Wednesday 3 June 2020

Lockdown Catch Up - 2

Yes, where was I?  That was it, Orcs...

Regular readers may recall that I picked up some old Nick Lund sculpted Orcs a while back, as potential opposition to my Nick Lund/Grenadier dwarves.

Quite a few were already painted, serviceably enough to be used.  Some needed basing, and a few others had no paint at all.  Those are the ones that have now reached the painting table.

First up, crew for a bolt thrower (no, not that one).  I haven't secured the Grenadier model that these chaps should crew, but I do have a few of the old Citadel Notlob ones, so that'll do.  Tunics are painted as if they've been removed from some unfortunate knight or retainer.



Couple of pole arms.



Archers.  Really not Nick Lund's finest work these ones.  Poorly proportioned and posed compared to the rest of the range, with massive chunky bows.  They'll do though, and they do have a nice hefty weight on the table.




And a couple of big boys with choppy things.  Sculpted by Nick Lund, but for Citadel rather than Grenadier, I think for the Regiments of Renown box, Eeza Ugezods Mother Crushers.

Hummed and hawed about skin tones for a while, but decided to go traditional after a while, with a slightly understated green (no GW Goblin Green here, but a base of old Gretchin Green, which has a bit more brown tone to it).

The Reason for all this activity is I want to give Fantasy Warriors a go.  This was the fantasy mass battle game released by Grenadier Miniatures many years ago.  I remember reviews of it, and being rather interested, partly because it came with a massive number of plastic dwarves and orcs.  This was before GW released their first Warhammer big box, so it was a contemporary of third edition Warhammer (still my favourite). I was intrigued at the time (and still am) by concepts that it included that were just completely alien to me as a Warhammer player: sure, third edition had introduced a pre-battle scouting phase (a rather good one I recall), but the idea that your leaders' jobs were mostly to give orders rather than stick things with pointy stuff?  Reading the omens and boasting about what your army would achieve?  Time of day being important (some races being more effective in the dark, how very 'Battle of the Five Armies')?

With proper Warhammer having gone the way of the Dodo, I've been curious about other options.  I've looked at Dragon Rampant and it's commendably simple, but a bit too generic to really grab my attention.  Never been attracted to Kings of War.  Oathmark looks good and I've seen some people really enjoying it, so that may well go on the future purchase list.  I've even picked up a copy of Warhammer third edition, which I must have a go with again, but something about Fantasy Warriors has just always been an itch I never scratched.  It helps that the rules are available as a free download from Mirliton or EM4 miniatures.

The downside is that it's a pretty crappy scan of a pdf (no excuse for scanning pages wonky in this day and age!), from a set of rules that did have a bit of a reputation already for not being brilliantly clearly laid out.  To counter this, I've done summary notes for the key rules in the game, and written up some reference cards with the main rules and tables for quick reference.


So let's see what we can do with this, shall we?


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