October 26: Two Overly Ambitious Kings of War Projects

**WARNING: this post contains images of miniatures that have not been kept in the best condition. Readers who care properly for their armies might find this disturbing **

With the Season of Scenery over, and having painted (nearly) all the Wildspire Miniatures set, I thought it was time to do something for October. 

Last year I started painting Old School Undead, and I've still got a load more to finish.  But the Winds of Gaming have shifted firmly towards Kings of War. So Orctober sounds like a great idea. 

For this project I'm going to look at my original orc army. Repair where necessary or possible, maybe touch up some of the painting, and rebase things more in line with my current methods.

I may add to it, but the intention is to, first and foremost, sort out what's already painted.

I'll do a separate post looking in detail at the army, but here's a picture of what I've got and an indication of what I might need to do. 

Most of my painted orcs (with a rogue unit of dwarves)

And if that's not enough to do, Boðvoc and I have both started new armies, so we're urging each other on in a vague sort of slow-gro contest. I've only just begun, one mini painted so far, but here's a clue; it's my Ogtober project. 

Season of Scenery 26 Roundup

Just a quick post to show my final entry in Dave Stone's Season of Scenery challenge 2026.

I'll witter on a bit more about the build in another post, but briefly, here's another Oldhammer building; the dairy from the Bogle's Farm in Terror of the Lichemaster. I started it last year, alongside collecting and painting minis for the scenario pack but it languished part built for many months.

The Dairy or is it a barn?

The rear of the dairy

Blank wall

And as a bonus, here's Fritzy's Kennel from the same scenario, also started last year and finished for the challenge.

Beware of the Dog!

Rear view

Challenge Summary 

A pretty good challenge for me this year. I built an extensive set of role-playing terrain for the Masterforge quest.

 

The Masterforge Assembled

I also got a bit of scatter terrain done using some old resin chess pieces.

 

The Standing Stones

And, of course, I finished off the dairy shown above.

It's been a lot of fun, and certainly spurred me on to finish stuff. The D&D terrain would have been built anyway for the game, but the standing stones were a direct response to the challenge, and finishing the dairy was also motivated by me wanting to get something else finished in time.

Mind you, I might have got more done if I'd not been distracted by the Wildspire stuff.

Thanks Dave for organising all this. It's certainly helped me expand my scenery collection.

See you on December 26 th for the next challenge?

Wildspire Miniatures for Dungeons and Dragons

Whilst assembling the minis required for the Master Forge I looked at what is available these days beyond the usual Reaper or Wizkids.  

I found Wildspire Miniatures, and thought they were an interesting collection, but by that time I'd decided what I needed, so filed them under 'possibly investigate later'.

I didn't pursue it any further until I noticed that they had a special offer on one of the boxed sets. 

At less than 50p a mini (and some of them are big) I thought it worthwhile investigating. The price has since gone back up, but they are still under 60p each.

(A quick note, this is an expansion to the Classic Encounters Essentials set, so is, perhaps, a little less immediately useful.  Both sets are available in the Classic Encounters Complete set).

That's a small box for 60 minis!

Well packed though

Contents

An 'Acid Elemental'* and three oozes.  I'll admit I thought these might work nicely for some of the elementals in the forge, though in the end they stayed in the box.

They are nicely detailed, and will definitely get some table time. They might get a wash and perhaps a very light highlight, but they're pretty much ready as is.

Translucent Green stuff

Air Elemental and Gas Serpents*. More nicely detailed minis.  I do have Air Elementals already, notably Reaper Bones, but a bit of variety is nice. I'm not sure what a gas serpent is, but the minis look fun.

Translucent clear minis

Bugbear, cultist, bandit and unholy knight*. All reasonable minis and pretty useful. They mostly have obvious D&D stats (I'd probably use the unholy knight as a wight). There are four of each of these in the set.

 A good set of adversaries for most heroes

Giant worm*, imp, ghoul and werewolf. There are some noticeable gaps on the ghoul and the werewolf, some filler should help here. Again, there are four of each in the set.

I'm sure I've seen all these in films

Dire wolf, boar, harpy and mummy. The wolf is a nice wolf, but small for a dire wolf. It's a refreshing change to have a clothed harpy. Yet again, four of each.

Are you my mummy?

Naga, giant and earth elemental. One of each of these. These are great minis. 

If I'm being picky, I like my earth elementals a bit chunkier and the pose could be more threatening.

Big stuff

First Impressions 

These are good minis, especially for the price. 

There are some odd sizes when compared to the Monster Manual descriptions, but nothing too egregious. 

Detail is generally good, though it's occasionally soft on some (the bugbear's face for instance). For some reason, the translucent minis seem better detailed. 

Most of these will do the job nicely, though not necessarily better than stuff I've already got painted up in my collection.

What's Next?

I've already started painting some of these (expect posts showing them over the next few weeks).  They easily chunk into groups of four so I'm getting through them steadily.

Will I get any more? 

I'm tempted if I find any more on offer. I've looked at the creatures here, but they also do sets of heroes, which look interesting, with a wide variety of species and class, and a good mix of male and female characters.

I'll do another post analysing the range and coming to some sort of conclusion if they are a must have for role players, or just a big disappointment (though how can you be disappointed by that giant?)

*Wildspire do a booklet of stats and various other downloads which should explain what some of the less familiar creatures are.

Wildspire Index

Wildspire Introduction

Painted Bugbears, Mummies and Dire Wolves

Painted Naga, Acid Elemental, Earth Elemental and Air Elemental

Painted Cultists, Harpies and Ghouls

Painted Werewolves, Giant Worms and Wild Boar

Painted Gas Serpents, Imp Hulks and Unholy Knights

Painted Bandits and Ooze

Painted Giant 

Wildspire Miniatures Bandits and Oozes

This is the final batch of the Wildspire minis for now, I'm saving the giant for something a little different. 

The final lot (apart from that giant)

Bandits

Firstly, yes, awful mould lines. I confess I'd got a bit complacent regarding mould lines and model clean up. Perhaps, also, I was rushing as I got towards the end of the box.

Once I started painting I realised just how obvious they are, particularly on the right hand.

If the colour scheme looks vaguely familiar, I based it on the Cultists. I even gave them red bandanas, though this was a nod to the Redcloak bandits in the Lost Mine of Phandelver adventure; the fact that the Cultists' hoods are also red is a happy accident (or is it something more sinister?).

They are good minis (or would be with proper prep), looking suitably furtive; actually I think they look more like they are picking pockets rather than demanding money with threats. Detail is certainly better for painting than the Unholy Knights.

The bandits - watch your pockets

Ooze

If you check the Monster Manual you'll find Gray (sic) Ooze, and Green Slime is a hazard in the Dungeon Master's Guide. No Green Ooze though. 

However, Wildspire's stats make it clear that the Green Ooze is simply a recoloured Grey Ooze.

Lovely though the translucent green is, I'm far more likely to want a Grey Ooze or four, so I decided to paint two as Green Oozes and two as Grey Oozes.

Green Ooze 

The painting was pretty much the same as the Acid Elemental. I tried to be a bit more careful with the wash.

Green Ooze

Grey Ooze 

The Ooze was base coated with Vallejo Extra Opaque Charcoal Gray, then I added a few brown blotches (they are supposed to blend in with stonework). The whole lot was drybrushed with VGC Cold Grey and Stonewall Gray.  I think the hints of brown make them a bit more interesting.

And Grey Ooze

Once matt varnished I used Vallejo Gloss Varnish on all the oozes to make them look wet.

These are really good minis, possibly with more detail than the subject merits.

There's a nice bit of detail on the underside of the head? pseudopod? tentacle? Some sort of mouth possibly. Maybe for feeding? It's not obvious from the above picture, so here's an upside down close up.

Detail on the underside

So that's it, apart from the giant, which I've already started painting (probably for Kings of War).

These have been a fun project, and are a great addition to my RPG minis. I'm pleasantly surprised at how well I've kept focused on the project. This is probably because there was a lot of variety in the set, and sticking to just four minis at a time kept up the impetus. 

I'll post a summary of my thoughts on the set, and also look at the rest of the range shortly. I just want to get a group photo done. 

Wildspire Index

Wildspire Introduction

Painted Bugbears, Mummies and Dire Wolves

Painted Naga, Acid Elemental, Earth Elemental and Air Elemental

Painted Cultists, Harpies and Ghouls

Painted Werewolves, Giant Worms and Wild Boar

Painted Gas Serpents, Imp Hulks and Unholy Knights

Painted Bandits and Ooze

Painted Giant 

Wildspire Summary

Wildspire Miniatures Gas Serpent, Imp Hulk, Unholy Knight

Another batch of three different sculpts, and we're nearing the end of the set.

Eleven more minis

Gas serpent

There are only three of these in the set. Why? I've no idea. 

Still, they look nice, and should be fairly easy minis to paint. 

When I painted the Air Elemental I thought the same technique would work fine for these. However, after checking the free PDF, (and realising they are called Gas Serpents, not Vapour Serpents) I wanted something close to a turquoise-ish colour, but still preserving their translucent nature.

As an experiment I tried Army Painter Speedpaint Prismatic Bolt. The serpents have wispy vapour trailing off them, and I wanted this to look a bit different.  So I gave the snakes themselves a coat of the Prismatic Bolt and finished off with the Vallejo Game Wash Pale Gray for the vapour. 

The bases were finished off with Vallejo Game Color Cold Gray.

Gas Serpents, bound to be useful somewhere

Imp Hulks

Next up were the four Imps, or rather Imp Hulks, explaining the bigger size. 

I went for red skin here to match the Monster Manual imp. 

Over a prime (I used Vallejo Surface Primer German Green Brown, but it doesn't really matter what colour, though perhaps not black) I painted a base coat of Vallejo Extra Opaque Dark Red mixed with a bit of black for a really dark red. This was then drybrushed with VGC Red Gore, then Blood Red, Flaming Orange and finally Hot Orange.

Final details were an opportunity to add some extra spot colours, so yellow eyes, grey claws and a poisonous looking green on the stinger on the tail (love that VMC Livery Green).

The drybrushing did get a bit tedious, but the worst part by far was painting the base while trying not to get grey on the imp (not always successfully).

Imp Hulks

Unholy Knights 

I've been looking forward to painting these since I first saw them, they look suitably impressive foes.

After priming I painted all the metals in VGC Chainmail Silver.

Then I did the cloak; black of course, starting with black and then shading up with VEO Charcoal.

The armour and cloak were washed with Vallejo Game Wash Black, which I keep forgetting is a bit too good at covering detail, especially when that detail is rather shallow. I tried to bring back some of the highlights with Silver 

I took the opportunity to vary the colours on the other bits of fabric to help with identification on the tabletop. Then I picked out a few ornamental bits on the armour and sword in VGC Tinny Tin, Brazen Bronze and finally Shining Gold.

The skull was painted pretty much the same as my old school skeletons. There isn't really much detail on the hands, so I painted them as leather gauntlets.  But that looked dull, so I dotted in some VGC Bonewhite and White to give the impression of fingers. It's not my neatest, but it doesn't look too bad.

The whole lot got a wash with Marine Juice, which pretty much covered the highlights on the cloak, so that got another drybrush with Charcoal Gray to bring them back.

I found the Knights less fun than I thought. I was continually frustrated by the lack of detail, so my usual base coat - highlights - wash technique wasn't that effective.

Still, they're done and they're ok. I'll probably use them as Wights or perhaps some sort of undead boss monster.

Unholy Knights

So another batch done, and relatively quickly too.

The collection is growing nicely and I'm very pleased with my progress.

What's Next?

Well, only nine left. I'll get the remaining Medium sized minis done soon and I have plans regarding the giant so I'm saving her for later.

I do have a summary post looking at the whole set and the others available coming soon.

Not many left

I'd also like to get a bit more scenery done to take advantage of Dave Stone's Season of Scenery challenge.

And there's my Undead to return to.

And I'd like to do some more Kings of War stuff too.

I'm not short of options.

Wildspire Index

Wildspire Introduction

Painted Bugbears, Mummies and Dire Wolves

Painted Naga, Acid Elemental, Earth Elemental and Air Elemental

Painted Cultists, Harpies and Ghouls

Painted Werewolves, Giant Worms and Wild Boar

Painted Gas Serpents, Imp Hulks and Unholy Knights

Painted Bandits and Ooze

Painted Giant 

Wildspire Miniatures: Werewolves, Giant Worms and Wild Boar

Here's another batch of twelve painted Wildspire Miniatures. 

The next batch

Werewolves

The next dip pulled out the werewolves.  

These certainly look the part, bipedal wolf-like humanoids with fragments of clothing. Otherwise they have no equipment. 

It made sense to approach these in the same way as the Dire Wolves, so I prepared them the same way.  

As previously noted, they have visible gaps where some of the arms were glued in place, but similar gaps on the Ghouls seemed OK, so I left them. 

I used exactly the same colour scheme for the fur as the Dire Wolves; although the later are small for the official creatures, I think they look just right for a lycanthrope in beast form.

Then I painted the torn clothing with Speedpaints, carefully choosing lighter and darker shades. 

And the next morning I looked at them and I really didn't like them. 

Poor paint choice

The colours look too garish, and there's no real contrast. There's nothing wrong with the fur, so I left that alone and went over the clothing.  I added highlights to the skirt? thing and painted the shirt? With VGC Khaki, highlighting with Bonewhite then Off White. Finally it got a shade of Marine Juice. 

Much better. 

Four finished Werewolves

Giant Worms, or Baby Purple Worms

Next was the Giant Worms. The sculpt is very reminiscent of the Monster Manual picture of a Purple Worm, and Wildspire's own stats PDF suggests they are essentially mini Purple Worms.

They had quite obvious mould lines along the belly. I removed these with a flat file, then used a triangular file to restore some of the lost details. In some cases this left a gap running up the belly segments, but I imagine the worms take quite a bit of damage as they burrow through rock.

I gave them pale bellies using the same method as the Naga. The upper side is a base coat of Vallejo Game Color Hexed Lichen, highlighted by mixing in VGC Warlock Purple and then Squid Pink. No exact ratios, I just used three dollops of the paints on my wet palate.

To tone down the rather pink highlights and add a bit more definition to the underbelly I gave everything a wash of Marine Juice. 

The various spikes were black, with a dot of Vallejo Extra Opaque Charcoal as a highlight. The disturbed earth on the base was painted with various browns and greys.

Baby Purple Worms

Wild Boar

I'll admit that I wanted the Wild Boar to be brown, based on the rather muddy boars I've seen in the Dales.

Wild Boar, what colour?

This also informed my choice of greys for the Wolves and Werewolves so they'd contrast nicely.

A Google search suggests that most boar are closer to dark greys and black, but never mind.  It's fantasy after all. 

I used Vallejo Surface primer German Green Brown and then gave them a thinned coat of VGC Terra trying to leave the belly in the primer colour. While it was still wet I then worked in Beasty Brown  along the haunches and back. I then added Scorched Brown, which simply gave a disappointing muddy colour. I finished off with black along the spine. Yes, I know it's pretty much the same patterning as the wolves, but I think it gives a reasonably believable animal look, spoilt only by my impatience with the Scorched Brown.

Finishing off with dark grey snout and trotters, and suitably off white tusks and they were almost done.

Not the most interesting minis, but not that boring

So twelve more minis painted.  

The Werewolves gave me problems with the Speedpainted clothing and the Worms were tricky, simply because I struggle painting purple (they actually came out a lot better than I hoped).  The Boars are a bit dull, but OK. I very rarely use boar in my games, but painting them has given me some ideas for some Old School minis that I'll one day get around to painting.

What's Next?

That's 40 minis painted, so I'm two thirds of the way through, counting that massive Giant as one (I'm sure Gimli would approve).

Seven of the remaining minis are translucent plastic, so that should speed things up a bit.

Just twenty left to paint

But I'd like to get some of my other ongoing projects back on track, so I might intersperse the remaining twenty with some other stuff.

Wildspire Index

Wildspire Introduction

Painted Bugbears, Mummies and Dire Wolves

Painted Naga, Acid Elemental, Earth Elemental and Air Elemental

Painted Cultists, Harpies and Ghouls

Painted Werewolves, Giant Worms and Wild Boar

Painted Gas Serpents, Imp Hulks and Unholy Knights

Painted Bandits and Ooze

Painted Giant 

Season of Scenery Scatter Terrain for Albion

Dave Stone's Season of Scenery lasts until the end of September, so I took little break between painting Wildspire Miniatures to do a bit of terrain. 

The Dark Shadows campaign requires 'standing stones' for one of the scenarios, and they are thematic for what is essentially 'Fantasy-Celtic-Ancient-Britain' (a statement that I appreciate makes no sense whatsoever). My first thoughts were to do a series of trilithons Stonehenge style, but I recently found a box of very old home cast chess pieces and they got me thinking. 

A collection of terrain pieces

These are from the Isle of Lewis* set, and I made these with my mother back in the early 1970s. These are actually various miscasts, which is probably why they were put away in a box, to be forgotten for decades. I assume the head and shoulders of the rather sombre chap were simply a way to use up excess resin.

They certainly aren't Neolithic in style, not are they carved with Ogham script as the scenario suggests, but they do look like they might be channelling magic of some kind, perhaps trapping it in the knotwork carvings.

The Raw Materials: fifty (ish) year old chess pieces

While they aren't much use as chess pieces, they will make great bits of terrain. Any imperfections are now evidence of weathering and damage and simply add to the effect.

For this first batch I based up seven** of the pawns and the top part of one of the rooks. I used foam board and then built it up slightly with acrylic modelling paste. One of the white pawns had an air bubble right at the top. I tried smoothing it down, but it was a very deep bubble. So I smashed the top off so it would look like a damaged stone.

Painting

Painting was straightforward. I went for a look rather like these actual runestones, a dark greyish brown.

Viking Runestones in the Nationalmuseet in Copenhagen

 

I added lots of green stains as they've been out in the wet Albionian weather for generations. 

Viking runestones have the runes picked out in red; pigment still remains in some of them, and museums tend to recreate this effect. I hinted at this, but most of the colour has gone over the years and lack of attention from the locals.

This took more effort than I thought it would; two coats of Vallejo Game Color Gory Red didn't really show up much. Finally I went over the lines with Vallejo Model Color Scarlet, which seems to do the trick.

Basing

They were based up rather like the boulders I did back in November last year, but I did have to dust off excess grout before the sealant stage (hmm, perhaps it would make good weathering powder?).

I chose quite lush vegetation for the bases; Albion is supposed to be more than a little rainy (clearly not based on the UK this summer at least). The runestones also got a nice flower on each base as well. The broken runestone is clearly functioning less well, just compare it's base.

Three of the stones

Broken stone and broken statue

View from the other side

There's nothing that special about these, but I like the end result and I really enjoyed working with something I started years ago with my mum. They'll come in useful for many games beyond just the Dark Shadows campaign. I think they give a certain atmosphere to a table. While I like the standing stones, my favourite piece is the top of the statue. I'm sure the locals have lots of tales and legends about him!

I should say that the idea certainly isn't original; I'm sure I've seen similar chess pieces used as statues in old White Dwarf battle reports. 

To give some sense of scale, here's a couple of the pieces next to a WizKids hobgoblin (effectively human sized).

Size comparison

What's Next?

I've some more complete pieces that might make good statues, though I'm not sure how well the bishops will fit in fantasy games. The seated king and queen in particular would look great.

I've also got the Wildspire Miniatures to plod on with, and I want to get stuff done for more Kings of War.

* The Lewis chess pieces are twelfth century, found as part of a horde on the Isle of Lewis in the nineteenth century. They are mostly carved from walrus ivory. It is thought that the pieces are from several different sets.

Wikipedia has a useful article giving more detail. 

** Yes I know there are eight pawns on the photo of them as found. I'm keeping the best cast one in case I want to make a press mould for some of that nice decoration.