Some plastic Mordheim figures

I bought a sprue of plastic Games Workshop Mordheim figures earlier this year at the club's Tabletop Sale. My original idea was to use them as warband members for Frostgrave, but in the end I didn't think that they suited the theme of my warband, so I put them aside to decide what to do with them. 

Anyway, a while ago I made them up, adding a shield to one of the figures, and undercoated them, and looked at them for a few weeks until I decided that I'd paint them up and try and sell them on at the next Tabletop Sale or on the Bring-and-Buy table at our annual Reveille II show, which is on 26th November.

I am reasonably happy with the way they have turned out, I've tried to make them look a bit shabby and functional rather than "parade ground", with some chipped paintwork on the edges of the shield and hopefully they will find a home, otherwise they'll end up on Ebay and, failing a sale by that route, they'll get stuck in a drawer and forgotten.

Table-top Sale at the club

A couple of Sundays ago the club held its annual Table-top Sale. The event was reasonably well-attended and there were plenty of bargains for sale.

We started setting up at around 8am and before long people were already taking notes and checking out what others were selling.

There were all sorts of things on sale, from ready-painted armies to board games and sets of rules.

After the sale was over, some of us played a Living on the Frontline participation game, using the Winter of '79 skirmish rules but with a decidedly weird twist. It certainly put a whole new gloss on the phrase "Leafy Suburbs".

The basic premise was that the local council had declared a state of emergency and ordered everyone to leave town. Unexplained outcrops of jungle were springing up in unusual places. A few groups of stragglers, happily armed to the teeth were stuck inside the town and had to make their way to a helicopter on top of one of the buildings to escape.

Before long, it became obvious that getting near the foliage was Not A Good Idea.

Not only was it a Bad Idea, but the patches of greenery began to spread rapidly. Where was Monty Don when you needed him most?

Before long, things were getting decidedly unpleasant. You don't get problems like this on Gardeners' Question Time.

My gang made it as far as the outside of the building where the helicopter was waiting, but it was really too late.

I've never seen one of these at my local garden centre!

In the end, young James managed to get one of his squaddies into the chopper and he made his escape, leaving the rest of his troops to the less-than-tender mercies of a horde of overgrown Venus flytraps, a fate shared by the rest of us.

So, thanks to Clive for a most entertaining game. You can see more pictures of his excellent carnivorous plants here.

Anyway, I am sure people are wondering if I bought anything at the sale myself. Well, I did, but not a huge amount, mainly because I forgot to stop off at an ATM in the morning.

I bought a couple of sprues of Deus Vult foot sergeants to make up as Frostgrave warbands, a Mordheim sprue for the same purpose and 10 rather nice 28mm metal figures by, I think Renegade. These are early Great War Scottish infantry in Glengarry bonnets, but I shall be painting them up in a more generic colour scheme to use in VBCW and other similar scenarios.

A Frostgrave AAR - my warband gets its first outing.

Last Sunday at the club my new Frostgrave warband got on the table against three other bands, those of Owen, Richard and Andy. Kev umpired the game. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera, but luckily Owen took plenty of pictures, and he has kindly let me borrow them for this blog post.

This was a one-off game but I think that we are now planning a proper campaign, which will be good. So, here is the initial table;

People are already starting to deploy. I am coming in from the right of the picture. Here are some of my desperadoes moving through the ruins.

The game was notable at the start for the inability of the wizards to actually cast any spells, occasionally even causing themselves varying amounts of harm. At this point, I decided to save using magic until it was absolutely necessary.

Andy's band of Orcs made swift progress towards a huge pile of treasure but soon ran into problems and ended up embroiled in combat against a summoned demon that Richard brought on to the table as soon as he stopped failing to cast any spells.

His wizard seemed happier after that and late on in the game managed to cast Scatter Shot, which pretty much damaged everyone within range. He also managed to pick up an imp to fetch and carry coins.

Elsewhere, Owen advanced quite quickly, but became tangled up in a long-running combat with a ghoul. My wizard cast Bones of the Earth on one of his fighters, which anchored him while he was fighting the undead creature, allowing my guys to get past and head for more plunder.

Unhappily, a large and threatening White Worm attacked two of my thugs, killing one easily but the other fighter managed to hold on.

Owen's band seemed like an easier target than a giant grumpy vermiform, so I concentrated my attacks on them, sending an archer and a couple of fighters to pick off his gang.

At the same time, I sent a couple more of my men (including a zombie that my wizard raised from the grave) across the table to secure more loot. Owen's thief in the foreground wasn't really a threat.

Elsewhere, Andy was reeling from endless magical and earthly attacks, but managed to get his treasure away safely, even eventually seeing off the demonic entity that had caused him so many problems.

I also decided to cut my losses and make off with my plunder. Meanwhile Richard was plagued by a succession of attacks from marauding giant rats.

All in all, this was a terrific introduction to Frostgrave. The game mechanisms are pretty easy to grasp and the action comes fast and furious. I look forward to actually being able to gain experience and wealth in future games. 

In the meanwhile, I shall be painting up a few more magic users and maybe some other odds and ends for my Frostgrave collection.

Making a start on Frostgrave

I've been interested in the idea of Frostgrave for a while, but never really thought about getting any figures because I wasn't sure I'd ever find anyone to play the game against. However, someone at the club recently showed up with a mat for the game and this piqued my interest. Inevitably, I took the plunge and bought the book and a couple of sprues of warband figures (Cultists and Barbarians) from ebay.

I've read the rules and it seems pretty interesting and I've also painted up ten figures from the sprues to be potential warband recruits.

Here they are;

I went for a relatively limited and fairly subdued colour palette, mainly because I don't really like garish figures on the table unless it is absolutely obligatory, but also because it seems to me that the kind of muscle for hire that would form a wizard's entourage might not be that bothered by appearances. I was also influenced in my ideas by the excellent gritty fantasy novels of Joe Abercrombie.

The miniatures I've painted so far are pretty much at the level of thugs, but I've also included a crossbowman, an archer, an infantryman and a man-at-arms. There is also one figure, the one on the left of the picture with the curved scythe weapon who could be used either as a thug or also as a thief (assuming one might think of his blade as an odd dagger).

To be honest, I am pretty pleased with the way they turned out. I've not painted anything like this for a very long time, not since I played Warhammer Fantasy about 20-odd years ago.

I also have a couple of figures primed to be my wizard and apprentice. These are going to be female practitioners of the magic arts and are from Bad Squiddo Games. I'll post them once they are painted. I'm not sure which magical path they are going to follow yet, so their colour scheme will be influenced by my choice.