Paint What You Got Challenge 25/26 Roundup

Well that's Dave Stone's Paint What You Got Challenge over with until December. 

I set myself a couple of goals: paint the minis for the second Rangers of Shadow Deep mission and paint the minis for the Middle Earth Strategy Battle Game storybook Fellowship of the Ring,  or at least the first half. I did a breakdown of the requirements in December if you're interested. 

How Did it Go?

I'll confess that I didn't manage everything, but I did manage a lot of it. Let's have a look at what I did manage. 

Rangers of Shadow Deep Mission Two 

I assembled (taking advantage of Anne's 2026 Miniature  Assembly Challenge for extra impetus) and painted 15 plastic gnolls, 1 metal gnoll Shaman and a kitbashed Ranger and a Reaper Bones Vulture. 

Gnoll sergeants, shaman and vulture

The gnoll 'staff'

The Warriors

Six gnolls running away?

Gnoll archers

'Dum-de-dum-de-dum-de-dum'

The gnolls go together pretty well, and bits from other Frostgrave kits can be used, as I did with the great axe for one of the sergeants.  If/when I build the remaining sprue, there's a two handed hammer on the Barbarians sprue that I think I'll use.  

While they were fun to paint, I regret making the decision early on to use as many different colours on the cloth as I could.  

Another Ranger (of the Shadow Deep)

Kitbashed from many sources

The ranger is made up from bits from the Frostgrave Barbarians sprue and the Oathmark Human Infantry sprue, with the scabbard from the Light Infantry set.

I also painted a couple of resin tents and a resin piece with fallen lög, shields, backpacks etc. for the gnolls' camp. These are from Scotia Grendel; nice models, if, perhaps, not quite 'gnollish'.

The campsite

Nine homemade bushes for the first scenario in Mission two.  These were a quick build, there's a full description coming sometime soon.

Ranger and gnoll hide and seek among the shrubbery

The second scenario requires a lot of scatter terrain for the inside of the tower.  Here's a start, but I'll need a lot more.

The crates and the board use Crooked Staff Print and Paste textures; the Build Along Dungeon for the floor textures and 19; Chests and Crates for the crates.  There are many similar products available; I like the Crooked Staff stuff as its cheap (Build Along dungeon 1 is, I believe, free, and the rest are pay what you want) easy to make and generally relatively low on ink use and I like the art style. 

I may print off some more floor texture and base the crates in small groups once I've built some more. 

Fellowship of the Ring Journeybook 

This was the big disappointment.  I managed two Rangers of the North, that's all. These took a lot longer to convert than I anticipated, it's my own fault for being too fussy (or too tight to buy the actual minis). 

I enjoyed building and painting them, and I'll continue with them, but possibly with a more realistic timescale. Once I have enough finished, I'll do a post discussing how I make them, and possibly why I bother. 

And yes, I know the bases are untextured; I'll do all nine at once when they are finished.

Two Rangers of the North

"Shadow Deep? What's that?"

Hints and Mysteries

In my last post I suggested that I had a unit painted for my undead that I was keeping secret.  Well, on closer inspection, I haven't finished the shields, so you can rest easy on that front Dave.

Challenging Fun 

Once again I really enjoyed taking part in the challenge and thanks to Dave Stone for all the work he puts in to organising this and the Season of Scenery challenges every year.

If I didn't finish everything I wanted to, it's my own fault for either being too ambitious or too distracted, especially as I've had a lot of rehearsals to fit in as well for April concerts.

What's Next?

I'll continue to prepare stuff for Mission Two, and I want to get more MESBG stuff done, but I promised something new for March, so expect some Deep Space action soon.

Paint What You Got Challenge 25/26 - Photo Finish

Today's the final day of Dave Stone's Paint What You Got Challenge and, while I haven't finished everything I planned back in December, I've got to a straight edge, so I'm calling it done.  

This is what I've managed to get painted in the time allowed.

The Finished Haul

I'll do a longer post soon, discussing the minis, but for now, here's a photo showing it all*

*Actually, there is more. I've got a unit done for my undead for Bodvoc's Dark Shadows campaign, but I'm keeping them a secret for now.

Paint What You Got Challenge, Two Weeks to go*

Dave Stone's Paint What You Got Challenge finishes on the 26th of February, so how am I doing?

Well it could be better, a combination of other tasks and obligations (not to mention concert rehearsals) means that I've not had as much time hobbying as I'd like. 

Still, I'm well on with the gnolls for Rangers of Shadow Deep. 

Progress so far

I've finished the first batch of five gnolls, plus another five from the ones I built for Anne's Miniature Assembly Challenge.  I've also finished off the last little bits on the vulture and the campsite bits.

Ten Gnolls

 

All the minis were painted with Army Painter Speedpaints.  I was looking for fairly washed out colours, old cloth that the Gnoll have stolen or scavenged. I think Speedpaints work rather well for this. 

I prepared the first five with a grey prime, black shade and white drybrush.  For the second batch I primed in light brown, washed with Army Painter Strong Tone and drybrushed with Vallejo Game colour Off White (the campsite was a test of this). I'd hoped it would give a warmer effect, but I'm not convinced there's much difference.  

I've also changed slightly the way I did the metals.  I used VGC Chainmail after the bulk of the Speedpaints were applied, then shaded it with Gravelord Grey.

I might add a few extra details, such as teeth and claws, but they'll do for now. 

Gnoll Archers 

The shooty gnolls. These are armed with bows, but I've a couple more with crossbows to paint. 

Four gnoll archers

Twang

Gnoll Soldiers 

The fighty group.  There's a good variety of miscellaneous weaponry here. I thought about shield designs, but then I see them as crude wooden construction.  Anyway, the gnolls don't care.

The warrior section

Gnoll Sergeants and Recon

Gnoll sergeants use two handed weapons, there are two options on the sprue.  I like the idea of the hood like cloth denoting rank, I just wish I'd thought of it when I built the first sergeant with the axe, but I've kept the red theme in  his eyepatch. 

They are accompanied by their vulture.

Sergeants and vulture

I'm pleased to have got these done, but they were, at times, a shore.  Part of the reason is my decision to go multi-coloured on the clothing.  I think I over did this, and I got a bit obsessive in trying to make the different models look as different colour wise as possible.  I'd have been better off choosing three distinct colours and applying them over all the minis.

What's Next?

I've the remaining five gnolls, plus their shaman already started, and three rangers to finish too, one of the Shadow Deep, and two of The North.  I'd like to get some more done, but I think time is going to run away with me.  I wonder if I can claim the Julian Defence again?

* Probably considerably less by the time this gets posted.

PWYG 25/26 and AMAC 26 Further Progress

I'm around three weeks into Dave Stone's Paint What You Got Challenge and a couple of weeks into Anne's Miniature Assembly Challenge.  

So how's it going?

PWYG

Well it's been a busy week outside of the hobby (lots of music), and I've done very little painting, so PWYG has been a bit in the background apart form a bit more paint on those zombies.  I haven't even managed to finish of the 

AMAC

I have managed to assemble another five gnolls, finishing the plastic gnolls I wanted for the second Rangers of Shadow Deep mission.  There's still the Herbalist/Shaman, but he's the metal model I got at RECON last year, so doesn't count for the assembly challenge.

The next batch of gnolls

Four of the gnolls are pretty standard, I used the crossbows this time, rather than bows. For a bit of variety,  I used the greataxe from the first Frostgrave Barbarians set. It fits pretty well on the gnoll bodies,  and the bits of armour help sell the idea of the sergeant being a bit tougher. The arms are a bit more muscled than the gnolls, but I guess the sergeants get first dibs on any protein?

Whats Next?

I want to get soem Dunedain built for the early scenarios in the Fellowship of the Ring book.  These will be kitbashed, based on the GW plastic Rangers of Gondor.  I plan on adding a few bits from various sprues to make them look less like the Rangers of Ithilien, so hopefully they count in the challenge.

I've a couple more minis I'd like to build too, more on those later.

PWYG 25/26 Progress Update, and More Challenges

Well, two weeks into Dave Stone's Paint What You Got Challenge, so how's it going?

Here's where I've got to so far. Nothing is actually finished, but I've got a fair bit of painting done. I'm waiting for suitable weather/a varnish restock/better light to complete the current batch.

I've also joined two more challenges, one of which shouldn't interfere with progress, the other has caused me to change the order in which I do things, more on this later.

The Tower, First Batch 

The first five gnolls

I started with a sprues' worth of Frostgrave gnolls; five minis. In this case I built two fighters, two archers and one sergeant.  They should all be quite easily identified by their equipment. 

I used a combination of Speedpaints and Xpress paints on these.  I'm sure I could achieve a better result with base coat, wash, highlights etc, but nowhere near as quickly. 

The gnoll's flesh was a 1:1 mix of Army Painter Speedpaint Sand Golem and Pallid Bone.  Once thoroughly dry I added Vallejo Xpress Paint Copper Brown for the shaggier hair, principally the 'mane' and head. I added a few spots of this on the less hairy skin areas too, after all, they are supposed to be hyena type humanoids. 

The various bits of cloth bandage and wraps were a 1:1 mix of APS Pallid Bone and White. I wanted this to stand out from the skin colour,  which just Pallid Bone wouldn't have done. I'm considering going over this with a grey colour,  for even better contrast. 

The various cloth colours came from my APS collection, often mixed with Pallid Bone for a more realistic look.

As of this post, I've still to finish these gnolls, but it's mostly the little details. You know, the ones that take the longest.

Three Reaper Bones

As I was painting the gnolls, I added three Reaper Bones to the batch; another Shadow Knight (in case we use the Challenge setting), a Vulture for the first scenario, and an elf, simply because I seem to be short of male Rangers; in that cloak, his fey features aren't obvious. 

The vulture is just about finished; Speed/Xpress paints again, with a few Vallejo Game Color paints for a few little details.  The wing tips are red as, apparently, the forces of the Shadow Deep do this as part of a ritual to control the birds.

Happy campers

I've also done a bit of scenery.  The first scenario calls for a gnoll camp; I had planned on making up some crude tents and perhaps a campfire.  Then I found a couple of resin tents and a log with adventuring gear. These are from Scotia Grendel Productions, and were given to me by Grim many years ago.  I'm missing the campfire, but hopefully that will turn up eventually.

They were given a quick wash in hot soapy water, then I tried a slightly different prep for the Slapchop. 

I gave them a prime with Vallejo German Green Primer,  then a wash of Army Painter Strongtone,  and finally a heavy drybrush of Vallejo Model Color Sand. 

Then it was a case of various Speedpaints and Xpress paints as required. 

The change to the priming and washing was to try and improve the colour in deep shade areas and to give a warmer look; appropriate, I think, for the canvas and the tree. 

I like the results, and I'll experiment further. 

The little details, such as shields, bottles etc were painted in using my normal minis paints.

These are nice models, though perhaps not quite how I imagine gnolls to go camping.  The shields are either Crusader shields (I have tried to make this less obvious with my colour choice) or a Celtic design,  an odd combination. 

Ten assorted zombies

Finally,  I'm continuing with these ten zombies for my Warlords of Erehwon undead.  I started them before Christmas and they are a mixed bunch of manufacturers. 

Like the zombies themselves,  progress continues slowly. 

More Challenges?

I found out about Anne's 2026 Miniature Assembly Challenge from Dave Stone's blog. Essentially, it's to assemble minis, something that I planned to do anyway.  The challenge runs until the end of January,  so I'm weighting my mini building this month with the hope that I can do the bulk of the painting in February. 

To this end I'm building all the gnolls for The Bridge Guards scenario, and I might do the Dunedain for the first couple of The Fellowship of the Ring scenarios as well.  I'll convert some of the plastic Rangers of Gondor, so hopefully they'll count as assembled too. 

I've also got an individual mini or two that I'd like to get done, but these are very much extras.

So my pledge is to assemble ten more gnolls (might as well get three sprues worth done).

Plus 4 to 9 Dunedain, depending on how many I can find. 

And as a bonus I'd like to kitbash a Dark Emissary for Bodvoc's Dark Shadows campaign. 

Assembled Gnolls

Here's five more gnolls,  assembled and ready for painting.  There's nothing special about them, though I've swapped bodies for the archers and warriors for a bit of variety.  I'm keeping the body with bits of armour for the sergeants, and this time I've given him one of the hooded heads as a badge of rank.

Five assembled gnolls

Bonus Ranger

Whilst looking through my sprues I found a cloaked Frostgrave Barbarian. I like my rangers to wear cloaks, so with a bit of shaving off of various teeth and other trophies, plus a head and arms from the Oathmark Human infantry sprue, here's another Ranger of Alladore.

A new ranger

What's next?

More assembling, obviously, but I still plan to get some painting done this month; I might as well get the stuff I've started finished, and I've a game pencilled in with Bodvoc for the end of the month for which I need to finish off a unit (and paint from scratch a new mini, but I haven't 'got' it yet, so it doesn't count for PWYG).

Oh, and one more challenge

Rantings From under the Wargames Table has challenged hobby bloggers, follow the link for details.

Here's his suggested list of blogs to at least glance at.  There's a lot, but I've found them to be interesting and entertaining, I'm even following some of them long term now.

Azazels Bitz Box

Bogenworld

Carrion Crow Buffet

Dead Dicks Tavern

Fantorical

Gisby’s Gaming Blog

Guru Pig

Imperial Rebel Ork

Just Needs Varnish

Leadballoony

Mark A Morin

PM Painting

Pat’s 1/72 Military Diorama’s

Skinflint Games

SP’s Projects Blog

The Imperfect Modeller

War Through The Ages & Other Dark horrors

Wargames sculptors blog

Anne’s Immaterium

Dragons Of Lancasm

Fawcett Avenue Conscripts

 The wargaming erratic

The bovine overlord

not quite mechanised

And, of course, the aforementioned Rantings From Under the Wargames Table

To these I'll add: 

Realm of Chaos 80s, ideal for  Oldhammer stuff

The War Crow, run by my long time friend/opponent Bodvoc

And good friend T'Other One's Vault of the Undead, (not just undead)

Please give them a look, and follow them if there's anything of interest to you. 

Speaking personally, the best thing you can do is to leave a comment.  It gives me a boost to know that fellow hobbyists like what I'm doing, and really helps inspire me to do more.

And if you like the idea of the challenge, the details are on the original post.

 

PWYG 25/26 Planning

A little while ago I ran through a few options for Dave Stone's latest Paint What You Got Challenge. 

If you've been pondering what I've been pondering, (I think so Brain), you'll see that some of them build nicely on games I'm enjoying at the moment, or have recently; some are more for systems that I rarely play. 

It makes sense to go for the former, but then, I'm not always sensible.

So here's a look at what I'd actually need for a couple of the projects. 

The Tower, Rangers of Shadow Deep

Miniatures 

This mission mostly involves gnolls.  Looking at all three scenarios, and allowing for the event cards, I'd need 1 Shadow Knight, 1 Flesh Golem, 1 Gnoll Shaman, 2 Gnoll Sergeants, 4 Gnoll Archers, 6 Gnoll Fighters, 1 Giant Vulture and a Soldier (Man-at-Arms). If I factor in the Challenge Level additions I'll need another Shadow Knight, another Sergeant and an Ogre.

Now I already have a painted Shadow Knight, a FleshGolem and an Ogre, and a few Men-at Arms too. after picking up the gnoll herbalist at RECON I've got the rest of the required minis, they just need assembling and painting. 

Terrain 

The first scenario is outside, so it might be time to finally make a proper gaming mat with reasonable colours and textures. I'm looking at it as practice for something larger. 

I'd also need a river, a bridge and various rocks and shrubs. All useful terrain items for future gaming. 

The remaining scenarios are set indoors, for which I'll simply print off some dungeon style flooring.  I've got plenty of PDFs to choose from. 

Furnishings will probably come from the Mantic Terrain Crate, which I might finally get around to painting,  well some of it anyway. 

Fellowship of the Ring Journey Book

This is a project that I've long wanted to do, and now seems a good opportunity,  especially as 2026 is the 25th anniversary of the Fellowship of the Ring film release.  Don't you feel old now knowing that*.

To keep things manageable I think I'll stick to the first book of The Fellowship of the Ring, up to Rivendell.

For this I'd need 9 Nazgul (foot and mounted), 9 Dunedain, the 4 Hobbits, Gildor, 4 Barrow Wights,  Tom Bombadil and Goldberry, Aragorn, Gandalf and Glorfindal. I could add Farmer Cotton and his dogs if I include one of the additional scenarios from an old White Dwarf.

And there's terrain of course.  I'm not sure if I should stick to the builds in the book,  which do a great job of making thing as multipurpose as possible,  or do some more specific pieces.  I'll probably end up doing a bit of both.

A Cunning Plan

So that's the plan.  I do have some Undead that I'm part way through painting, so I'll try and finish those as well, but it'll be nice to do some living creatures for a change. 

I've started on building five of the gnolls using the Frostgrave gnolls kit.

And finally, the Christmas Haul

I was gifted four hobby related presents; a GM's mug, a deck of 7TV profile cards, a light pad (great for copying maps etc) and a lovely 3D printed Beholder.  So many thanks to my amazing family,  and T'Other One as well.

I'll be squeezing the Beholder into the challenge,  after all, I got it before the 26th.

* Don't worry,  I still remember the excitement over the imminent release of The Silmarillion.

Paint What You Got 25/26

Paintbrushes at Dawn

Dave Stone has announced the next Paint What You Got challenge over on Wargames Terrain Workshop.

I really enjoyed taking part in the last one, not only did it focus my hobby enough to get minis and terrain ready for the first Rangers of Shadow Deep mission, it also encouraged me to take part in more challenges this year.

The challenge runs from Boxing Day (26th December) to 26th February, and it's delightfully fuzzy. Simply paint stuff. 

I assume that it's not really the done thing to add new stuff (so any Christmas presents should just squeeze in), but maybe that's just me.

But What? 

Me taking part is certain; what I paint is less so. Here are some of the possibilities.

Rangers of Shadow Deep Mission Two. Since I did mission one last time, it would be fitting to do mission two this time. I don't need as many minis this time, mostly just gnolls, so I might have time to move on to something else.

More Undead. Bodvoc is planning a Warlords of Erehwon campaign, for which I will need to boost my Undead beyond the minis required for Terror of the Lichemaster. I've already got quite a bit to paint (so it ticks the 'got' box).

Orc's Drift. I realised the other day that I actually have just about everything I need for Bloodbath at Orc's Drift. I've painted the minis for Ashak Rise, so maybe pick another of the scenarios?

6mm Fantastic Battles. I've painted a good amount of dwarves and a more eclectic gang of orcs. I've got the minis, so perhaps I should get two decent armies finished?

Fellowship of the Ring Journey Book. The three journey books provided a good framework for a 'Slo-Gro' MESBG collection, with painting advice and terrain building too. I've long wanted to tackle this, so I could finally make a start. It's also an excuse to sort through my collection and thin it out somewhat. For instance, I've got more than nine Ringwraiths, clearly I can get rid of some.

Dungeons and Dragons Minis. I really enjoyed rationalising my undead collection for the Crypt of the Vampire Knight adventure. It would be a useful exercise to do the same with more of my RPG minis collection.

Choices

Phew, that's a lot of options. Knowing me, I'll probably end up doing something completely different. Regardless, I'll have a lot of fun, and hopefully I'll make a bit of a dint in the lead massif.

You're Welcome

Why not join us in the challenge? All you have to do is paint something during the two months and post pictures. Here's the link again, so you've no excuse. Leave Dave a comment on his post so he knows you want to take part.