Rangers of Shadow Deep - More Heroes

I Can Stop Anytime I Like

I find kit bashing minis for games such as Rangers of Shadow Deep almost compulsive. I sit surrounded by sprues and hold them against each other to see what bits look good together. I've also got a compartmentalized box with lots of bits clipped off largely emptied sprues so I can root through various different weapon and equipment options. 

Anyway, while doing this I built a couple more Companions along with the Ranger I briefly mentioned in my planning post.

Man-at-Arms, Ranger and Archer

The New Companions

The Man-at-Arms and the Archer are straightforward builds from the Oathmark Human Infantry sprue, so don't really count as kit bashing.

The painting is straightforward. They both have Vallejo Game Color Sick Green tunics and VGC Green collars. The leather armour is VGC Leather and I gave each of them some yellow somewhere. 

The two currently unnamed Companions

They got some highlights before the Marine Juice, then a few details, such as the shield design, buckles and metal studs, then a few more highlights where required.  I kept the shield design simpler than on the earlier Man-at-Arms, perhaps he is from a different division?  I think I got his skin tone a bit better than my first attempts with Bellisara, in fact I went back and repainted her hands and face using the same recipe.  He does have a bit of an 'early morning stare' though.

Conorith the Ranger

Conorith is the Ranger I used in a three player game last year (mentioned in the previous post about the Recruits). He's equipped with heavy armour, a two handed weapon and a crossbow. I was deliberately going for a very 'fighty' Ranger, no magical abilities at all. 

My first thought was to choose a body from the Frostgrave Knights sprue, but building the various Companions left me with the Human Infantry cloaked body, and I do like my Rangers to wear cloaks or long coats. 

I particularly wanted him to have a Greatsword, and there's a nice one on the Frostgrave Soldiers 1 sprue, but it's held resting on the shoulder. What to do with the left arm? I tried various arms with crossbows, but they were all obviously firing rather than just holding the weapon and looked wrong. In the end I slung a crossbow on his back (a bit of cutting and filing removed the hand holding it). Thin plastic provided a suggestion of some rope holding it in place (actually the waste from drilling holes in the minis legs for pinning - waste not, want not). 

Because the Rangers are explorers as well as fighters I gave him a torch, again from the Frostgrave Soldiers sprue. I can have a go at object source lighting I thought.

Conorith the Ranger

I painted him alongside the Companions, but went on to add extra highlights and details after the Marine Juice. 

The OSL was simply a drybrush of VGC Moon Yellow on the bits that looked like they'd catch the light from the flame. I'm not convinced it looks that good (it's worse in real life than on the photos), still, I'll keep on practicing.

So there we go. More than enough Heroes for games of Rangers of Shadow Deep, and of course they'll do nicely for roleplaying games and other skirmish games. Very enjoyable to build and to paint.