Send Reinforcements: I need more Adventurers - Female Elf Adventurers

The eldest son is off at university and it comes as no surprise, he is soon to be found running a Dungeons and Dragons campaign with new found friends (and hopefully attending some lectures). The "gaming group" are obviously expanding into new character classes (or perhaps needing replacements for dead characters?) as he wants an urgent "resupply" from his toy cupboard (see below, lead figures were consequently pulled from their retirement sanctuary of the "cupboard cloisters" [after being carefully packed away on his departure] and thrown once more into the frenzied life of adventuring, with new eager young hands waiting to push them around a tabletop, trying to doing unspeakable things [and probably failing ignominiously, as I remember doing]): 

"Please send elves, female elves, I need adventurous female elves!" Dad sighs. "Don't we all son! Try the University Bar on a Friday night." The son is not impressed. "Thanks dad, I need lead figures! "Ok, looking into my side of the figure collection I bring out some old Grenadier classics. These ladies will be some forty five years old, or older. I wonder if they will survive the modern tabletop experience (see below, a female ranger and a female monk [or so I am lead to believe if I recall the listings correctly], they are painted green so they must obviously elves):

A close up of the figures and to my shame the female monk has some "chipped paint" -- gasp -- on her staff, but fear not she should still be able to blend in nicely to the forest backdrop, pity as they are destined for dungeon delving (see below, farewell my lovely ladies. I fear I may never see you again as they have been passed onto another's (un)worthy hands, I hope you get beyond third level (base) with my son and his friends as I never did - too lightly armoured for my dumb ass style of play, I always needed to be wearing chain or plate mail!):  

Final thoughts? He will be after my Orcs next, which means I will have to finish painting them! I mean I have only had them just under twenty years?

Waterdeep - The Tavern of the Yawning Portal

Waterdeep - The Tavern of the Yawning Portal (see below, a rather challenging task for a DM to describe to the adventurers as they are hauled up for the first time): 

Instead of walking in through the tavern door like most folk - mysteriously the party are pulled up one by one from a room (which I inserted) in the Lost Mines of Phandelver adventure! A curious seg-way perhaps but the characters seemed up for it!

Personal D&D Highlight of the current Campaign: "Elven Magic User, do you remember the time when, ..."

Snuggly settled into a quiet corner of a tavern, the players reminisce together: "Elven Magic User, do you remember the time when, ..."

" ... You got scared after a Spectator hit you with a ray and you sprinted off down a random dungeon corridor screaming at the top of your voice until you were out of sight? And then, when we eventually found you, weren't you chained to a large rock, barely clothed, shivering in the middle of a cavern surrounded by [as yet] unanimated skeletons? 

We rescued you but you kindly forgot to tell us about, ... the fact that a Wraith had put you there as bait to lure the party into the cavern and he was coming to get us?" ... pause ...  "And, as the Wraith was 'getting us' you were totally without any magical powers of any sort to help us - being striped of spell books and ingredients for spells, by the clever Wraith. 

And ... if it wasn't for the fact that 'Beady' our lovable, but slightly murderous Gnome thief was secretly [as in unbeknownst to the rest of the party] possessed and under the malevolent power of an ancient, evil, intelligent artefact - which made Beady hand itself over [that is the evil artefact, aka a 'Mark of Chaos' - which everybody is now agreed as a "bad ass" thing for him to pick up in the first place and not tell us] to the Wraith which was then .. to our complete surprise .. was consumed by an unnatural red ball of energy that opened a dimensional portal, out from which stepped forth a Greater Demon spitting forth lightning and destruction - which we narrowly ducked, despite it bringing the roof of the cavern partially down?" 

Gasp of breath and sip of beer, then the Dwarf continued ...

"Which meant that, instead of being simple undead servants of the Wraith, we were alive but now responsible for releasing a terrible monster into the realm of men-elf-dwarf-gnome, the likes of which has never been seen in centuries and something we are desperately trying to hide from all the authorities, despite their persistent questioning?" 

Now that is a good tale for a long, dark, wintry, night in a tavern - providing it doesn't end up in a bar room brawl (see below, the scene in question from the adventure, proof that 'a fellow party character in need' [magic-user chained to a large rock] is definitely a pest of the highest order): 

Meanwhile back at the bar ...

"Yes?" said the Elf rather truculently, "I do kind Dwarf, I do remember the incident in question, but what of it?". "Well I only ask," said the Dwarf sipping his tankard of beer which was almost empty, "because I thought, isn't it your round at the bar?"

Old School Friends continue our D&D Dungeon Hack

Damn it, is it not a frustrating blast when those darn adventurers get their act together and bamboozle a clump of dangerous looking monsters (in this case a band of five Bugbears). By deft and cunning use of a magician's familiar, a Dragon Breath spell (see cotton wool below in the picture below) which as it came from a completely unexpected direction, "spooked" the monsters into stampeding into a well set up trap, aka killing zone (see below, as their "singed" [Bugbear] leader fell along side another Bugbear to the deft back-stabbing of the party's two thieves [the tiny Gnome thief dropping down from a point above the archway - a set-up that is becoming his trademark move], the "force morale" of the remaining three Bugbears crumbled [as per the three Bugbears exiting south at the bottom of the photograph]): 

Catching but a short breath the adventurers then moved onto the "next room" and came across another three Bugbears plus their Drow overseer. Two of the Bugbears and the Drow were distracted as they searching in a chasm for "something" (see the figures in the white 'chasm floor' area [top part] in the photograph below). Silence whispers and mutterings  - the PCs were up to something. Sure enough they had a "plan" very similar to their last escapade. However, the party's next assassination plan (meticulously worked out beforehand) came unstuck right at the start of its execution. The magician's familiar was this time spotted and "plucked" from the sky [by exactly "what" the party are not sure of], but at least the party's thieving duo still managed to take out the isolated Bugbear on guard duty up top, already dead as he toppled to the chasm below (see below, the party's killing spree continues, but now the enemy now know they are there):  

I am looking forward to the resolution to this Mexican stand-off in the next session.  

Dungeon Fun: Skeletons

Ain't it always the same, a room described in the most non-descriptive way .. "a room filled with a bunch of trash really, intermixed with the now skeletal remains of the former guards who once inhabited and died in this area" .. the adventures trundle in and start rooting around from loot (see below, notice the eagerness of the thieves to be 'first in'): 

Imagine their surprise and my glee as the skeletons animate and surround the party gaining a two to one attack [apparently when this happens one of the attacks comes in at advantage] which started to beat up the party until the Cleric used his "anti undead" magic .. boo hiss .. and they all relaxed (see below, figures of the skeletons [Warlord games and really nice] are only partially complete [highlights, wash and base work still to be done] but have that lovely Jason and the Argonauts feeling which defines "skeletons" in D&D to me):

So spoiler alert, they got away (how did these guys make it to third and fourth level, I am sure in Second Edition Dungeons and Dragon their numbers would have been long up) but a more serious threat in the form of a guard room full of Bugbears awaits.

Why so few posts this year?

I put it down to computer fatigue - the screen and keyboard time associated with work have soared during lock-down. Being a home office working and spending most of my day in front of a computer, the thought of spending extra hours in front of it typing away at a blog simply does not appeal. The social interaction of online gaming is a real buzz though, as well as Virtual Meetings with other wargamers - such as those put on recently by Wargaming Developments. The high light however is the online D&D session that has rumbled on through Covid regardless (see below, a scene from my last "Dungeon Hack" session - the party gets bounced by a 'gang of ghouls' [evil laughter] lead by an "undead" boss monster with .. ooh look ... a dangerous looking 'evil' magic item - so the party's Cleric attacks the undead with "Light Domain - Channel Divinity" ability): 

More 'good news' is that I do snip away making things for my hobbies more. For some particular reason the Covid-crisis has inspired me to "put-together" plenty [too many] 28mm WWII (for Chain of Command) figures. I do seem to have organised and assessed the contents of the wargaming attic in meticulous detail - although arranging troops for my own  "big battles" has not been part of this activity. So, credit to all the other bloggers who have kept up such a prestigious rate over Covid and the good news story is that I am getting a few games of the F2F type in too, so I think the tide is a turning for the better.  

As for the Dungeon Crawl (see below, spoiler alert, the adventurers were victorious .. sigh .. [as all the undead are now really well and truly, once and for all .. er, dead .. their natural state I suppose], the adventurers may have won this particular battle but the war or rather the quest goes on!): 

PS: To all my fellow bloggers out there .. blog on .. I am still reading you .. and enjoying you all tremendously ;) 

Good Old Fashioned Dungeon Hack: D&D 5th Edition

Mixing the old with the new. Fifth Edition D&D Rules (relatively new), with Games Workshop Figures and Warlord Games (monsters) and forty year old adventurer (Citadel[?]) miniatures and "the classic floor plans" (see below, the old-timer is the Dwarven thief skulking across the large cavern floor [actually invisible courtesy of a friendly magic-user's spell] the angry pack of ghouls [represented by GW Chain Rasps] heads towards the rest of the party - also note the suspiciously "un-animated" skeletons littering the cavern floor [from Warlord Games]):

Thing was the moment we stopped the session for the night/ What they call in the movies "a cliff-hanger". To be continued ...

Beauty is in the "Eye of the Beholder"

This is a Black Tree Design "Evil Eye" which to me equates to a Second Edition D&D Monster Manual picture of a Beholder (see below, a ping pong table tennis ball with pin tacks sticking out of it and a "bitey" mouth on it): 

As they say, the beauty is in the eye of the beholder (and although it does not compare to the Fifth Edition pimped up larger model of the Beholder) and I like its rustic charm. The other nickname we gave it was "the purple people eater"! Time will tell on that one as you have to be fairly high level to be unfortunate enough to meet and greet one! 

Some Pictures of D&D Adventurers that I had fun with in Lock-Down

One of the unexpected benefits of lock-down was my rediscovery of RPG with my old school friends at the tutelage of my eldest son (whom I think has memorised the contexts of 5th Edition AND the subsequent rules changes .. respect). From the loft came out some old Grenadier and Citadel friend from the 1980's (see below, not forgetting the ubiquitous dungeon floor plans - basic set corridor grey):  

This guy in particular, children's magic party "over the top" classic D&D wizard - dressed so crazy he's got to be both mad and powerful (see below, I take my hat off to the "mojo" I had when I painted him): 

Dwarves you gotta love them and that serious looking lost Crusader paladin type in the background (see below, the dwarf female looks tougher than the male counterpart - a happy couple on an orc killing spree): 

These are the new-comers in two senses of the word - new race (Drakon) and new figure casting (sexy plastic- resin from Wizkids, Noldur's Marvellous Miniatures) - but wat is there not to like (see below, apart from the joint custody of them between me and my teenage son; he'll eventually  break my heart when the collection moves out with him): 

Last but not least, in what seems like an age ago the original LOTR's "The Fellowship of the Ring" came out and along with is GW's LOTR's miniatures started (see below, I think it is Pippin, perfect for that halfling thief that appears in every party .. well at least at the start): 

This sums up D&D or rather RPG as lots of everything coming together in one big "mish-mash" of fun ;) 

Long may you all game on!

The Finished Minotaur .. I am gong to call him Finbar

The finished "beast" (see below, pity the poor fool of an adventurer who tries to take him on alone, in a disorientating underground maze): 

I toyed with the colour scheme, originally having him much browner but my eldest son convinced me to go more "fleshy" and I am glad he did (see bellow, looking rather Spartan with his bare buttocks): 

A bit of bounce off glare perhaps spoils the total effect but up close and personal this dude is going to tear hit points off you):  

Scratch this one off the bucket list, but maybe I need one with an axe too?

Bucket List: Fantasy Monsters - I always wanted a .. decent Minotaur figure (WIP)

The Minotaur is an iconic monster and one I never had as a kid, but it was always on the "bucket list" of D&D monsters to get. Lock-down and internet browsing lets certain things happen and while "purchasing" a WW2 28mm German infantry gun (more about that in another post) from Black Tree Design something dropped into the Cart and once in I just could not figure how to remove it (see below, I think they called it a Minotaur Champion but it looks like how any Minotaur should look to me - based up on Milliput to avoid it embarrassingly falling over): 

The base texturing came from my son's hobby tip courtesy of the Critical Roll podcasts - crumple up some tin foil into a small ball and roll it over the still pliable Milliput. He took pity on his farther cursing his old school efforts with an old toothbrush. Airfix Acrylic primer under coat was added (see below, ready for the painting tray to begin proper - really impressed with this sculpt): 

Note: This one might be a race against time to get this one ready for his (or its) campaign debut! Just saying to any PCs casually reading this blog post ;)  

Skeletons ... Just Because ...

No self-respecting fantasy Evil Lord of Darkness, Necromancer or Demi-Lich can ever have enough of them .. a bucket of skeletons (see below, they looked too cute not to get - honest, even a Paladin with a few spare gold coins couldn't pass them up):

They are really nice (see below, they are somewhat understated models from what I have come to expect from Game Workshop - uber swords and horns etc):

Something to scare the pants off your classic "First Level Adventurer" party as they turn the dungeon corridor corner .. "Turn foul beasts!" says the Cleric, but "Oh, I forgot I have to wait until I reach Second Level to do that now! [5th Ed!]" (see below, "You are passing the graveyard and notice the full moon is out .. you are surprised to find a hoard of angry skeletons coming at you!" said the DM in a sort of plausible but non-explanatory way .. "roll for initiative!" [Evil laughter]):

A close up of the nice sculpting (see below, this half skeleton was made out of some of the left over bits, lots to be fair - mostly weapons as you had the choice of a lot of swords or spears, I just mixed them up for an ad-hoc battle group):

All now put away in "cleaned up" butter plastic container waiting for their "painting day"!

Chainrasps

They are dark evil spirits (see below, Arifix Acrylic Primer, Vallejo Black Wash, Vallejo Wolf Grey and Citadel Base Stegadon Scale Geen - gives a good base foundation layer)

Time to play with the mid-tones (see below, Citadel Technical Nighthaunt Gloom over the light bits and then shading up with Wolf, using Citadel Layer Thunderhawk Blue to highlight the Stegadon, base charred brown and gun metal on other areas):

A touch of of the lighter highlights (see below, make those candles shine):

Before I play with the Citadel Technical Mordant Earth (which gives a broken textured base) I was taught a top tip by a member of the GW staff - paint the base in a light colour you want to seep through the base (see below, I chose the haunting light blue - the first five):

I almost left the bases as they stood as I liked the unearthly feel they had to them (see  below, adding an extra bit of highlight to these as I went along - the last five): 

Thrown into a mock encounter (see below, maybe the Cleric would prefer the Doggelgangers now):

I like the look and feel of the recent GW undead range as them have an excellant fantasy feel to them, useful for generic dungeon fodder!

Dopplegangers .. Your Worst D&D Nightmare

After a long arduous night adventuring in the depths of a dark and deep dungeon the surviving members of the party gather round what they sense is the final door, behind which is either fabulous treasure or a hideous "boss monster" (see below, steel your girth Cleric, the Wizard and Fighter have your back):

The Cleric pauses, sensing something is wrong, but the moment passes and he steps forwards raising his magical mace (see below, but "facing dangers to the front"):

But when the real danger lies behind you (see below, your fellow characters are not at all what they seemed to be (see below, "evil hisses" give the game away): 

Attacked from behind, multiple times at advantage, perhaps casting a "Detect Evil" is a good deep cleanse precaution - something to be done whenever possible (see below, "so ends the Cleric's holy career): 

The Dopplegangers come from the new D&D primed resin range Deep Cuts/Pathfinder Battles/Wizkids range. Although I was initially frightened of a 'fragility' I managed to cut away the tiny bits of excess flash and paint them up rather nicely.

Still a nasty DM trick though! The other two PCs could have gone home hours ago ;)

Fantasy: A Green Dragon (Puff The Magic Dragon?)

The origin of this modelling project was a rather dodgy cheap fantasy ornament picked up in a nick-nack shop - but I saw the "potential" (see below, after an undercoat of Airfix Primer, then a Brown Vallejo Wash, then a colour undercoat of Vallejo Game Colour Dark Green to get to here - though it has to be said I did have a lot of trouble with this particular Valljo Game Colour paint as for some reason it starts to separate out in the bottle into a solid and liquid half more so than any other of the colours I use in the range!):

I added further layers of mixes Vallejo Game Colour Sick Green and Scorpion Green (I think, it was certainly a lighter green almost yellow) followed by a little Moon Yellow, with Off White added for final highlights. The "Glossy" look came from my experimentation with a Yellow Vallejo Yellow Ink glaze (see below, the Green Dragon's front with its lighter underneath is done):

The scaly back was layered but kept to a Sick Green with touch of white highlight. Again I experimented with Vallejo Black Ink and Green Ink Glazes with a modicum of success (see below, a young fat Green Dragon about to fly off in search of food):

Nobody would want to mess with my Puff the Magic Dragon, surely? Please note, adventurers in my D&D Campaign have nothing to fear as this is purely a "painting challenge" with little or no relevance to the Lost Mine of Phalindar, despite the large picture of a Green Dragon on the front of the new 5th Edition D&D Starter Pack!

Role Playing (D&D) Monsters .. Large Serpent

In preparation for a friends re-union and introduction to role playing (D&D 5th Edition) to my eldest I was rummaging through lead figures that had not yet acquired a coat of paint. I was surprised to find not that many of my original Fantasy figures unpainted. The LOTR range is another matter and best left for another day. Here are a couple of my highlights (see below, from my "character" selection I have five fighter/mining Dwarfs [Note the duplicated behind them, they came as a box of ten figures but five poses - a good squad and a bad squad?] and a female magic-user, plus three ranger types [Grenadier?], an old plastic Games Workshop Drow Crossbowman - and a "crazy" Dwarf wizard):

I also found some old 'creature' packs from Citadel useful for those random dungeon encounters to liven things up (see below, five snakes and serpents, five small [but as big as a dog] lizards and five giant rats):

Just a little extra to do on the basing but I thought this one came up quite well (see below, standing head high to a Dwarf this I think is best classed as a 'serpent' rather than lowly 'snake'):

All fun stuff and good to get the brushes a work out on the fantasy stuff, using the Vallejo Game Range of paints.