The Erlking and the High Elven Host

After a bit of a hiatus whilst I readied the orcs for battle, the elfin folk are now ready to take the field against them. Where the orcs are dark and grim, my elves wear burnished mail with bright banners flying and glittering spears held high. Whereas orcs are generally considered all-round evil-doers, I don't necessarily think of elves as being the good guys. I see them as aloof and removed, caring only about otherworldly concerns and their own elfish schemes. More like the elves depicted by Poul Anderson in The Broken Sword rather than the common Tolkienesque view. 

I had a few little elements to complete for this army and I'm still not 100% finished, I'm still working on the chariots and I have one more eagle that isn't based and I'm looking for another so that I can make a second eagle base (for a future big, big battle!).

I'll start on the right flank. This should really be the place of honour for the King and his guard but instead there are some chariots, light infantry javelineers, Swan Knights and The Guard of The Tower of The Sun. There are also some skirmish archers at the front but this army doesn't have many skirmishers and relies on formed archers backed by solid phalanxes of spears. They are lead by the shieldmaiden Ælfgifu at the moment as I'm a bit light of heroic male elf figures. But this is a striking figure that fits the role well... And so she may remain.

Eagles, the King's Guard (in blue) and The Rose Knight mounted on her steed: the war dragon Blue Fang. I'm of two minds whether to include the Rose Knight in this army or to put her in my army of Forrest Folk. She can fit in either army and I want her in one or the other as I do like to theme my armies and don't like to swap models between them.

The Erlking - High King of the Elfin Folk standing before the Royal Guard (in blue). These troops were originally made to be a large 36 figure phalanx but they have now been organised into three 12 figure units. I think I might have to create a 4th unit to balance the whole regiment. Beside the king is a she-elf spell caster and a low level hero which, in the past, I've usually used as the captain of the guard.

This regiment is the largest, having 6 units. They are organised differently to all the others in that they're mixed bow and spear. This can potentially make them pretty lethal on the battlefield. They are lead by The Prince In The Scarlet Robe.

Next in line, on the left wing, are some lighter troops. These are medium infantry warriors with sword and shield. I'm not exactly sure how to represent them in Midgard at this stage. With them are another two units of javelineers - light infantry skirmishers - straight out of the rule book but with some extra fighting ability. This wing also has a couple of bases of standard, bow armed skirmishers.

Knights of the Three Keeps - Heavy Riders (Knights). I've made them knights because they're virtually cataphracts which gives them a nice archaic aesthetic. Here' they are on the extreme flank although they could just as easily deploy in the centre as they are a hard hitting strike force. Their proper role is to charge the enemy with full force. They're not really suited to working around the flanks to harry the enemy.

Another shot of the Rose Knight and Blue Fang.

The whole host deployed for battle.

A close up of the javelin bases. I originally created these as you see in two 12 figure units and although the sabot bases they are on are 8mm wider than the standard bases I'm using (11.2 cm) they are close enough to use together (I'm not fussed over a few millimetres). Using these sabot bases also gives me the option to keep some of my elves on single round bases for other possible rules sets.

Scorpions - Just like with my orcs, these are from the WizKids range. A little modification and they work great. Again I'll say: A set of 2 for about $10/$12 and you can't beat them.

Another shot of my javelins, medium infantry and skirmishers. The sabot bases work well for the lighter troops and I have the option to keep a bunch of single base figures.

Another angle.

And, once again, The Erlking - High King of the Elven Folk.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So that's it. One thing I'm working on is this: I actually have three chariot models and I'm looking at putting each chariot on it's own base with a few chariot runners armed with bows. This will create an independent, strong chariot force of three units for fast skirmishing and flank attacks. A good match for the orcs and their warg riders.

The Goblin Host of King Gorgol the Mighty

It took me much longer that I expected but I finally finished re-basing my goblins. This was a much bigger project than rebasing my elves. It didn't help that Christmas limited my time a bit, but the effort of doing these bases in the style I wanted meant that each base needed four different stages of work - adding the basing muck and placing the figures, stones and grit, grassy flock and finally adding the tufts to bring it all together. 

I do think it was worth the effort though.

I'm very happy with the results however, there is still a little bit of work to finish the project 100%. For instance I have a unit of werewolves and a bunch of regular wolves. I've been debating if I should include them in this army or add them to my undead hoard. Same with a bunch of giant spiders: this army or add them to my woodland army? Give me your opinion.

The whole army deployed takes up more than the 6' edge of a table. I had to deploy them deep so that I could fit them in and photograph them (they only just fit the table and I used the photoshop AI function to extend the background and widen the table edges). There are 12 bases of heavy warriors, seven skirmish bases, elite warriors, crossbows, wolf riders, boar riders, giant scorpion riders, mountain orc light warriors, ogres, a giant, a wurm, light artillery, heroes and a couple of shamans.

The Orc King Gorgol the Mighty, an uruk of great stature and evil cunning! This is a Mantic Games figure. He's nice and big and looks like a mean kind of guy. I'm not sure where the drummer came from but he looks cool.

Below is the newest addition to the army. This is my version of a pretty popular Reaper Bones giant. He normally has his right arm extended, parallel to the ground holding his club out. I did a bit of modification and added a bit of (green-stuff) armour to his right shoulder to cover up the modification marks. he looks like a pretty tough customer.

Starting on the flank are some warg riders. These will be classed as light riders with some missile capability. I don't want them to be too powerful but good enough to harass and capable of attacking vulnerable enemy units. The boar riders below will be a more hard hitting cavalry arm. They are from Mantic and they come as a unit of 10 figures so I was thinking of making 3 units of 3 figures and setting up the remaining figure as a hero but the units looked weak so I made two regiment of 5 figures and I'll have to find a suitable mounted hero.  The hero on the dire wolf is better suited to lead the wolf riders in my opinion.

Here's half of the heavy warriors. There are only 10 figures on each base as I wanted them to appear as more of a rabble when compared to my elves. By doing this I also turned my existing 10 regiments of 12 figures into 12 regiments of 10 figures! Two extra units! It meant that I had to make two more standard bearers but that was a pretty easy task (I just converted a pair of existing spear holding figures).

I decided to not give them any formed archers and, instead, made 7 bases of skirmishers. This is a much stronger skirmishing element that the elves who's main skirmishing is provided by javelineers. I think this is good as it will create very different tactical doctrines between the two enemies.

Below are the big hitters of the army - the giant and a wurm/dragon. The dragon is based weirdly. I didn't want to destroy the original base so I ringed the edge of the plastic base with thin strips of bark and added some magnets to the bottom. I then made a square base with magnetic sheet on it. It's very sturdy and I can remove the model from the big square base.

Above & below are some crossbows that I kit bashed using Oathmark Orc bodies and pieces from a Perry War of The Roses box. I'm going to make one or two more of these and they will constitute the army's formed missile elements. There is a noticeable gap in the picture below... I made a 12 figure unit of big tough chaps by doing the same oathmark/Perry conversion. These are designed to be the elite troops: bigger goblins (Oathmark Orcs) wielding two handed polearm weapons. I only made 12 so I need to kit bash more and fill that gap in the line.

A pair of ballista using the great WizKids set - you get a pair of these for about 10 bucks. Bargain! Just add a couple of modifies goblins and they're ready to go.

On the other flank are the poor relatives - The Mountan Orcs. These figures are from Wargames Atlantic and they are very different from the Oathmark figures so I decided to paint them with tan skin and give them a completely different aesthetic. The infantry are light warriors. They also have ogres in their ranks and these units will be classed as regular warriors with added traits to boost their hitting power. The idea of these units can be attributed directly by a quote from Boromir in the Mines of Moria: "They have a cave troll."

The Scorpion Riders came about because I don't like spiders. I'm such a pathetic arachnophobe that I cant even touch spider models that look too realistic (I'm okay with those old, stupid looking GW ones). So I bought a bunch of Reaper Bones giant scorpions and made these. I'm not sure how to class them for Midgard at this stage. I want them to be fast (scuttling) powerful (big snapping pincers) and difficult to control (insect minds), with missile capability.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And that's it. There is still a small amount of work to do to get this army finished and that will be pretty easy to do. I will add to their numbers in time and I especially want to build up the elite element. I have another box each of Oathmark and Wargames Atlantic goblins so the whole army will grow in time. I could combine elements of my Undead Host with these chaps to give them a boost it needed, but there are enough of them that they can stand alone in any sized battle.

Next thing is to complete the rebasing of my elves.

Cheers and thanks for reading.

It's Orcish Re-Basing Time

I haven't quite finished rebasing my elves but I was getting bored with doing the same bases over and over so I thought it must be time to start getting my orcs into order. These bases took a bit more thought and effort than the elves and a fortuitous trip to my closest wargames supply depot (House of War) saw me buy all the supplies I needed in one fell swoop.

The basic item I needed was a basing past. The one I wasted was European Mud from Vallejo, and I was lucky in the fact that the shop had a delivery and the stuff was put on the shelf an hour before I got there. So I bought two tubs along with a large bag of stony grit and several packs of tufts.

I started with some infantry. I wanted to make the units as looser formations compared to the elves and as a result I only used 10 figures per base instead of 12. This will end up giving me two or three extra units buy the time I get them all done.

The vast majority of the heavy infantry are Oathmark Goblins plastic figures. However, there are a few other figures including a couple from Mantic some conversions of human figures. 

The bases are the same as I used for my elves - 11.2cm blank cup coasters that I get from my local hardware shop. I cut them down to 7cm depth, round off the cut corners and add a 12mm dice frame. After that I slather on the basing past and add stony grit and foliage. I like the result although it is time consuming.

I also did a couple of bases of skirmishers. This army won't have formed archers but they will have formed crossbows.

Next are what I'm calling Mountain Orcs. These are Wargames Atlantic goblins. I initially made these as light infantry but I decided to change them a bit. I have three Reaper ogres/trolls and I could put them together to create a unit but I decided to add them to an infantry unit. I like the idea of a troll escorted by contingent of smaller critters (to make them feel braver) so that's what I did. Sort of.

As you can see I painted these orcs with a dark tan skin to differentiate them from the regular orcs. I think these figures they look better with this skin colour. The idea of these bases is to create a hard heavy warrior unit and not a monstrous creature unit. They will be Heavy Infantry Warriors with a couple of appropriate traits (Spears as Tribute and Brutal).

However, The trolls are not permanently fixed to the bases. I made a plateau using 3mm cork sheet and cut out a 40mm x 40mm square. I put a magnet into the bottom of the creatures bases and a square of thin metal sheet onto the base (after photo). In this way I can actually group the three creatures together into an dedicated troll/ogre unit.

And now, here's in one of my favourite and weirder units: mounted bows on giant scorpions - Scorpion Archers!

Hey, I forgot to add tufts to the second unit and I also forgot to paint the bases edges!

These were made using Wargames Atlantic Goblins and Reaper Bones giant scorpions. I used the saddles that come in the goblin box and fitted them onto the big stingers with some minor modification and some greenstuff. I'll make these Heavy Riders with bows and the traits Fearsome and Spears as Tribute.

I had to put these onto fairly large bases. I tried mounting two of them onto a shallower base but they didn't project the same sense of power and awe as the single base with three. I was a bit sad to have to remove these from their single 60mm bases but the big bases wouldn't fit on to a sabot with the same frontage as the rest of the units.

And, that's it for the orcs so far. I still have a lot to do including warg-riders, boar cavalry, spiders, werewolves and a dragon! I'm sure there are other things too that I can't remember off the top of my heard right at the moment.

Thanks for reading,

IanKH

P.S. Since I began writing this post I've done another 4 bases of heavy infantry bringing the number up to 10 units and I still have plenty more to do.

The Erlking's New Model Elfin Army

Well, this is going to be a big post...

I've continued with the rebasing of my elf army. There are about 6 companies/bases of spears, 3 of formed archers and 6 of spear & bow. Next there are 6 companies of medium infantry - 2 x sword & shield, 4 x javelins and 4 companies of skirmishers with bows. That's 25 infantry units. I think it's about 240 figures. Add to these some cavalry, chariots, light artillery and command ~ as well as a couple of big beasties to keep things interesting - and it all comes to around 300 figures.

First: here are the rest of the heavy spear units and the formed archers. As in my previous post these represent different houses or clans (or whatever). I still haven't written up anything regarding the army so it's just a bunch of regiments thrown together more for the sake of making them colourful, at this stage, rather than anything else.

These ones below are the light/medium infantry. In the Midgard rules they will be counted as Skirmishers (light Infantry). The swordsmen will be the same but I can give them the trait Spears as Tribute to give them more of a combat role. I've kept these troops as individual figures and put them onto some 12cm x 6cm sabot bases that I already have. This suits the skirmishers okay but I'm not so sure about the swordsmen. I think they might be better on a single base. All of them are magnetised so they are stable on the sabot bases.

I posted these below guys last week but I've added them hereto show the javelin companies all together.

I don't have many actual skirmishers units. Just four of them at this time. Once again these figures are on sabot bases and I think this suits them fine. The first lot are Oathmark figures from their light elf infantry kit, but the second lot are kit bashed. I had a bunch of Dark Age warrior figures that I didn't really need. I made these figures a long while back before the above mentioned kit was available. Overall I actually think they, arguably, look better than the Oathmark figures. I'm not sure which manufacturer made the figures but they were warriors - not archers. Likewise, I don't remember where the bows and other bits came from. However, the heads are all from the Oathmark heavy elf infantry set.

Every army needs some cavalry and here's what I have. The heavy cavalry will be counted as knights. They're made using the popular Gripping Beast Goths. I used the Elite Cavalry set for these companies. I don't think I'll make any more elf cavalry. I think this single contingent is enough. Chariots, however, are a different kettle of fish. I think they fit the elfin aesthetic better than cavalry so I would like to add more chariot companies.

The chariots will use one of the light cavalry templates. I'm not 100% sure about this basing. They are held by magnets so the basing isn't permanent. I contemplated if I should have a single chariot on the base with several chariot runners. Two carts on the base makes it look very crowded. I have three chariots all up plus an extra one that remains unpainted. I kit-bashed them using 4Ground mdf Egyptian chariots and plastic Perry horses. If I do the "Runner" thing I could have 3 units and I could then make the remaining cart as a Hero/Commander. That would give a good sized contingent for large battles.

A light ballista company. These were made using a set of WizKids ballista's. You get two in a set for about $10, so they are a good cheap option with a little bit of conversion. I used the same set for my Orcish army. Again, they are magnetised so I can remove them and use them as single models if needs be.

I rebased the Earlking. I originally made a pretty large base with three individually based figures (first photo. This base is too large so I made a smaller one with the king still removeable but the herald and banner bearer attached. With this set up I can remove the Earlking and replace him with the Elf Queen (either as a warrior queen or spellcaster).

The Erlking's base was made using some wooden disks I found in a craft shop. I gave the bark on the outside a couple of coats of pva glue to prevent it from peeling off at a later date. I rebased the Wood Elf King onto a similar base.

And here are all my command and heroes together. The figure at the front (with shield) was a kit bash I did a few years back and is a bit out of date with the rest. He was made with a left over Norman foot knight torso. I have a few elf figures in amongst my general fantasy figures that could make potential heroes. I'll have to go through them and see who is worthy for a promotion.

I have co-opted other figures in the past, so maybe one of these fine fellows can make the grade...

Anyway, that's it. There is still a little bit work to be done with this army but the re-basing is mostly complete. I've already started on a couple of Orc bases but they're a bit more complex and will take a bit more effort. I'm hoping that by the time I'm finished with both armies I'll have my 6 x 4 table back and I can set up both armies and get a couple of photos of them in full array. After that I'll start on the Undead and my Northern Men (basically my Anglo-Saxons with added "Not the Rohirrim" Riders and some fantasy elements. There is also my Faerie Army to add to the mix too (lots of fauns, goblins, centaurs, trees and other forest dwelling creatures).

And my Granbretanians.

So much to do.

The End