Porsenna's occasional adventures in Frostgrave and Oathmark conversions.

[Porsenna]

Hi all! I'm mostly a long time lurker, but I figured I finally had a reason to start a thread due to my recent first time purchase of some frostgrave sets.

Still some fine work left to do on this guy, but he's coming along!

Back Story!

Usually I spend most of my hobby time working with converting war hammer plastics for use in Hyborean style skirmish games (long live the warcry sets!), but for a long time I've been attracted to the simplicity and somewhat 'retro' feel of the frostgrave sets - and recently found the perfect 'excuse' to get some - my students.

I'm lucky enough to have a very small class of four 11 year olds in an ESL class, and so we've been experimenting with doing RPG's as a way to strengthen their English.

Eventually, both because I like miniatures and that it's just helpful to have visual aides I decided to look into some cheap mini options for the students to use on a grid when we're in a combat, along with using some kind of printed paper counter for the various enemies. While I first looked into the cheap DnD minis I remembered the frostgrave sets, and finding an ebay seller who sold single sprues for a reasonable price got a couple.

I'm happy to say that it's big a big success introducing the students to looking through a sprue full of bits to find the pieces needed to make *their* characters come to life, even if the occasional game of rock-paper-scissors needed to be had to settle a debate on who got what piece.

I was also left with enough afterwards to start tinkering with the left overs myself, and this is how I arrived at this!

[Grumpy Gnome]

Sounds like a great project and that is some brilliant work you have done so far.

[Ranthony]

Yes, great work on this.
A great idea too, who knows, maybe some future modellers?

Good luck with it!

Cheers

Ry

[Porsenna]

Thank you guy for the support!

@Ranthony:

I think one of the 4 might have the bug in him already, as he was asking a lot of questions about where to get the sprues from. He did get a little discouraged by the painting aspect which we tried out yesterday, but I assured him and every one else that everyone's first miniature paint job is usually something of a mess.

I think the thing that is most rewarding is that here in Taiwan creativity is not always fostered well in the mind of children, and that model kits (and RPG's) offer a nice way to let the kids slide into a 'creative zone' that is more comfortable then being handed a blank sheet of paper and then told to 'Go!'. They don't need to fear 'messing up' as all the individual pieces already look nice - but they get to express their own creativity in the posing and composition of them.

----

I'm hoping to add to this thread as my hobby time, budget allow and shipping times allow (No local frostgrave in Taiwan, from what I've seen) - I've been on a moratorium from GW for nearly a year which one would think would have me sitting on a pile of hobby cash, but I've been saving it up for some rather different projects.

I don't know if I'll ever end up playing Frostgrave proper just because my preferred 'Point of View' character is melee type, it'll be a fun project to build up a team of adventurers none the less.

That said, while there will be a wait for the next update in miniature form as I wait for another small bundle of sprues I convinced myself to get... I do have something to share- the setting these brave explorers will be :

Sadly, the details show up smudgy in this picture, and while i could take a better one, this will do for now . It is a work in progress that could probably use a thread all of it's own. It's a setting I cooked up from scratch using the 'game'  Mappa Imperium - a cooperative game where it's easy for a single person or a small group of people to make a whole fantasy setting.

https://nookrium.itch.io/mappa-imperium

I strongly suggest it as an activity for anyone with kids/grandkids or students who might be interested in this sort of thing. (However, as a word of advice I recommend running through it by yourself first, from beginning to end. It will be a big benefit to you if you already know what you're doing if anyone asks questions.)

One day I might do a write up on the lore of the land, particularly after more of the map gets filled out.

[Ranthony]

Here's another great world making site that you may not have come across yet.

https://ui2.worldspinner.com/

It appears to be in a similar vein as the one you posted but here there are options to create heraldry, lore etc.
Hopefully it's of some use.

Cheers

Ry

[Porsenna]

That's really interesting! I'll need to play with it some for sure!

[caelthebard]

That conversion's looking good, Porsenna. Also, thanks for the links to Mappa Imperium and Worldspinner. I think I'd like to try them both out!

[Porsenna]

That conversion's looking good, Porsenna. Also, thanks for the links to Mappa Imperium and Worldspinner. I think I'd like to try them both out!

I found map spinner to be interesting, and could be useful in time with more experimentation - but I think the actual play through and decision making in Mappa Imperium to be more to my taste (at the moment!)

[dadlamassu]

For mapping I  have used Campaign Cartographer 3 for may years though it has become more complex with each new issue.

https://www.profantasy.com/products/cc3.asp

Incidentally your island bears a striking resemblance to:

[Porsenna]

I've heard of campaign cartographer, and wouldn't mind trying it- except I'm cheap

As for what the map looks like, I find that people from different backgrounds tend to say it looks like one thing or another, and everyone's kind of right - I've had it called a distorted Taiwan by the students, Albania, (relatedly, I guess) Yugoslavia, and even a yam.

It's interesting to see what people bring to the table regarding associations, though I didn't have anything in mind when I drew the shape other than wanting to avoid 'square map syndrome' of trying to fill in as much space on a rectangular piece of paper as possible.

[Porsenna]

I think it's about time for an update!

I've been working on different projects over the last few weeks - including some 'touch ups' on the of the figures my students painted up which I might upload pics of later.  But most of my hobby efforts have been towards kit bashing the (personal) hero I showed off earlier, as well as some terrain and a barbarian warband to serve as NPC enemies for my student's adventures.

This hero is still very much a work in progress. At the moment i don't have a particular game system in mind to use him in, but I do enjoy the figure a lot. I think there needs to be some work don't around the shoulders to more clearly visually separate the pauldrons and breast plate as they kind of merge to together as if they were all one but piece of metal. And of course working up the nerve to either try some freehand, or track down some decent shield transfers for the shield.

However, I am mostly happy with how it looks something like a late medieval Roman.




And here are the barbarians - There's a good assembly here for a frostgrave warband if I ever wanted & could convince someone else to play it, though I would need to figure out a conversion for an apprentice. For the time being they are serving as decent baddies for my student nascent RPG setting. (Which we sadly don't get to play nearly as often as would be nice to.)



None of this is really finished yet, but the barbarians at least are 'table top ready" as they say.

[Porsenna]

*You can also see some terrain I've been working on behind all these models- though the students haven't yet left the starting city for me to bring in any of these trees and ruins.*

[Little Odo]

Great map and wonderful work on the figures so far. Looking forward to reading your adventures when published.

[Grumpy Gnome]

Looking good mate!