Fantasy warbands for skirmish gaming [Latest: Barbarians, April 12!]

[PatrickWR]

Thanks, stone-cold-lead. And would you believe I regularly get 'em all on the game table together? These days my group only plays games that don't restrict what minis you put on the table, so we can collect and paint whatever strikes our fancy.

[PatrickWR]

More adventurers! Actually, I don't know if you can rightly call these guys adventurers. They mostly just carry loot from the dungeon back to town. I have a real soft spot for miniatures that look like they're doing something other than fighting, and aren't obviously carrying weapons.

[PatrickWR]

And here's an odd pairing -- I wasn't sure where to put these 2 figures. On the left is a pack mule, outfitted with a sturdy frame for use in the dungeon or in the wilderness. I can't remember exactly where I got this mule...he came in a 2-pack with another slightly different sculpt. On the right is the first dwarf I ever painted -- I believe he's a Citadel berserker? He literally looks like a gigantic beard with arms and legs. Yes, that is a severed head on his hip.

[Constable Bertrand]

    

You mean there are little fellows an mules that carry all the loot back to town? I always wondered how my adventurer could carry so much treasure and scrap! 

I really love the fellow with the box on his back. Is he OOP or still available somewhere?

That's an amazing paintjob on the dwarf, great effort!

[PatrickWR]

I really love the fellow with the box on his back. Is he OOP or still available somewhere?

That is a Grenadier figure from the 1980s and, I believe, he is long OOP. The thing he is carrying on his back is actually a big ol' treasure chest! It's hard to see because of the angle.

[PatrickWR]

Who the heck is this guy? The package labeled him as "Duke Ice Falcon" from Crucible. But I painted him up as maybe a dark elf warlord or something. I'm not entirely sure what I was going for with this paint scheme. But I do remember that I wanted to use purple paint!

[Damien]

Hi Patrick,
 He is from Ral Partha, they came up with a warhammer type game called Crucible with different types of armies etc. He is painted up really well, I like the purple armour and the hex base.


Damien

[PatrickWR]

Oh, that's good to know. I actually have several other minis from the Crucible game line, still boxed up in the blister packs. Guess I better paint 'em up!

[Spooktalker]

I like the mule and grenadier figs and agree that henchmen really add a lot to the experience. Have you seen the grenadier potion tester?    I need to get that guy. The huge-headed dwarf is Heartbreaker Hobbies from the nineties. I have one or two and I don't know what to do it with. Maybe a huge face chaos mutation figure.

[Nedo]

Nice minis.....
However, I would have made the bases a little more homogeneous....maybe all round bases.

[PatrickWR]

However, I would have made the bases a little more homogeneous....maybe all round bases.

No way! I like the glorious mess that comes from having a mishmash of bases on the table. Perhaps this stems from my RPG background...I originally painted these guys up for D&D, not wargaming, so it wasn't essential to have a uniform basing system. And now I play skirmish games that also don't require uniform basing. So it all works out in the end.

[PatrickWR]

Alright, here's a kit I picked up, half-painted and poorly assembled, at an auction back in March. It's a Reaper Skeletal Dragon, 02705 by Bob Olley! I put it in paint stripper for a few days, scrubbed off most of the old, cracked paint, and started over from scratch. I have a pretty big undead army, so this guy will definitely be the centerpiece of some future battles.

[majorsmith]

love the dragon, and that purple armoured dude!

[PatrickWR]

love the dragon, and that purple armoured dude!

Thanks! And that's how we refer to him in games. "OK, I'll have my goblin warrior charge that, uh, purple armored dude."

[PatrickWR]

My game club freely mixes old school and newer figures. Really, our whole goal with our skirmish games (both sci-fi and fantasy) is to just paint up whatever looks cool to us at the time. Case in point: these Mantic Orcs. I split Mantic's big holiday grab bag (basically 100 random sprues from all their figure lines) with a few other guys in my club, so we all ended up with a handful of figures from each race and faction.

These Orcs are nice because 1) they're really close to true 28mm, leaving room on your table for something "bigger than Orcs" and 2) they've got decent armor, including some fully enclosed helmets, which you don't often see for Orcs.