Guitarheroandy's Middle Earth Project WIP UPDATE: 2.3.13 Orcs!!!

[guitarheroandy]

Here is the thread that will detail the development of my 2013 'main project' for painting - my Middle Earth project.

I have had a load of GW LOTR Haldir's Elves in my loft for ages, along with a set of plastic Galadhrim which I bought on a whim a while ago. I've always wanted to do something with them, but other things have always taken over. Now, in 2013, with lots of stalled mini-projects and needing something very different to kick-start me, I have dragged them out again. This has been prompted by two things.

Firstly: The Hobbit movie reawakened an interest in Tolkien that has been with me for over 30 years, especially the Elves and the 'Long Defeat'.

Secondly: The 'Dux Britanniarum' dark age wargame rules by To Fat Lardies. Although a game for my favourite EVER period, the 5th-7th Century AD and the 'Age of Arthur' in Dark Age Britain, it is the one ruleset where I immediately looked at it having played a few games and thought  -"that's it! That'll do 'proper' Tolkien-ish Fantasy skirmishes really well!" Now, don't get me wrong, the GW LOTR SBG is a good set of rules...or at least it was originally, but they have b*ggered about with it a bit and, while it will still have its uses, my own on-going adaptation of Dux Britanniarum' will be my rules of choice.

In addition, the whole thing has been inspired further by the excellent 'Campaign in Ithilien' thread by Doomhippie on this forum...bloody magic thread that is...totally inspiring...thank you Sir!!  

So, the project will be set in the West of Middle Earth around the time of the rise and eventual fall of Angmar and will be based on border skirmishes between the Elves and one of the Orc warbands harrying the Rivendell borders under command of Angmar. I haven't fully worked out the back-story yet, but that's the gist. It will allow other folk  at my club who have LOTR armies to join in, as Gondor and Rohan models could easily be Arnor, or the latter could even be men allied to Angmar.

For very small scenarios (up to 20 'good' models) I may well use the original SBG. For bigger battles (around 50 'good' models) Fantasy Dux would be used. The former I will even be able to use to play solo games...

I'm going to do forces of Elves and Orcs so I will have access to both good and evil forces myself, so can umpire for others to play, which I also enjoy.

Here, to start things off, are some pics of the Elves. I have never been one to stick to what I 'should' do when gaming...so all this bollox about LOTR having to use exact models, etc...well, it's alright and proper for tourneys, or taking toys to play in a GW store, but all that stuff is not for me! So, it's conversion time!!!

As I already had some Galadhrim models (and I really prefer them to the official High Elf stuff) they formed the basis of my forces, so I do have 2 lots of 6 metal archers and one lot of 6 metal glaive-bearers to be used 'as is' (archers on the painting table as we speak!) However, the plastic chaps were not quite what I wanted -esp the spearmen. I want Elf spearmen to look like they mean business and those plastic spears are simply not good enough, so they got removed and Perry miniatures Samurai 'Yari' got used instead (just steel rod with long points hammered out). Those are proper spears and will paint up just fine.

In addition, for Fantasy Dux, I need some elite Elf infantry, so, with Christmas money, I bought a load of Galadhrim Court guards (HIDEOUSLY expensive and bloody Finecast, which has been a pain...) as they look pretty 'elite'. They don't have shields, which is no bloody good either and I also didn't want to use the huge plastic shields on my spearmen, so the latter now have some original High Elf shields I picked up when GW did 'conversion bitz' for LOTR and the elites got some lovely resin shields from Scibor miniatures in Poland (pic below) ...they also had the spears replaced as Finecast spears are beyond shite!!! Bendy, bendy, bendy...ugh....



Here are the results of the converting. Pics are a bit rough, but you'll get the idea...










With regard to the heroes, most of the GW ones are actually not that great, IMHO. I did have an Elladan set from ages ago in the loft, but it's a poor model really...the head was way too small and the legs too big...the pose not great...so I tried a conversion and added a Galadhrim head. I'm still not 100% convinced, but it's a start.
For Dux Brit, all my heroes go on 40mm rounds. I shied away from this originally, as I also want to use SBG where all bases are the same size (25mm) but actually now, I think I may just use 40mm rounds for the heroes anyway, so the chap below will eventually have a bigger base with more Greenstuff and added small rocks, etc...
What do you think?




Anyway, that's a taster of where I'm going. Next update will either be the first group of 6 painted Elves with a full painting tutorial, or my initial ideas for the main forces to be used in my Fantasy Dux adaptation, plus some ideas I am mulling over for tweaking the rules for Elves and Orcs...it all depends how quickly I can complete the painting...

Cheers

Andy

PS, for future posts, I'll re-size the pics down a lot more! Sorry!!!

[OSHIROmodels]

Very promising Andy 

Are you going to put something on the Perry Japanese pike near the blade or just paint something fancy on it.

I think the conversions have worked very well; am I right in thinking that the Elledan model was by Gary Moorley (sp), if so I'm not keen on that one either 

Just from a personal point of view I would leave the hero on his 25mm base as it look suitably heroic as it is.

Looking forward to seeing some more 

cheers

James

[tomek917]

Really nice start, I will be following this project with interest!

I started converting Dux to use with my Westeros project, it's a really nice system, I think it will work perfect for Middle Earth too!

[Theatralic]

Consider those Ideas stolen ;P. Yeah, Doomhippie did the same with me , searched out all my LotR Minis.

As for the Heroes I have to say to me  the LotR Elves have some of my favourites:
Gil-Galad, Elrond, Celeborn and Glorfindel with Armor, Erestor,Gildor (awesome) and Rumil, the Rest is meh.

Great stuff  , looking forward to see them painted!

[commissarmoody]

They look great! Cant wait to see what rules you come up with for the Elves and Orcs.

[B. Basiliscus]

Looking snappy, I like their spears.
BRING ON THE ORCS~!

[Vinlander]

This just became my favourite thread! 

[guitarheroandy]

Once models have been cleaned & prepped, I undercoat them with white. Any areas of ring mail armour are then re-undercoated black to enable me to dry-brush it. Below, what the models look like once this is completed.



The next job is to drybrush the mail. This is undertaken with GW Boltgun metal, followed by GW Ironbreaker. This gives the mail a darker appearance which I feel is more realistic, even for Elves.

Next, I tidy up the white undercoat where the drybrushing has affected it in readiness for the next phase. This is the application of basecoat colours to the entire model. I start with the flesh which is Foundry Flesh Light. The lower lip is painted with Foundry Flesh Shade. While it may sound daft to do the lips, actually, I find they make the face more expressive than doing eyes, as eyes can look ‘staring’ (at least, they do when I paint them!)

After the flesh, I paint the under-tunic (Foundry Arctic Grey Shade) The patterning is done with Foundry Stone and Arctic Grey. After that, the cloak is painted with Foundry Night Sky Light. Next, the hair is painted. The dark hair is painted with Foundry Peaty Brown Shade with a highlight of Peaty Brown Light. The darker blond is GW Bubonic Brown highlighted with Bleached Bone. The light blond is GW Bleached Bone highlighted with White. The highlights are applied before and after washing as I find this adds depth to the hair.

Next, the armour is done with GW Ironbreaker. After that, the black parts are painted and the  bow-grip is painted with GW Kommando Khaki. The pic below shows the base-coated model. The key to this whole process is to be very neat and tidy. As you can see, even being neat and tidy, the model doesn’t look great, but you just have to move past that and apply the wash!





This is done by brushing on the Army Painter Strong Tone. This is done relatively sparingly. On NO account dip the model in as Army Painter recommend!! This causes hideous overkill and pooling, especially on models as fancy as these Elves!!

Once washed, they look like this…hideously glossy!!




However, that will all change at the highlight stage. IMPORTANT: Leave a full 24 hrs between the wash and the highlight, as it takes that long to fully dry.

This next stage is where the original basecoats are used to highlight up most of the colours with just a single highlight. The exceptions are the under-tunic, which also gets a second highlight of Foundry Arctic Grey and the patterning is highlighted with White. The black is highlighted with Foundry Charcoal and Charcoal Light. The armour gets an additional highlight of GW Runefang Steel (the new Mithril silver which is perfect for Elven armour as it is so shiny and bright). The hair is re-highlighted with the lightest shades above.  The cloak patterns are added at this stage. The blue pattern on rank and file is Foundry Storm Blue Light and on the Haldir model is Foundry Arctic Grey. This pattern is a lot easier to do than you’d expect. Pain the horizontal lines first. Then just add little ‘flicks’ between the lines criss-crossing over and over – keep it fairly random and you end up with what you see here…

This is what they look like now…looking better!





Next, the model needs matte laquer (the Dip is actually a gloss varnish). I use Testors Dullcote for this. In spring and summer I’d spray it on outside, but this won’t work in winter, so I brush it on. WARNING: this stuff is EXTREMELY toxic!! I do it in my office by an open window, wearing a mask and not doing any more than 6 models at a time!!

The models are nearly done now. All that remains is to re-highlight the very ends and edges of the armour with GW Runefang Steel to add a bit of ‘shine’. This is really good on Elf models as I feel they should be ‘bright and shiny’ on the armour front!!!

All that remains now is to base them. I do this by PVA-ing sand to the base. Once dry it is basecoated with Foundry Peaty Brown Shade and drybrushed with GW Bleached Bone. Then clump foliage and tufts are added. The clump foliage has flowers dotted on. On these models I have used Foundry Winestain Red Shade and Winestain Red Light, Yellow Shade and Yellow Light and Arctic Grey Shade and White. The base edge is done with GW Graveyard Earth.
The results are below…







Here is the full group in a scenic setting…




And that’s the method and colours I’ll use for my Elves. The method will be the same for the Orcs, but obviously they’ll be much less ‘prettified’ and will be darker in colour. If you like, I’ll do a similar step-by-step for a group of those at some point… I do plan to paint a unit of Orcs next anyway to get a feel for what they’ll look like…

PS...these pics still seem a bit big to me...if it bothers anybody I'll reduce further next time. If you like 'em this size, I won't bother... Thoughts (esp moderators...??)

[Theatralic]

Good stuff, i really like them 

I prefer bigger pictures and don`t think you need to make them smaller but the mods probably know better.

For my own Thread I usually use Pics 800*600 and so far no one has complaint.

[guitarheroandy]

Thanks...I think the landscape group shots are better large, but the single model shots are too big. I set them at 6x4 inches in PSE Photoshop Editor (they are huge when taken on the camera) so maybe I need to look at Pixels... I am crap on techie photo stuff!!! 

[hjorhrafn]

Those are very well done.  I especially like the cloaks, both color choice and free-hand.  Everybody's Middle Earth projects are starting to make me wonder if I could get the wife interested in playing a skirmish game set in ME. 

[Doomhippie]

Wow, now here's a thread I instantly fell in love with (even more so as I seem to have been some inspiration for it... that really sounds sweet in my ears - thanks a lot, Andy).

I admit I am a little shy if it comes to dipping but it works really well here and I absolutely love the group shots. Very well done. I also like your conversions and I agree that the Eladan model looks really bad but with a change of heads it's actually quite nice.

Furthermore, I like the setting as it gives you a lot of possibilities to use various groups of models and cultures. The idea of using Rohirim models both as northmen fighting on the good or on the bad side sounds very reasonable to me as Angmar probably used lots of mercenary troops since the land itself is too arid and cold to grow enough crops for a large standing army.

The wars in the north against Angmar have always been one of my favourites and you using that background makes it all the more exciting for me. So I'll be watching this thread closely. Lot's of luck and fun with this project. 

[Vermis]

That's a bit spesh.   Nice choices and results on the conversions especially.

(When the 'Dux' DA games were released I went for Dux Bellorum rather than Dux Brittani... Dux Brittianu... The Other One.  But I see more mentions of that and I wonder if I made the right choice.  Any comments?)

[guitarheroandy]

Furthermore, I like the setting as it gives you a lot of possibilities to use various groups of models and cultures. The idea of using Rohirim models both as northmen fighting on the good or on the bad side sounds very reasonable to me as Angmar probably used lots of mercenary troops since the land itself is too arid and cold to grow enough crops for a large standing army.

Absolutely! There are a number of parts in the LOTR appendices that refer to the 'Evil Men' fighting for Angmar, including the fact that in Rhudaur "...power had been seized by an evil lord of the Hillmen, who was in secret league with Angmar" (LOTR Appendix A iii p1077) and later that Rhudaur "was occupied by evil men subject to Angmar and the Dunedain that remained there were slain or fled West." (LOTR appencix A iii p1077) I'd imagine that the Hill men (or indeed the Dunlendings) would be well represented by Rohirrim types (although I'd replace the shields with blank plain round ones and create my own designs.) To be honest, the best likely bet would be to use Gripping Beast plastic Saxons or Vikings for these Hillmen http://www.grippingbeast.com/product.php?ItemID=2727 http://www.grippingbeast.com/product.php?ItemID=2531

@ Vermis: I have Dux Bellorum (I know the author and a couple of photos of my miniatures are in the book) and it is a cool set of rules, but Dux Britanniarum really is something else. It is card-driven, with bags of character and the scenario and campaign system is nothing short of brilliant. You really can play the same scenario several times with identical armies and each time it'll be totally different!! There are lots of battle reports on my blog if you are interested.

[Little Odo]

Excellent thread and wonderful painting. Nice to see a step-by-step guide too as it really does help on the inspiration front. So many of my projects fall at the first hurdle as I just can't figure out the 'best' paint scheme!