More Gothic Horror......

 ... from Bad Squiddo. First up, The Count and Countess (with her little dog);

Two respected (OK, feared) members of the local community, The Count and Countess turn up at all the best parties and are always sophisticated and erudite company with magnetic and compelling personalities. People often find it hard to refuse them anything and no one has anything bad to say about them, nor about the three young ladies who often accompany them on their travels around the region. It is assumed that they have a private chapel in their castle, because no one has ever seen them in church. 

OK, witches often have a bad reputation, but this is mostly just gossip and bad publicity. You shouldn't believe everything you might read in nasty muck-raking books like the Malleus Maleficarum, after all that Heinrich Kramer was just a misogynistic old nuisance who couldn't get a girlfriend. Anyway, these two witches are most definitely not bad people. In fact, they are conscientious and public-spirited young women  who have dedicated themselves to the business of Pest Control across the Carpathians and beyond. If your town or village has a blood-sucking problem, just get the Bürgermeister to get in touch with Mr Rupert Giles, Miss Summers' agent and business manager. The Misses Summers and Rosenberg will soon sort out your problems. Trust me, the problem will disappear like magic in a puff of smoke.

First post of 2026 - odd happenings in the old graveyard

I've had these Gothic Horror figures from Bad Squiddo on the painting table for a while. First, three young women;

 Clearly, they have decided to take an evening stroll, but why on earth have they chosen the old ruined graveyard? Haven't they heard the rumours about this place?

Next, the kind of people who usually hang around the old graveyard at night;

Who are these women? There is something clearly abnormal happening here. Why do we only ever see them at night? Why is it that few of those who see them are ever heard of again, and those who do escape end up babbling insanely about "Vampire Acolytes" preying on the innocent and foolish.

The scatter items are things I've had for ages and the backdrop is by Jon Hodgson at Handiwork games.

I've two more Vampires and a couple of other figures to photograph and I'll post them soon.

Carpathian Fun and Games

Or maybe not. I've had some of these Bad Squiddo figures for ages. Scroll down to see them all.

 

These are a mixture of figures from the Bad Squiddo Fantasy range, but I decided that the six of them would make a rather nice fantasy Carpathian Vampire Hunting group. As we all know, young women make the very best vampire slayers, don't they? As you can see in the first two pictures, two of our valiant slayers are brandishing their personal Mr Pointy weapons and I'm sure the slayer with a crossbow is reaching for a long range Mr Pointy of her own.

I decided to give the group a colour palette that would tie them together and nothing much goes better than red and green.

Below is another Bad Squiddo figure that I've taken to calling Dave Dead while I've been painting him. I hope he's Grateful. OK, he is literally Death Incarnate, but whatever you do, don't ask him where his Sting is.

I'm rather pleased with all of these. Next, I'll finish off some vamps and victims.

Quite a lot of 3D printed ruins

A couple of years ago, I bought a load of 3D printed scenic items at the club's Tabletop Sale from a guy who trades as "Dungeon Scenes" and who can be found on Facebook, here. For a variety of reasons I'd not got round to painting any of the stuff until now. Here are various bits of ruined buildings, you'll have to scroll down to see everything.

First, some nice ruined arches and columns (the Bad Squiddo Amazon is for scale purposes only).

Next, a corner piece with arches and another piece which shows an overgrown red tiled floor and low walls.

Finally, seven pieces from a much larger ruined building. This could represent a manor, church, an abbey or maybe some kind of Elven stronghold?

Obviously, all the above could feature in fantasy games, pulp, horror or historical settings and I am planning to use them as parts of the scenery to sit in front of Jon Hodgson's backdrops.

I found these remarkably easy to paint. I washed and dried them off before priming them in Halford's grey plastic primer, which pretty much provided the base coat and then the rest of the work was dry-brushing and adding grassy flock mix and other odds and ends of vegetation. I'm very happy with the climbing plants entwined around the windows in the final photo. They are wire-stemmed model railway small scale trees and really add some nice atmosphere.

I have some sci fi bits and pieces to paint up next, and I have also finished off a small fountain piece which I need to get varnished.

Spanish Unit For The Silver Bayonet

I haven't posted anything for over three weeks, but I have been busy, mostly working on Napoleonic Spanish types. First up, is my Spanish unit for The Silver Bayonet, a set of rules for Gothic Horror during the Napoleonic Wars. There are eight figures in total.

These four above are the more "regular" troops, an Artilleryman, an Officer, an Infantryman and a Sapper. Below are four "irregular" types, a Guerrilla, a Veteran Hunter, a Champion of the Faith and a Swordsman. All these eight labels have specific meanings within the rules.

The figures are from the official range of figures produced by North Star and I have to say that they are excellent sculpts with lots of character and nice details. I decided when painting them that I wasn't going to get too bothered over making them specific to any particular Spanish units of the period. After all, it is basically a fantasy game, although some of these could be used in historical Peninsular War games, probably as characters or specialists for Sharp Practice, although they are quite chunky and on the large size compared with Perry figures, for example.

Anyway, I now finally have a force to use for games of The Silver Bayonet. I'll have to find time to paint up the French and British sets at some point.

Two more vampires

I had a quiet lazy day yesterday, what with my partner being off out all day so I got on with some more painting and did two more vampires.

These have a much more Carpathian or Eastern European feel than the previous two. They are Noble Vampires from the North Star Frostgrave Blood Legacy range of figures and I really like them a lot. I probably won't ever play Blood Legacy, but these two have so much potential for all manner of things.

I think that the forested mountains of Transylvania are likely to be their original home, because they really do have that Balkan nobility vibe about them. There is a Gothic supplement for In Her Majesty's Name which has been brought up to date for the second edition of the rules. You can download it here. These figures seem to be pretty much perfect for IHMN, but are also going to work with all manner of horror or Pulp rules, and even with The Silver Bayonet, especially if you want to play in a Russian setting.

One of the nice things about a warm day is that things dry quickly and your varnish won't go cloudy. I got up before 7:30 this morning and varnished and photographed the pair of toothy horrors. I think that they have turned out really well.

Ancien Régime Vampires

I am currently getting a few nice odds and ends out of the way before embarking on a new (as in, not one I was planning to do at all last year) big project.

First up are two vampires, both from the North Star Silver Bayonet range of figures.

I am really taken with the poses of these two, they are full of cunning and menace, as though they are waiting in some lonely place for passing victims.

I have called them Monsieur le Marquis and Madame la Marquise and I see them living in an ancient château somewhere quite remote in south-western France, maybe close to a village that is entirely under their control. Although they are dressed in the fashion of the 18th century, they are clearly far older beings, perhaps with lives that stretch back to the Middle Ages, if not before that.

Although designed for The Silver Bayonet, these figures clearly have a lot of potential for all manner of rules and scenarios. I think that they are terrific figures and they were a lot of fun to paint. as an aside, I gave Madame a green dress trimmed with yellow to echo the uniform (green with yellow facings) of the 17th century Régiment de Fimarcon dragoons, who by the Seven Years' War had been renamed the Aubigné Dragoons and were uniformed in red with (probably) green facings.

 

Bad Squiddo Undead Things

Well, I've been busy today! I was up before 7 a.m because the dogs were being loud and excitable and I've been at home all day waiting for a parcel delivery, so I thought I'd paint some things that have been lying around for ages. 

All four are Bad Squiddo 28mm figures, and I have to say that they are terrific figures to paint.

First, there are two renaissance skeletons; a Landsknecht Doppelsöldner and a fine gentlewoman, maybe a countess or duchess.

I really love these. They are so animated and full of character.

I decided to try and get a few hints of rust on the Landsknecht's armour and double-handed sword and I think that it has worked pretty well.

Both figures were undercoated in black and given a top-down zenithal blast with Army Painter Skeleton Bone spray. I then used a combination of paints and drawing inks to build up the colours. I am really happy with the end results.

The other two figures are Mummies.

These were given the same black undercoat and skeleton bone zenithal treatment and I then built up the finished effects with dry-brushing and dark brown drawing ink. They were pretty quick to complete but I think that they will work well on the table.

These will be good for all sorts of horror and pulp games, as well as 7TV Fantasy and Pulp. I cannot recommend these figures highly enough. They are excellent.

Anyway, even after all the painting, basing, spray varnishing and photography, my parcel still hasn't arrived.

Bah!

 

Maze of Malcor - Four Wizard Shades and a Banshee

Ages ago, when it was first announced I bought the Frostgrave Maze of Malcor book and the associated range of figures from North Star. Sadly, our then-current Frostgrave campaign at the club came to an end and we all decided on a break from Frostgrave. I never painted up any of the figures, well not until now.

In the book, the Wizard Shades are portrayed as incorporeal but with a normal appearance. I decided that I wanted them to look more "ghostly".

As you can see, I've used a greenish palette for these figures, making them, hopefully, look a bit more like generic ghostly apparitions, or maybe even statues. Who knows? They could come in useful for all sorts of games with horror-based, gothic or supernatural settings.

I took a slightly different approach with the Banshee, giving her a reddish tinge to her flesh and hair. I wanted to make her look a bit different to the other apparitions. I'm not sure that I'm totally happy with the outcome, but she will have to do.

I'd be interested to see what others think about these.

My Last Sunrise - The Vampire Hunters

The only upside of having an elderly Westie with a bad cruciate ligament (although she is on the mend now) is that, because I need to keep an eye on her and carry her around a fair bit, I can spend a lot of time painting.

So, thanks to Maisie's gammy leg, I've managed to finish off the rest of the My Last Sunrise figures. There are six of these in total. First, here are two fighters who place their trust in sharp blades;

Next, a couple of stout fellows who use faith, chemical warfare (a.k.a. holy water) and pointy things to send the Undead to their doom;

Next, courtesy of two fearless females, ranged attacks;

The figure on the left is a witch called Clara on the Bad Squiddo website and she has a small McGuffin that looks like a gold scorpion in her hand. I wanted to give her a more obvious magical attack and decided that a ball of magical fire would work quite nicely. After all, vampires don't really care for that sort of thing, do they?

Anyway, here is the assembled Scooby Gang (Buffy fans will know what I mean);

Now, I have cleared enough space to get some Shieldmaidens prepped for painting.

Anyway, here is Maisie, being totally unfazed by her knee ligament. Her sister Daisy is doing her own thing out in the garden. I expect I'll have to carry Maisie outside fairly soon. Of course, once she's out there, she will make her own way back into the house. I think she's having me on a bit.

My Last Sunrise - The Vampires

As promised, I've been working on the Vampires from the Bad Squiddo "My Last Sunrise" Kickstarter. It is worth mentioning that all these figures are now available from Annie's website, here.

Vampire lore tells us that all vampires are "made" by an existing vampire, the most famous being Bram Stoker's Dracula. Here is the leader of this particular vampire "family", a somewhat dramatic and Byronic-looking figure. He's clearly just nipped out for a bite, but is a bit of a messy eater.

Of course, vampire lords have to have brides, and here is the Count's trio of lovelies. Their arcane powers of seduction have lured many an unsuspecting victim to their doom. Male or female, it doesn't matter to these ladies. They are equal opportunity blood-drinkers.

And here is the Count with his backing singers. They literally knock 'em dead wherever they appear.

The Count has also recruited some muscle. First, a terrifying psychopathic Revenant, who may or may not be a vampire, but who certainly likes a bit of blood-letting. I think she likes her meat very rare.

The Count also has two fearsome ladies of the night whose skills with a blade are legendary. Tangle with these beauties at your peril.

Here are all the Count's bodyguards together. What a delightful trio they are!

My Last Sunrise - finally making a start

Last year, Bad Squiddo launched a small Kickstarter called My Last Sunrise. The theme was vampires and vampire hunters, plus a couple of other rather nice figures. I backed the KS and I've had the figures around for a year now, undercoated but nothing else done. I am currently trying to reduce my lead and plastic mountain, ready to really get into my Swordmaidens, so I decided that now was the time to unleash some Gothic Horrors onto my painting table.

I've blocked in some basic colours on the vampires, which I'll be finishing off next, and I've also completed two figures, a Golem and a Werewolf, who I think will have a dual use as random monsters in Frostgrave.

Anyway, here they are. First a rear view;

And now the front;

I particularly like the Golem. I think he is a rather menacing and characterful model. I wanted to see if I could take the figures off of the slotta bases, of which I am not a fan, and it worked fine for him, but looking at the rest of the range, I realised that some of the figures would need pinning to give them strength on a simple MDF base. Therefore, I cut down the MDF base I'd stuck the golem on and glued him onto a slotta. This has had the effect of making him even taller and more impressive, I think, so not really a problem.

Anyway, I'm thinking that the other figures won't take too long to complete, so hopefully I'll get them out of the way over the next couple of weeks.