Chainmail & Sword

 A little while ago, Lancer Miniatures kindly sent me some samples of their new 10mm Beastherd fantasy figures, yesterday I finally got those samples painted and based.

The range includes Beastherd in several different poses, Beastherd command and a Beastherd Sherman figure.  In addition to those are Centigors, Chaos Hounds, a Doombull figure as well as a set of three Minatours in different poses.

The Beastherd figures do come with shields but non were included with the two sample Beastherd figures sent to me, thats not an issue it was very good of Lancer Miniatures to send me samples in the first place and do Beastherd care about personal protection all that much anyway.

 Religion plays an important part in the EotSR world and I felt I could do with a few Clerical types.  I spotted this figure whilst browsing Magister Militums website and decided he would make a good generic cleric.

I decided to paint him in fairly neutral coloured garbs, a simple grey habit and off white robe, as such he would be useful as a village or town priest or even as a more important bishop or patriarch depending on the game being played.

In addition to the EotSR games, this figure would quite happily fit into some Robin of Sherwood scenarios, so lots of uses for him and well worth the purchase.

Robin of Sherwood

I am a really big fan of the old 80's ITV show Robin of Sherwood, for me it is the best Robin Hood series ever, nothing has come close to Richard Carpenters classic. it struck the right balance between history, realism, folklore and fantasy.  It had a fantastic cast and wonderful settings.  It is truly an inspiration for a gaming setting.

Conquest Games have had a small range of miniatures based around Robin of Sherwood for some time, recently they have been expanding the range which is great to see and that has inspired me to work towards running some games using Richard Carpenters Sherwood setting alongside my own Empire of the Scarlet Robe campaign.  I already have a set of the 'Wolfshead' miniatures from Conquest painted up but nothing ready to go up against them, now though, I have made a start.

I recently picked up 8 foot knights from 1st Corps, four of which I painted as Knights of the Scarlet Robe, I posted a quick post about those a little while back in October.  The remaining four I decided to paint up as the Sheriffs men to go up against Robin Hood and his band of outlaws.  This is the result.

They are fine figures and will add some variety to the Conquest Games Norman figures which are in their Robin of Sherwood range.  I still need to add a few more figures to the Sheriffs Men before I can get a game underway but I am certainly happy with these minis as a starting point.

I ordered 8  1st Corps Medieval foot knights wearing cloaks and hand weapons a few weeks back, I have so far only managed to complete half of them, painted as Knights of the Scarlet Robe.

The final four figures I am tempted to paint to be used alongside Conquest Games Robin of Sherwood style figure range, as much as I am enjoying working on EotSR, I haven't got as much spare time as I would like to spend detailing the lands and Robin of Sherwood offer a ready made setting to dip into now and again, more on that anon.

 Here is another miniature I picked up, part of a job lot of old minis sold as Ral Partha.  I have no reason to suspect this axe wielding  warrior is anything but a Ral Partha miniatures, however I could be wrong.

I finally got him painted up and based, another great addition to the collection.  This figure is the first of a Varr raiding party I plan to build.

 This Female Fighter is one of my favourite figures, I don't know the manufacturer, she arrived in a job lot of fantasy figures I picked up on a popular online auction site about 5 years ago, most of the other figures were old Ral Partha sculpts so I suspect she is from that stable as well. 

 In my quest for miniatures to fit in to Illmoria, I decided to explore the great range of minis from Otherworld Miniatures.  Some just would nor work in my world, (plate armour does not exist for example), but there are plenty that fit right in, including this Cleric which I recently painted.

This is a smashing miniature and proved to be a real treat to paint, certainly should find his way onto the table top in one guise or another, I plan to add more from Otherworld to my collection, in particular some of the monsters.

Many of the Frostgrave figures from Northstar work well withing the EotSR world, not necessarily as the Frostgrave role they were perhaps intended for though, but they are well designed figures, always good to paint and typical of the medieval/fantasy genre so very suited to my fantasy setting.

I picked up a couple of sets recently including these two figures, the Illusionist and Apprentice.  These figures will be useful not only in their intended role as illusionists but also as merchants or similar.. 

I painted them as per the picture on the card supplied with the figures, a little lazy of me really but it saved me having to think of a new colour scheme.  In their fine green and gold I see these two as being from fairly wealthy backgrounds, suitable for a role as Nobles  or perhaps traders from one of the southern lands.

I based them on 25mm round plastic bases, I will be using that size for all my 28mm skirmish foot figures, and added a bit of greenery and soil.

I am tempted to glue a weapon in their outstretched hand just to give them a little more purpose, sword perhaps or a dagger, but it is only a temptation and maybe not necessary, I will wait until there is a game lined up for them to decide on that one.

   Whatever decision I finally make regarding weapons and roles, this is another set of great figures from the Frostgrave range and will make a very useful addition to my Empire of the Scarlet Robe collection.  

 Religion plays a central part in the lives of everyone in Illmoria, the main religion being that of 'the one true god'.  This religion is dominated by the Ellmoria Orthodox Church, which, whilst its rules are very strictly observed in the South lands, in the north there are many sub-sects which intermix old pagan beliefs with the one true god religion.  To the Ellmoria Orthodox Church, and thus the Elmorian Empire, any deviation from their Church is heresy and anyone preaching such heresy does so at risk of their life and such clerics often keep moving from one village to the next, or keep their meetings and identity very secretive .

This Reaper miniature of Josephine Lucere makes an excellent cleric or preacher of one of these sub-sects.  Well sculpted and in fine medieval fantasy clothing, armed with a staff  Little John would be proud of, she wanders the Northern land of Cleff Tria, possibly with a small group of companions, possibly alone.  As yet she has not come to the attention of the Ellmoria Church but it is just a matter of time.

This proved to be a fun mini to paint, and I can see a number of possible games set around this cleric, I will add more details about her at time goes on, for now I just happy to have her painted, based and ready for the tabletop.

 As the Empire of the Scarlet Robe (EotSR) slowly begins to be mapped out, (a map will be up on the site soon), I have realised that the known lands of Illmoria are vast, the EotSR covers all of the Northern lands and most of the South Lands, only the Icy peninsular land of the Var in the North, detached as it is from the rest of the Northern lands, and the Kingdom of Tarkesh in the South lands are free from Ellxantium rule.  It would be a mad to attempt anything but to sketch out the scantest of details for most of the countries.

I plan to start by detailing just a small area.  The northern lands are of the most interest to me, I see the south lands as fairly stable, the main threat to the EotSR in the south comes from Tarkesh and the peoples beyond the Burning Desert, the north though, the danger comes from within, the intolerance of the one true church towards any of the older religions, minor lords and dukes who squabble between themselves and the Empires inability to deal with sea raiders from the Var all create problems for Ellxantium, all create outcasts and misfits who live outside the law.

Some great little skirmish games can be played here, raids on villages or monasteries by Var raiders, ambushes on nobles and merchants by brigands or Scarlet Robes hunting down outlaws, all perfect for small scale games, so with this in mind I began looking around for suitable figures.

I painted them very much as shown on the packaging they came in, the colours fit well in my world.  They could easily be used as raider from the Var and as brigands who live in hills and forests of the northern lands.

 They befell our village, soldiers, red cloaks,  they proclaimed us as heretic's,  they set fire to our homes, forcing us out into the ope.  A few villagers fought back  yet they were cut down with sword, some tried to flee  yet  were shot with arrow, the few whom survived were taken aroint, i wot what happens to those accused  o'  heresy, belike it would  hast been better  they died that day.  I alone survived, i saw the massacre from the woods near by, i saw the village sear, what could i doth  yet  encave. 

 Mine name is mildritha, i am now a heretic, i am now an outlaw.

Ral Partha Female Rangers 

I bought six of these figures about 6 or 7 years back, I wanted them as archers for a fantasy game I had planned back then.  I remember having to very quickly paint them up.  Since then they have been stored in a box gathering dust.  Time to give these great little minis a new lease of life.

 

Although the minis had been painted up quickly, they still looked reasonably okay but I had painted them as a unit of archers, each figure give the same colours, very uniform, the two photos above show how they all looked, not what I now wanted. In EotSR (Empire of the Scarlet Robe), I did not see there being any units of female archers,  they would be better served as outlaws, wolfsheads and rebel fighters, so I had to get rid of the uniform look.

That sounded easy enough but the dust, oh the dust, each figure was thick with 6 years of the stuff, I had to very carefully wash each figure, allow to dry and then use a paint brush to remove any remaining dust.  The figures had been based on 25mm as shown in the picture, and I noticed that I had been a bit sloppy with the glue and flock when I originally painted the figures, so I had to remove any static grass that was attached to parts of the figures where it should nor have been.

 

Most of the paintwork was good enough to leave as was, it was just a matter of changing the colours on the cloaks, leggings and tunics, I decided to keep one as it was, only changing the other four.  I don't know what varnish, if any, I used back then but the new paint just did not want to adhere to the old paint, it took several thin coats to get good coverage.  

That said and after only a hour or so's work, these Ral Partha Rangers are now transformed, and ready to go back onto the tabletop, I now have 5 female outlaws ready to defy the EotSR, and they could also fit happily into my Robin of Sherwood games as well.

A quick update, the 6th figure has now been put back together and given a new paint job.