Back to 7TV Fantasy - two more villainous characters

After the diversion into 1/10 scale painting, it is good to get back to the 28mm fantasy stuff.  These two are definitely villains;

Both are actually Frostgrave figures from North Star, but I am using them as two of the major bad guys from my imaginary Anglo-Italian TV series, Tales From The Enchanted Kingdom. I have already alluded to the Guild of Torturers and these two brutal-looking characters are leading members of the Guild.

On the left is Hengist the Executioner and the figure on the right is his regular associate, Landulf the Pitiless, a torturer by trade but willing to do anything illegal for money.

I decided on a dark minimal colour palette for these and I think it works pretty well. I'm pretty sure that you wouldn't mistake these two for friendly assistance under many circumstances, although if you were willing to pay them enough gold they might do you a good turn.

A bit of an oddity

This isn't a wargaming miniature. It is the driver for a remote control (RC) vehicle and is in 1/10 scale, i.e. huge, as you can see from the 28mm figure next to it.

As an item to paint it was pretty simple. The cast is quite crude and lacking in t he kind of fine detail you would expect to get in a 28mm miniature. However, that doesn't really matter because it is designed to end up inside a RC vehicle and seen from a distance.

The vehicle it belongs to is a kind of quasi-military light attack speedster, which is going to end up with a Mad Max vibe when it is finished. It is a project for my partner, not me, but I have agreed to do the modelling and the paintjob.

Anyway, the driver was a really quick and simple thing to paint. Big brushes and a bold and impressionistic approach to colour was the order of the day, with the aim of turning out a finished article that would look good from a distance. Job done, I think.

I gave him a camouflage finish because it just seems right for someone who is going to be sitting in a post-apocalypse vehicle.

Before long, I'm going to have to make a start on the actual shell of the speedster.

7TV Fantasy - Vanozza the Fearless, a Pirate Queen

In my introductory post, I mentioned Vanozza the Fearless, a pirate captain, and here she is;

She is a Bad Squiddo figure, originally intended to complement the release of Frostgrave: Ghost Archipelago, but although I bought the rules and some minis, I've never actually played the game. As you can see, she has a pet, a very grumpy Giant Iguana. I like this figure a lot and I've given her a back story to fit in with my imaginary TV series, Tales From The Enchanted Kingdom. 

Vanozza was the illegitimate child of a one of the great Lords of the Enchanted Kingdom and his concubine. From an early age she rebelled against her father and ran away from home many times. Eventually, she was sent away to live with a community of priestesses on an island off the southern coast. She was captured by a fleet of slavers who had raided the island of the priestesses, carrying off valuable treasures and many captives. The teenage Vanozza was sold to a sea captain, who was later killed by pirates. Vanozza joined the pirate crew and rose through the ranks because of her almost insane fearlessness, her aggressive attitude and her ability to read and write (much valued by the largely-illiterate pirate crew).

Over the years, Vanozza became the Captain of her own ship and now commands a fleet of six large ships and three smaller sloops. From her fortress in the Perilous Islands, she raids far and wide. Because she wages an unceasing war against the Slavers, many of the rulers and governors of the islands and coastal communities see her as their protector and pay her a tribute to defend them and not plunder their shipping.

I am working on her crew, and I'll post them later in the week.

7TV Fantasy - A pair of Jesters for Tales From The Enchanted Kingdom

Here is something a bit different, a pair of Jesters from Bad Squiddo Games;

I have always loved these two, but never really had a handy niche in which to fit them. Now, with 7TV Fantasy, I can use them, or maybe just the guy on top as a Fool.

And here they are from behind;

There is so much wonderful detail in this sculpt and bags of character in the two jesters. They were an absolute joy to paint, superb crisp casting and no cleaning up required before priming them.

So, to fit them into the context of my background story, Tales From The Enchanted Kingdom, I'll need their story.

These two are Antonio (the agile juggler) and Decimo (the sturdy support), two travelling tumblers and jesters who have been known to attach themselves to parties of adventurers when funds become short and belts need tightening. Antonio and Decimo, it is said, used to be Official Jesters at the Court of the Great Emperor Sigismondo, who left under a large and threatening cloud when certain valuable portable items went missing from the Imperial Jewellery Collection. These items were stored in a sealed and guarded chamber but somehow disappeared one night. The mission was said to have been impossible but the presence of a rope left by an open skylight showed that the thief had been lowered down into the chamber, leaving in the same way. Anyway, the jewels were gone, as were "Ant and Dec" as they are known to many.

7TV Fantasy - Seven Elves for Tales From The Enchanted Kingdom

Here are some more fantasy figures for my 7TV fantasy project, once again characters from that legendary TV series "Tales From The Enchanted Kingdom". These are Grey Elves of the Great Forest.

First here is Oberon, Lord of the Elves, a great Paladin and Artemisia, Lady of the Grey Elves, a mighty Sorceress.

Next, here are three great Elven heroes, Achates, Pallas and Anchises. They appeared in the very first episode of the first series but were not given names until their next appearance several episodes later.  

These are the only other Elvish characters who were ever named in the programme. On the left is Juturna and on the right is Ascanius the Herald.

Their names were taken from the Aeneid, presumably because that work was no longer covered by copyright and therefore unlikely to incur any angry letters from lawyers, which was a problem that bedevilled the series throughout its existence.

These figures are all Oathmark Elves, available from Northstar.

I decided to give their weapons and armour a light blue effect, to represent their otherworldly magical properties. I think it has come out rather nicely. The design on the shield is a hand-painted tree. It is OK, but could have been better.

7TV Fantasy - some evil characters take the stage

Having completed a few characters who we can broadly think of as "good", here are some of the villains of the series, in the form of two evil sorcerers and some skeleton warriors raised from their graves.

First, the two sorcerers;

On the left is Tartaro the Necromancer, once a living human being and now an Undead Liche, a sorcerer whose entire existence depends now on the incantations and rituals he learnt long ago in the Lands of the Dead in the far North. Tartaro lusts for a legendary arcane treasure, The Black Skull, which he believes will allow him to regain the form of a living man without losing his mastery over Death, but this has always eluded him. Many believe that this artefact no longer exists but Tartaro is featured in a number of episodes searching for it, but without success.

The wizard on the right is Morgos the Dark, who is described in one episode as a Master of Thelemic Magick and the possessor of the Book of Abramelin the Magus. Clearly one of the writers was plundering the works of Aleister Crowley, which may have accounted for the popularity of the series with a lot of far-out hippy followers of Crowley.

Morgos is often portrayed as the great adversary of Pandolfo the Celestial Wizard and this struggle is played out in a few episodes, especially in Series Two, but Morgos is also the sworn enemy of the Grey Elves of the Great Forest who, long ago expelled him from his mystical fortress on the western coast of the Enchanted Kingdom, forcing him to find a new home in a Dark Tower in the Mountains of the East.

Morgos works his evil schemes in many different ways, using different intermediaries from the different communities of the Kingdom, but most often employs the avaricious and cruel Goblins of the Mountains or various members of the Guild of Torturers.

Tartaro, on the other hand uses supernatural beings such as Ghosts and Banshees, as well as raising long-dead warriors to carry out his bidding. Here are four such Skeleton Warriors.

All of these figures are from the Oathmark Undead range, available from North Star.

7TV Fantasy - the first five characters

Yesterday, I unveiled my new fantasy project and said that I'd do a series of posts about the various recurring characters who featured in the now-lost Anglo-Italian TV series "Tales From The Enchanted Kingdom". 

Right from the first broadcast, each episode was introduced by a sarcastic and bad-tempered blue-skinned Genie named Ozymando, who would emerge from his brass lamp and, often mockingly talk about some of the characters who could be found travelling around the Enchanted Kingdom and "meddling" in the affairs of the mighty rulers of the Kingdom. Over time, he explained his origins and how he had become a trusted advisor to the Great Emperor, Sigismondo, a character who we never actually got to see at all.

Ozymando also acted as the narrator during episodes, generally commenting directly to the audience about the stupidity or avarice of characters, or as a link moving the action from one location to another, which was clearly done to avoid lengthy or costly shots of ships sailing the seas, caravans crossing the land or similar. Later, on towards the end of the first series, Ozymando began to appear as a character in some of the episodes.

The most frequently-recurring character was a Wizard of Celestial Magic called Pandolfo. It is rumoured that the writers had originally wanted to call him Gandolfo, but lawyers advised that this was likely to infringe on the works of J.R.R. Tolkien, so the name was changed. For the same reason, all the orcish characters in the series were described as Goblins.

Pandolfo featured in around half of all the episodes ever produced, often in a supporting role but sometimes as the main protagonist. His magical expertise was concerned with controlling the weather, conjuring up fogs, winds, outbreaks of rain, thunder and lightning etc but also in making predictions based upon the movements of the heavenly bodies. His predictions often tended to come true, but not necessarily in the way that might have been expected.

The next three characters always appeared in supporting roles, generally providing assistance to move the plot on or to resolve apparently insurmountable problems.

From left to right, they are Mercator, an itinerant seller of obscure books and scrolls, potions and ancient objects, Chung Lin, a warrior monk from the faraway land of Xanadu and Pankrates, a mercenary master of unarmed combat.

All of these figures are from the North Star range of Frostgrave miniatures, the MDF bases are from Warbases and the tufts are Gamer's Grass from Bad Squiddo.

7TV Fantasy - a fun new project

I bought 7TV Fantasy a while ago as a pre-order, because I thought that it looked like it would be a fun game to play and also because I really like painting fantasy figures. 

I already have figures for Frostgrave that I thought I could use for this but I also wanted to use other figures that I either already have, lying around unpainted, or like the look of but don't actually own.

So, I plunged in and looked around at what interested me. I had some metal Oathmark Elves that I wanted to use, so they went onto the pile and thought that both the Oathmark and Frostgrave ranges stocked by North Star would come up with suitable characters. They didn't disappoint and I bought a dozen or so. I'll dip back in later for some of the Rangers of Shadow Deep figures too. I've also got some Bad Squiddo figures for Ghost Archipelago that I can use as well. Annie Norman is also planning a smallish Fantasy Kickstarter, which is expected to arrive quite soon, so there is going to be another range of options available too.

So lots of nice shiny new toys.

Anyway, 7TV always needs a nice backstory and I do love a backstory, so I have dreamt up a setting for my figures, so Laydeez and Gennulmen, I present to you a long-forgotten Anglo-Italian co-production "Tales From The Enchanted Kingdom". 

This ran for three series at the end of the 1960s and early 1970s and was set in a mysterious mediaeval land where magic and enchantment was real and a range of good and evil characters, together with a few of dubious and shifting morality regularly clashed and fought to gain advantages over their enemies and rivals. Filmed in a variety of locations in Italy, the UK and Yugoslavia, the programme drew heavily on existing fantasy tropes, plundering the likes of J.R.R. Tolkien, Robert E. Howard, E.R Eddison, C.S Lewis and others to create a series of adventures which featured a recurring group of main and supporting characters, villains and magical beings whose main aim was initially unclear but which, in Series Three, later turned into a Quest for a magical item, The Crown of Ouroboros. Unhappily, this Quest was never completed as the planned Fourth Series was never made, the programme being cancelled when the production company went bankrupt.

Cast regulars included;

Pandolfo the Celestial Wizard
Ozymando the Genie
Hengist the Executioner
Landulf the Pitiless, a torturer
Mercator, an itinerant cleric and bookseller
Morgos the Dark, an evil Wizard
Tartaro the necromancer
Chung Lin, an oriental warrior monk
Pankrates the boxer
Anastasia and Irina, twin adventurous sisters from icy Novgorod
Ivar and Sveyn, two warriors from icy Novgorod
Oberon, Lord of the Grey Elves 
Artemisia, Lady of the Grey Elves and Elven Sorceress

Vanozza the Fearless, a female pirate captain 

There were also three "goblin" brothers (derived heavily from Tolkien's Orcs), Gomba, Banda and Munga, who were regular baddies for hire, female pirates, assorted Skeleton warriors, Elven warriors and a shifting cast of humans, dwarves, ghosts, demons, giant spiders and other standard fantasy creations.

Over the next few posts, I'll talk about the various characters and put up photos of the ones I have completed so far.

La Milice Canadienne

 These are intended for the French and Indian Wars. There are 29 figures in all. First three groups of eight.

And now some leaders and musicians.

Now, the sharp-eyed amongst you will note that they aren't really very accurate for the period, and that is because they are really Warlord Games plastic American Militia for the War of Independence and their clothing isn't really right at all, assuming that they should be wearing the items that French regulations mandated. My only defence here is that they are a bunch of rapidly-raised militiamen who are just wearing whatever was available.

These are going to be used for FIW Sharp Practice games at BIG this coming weekend, using David Hunter's Saindoux Campaign troop rosters, which allows for Milice Canadienne in line groups of eight figures.

These took me ages to get finished, mainly because I fell out of love with the figures while I was painting them. They were all from the free sprues that Wargames Illustrated gave away ages ago and I really didn't much like the poses of some of them, nor the fact that too many are equipped with Pennsylvania "long rifles" rather than standard muskets. I think that they have turned out OK, but at some point I think I'll replace them with some more appropriately-equipped metal versions.