And now, a more academically inclined wizard...

My Frostgrave warband has been coming along quite nicely both in terms of adding models to my collection as well as giving me constant excuses to paint new and only slightly different models.

Today I decided to circle back and update a character in my warband.  Professor Viatle has been the leader of my warband since I began the Thaw Of The Lich Lord campaign but I was never entirely happy with the miniature I was using.  When I first started the warband I had decided to use an old Lord Of The Rings model (Malbeth The Seer) but it once again fell into the 'old man with staff' look for a wizard and I'm honestly sick to death of that.

I wanted someone who looked mature but not 90+ years old and I also wanted to get away from the long robes and huge staff that most wizard figures favour.  The other concern with Frostgrave is that if I don't want to be endlessly mocked (and my fragile ego could never take that) then the figure must also look like they are equipped to deal with cold weather.

Sitting in a pile of figures I forgot I had I came across this Reaper Pathfinder model who was PERFECT for an updated version of Professor Vitale!

I love the layers on this figure, it really captures the feel of a lot of the Pathfinder artwork with characters looking like they are geared up for adventure in a utilitarian sort of way instead of a high fantasy artwork sort of way.

It was really nice to get this done because it always struck me as odd that the only figure in my warband I was never really excited about was it's leader and most powerful member.

-Jay

Dual purpose/Dual Wield

I'm playing in a Dungeon Crawl Classics game once more, this time as a thief with a short sword and an assortment of daggers.
I don't have a lot of figures that are armoured but lightly armoured in my backlog so I built something out a Bretonian man-at-arms and added some appropriate weapon arms from the Frostgrave soldier sprue.

Thus was born Jaqar; 4th level thief and member of the guild of The Grasping Hand.

The other thing that worked out about this is that I also needed a Treasure Hunter for Frostgrave and Jaqar will be doing double duty.  In Frostgrave most of the basic soldier types have 2 or 3 tiers of skill and value.  A Treasure Hunter is basic an upgraded thief,  So they're quick and lightly armoured but slightly more survivable than a starting thief and they also pack a stronger punch.

Painting one figure and getting 2 separate immediate uses out of it feels extra productive.

-Jay

Reindeer Games

Frostgrave has hit on a great combination of 'classic' fantasy creatures and items mixed in with some new and truly unique stuff.

When Thaw Of The Lich Lord was first announced one of the things that got me really excited about it was the idea of the Rangifers.  The Rangifers are reindeer-men or were-reindeer or something.  Their origin is intentionally poorly defined to add to the sense of ancient mystery surrounding Felstad but they are basically bipedal intelligent reindeer that hate the undead.

The rangifers were needed for the fifth scenario in Thaw Of The Lich Lord where the two warbands encounter a fight between a group of rangifers and one of the Lich Lord's deadly Wraith Knights.

For the next scenario I'll be needing a Zombie Troll but I need to get my new Dungeon Crawl Classic character model done first.

-Jay

Sellsword Captain and Les Impes!

This past weekend I finished up 4 more models for Frostgrave.  In spite of that I missed my deadline for getting my wizards done so boo me!

First up I needed a captain to join my Frostgrave warband.  There are a lot of different options for what kind of captain you can have but I wanted a fairly traditional older warrior type.  I had an extra Denethor (Boromir & Faramir's father) from Lord Of The Rings and he felt perfect.  He's wearing mail armour, armed with a sword and as a bonus has a fur-lined cloak so he felt he fit the background very well.  I went with a largely black colour scheme so he will blend in with some Darksword miniatures I'll be starting in a couple of weeks.

I also needed some Imps to add to the ever growing pile of wandering monsters.  I actually painted 5 of these same figures (on bevelled bases) last year for a D&D game but I wanted consistent basing across my Frostgrave stuff so I painted 3 new ones.  These are "Les Impes" from Ex Illis a Canadian wargame that had great figures but failed to get any traction in the market a few years ago.

Alright.  Here's my new "to-do" list  (all by Friday):
- 6 Rangifers (Frostgrave)
- The Mad Hatter (Batman Miniature Game)
- Mature Nephilim (Malifaux)

Maybe I'll get it ALL done for once

-Jay

Barbarian

Today a fierce barbarian joins the warband for Frostgrave!

The funny thing about getting this figure done is that for all my years playing D&D and Pathfinder I've never actually painted a barbarian before.  He's a pretty classically styled take on the character and he's one of those figures that seems to hit just the right balance between having a few extra details and textures without crossing the line into overdone.

That's one of my six needed miniatures from yesterday crossed off my list!

I actually painted this guy late last night (or early this morning) due to a bout of insomnia.  The upside of insomnia is that you can get some extra hobby work done, the downside is the no-sleep part.  Having said that I had time to get even more done last night but unfortunately the rest of the stuff I need for this week was unprimed so I couldn't work on it last night.  This did mean I worked on a few other pieces simply because they were primed and ready to go so I might have a few off-plan things getting finished up in the next couple of days.

Pre-weekend checklist:

1.  Barbarian for Frostgrave

2.  Soothsayer and Apprentice for Frostgrave

3.  Renegade and 2 Motorcycles for Dark Future

Crossing things off checklists is what separates us from the animals.

-Jay

Some scatter terrain and a bear!

We all go through different journeys through hobby gaming.  Some people start with role-playing games, some with collectible card games, some with euro games and some with miniatures.  It can be funny how where you start can sometimes influence how you buy, collect and use hobby materials years later.

When I first got into hobby gaming it was via the role-playing game route which then transitioned into miniatures.  That meant that when I first starting buying stuff on a 12 year-old's restrictive budget I prioritised rulebooks, then some models and after that scenery/maps.  As someone who has now been collecting for years I find I rush to get new books, buy models steadily (don't we all), then grab up cool buildings and scenery kits.  In the past I always played game with a lot of figures on each side so my scenery focus tended to be on "full-sized" pieces (buildings, hills, forests, etc) , now that I'm skirmish gaming more often I've found I have tons of scenery but a lot of it is too big or doesn't work well together.  To that end I've really only in the last couple of years started adding scatter terrain to my collection.  A while back I showed the two ruined Undertaker's carts I had done as an example.  In each of those cart boxes came a second pieces (2 crates with a sack draped over them) which I just finished up.  I also painted up 4 cake pillars to use in the Storm Of Undeath scenario from Thaw Of The Lich Lord.  Having done those I think I'm going to buy a second set and do them as broken pillars.

While shopping at Michael's for cake pillars I also came across a small vinyl toy bear figure.  I've been looking for a bear for Frostgrave but they seem to be really difficult to find.  I repainted this guy as a polar bear and he seems to work just fine.  He's quite a big beast (that's a 60mm base he's standing on) so even though he has a friendly look on his face I'm assuming he'll be quite menacing on the tabletop.

All right, so here's the count down for this week.  All of this stuff is do-or-die, I need it for an assortment of games/events I'm participating in this weekend.
1.  Barbarian for Frostgrave (needs to be done by Friday morning)
2.  Soothsayer and Apprentice for Frostgrave (need to be done by Saturday morning)
3.  Renegade & 2 Motorcycles for Dark Future (need to be done by Saturday night)

Wish me luck!

-Jay

Ice Spiders for Frostgrave

Another wandering monster has wandered in; Ice Spiders!

These are Reaper Bones figures so they are fairly basic but they will serve their purpose.  They're nice chunky figures (they are on GW 32mm bases for reference).

I've got four more projects (five more figures) that NEED to get done by Saturday....keep watching this space!

-Jay