoony and Evil Empire inspired for me to include too many of them in The Horde. I think I can sneak in a few of their big, toothy faces without distracting, though. I'll finish the shield when I decide on which evil orcy symbol I'm going to go with (like the white hand or the red eye.) I'm thinking a blue and red lightning bolt, perhaps. ↓



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↑ Another of the 20mm Goblins from CP Models. I really like these, and they work really well at 15mm. ↓



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↑ A Barbarian from the 15mm Deamonworld range sold by Ral Partha UK. This particular model makes makes a very good Orcy-Goblin-type. An excellent sculpt. ↓



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↑ An Orc from one of CP Models's 20mm ranges. Bit of a clumsy sculpt - which made it quite hard to work out what was what when being painted - but he looks pretty good now he's done. The goofy proportions sell him well as a bigger guy at 15mm scale. ↓



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↑ The first of the 10/12mm Goblins from Pendraken. He works very well for a smaller goblin at 15mm scale. I only wish Pendraken had a larger range of them. ↓

More goblins "soon"....

MM.

↑↓

[Mr.Marx]

Progress that does not photograph well...

I finally had enough goblins painted to get the varnish out. Once that had had time to dry, I was finally able to pop the first figures off their painting mounts and see what this mixed up mob might look like once their done.

I think, despite their disparate origins, the figures all meld in together to form a convincing whole.



This also means that I can finally put away the figures that have been laying out on the side for weeks - which my Wife is very happy about. I don't want to base anything up yet as I don't want the horde to end up looking "patchy".

I'm painting the goblins up in small batches of using the same colours and then mixing them all at the end such as to hide that I painted them in batches at all, so I need to have a solid quorum of figures done before any get glued down.



I'm also waiting on my order from Battle Valour to arrive. Battle Valour seems to have the widest selection of individual sculpts of Goblins and Goblin-passing creatures in '15mm scale'. I don't know quite how many different figures they do, as they are not here yet, but I ordered 'one of each' so I should know before too long. I'm not completely sure what I've ordered, but I paid a lot, so I assume it'll be a lot of figures - possibly so many that roughly every other figure used in this project will be from Battle Valour, despite the fact that I've bought every figure variant I could from every company I could. Given this likely majority, to keep the horde from looking "patchy" from a figure sculpting perspective, I'm going to make a special effort to spread the Battle Valour figures out as homogenously as possible across every base in the horde.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. The work I've been getting on with does not photograph very well: but here's a go at it anyway.



I've washed, cleaned up, mounted, and primed about 60 figures - which took quite a while. This should be enough to keep me painting for a couple months. Will show more of them once they've got their paint on.

That's me update. I'm free this afternoon, so I'm gonna go paint me some goblin.

MM.

[Mr.Marx]

Long time, no goblins...

It's taken me a while, but I've got some more goblins done. Three of them.

↑ The Goblins.

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↑ A Deamonworld 15mm Orc from Ral Partha UK. These are all lovely, high-detail sculpts, but they are very Evil Empire in style, so I'm including them in the horde sparingly. ↓



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↑ Another Deamonworld 15mm figure. He is sold as a human peasant, if I remember correctly, but he has an orcish look about him that is exactly the sort of thing I want in the horde. ↓



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↑ I cannot remember which range this goblin was originally from, but I know it is now sold by Alternative Armies. ↓



↓ Alternative Armies' 15mm offerings are a very mixed bag in terms of sculpting and casting quality, but this one stands out as a particular anomaly. The figure is a good, high detail sculpt, particularly for a being done 25-30ish years ago, but, inexplicably, at some point someone has made the decision to ruin the face. The figure has it's head turned to the right, creating what I assume must have been a very problematic undercut between the right side of the face and the shoulder. Rather remediating it in any number of sensible ways, someone has instead stretched the head to fill the gap, and the face along with it. The gap filling does not seem to have been done very well, with evidence of its doing on the cast, and the only detail of the face carried over being an attempt at extending the mouth. I did my best to "make-good" on the figure, and I think I've done the original sculpt justice, but it's just a baffling thing for someone to have done.



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I have three more goblins 2/3rds of the way done. Hopefully I'll have them to show in the next few days.

MM.

[DivisMal]

The idea is brilliant and I love the idea with David Bowie (Jared, wasn’t it)!

Where are you based? I have a huge 15mm collection and could check if I have some spares.

[Mr.Marx]

The idea is brilliant and I love the idea with David Bowie (Jared, wasn’t it)!

Where are you based? I have a huge 15mm collection and could check if I have some spares.

Oh, I'll jump at that. I'm in the UK.

MM.

[Mr.Marx]

Shopping Update, or rather “notdate”

I’ve not painted all that many goblins, but, by Jove! If I’ve not been buying the things.

I’ve now purchased every figure that looked like it’d fit the project from the following companies’ ranges:
Alternative Armies
Battle Valor Games
CP Models
Deamonworld / Ral Partha UK
Eureka Miniatures
Magister Militum
Pendraken
Splintered Light Miniatures (via their UK stockist The Little Corporal)

Of those, I’ve been waiting for some months now to actually receive my orders from Battle Valor and The Little Corporal. This is somewhat frustrating as, while I do have plenty of goblins to be getting on with, I placed, frankly, far-too-large an order with Battle Valor for every single miniature that they did that I thought would fit in the horde; and they do a lot of miniatures! All in, the figures from Battle Valor will likely account for every other figure in the horde.

Given how I’m painting the horde in dribs and drabs, I’m making a conscious effort to take up a mix of manufacturers figures each time I do a batch. I would really like to be including a few Battle Valor figures in each batch so they can be mixed in proportionately with the figures from all the other makers.

It’s proven quite the stumbling block, and, to be honest, it’s given my enthusiasm for this project a bit of a kicking. The one thing I really, really did not want to end up doing is to paint up all of the goblins from the other makers and then paint the Battle Valor ones afterwards, as that would ruin the whole effect.
That made the sensible thing to do to be to just wait for the Battle Valor figures to arrive, but it has been months now. It is my understanding that such delays are quite normal for that particular seller of figurines, so I’m not too worried that I’ve been swindled, and I’m fairly sure he’ll send something one day, but, golly if it’s not a bit annoying.

There are still a few odd figures from the Demonworld range that I need to pick up, and at some point, I’ll make international orders to both Khurasan Miniatures in the USA and Mirliton in Italy for their goblinoids; I’ve been putting those orders off as they will leave me with lots of duplicate poses that I’ll probably need to dispose of.

On duplicate disposal, I also have a good number of other duplicate poses of goblinoid. At some point I’ll do a post on here to offer them up for swapsies or sale.

MM.

[DivisMal]

Months? That sounds strange. 4-6 weeks if custom intervenes is likely ng for an order from the US. If it’s really months, I would contact them and ask what’s up.

[Mr.Marx]

Months? That sounds strange. 4-6 weeks if custom intervenes is likely ng for an order from the US. If it’s really months, I would contact them and ask what’s up.

Yes, a good few months now too. I - and, by the looks of Battle Valor's Facebook page, a fair few others - have sent many emails and messages to the proprietor. For the first few months I got a reply to each message saying that my order would be out 'very soon' or 'the next week', but for a while now I've not had a reply at all. It's a very funny way to run a business.

MM.

[DivisMal]

Yes, a good few months now too. I - and, by the looks of Battle Valor's Facebook page, a fair few others - have sent many emails and messages to the proprietor. For the first few months I got a reply to each message saying that my order would be out 'very soon' or 'the next week', but for a while now I've not had a reply at all. It's a very funny way to run a business.

MM.

Oh dear, I really hope he hasn’t quit or something nasty has happened to him!

[OSHIROmodels]

Very cool