Fire and Blood - Vhagar

[Rosie]

Hey y'all,

I recently announced that I'd have another exciting project in store for you. I'm proud to now finally be launching it: Fire and Blood. Now the Targaryens have been my favorite house from Westeros all along. I absolutely love the combination of red and black in their clothing, love their backstory, their silver blonde hair...

Now since this will become my main tournament army for MESBG, I will be taking a different approach to them than with my other projects. Instead of aiming to 100% resemble the show depiction, I'm going with a creative blend between the universes of Tolkien and Martin this time. The first decision to make therefore was which army to use as the base for this project.

I ended up with Rivendell. Lore wise, the High Elves seem like a good fit for the Valyrians. Added to that, their heroes will allow me to do some really exciting crossovers. And finally, Rivendell was the first army I played back when I started with the game more than ten years ago. Wanting to do something different then I was used to, however, I made the decision to start off with an all cavalry army.

This morning, I finished the first models in the army: the Valyrian Knights. For these I mainly stuck with the Rivendell Knights from Games Workshop. To add a bit of variation, however, I changed the position on some of their arms. In addition, I swapped their heads with the High Elf helmets from Medbury Miniatures as I find them to be more decorative than the ones they originally have.





For their paint job, I went with red robes along with black pants and cloaks, painting the inside inner parts of the cloaks red as well. I went with a darker tone of metal, going over it with Black Templar contrast paint before highlighting the upper parts with Ironbreaker to really make them stick out. I also added in gemstones on their shields and horses for some added detail. I stuck with black for the horses themselves to maintain the dark look, while adding in different white patterns for some variation.

Overall, I'm really happy with how they turned out. Bringing them to a tournament last weekend, I got told they would have been nominated for best painted, were it not for the fact that some of the hero models still weren't fully finished, which of course is a lovely compliment to hear. I'm still not sure about the leather on the boots and saddles however. I left it darker at the moment, but am considering to go highlight them like I did with the straps on the horses. What do you think?

I also might add some more decoration to their bases. I'm thinking of adding a few spots of scorched earth with flames coming from them and burnt corpses laying around. Do you think that would be an improvement, or should I stick with their current design? And in case of the former, does anyone know of either models or STLs of burnt corpses that would fit onto 40mm cavalry bases? Thanks in advance for your feedback.

That's it for now. Stay tuned for more content coming up soon!

[glenning]

Looking great so far - can't wait to see more!

[Grumpy Gnome]

Looking good! 👍

[HappyChappy439]

Great work!

Elves as Valyrians is a nice choice, to give them this sort of otherworldly look compared to the main Westerosi forces!

[voltan]

I got told they would have been nominated for best painted, were it not for the fact that some of the hero models still weren't fully finished,

This amused me way more than it should have.

I also might add some more decoration to their bases. I'm thinking of adding a few spots of scorched earth with flames coming from them and burnt corpses laying around. Do you think that would be an improvement, or should I stick with their current design?

I'd say no myself, you might end up making the bases too busy and distracting from the figures, but if you can keep it restrained it might work.

[Rosie]

Thanks for all the praise! I'm glad you like the direction I'm taking this new project. I finished another few models last week. First up is the Valyrian Knight Captain. I kept him mostly the same as the knights themselves, but went with a different helmet. I used the commander variant from Medbury miniatures, then cut off the feathers on the front. To make him stand out more, I then painted another ruby on the spot where the feathers had been. Here's how he turned out:



I'm quite pleased with the model. I also painted up a few objective markers, which were finished just in time for Easter. First of all, I painted up two boxes of dragon eggs from Great Grimoire. One of them was made to match the colors of the box Daenerys received for her wedding with Khal Drogo, while the other one used up the remaining colors that would both be suitable and I had the required paints for.

After that, I painted a third objective marker. The baby dragon is from Great Grimoire as well, painted to resemble a young Vermax as he is shown in the sixth episode of House of the Dragon:



I hope you like them as much as I do! Stay tuned for more as I'll be finishing another few exciting additions soon.

[HappyChappy439]

Nice work! The Dragons' eggs are a fun touch!

[AKULA]

Good work, can see you are having lots of fun with this project 

[Rosie]

Thanks guys, glad you like the objectives. Yes, I'm definitely having loads of fun with this project. Speaking of which, I am proud to present you one of the leaders of my army: Daemon Targaryen, the Rogue Prince. So this is actually where it all started. Looking at the newest Glorfindel model from Forgeworld, I saw the potential for a great Daemon conversion in it a while ago.

His pose, backstory and armor all seemed to match the vibe rather well. In order to further add to the similarities, though, I decided I needed to add in some more of Daemon's show armor. Therefore I sculpted a plume onto his helmet and added wings to it to match the one he's wearing during the tourney in episode 1 of House of the Dragon:




As you can see, I went with roughly the same color pattern as on my knights, Targaryen blonde hair and red for the lining on his cloth. I also flattened out the circle on his loincloth so I could paint a Targaryen sigil onto it.





For his mounted version I went with a purely black horse, both to resemble the one he's riding in the show and to add to the grim look of the model. In order to add some more detail, I then painted the tassels on his horse as well as the middle part beneath the horse head into rubies. I'm really happy with how he turned out. Hope you guys like him too! Stay tuned for more exciting content coming up soon!

[HappyChappy439]

Great work, he really looks the part!

What did you use for the wings on the helmet?

[Rosie]

Thanks again! For the wings on the helmet I had two heads for the Davale variant of the Easterling acolytes printed, then cut those off and put them on Daemon's helmet.

Alright, so I'm back with another update. With Daemon done, it only seems fitting Rhaenyra should come next. Since I wanted to use her as Elrond in game, making for an excellent leader and an auto pick really when playing Rivendell Knights, I started off with his model. His armor was sculpted to have breasts on it while I swapped the face with one from the Folk Rabble to make the model appear more feminine.





As you can see, I went with the now familiar paintjob on Rhaenyra of black and red with blonde hair and rubies added in wherever possible. For the horse I decided to add in a few white patterns like I did on some of the knights, making it look less sinister compared to the one Daemon is riding. I'll be doing her dismount later since I figured out I'd prefer the Vanquishers version of Elrond for that.

Another little addition I managed to finish is the fourth objective marker for this army: the Iron Throne. I found a 3D file online, then had it sized down and printed. Here's how it turned out:



I hope you guys like the newest additions to my army. More updates to follow soon!

[Rosie]

I'm back again! For my next update, I've decided to start working on the Elven twins. While I love Glorfindel, he seems like the suboptimal option below 700 points compared to having two 3 might heroes running around, so I'll need to be including them to my army from a competitive viewpoint. I think the sculpts for Elladan and Elrohir aren't that great, however, so decided to put some work into them.

First of all, I swapped their sword arms with ones from Medbury Miniatures for better looking swords that were not bent or warped. After that, I added rubies to the front of their horses to cover up the parts where both halves meet. I also sculpted ruby necklaces onto them. To finish them off, I then added the same helmets as on my captain, going for the Queensguard look.








As I started painting them, however, I realized they'd actually be a rather good fit for Lucerys and Jacaerys. So, while keeping with the paint job you all know by now mostly, I went with dark brown hair instead. I also made sure to get in a few more gems, painting the pummels on their swords into rubies as well to add to their royal look.

I hope you like how they turned out. I'll be receiving the final parts for another addition I've been working on over the past week, so stay tuned for a very exciting update coming up soon!

[Rosie]

I'm finally able to finish the model I've been eager to show you for some time now. A Targaryen force wouldn't be a true one without a dragon. That's why I decided to start working on the one bonded to Rhaenyra: Syrax. I first looked through some 'normal' dragon designs, but then actually managed to find an STL made to match her appearance in the show.

Given that I want to be able to play her as a stand-in for Gwaihir, I made sure the model would fit onto a 60mm base. With that in mind though, I went for a scale that would have the maximum size, making sure that any part not connecting to the ground would be hanging over the base, making her come in at about 5" from wingtip to wingtip and from head to tail.

I then started working on the base. To both make her look more imposing as well as more playable, I built a large rock out of cork to place her on top of. While that did further improve on the model, I still thought the base looked a bit blank. That's when the idea of adding eggs to it came to my mind. Since Syrax was one of the main egg producers, this would fit in perfectly with her backstory.





For the paint job, I went in with a somewhat sandy type of yellow on her scales, matching the ones she has in HotD. Now her wings are both shown as rather closely matching the scales as well as looking more like a leathery brown. I went with the latter to create some more variation. Her eyes were done in bright blue while I added some fire effects to both her mouth and the inside of the hatched egg to bring further life to the model.

All in all, I'm really happy with how she turned out! Better still, my boyfriend was so nice as to buy me a little photo studio, allowing me to take pictures that are both way brighter and sharper than any I have been taking before. I hope you like the end result!

[HappyChappy439]

Great work on Syrax and Rhaenyra's sons! Are you planning on adding any more of the dragons?

The new lighting in the pictures definitely shows too, nice work!

[Pattus Magnus]

That’s a beautifully painted model, great job! The dragons from the GoT series are some of my favorite depictions and you definitely got the beast right.