Clearing Out More Reaper Metals

It has been a busy week for me and I've not done much on my various projects. What I have been doing is cleaning out a bag of Reaper metal fantasy models that have been hanging around for a while. Not much to write home about, but here they are.

These are "vampire thralls" or something similar. Not a lot of detail on these models but they look suitably undead and evil. They come two to a pack.

Then I had a couple of crossbowmen, a model type not represented in my fantasy collection. So I put them on the painting table this week. These are much more detailed. The female is a Werner Klocke scuplt, and like all of his stuff it looks great. I'm not sure my paint job did it justice.

So there you have it. I also painted a giant snake but forgot to take a picture. It's really nothing to speak of anyway.

Up next are modern zombies, a whole new genre for me!

Copplestone Castings Cavemen

In my last update I mused about adding Copplestone Casting's Cavemen range to my tiny collection of prehistoric miniatures. I got inspired and placed an order. I was surprised at how fast the delivery was from the UK to the US, and it really wasn't all that expensive. I'll be ordering more from Copplestone from now on!

So here's the whole tribe. Click for a larger picture.

I decided that they were a little under-dressed to represent northern climates during the Ice Age. So, I painted them to look more "equatorial" or at least like people from a southern climate. I was thinking of going crazy with tribal tattoos, but decided I had neither talent nor patience for the effort.

The full range comes in four packages. Some of the models don't have their weapons attached, and so you can decided what goes where. For the most part, the poses dictated their weapons. Still, if I ordered more I could create a bit of variety by switching a weapon. The weapons were over-sized for the models' hands and have a tenuous bond with the models. One drop and the weapons will break off. That's my only complaint.

Here are details of the packages.

These are the Caveman Characters pack. They make suitable leaders or shamans. One is equipped with state-of-the-art weaponry, a bow! They're all single cast models.

For the unobservant, these are Cavewomen. They look a little too pretty for me, but at least they are solidly built. I really didn't think the bikini tops were necessary, but I guess it gives the models a pulp flavor with a nod toward modesty. Anyway, they're good models with interchangeable weapons.

Here we have the Cavemen pack. These guys remind me of some people I knew in high school. They all have swappable weapons, but I think in this case it's obvious what weapon should go with a model. This package provides the tribe with its hunters, so an extra pack might be worth it.

Lastly we have the More Cavemen pack. This is a cool pack because it give two more adult hunters, but also a range of ages. There's one about 18 - 20 years, one 14 -16 years, and a boy about 8 - 10 years who is throwing a rock.  That's a cool touch, and rounds out a "tribe" theme where everyone contributes.

So that's all of the cavemen I'm going to paint for now. These models don't all have to be from the same tribe, obviously. Combined with the Neanderthal types I painted last time, I'd have a good mix of prehistoric clans for some small skirmishes.

As a bonus, I dug into my bag or Reaper metals and found a large flightless bird I had once planned to use for my aborted World of Warcraft conversions. This was going to be a Plainstrider (WoW has tons of these large, flightless birds in the game). So I painted this up to go with my prehistoric stuff.

I don't know what it represents, but it looks stone age to me! Combined with the sabertooth tiger I have plus some wolves, bears, and a giant snake I need to finish, I have some animal enemies for my cavemen to hunt, too.

Not sure where I'll take this now, but I'm glad I scratched this itch. The models look great and can serve a lot of different purposes.

Reaper Bones and Warlord Thoughts

I took a short break in the 20mm WW2 project to paint more from my pile of Reaper Bones. No matter how much I pull out of that box, it is still full. I'll be getting another box just like it this Fall too! Anyway, I rummaged around for some Elves and here's what I found.

I just felt like painting bright and colorful, so High Elvish heroes fit that bill. I got hold of a pot of GW's specialty paint for creating a patina on metal, and you can see it on the Elf King's shield. It worked out nice, though it needs to be applied with some thought. I sloshed it on, which was okay but not as good as it could be. I imagined he's carrying some ancient, magic shield. It was a great excuse not to paint the detailed peacock.

What I didn't realize at the time was the two females are Warlord hero models. I have been giving a lot of thought to trying that game, particularly because I love the figures. I've also heard second edition was a huge improvement over first. As I dug into it, I realized not only do I have a ton of Warlord models in my collection, I actually have a complete Black Orc faction fully painted and ready to go!

Without realizing, I also have a functional Necropolis army (undead) that only needs a few more models to reach the recommended 1,000 point game size. I have almost all of it in Bones, too, or in metals that I painted for Song of Blades and Heroes a while ago.

The only challenge is I have a mix of square and round bases. I don't think it will make too much of a difference, really. Visually it looks a bit weird. I'll live with it.

I found the beta test rules and walked through them. The game is pretty solid, though there's some strangeness in the way troops are organized and activate. I really liked it and ordered both books (2nd Ed rules and Savage North expansion). I will also start building toward some other factions. It fills that niche LotR SBG vacated when it got screwy new books that jacked up the game. In fact, this has a higher fantasy feeling than LotR, which I love.

For now it's back to building my 20mm WW2 Americans. However, expect more Reaper Bones and Warlord updates interspersed.

Quick Update

Been a slow few weeks for me, and I haven't had a ton of enthusiasm for new projects. Therefore you see my production has dropped off. Fortunately I always have a gigantic stack of Reaper Bones and other Reaper models to work through for when I don't know what to do next.

Here are some odd models selected from the pile.

I really like the detail on these models. They're not all Bones, though; the Orc is metal as well as the little tree dude (forgot what it's called).  In any case, you cannot tell the difference between the two once painted.

The Orc and Warrior took quite some time, as they're overflowing with detail. Here's another shot of them to give an idea.

In any case, that's what I've been working on recently. I enjoy painting Reaper models, and have a ton more to do. I'll keep posting what I finish, but honestly all of my Reaper Bones and model posts are the least viewed articles on my blog. So I get the feeling I'm pretty much talking to myself here! Ha ha! Anyway, that's all for Reaper right now.

I've moved on to completing my 15mm Russians, which will be a large project. After that, I've teed up more WW2. Stay tuned!

Big and Bad: More Reaper Bones

In an effort to put a dent in my Bones collection, I worked on a few of the larger creatures that came with my Kickstarer. I haven't got around to the giants and dragons, but I've been thinking about getting them together soon.

So here are the big and bad boys: a gnoll archer, ettin, and ogre. Click for a larger picture.

These models had an amazing level of detail and were very crisp castings. I think they were all Tre Manor sculpts, but I could be wrong. The blue stuff hanging from the ettin's belt are two fish, which I though was a characterful touch. The ogre's shield is interesting, and I imagined that he covered it with tanned hide, probably human!  The gnoll is a nice addition to the other Reaper Gnoll.

I imagine these guys could serve as bruisers and tanks for my orcs and give a little variety to the force. I'm looking forward to trying them out together in a game of Savage Showdown.

After completing these models, I wanted to keep going. I have so many other projects in the pipeline, I felt a little guilty for it. However, I couldn't resist giving these bruisers something to beat on. So, here are three models that I'm planning to use as rangers.

I've actually painted these models before in metal, except for the middle one which was a new sculpt for Bones. Painting them again did not bother me, and provided a chance to re-base them and do a different color scheme. I did these in analogous forest greens and browns, trying to make them look more like a "unit." These will serve as leader and hero figures for the "good guys."

To give a sense of scale, here is the group all together.

Now you can see how meaty those big guys are! I'm pretty satisfied with these models. However, I've got to get moving on other stuff. I'll come back to my Bones collection soon.

Up next will be 1/600 scale planes for an up-coming Guadalcanal air war campaign. Check back soon for the first installment of US planes.

Reaper Bones Heroes

The nice thing about having a giant pile of Reaper Bones from the first Kickstarter is that I always have models to paint when I just want to work on something different. The bad thing is that no matter how many I paint, the pile still looks unchanged. Of course, so far I've only painted 37 of the Kickstarter Bones, so I guess I shouldn't be too quick to complain.

I've been on a WW2 jag recently, and I don't think that's going to change. So to break up all the military colors I pulled out a handful of models from my pile of heroes and painted them.  Here's what I've done this week. Click for a larger picture.

So this is a bit of a mish-mash in terms of theme. From left to right, I've got two casters, then an elven pirate, a female warrior, and finally an Elf ranger.  The ranger I have actually already done in metal before, which you can see here.  I like both, but am partial to the way this one came out and I prefer the round base.

As with most of my Bones, I didn't prime these but just went straight to paint. I've never had much problems doing this, but this time the female elf pirate (in the center) was hard to paint. This one resisted the paint, even after washing all the models. I scrubbed her again, and it made no difference.  Also, her sword had a lot of flash and just poor casting.  I considered replacing the sword blade, but then I don't know if this model will ever see the light of day after this. So it wasn't worth the effort to me. Well, no big deal, but I was a bit surprised at the difficulty of this particular model. The others were fine.

So, I've got some miscellaneous WW2 on the painting table, and I'll be building my Samurai Battles models. I won't be painting the Samurai Battles figures, since I have so much else I can do, but I'll post up the finished game when it's done. If it was not 20mm scale, I might have been tempted to paint them.

A Few More Bones

This kind of post is going to become a lot more common for me.  I've worked on a few of the 200+ Bones models that I have, and took a few pictures. Generally speaking, I like to complete a project and then post up everything at once. However, with Bones it will be an on-going project and not a lot of "theme" to it.

Having said that, here are three "good heroes" I did this week. These were not primed in any way, just washed in soap and water then glued to a fender washer.

My favorite is the middle guy, who is a typical holy warrior. He could pass as a Priest of Sigmar for all you WHFB fans. My son and I have been joking that he is actually a medieval Billy Mays. He's got the beard for it.  In any case, I've got a ton more "good guys" to do.

These are all done in Reaper paints, too, and the triads are magical for the doing the robes. Not all the triads blend so well, but these colors were great for it.

Next I'm moving back to my 15mm WW2 project. The US Marines are cleaned and mounted, and now just need basing material and primer for me to start painting them. A Marine platoon is a surprising amount of models; there's over 50 models with HQ and I haven't added MGs, mortars, or anything else.