HotT Narnian additional elements

New Narnian Elements

I have had most of these around for a while, but I just finished the Dryads and crows, which inspired me to finally photograph the rest of these fantastical critters.

Above is a Ral Partha Hill Troll which, though a 25mm figures, double perfectly as a giant for my Narnians.

This is another Ral Partha 25mm casting, a bit large perhaps, but for a hero element being a bit on the large size seems appropriate. I stole this miniature from my daughter, but she didn't seem to mind.

I added a couple of new beast elements and this one includes a Splintered Light mouse which is meant to represent Reepicheep, though I must admit I liked the swashbuckling interpretation in the movies a bit better.

This is another great miniature by Splintered Light. A real pain to put together, but worth the effort!

The murder of crows takes flight. I will play this as an aerial element.

These are one of my all time favorite sculpts and once again come from Splintered Light Miniatures. I will play these dryads as either beasts or behemoths, or even possibly lurkers. The folliage is an addition made with spray painted fiber floss material with turf and scale leaves glued to the fibers.

The big man himself, Aslan. I don't like playing with God elements so I usually use him as a hero or hero general.

HoTT Wax Tournament - Narnians Triumphant!

Robin Hood Update - Figures Rebased and Ready

The Robin Hood HotT army was this year's HotT Wax tournament prize painted and provided by David McBride at Splintered Light Miniatures. I wanted to rebase them just so they would be consistent with my own style, especially since I wanted to add a couple of Hero elements which you can see above. These are Essex miniatures and represent Richard the Lion Heart and Ivanhoe. They can be played as heroes or knights. I also wanted to rearrange the character figures of Robin Hood and Maid Marian etc. In the process of rebasing I decided to darken the skin tones a bit just to fit my personal taste.

The Characters - Friar Tuck on the left will play as a cleric, Robin Hood with Maid Marian and some of his merry men will play as a hero element, and Little John, Alan-a-Dale, and will Scarlett will either play as a hero element or as a lurker.

The merry men - seven elements of shooters.

The peasantry - eight elements of warband.

These are great figures in wonderful dynamic poses. It took a bit of doing, but I rearranged the figures so that none of the staves were sticking off the ends of the stands.

A typical shooter stand. Once again Splintered light has provided some great dynamic figures.

A closer shot of Robin Hood with Maid Marian. I wanted to use some gold in her outfit to distinguish her as being of noble birth and a bit out of place with the woodsmen. She even has some gold braided through her hair, at least that is what it is supposed to look like.

THE VICTORS

The Narnians emerged victorious from the field of battle in Columbus Ohio. HoTT Wax was a blast, with twenty participants all sporting some magnificent armies. With a lot of help from the die, I took first place and came back to Nashville with a nicely painted Robin Hood army courtesy of Splintered Light Miniatures and David McBride. The die gods were giving me good Karma for making the long drive with Terry Webb and Paul Potter. Many thanks to David Zecchini for all his efforts to put Hott Wax together for us!

hopefully the final iteration of the Narnian army! I had enough elements to pick and choose from this fairly massive army that I was able to pick a winning combination. My tournament army consisted of 1 hero, 1 beast, 1 flyer, 2 behemoths, 2 knights, 1 rider, 2 warband, 2 spears, and 3 shooters for a 36 AP army.


A view of the Narnian host from lower down. I opted not to use the magician, or paint Aslan as a god element due to the vagaries of fate from which these elements can suffer.

I fielded both of these behemoths and they played a crucial role in almost all my victories. I finished them just hours before we had to leave, and I was extremely glad to have pushed to get them done. These are wonderful Splintered Light castings.

To the victor goes the spoils, which in this case was a wonderful Robin Hood army painted by none other than the proprietor of Splintered light. Thanks David!

Maid Marian and Robin Hood with some of his gang. I may remount this as a Hero stand, but I'll have to think about that for a while.

Will Scarlet, Little john and the Minstrel Alan a Dell.

Of course no army with Robin Hood would be complete without Friar Tuck! Great fun at HoTT Wax. Thanks again for all who played and put this wonderful tournament together.

Narnian's ready for HoTT Wax

My friends and I have decided to make a road trip up to Columbus Ohio to join the fun at HoTT Wax. The powers that be have decided we will be using 36 Army points instead of the usual 24, which has inspired me to actually finish painting the rest of the wonderful Splintered Light figures I got at last year's Nashcon in May. I have added several elements of satyrs and a flyer. I'm also currently painting a couple of elements of minotaurs which I will play as behemoths if I can get them finished before Friday. Here are the results of my efforts:

Here we have the satyr warband. The figures are a tad large and might have fit on a 20mm deep base, but as I had to use a deeper 20mm base for the elements of 4 spear, I decided to go with a deeper 30mm base to make it more apparent that these were warband and not 3 blade.

The warband general. I'll probably play him as a regular element and have my hero stand or centaurs be the general's element.

Here we have 2 elements of satyr shooters and a spear. These will mix well with their faun brethren to give me three elements of spear and three elements of shooters, which I hope will be enough. The spears are a great all around element, but they are slow in comparison to the rest of the army, so they may get left in the box if I have enough Army points to do so.


This is one of the smallish Ral Partha griffins from the 1980's and as such, he mixes well with the Splintered Light miniatures which tend to be a bit on the big side. I'm not a frequent HoTT player, so learning how to use this guy to my best advantage will be a challenge. I figure I've got five hours in a car with an expert HoTT player, so I hope to pick his brain for some strategic hints. Looking forward to seeing everyone at HoTT Wax.

HOTT 15mm Narnian Army ready for battle

Though not quite complete, I realized with the latest addition of the Fauns and hero element, I had enough elements to field the required 24 points. I still want to paint some Satyrs, especially shooters and blades, as well as a griffin (flyer), and possibly some manticores, but I may save them for an army of the White Witch, which will come sometime in the future. First I want to make an army of Telmarines for the Narnians to beat up on. At present the army consists of 3 knights (centaurs), 2 riders (centaurs), 1 beast (forest animals), 2 spear (fauns) 1 shooter (faun slingers), 1 magician (faun shaman), and 1 hero (Peter, Susan and Edmund - lucy being to young to take part in a battle), for a total of 26 possible points. Below are the latest additions. To see closeups of the other elements, just hit the Narnia label at the left of the screen.

The army arrayed

The contingent of Fauns - these are splendid figures from Splintered Light Miniatures

The Faun Shaman. The ring of stones are made with Sculptamold.

The heros - King Edmund on foot, High King Peter on horseback, and queen Susan. Edmund and Peter are Essex figures and Susan is a converted Vexilia figure for the Italian Condotta. Her expression is a bit more manly and aggresive than I would have liked, but the figure itself was an easy conversion. I simply added the dress (and breasts) with green stuff. From this angle she looks a bit more buxom than she really appears, which I tried to avoid, but with the expression on her face I wanted to make it clear that the figure was female. The human miniatures are a bit more slender in style than the fantasy figures, which actually was a fortuitous accident, as they are meant to represent children.

Saxons and Centaurs Oh My!

So my painting these days has been a bit eclectic. I have started the long slipery slide from historical to fantasy miniatures. Today I have some Narnians for a HOTT army, and waiting in the wings, as yet unseen, lurk the bugs and marines of the Star Ship Troopers. Not to fear however, my true love will always remain histprical gaming, and to that end I offer up pictures of my Saxon musket elements for DBN. Enjoy:

These are Eureka miniatures centaurs and though on the large size, more like 20mm, they are wonderful sculpts. I am using them with Splintered Lights beastlands range and their size should not be out of place. That's one of the nice things about fantasy. Who really knows how big a centaur should be?

These elements will play as knights, with the generals element in the center. I tried to pick Narnian themes for the shields, hence the lions and stylyzed antlers, as well as the pan pipes.

The archers and javelin armed centaurs will be classed as riders.

Now for a more serious subject: the Saxon line infantry regiments. I still have to look it up to be precise, but these are painted after the units present at the battle of Saalfield. I believe, the Clemmens, Elecktor and Xavier regiments. I usually hand paint my flags, but I decided to use the Napflag site this time, as there was so much detail in the saxon flags. I highlighted and shadowed the flags with gold paint and darker red shading for the red flag.

A frontal view...

and from the rear.

I opted to paint the saxons solid white and then wash with a diluted black ink to provide some shading. This did make for a very efficient method and the results, though not stunning, I found to be quite acceptable. The faces are a bit rough when enlarged to this degree, but in 15mm they actually look quite good.

New Projects

I have been working on a few odds and ends so I have decided to post my progress. The two main projects are a 15mm Narnian army for HOTT which I have just begun, and a 25mm Lord of the Rings army for HOTT which has been in progress for decades. The elves are Ral Partha figures sculpted by Tom Meier. Most of these are painted and just waiting to be based. The Orcs are about half done, but I have all the required figures for both armies and It shouldn't take too long to finish them. I have also revamped my camp for the Hundred Years War English that I have and made a Barker marker. Enjoy the pics.

Narnian Camp and beasts element. The camp is Baueda, the badgers are from splintered light and the other animals from an old Ral Partha 25mm set, but they seemed to be the right size for the large Narnian animals. The standing stone is scratch built from insulation foam.

Finally the Black Prince will have a suitable place to rest.

This is a conversion for my 25mm Hott Elf army. The Elf is a Tom Meier sculpt from Ral Partha, which I have placed on a dragon sculpted by Julie Guthrie? from the same era. The dragon had some considerable modifications to make the figure fit.

I must have had the caffeine shakes when I took this one, but you get the idea. Sea elf pikemen.

I needed a Barker marker for 15mm armies, so I used this old 25mm Ral Partha crusader to add a little uumph to the marker.