Kicking off 22 with some larger monsters

Not the only miniatures I worked on in January, but the ones I finished.

Something Old  

Minifigs AD&D Greyhawk series - 64 Aquatic Dragonnel

75mm Base

This wonderful creature was a Christmas present from my Old School miniatures Secret Santa. I had never seen it before but vowed to make it the first thing I painted this year. So it has been released from its packaging after 40 years and can be found lurking in coastal shallows and estuaries. 

Something New

Reaper Miniatures - Carnivorous Pudding 4406 -  Julie Guthrie 2019

Produced in smoke colored translucent plastic this giant beast required very little effort.

I magnetized it to allow it to be used off the 75mm base.

Something Borrowed

Grenadier - Fantasy Lords 138 Hippogriff - 1983

Color selection 100% stolen from the amazing Steve Dean 

(but I cant get close to his wonderfully clean style). See page 2 of the link below.

http://www.steve-dean.co.uk/search/label/28mm%20Fantasy%20Monsters

Some Blue Things

These dragons came to me painted - rather than strip them I opted to use the original color as a basecoat and rebase, repair and tweak.

Citadel DG4 - Black Dragon - Tom Meier 1984

Reaper - Cavern Crawler 02730 - Bob Olley

Date, as ever with Reaper, a mystery.

 

So Many Projects - a resolution update.

Its 2022 so my resolution to paint, on average, one pre-slotta Citadel miniature every week is now eleven years old.  This blog has received around 100,000 hits which seems surreal when you think this is only the 45th post - so an average of 4 posts per year (but with 18 posts in the first year the average is really more like only 2.5).  My resolution worked, I stuck with it and have painted and consistently based well over 600 old Citadel figs.   

Having put some energy into clearing the paint table for the end of the year, it is already getting crowded this week as I'm basing a couple of this years projects at once:

Assorted Monsters 

The batch I'm basing are mostly Grenadier and I'm putting in the 12 Fantasy Lords Dragon Men - lovely figs with loads of character who deserve better than the turquoise wash I gave them years ago.

Speaking of monsters I've painted quite a few C series monsters that have not made it into the blog so I'll put in a group shot at the end so this post in not completely devoid of new painted pictures. 

Citadel Fantasy Tribes

I have been working through the fantasy tribes sets - Orcs, Dwarves, Skeletons, Zombies, and Gnolls - and getting into the C series where there are overlaps - Those 5 sets have the consistent feature of multiple figures with the same pose. I'm going to use that as an excuse to put off the fighters till the C series. But the trolls do fit ,with Tom Meier's 6 contributions working from two basic figure poses. So I'm basing trolls for paint this year.

Villagers and Townsfolk 

Between multiple manufactures I have enough of these to populate a real village. They have always been a favorite to collect and they have been neglected for decades. The majority of them are not Citadel, and those that are are slotta based, so this project does not skew the year towards my annual resolution goal. 

Furniture and accessories

Its been zero days since my last treasure chest/doorway/table and I have no intention of stopping this binge. But I do want to paint all the vintage metal and resin pieces before I get further into the wonderful stuff coming out of my printer. But 99% of my Citadel stuff is done - so again, not helping find the 42 Citadel pieces after the Trolls.

So to round out the projects for 2022 with early Citadel my initial choices are: 

Early Goblins ("FTN", fanatics, chaos mutants, whatever I can find) 

Orcs - Finish the range with all the C Series armored orcs and the war machine   

DA/C26 Men at arms - Human Army 

    We will see which one or two of these, or if something else, grabs my imagination this year. Or if I really get into the villagers I might just decide 11 years was a pretty good run.

Cheers

C

Assorted C Series Monsters painted over the last few years

Accessories, Props, Scatter & Scenery

Since first posting Furniture and Accessories in 2017 it has been one of the most consistently popular hits on my blog. But that may just be the words in the title because I've had to deleate loads of comments that were trying to sell furniture. 

I dont have all of the peices released in the following collections from Citadel. But what I have is now painted. 

C39 Treasure Chests  (1984)

Mounted on washes as the small ones are tiny.

Chests on Square bases

DS3 Graveyard scene

7511 Tables

As well as all these nice Citadel pieces I have become so hooked on the stress free nature of painting furniture, doorways, and all of the other gubbins with which one can populate a 28mm fantasy world, its almost become a second hobby in its own right. 

Peices from many manufacturers and some 3D prints painted in 2020 amd 2021 respectively (there was more that didnt fit either of these pics, and I think only one thing managed to sneak into both pictures)

Furniture and accessories post from 2017:

https://leadnpaint.blogspot.com/2017/08

Loads more accessories in the Citadel FS Range:

https://leadnpaint.blogspot.com/2015/

Plastics Too

With this Blog now 10 years old I have been trying to wrap up some old projects this year. In 2017 I posted the heros from the various original "Quest" boardgames.

http://leadnpaint.blogspot.com/2017/07/

My HeroQuest set has been waiting 5 years for me to get back to it. The primary delay was that I wanted to have painted accessories rather than the original printed card. Various options had started to become available and this year I opted to enter the world of 3D printing specifically with HeroQuest furniture as an initial project for my bottom of the line Photon. 

The Monsters

Accessories

 After some initial trial and error, my expectations of 3D printing were significantly exceeded. The universe of STL files and digital sculpts has been an enjoyable timesink. I really should have paid more attention initially to souces and sculptors as I dont know where many of these came from. Yes, I had a particularly squished copy of the fireplace so I cut out the portrait and the fire rather than paint them.

I also started on a few figs from another classic game (I never played); Dark World.

Over the last few years inexpensive plastics have been finding a place in my collection  Reaper Bones, Wizkids (even pre-painted), and miniatures from any game. - Mostly I focus on monsters. creatures and accessories because scale and proportion dont matter as much as with heros and NPCs - and these figures often have a very loose idea of scale. Consistent basing seems to be the key to make everything work together.

Reaper Bones

Various, mostly Wizkids

FTG - Fantasy Tribe Gnolls

Citadel Miniatures - 1980-1984

FTG 1 through 14 were released in the UK 1980-82

Many of this range came in multiple poses (marked with an asterix), others in just one.

Multi-pose figures came in many variants with different heads, weapons, etc. 

With Added Banner

Other Gnolls

Citadel figures with the same appearance, updated Nov 2021:

FTG The range was extended in US by Ral Partha with FTG 15 thru 19.

(though a couple are goblins not gnolls imho so they will be with the preslotta goblins when I get around to them) 

In the UK they were rolled into the new numbering system as C12 Great Goblins

Another Ral Partha release in the US - FF82 Kobold Hero - matches these figs

He can be seen here:  http://leadnpaint.blogspot.com/2017/03/citadel-ff-series-us-extension.html 

This figure also shows up in the C12 range.

 In the Second Compendium ten C12 poses were added

The Boar Riders were moved to the C21 code and illustrated in the First Compendium. Four new poses were added with rider and boar as single piece castings. I have three of them, two are in progress, one is stuck in the UK with my mum, I should put more effort into finding the fourth. I'll update this when I can show them.

Gnoll Army

Boar Cav

I

Infantry with hand weapons

Infantry command conversions

(Standard bearer idea stolen from David Wood)

Infanty Pole Weapons

(Many spear heads replaced over time)

Second Chariot, Conversion

Citadel Undead - FTS, FTZ, C18 & C21

FTS - Fantasy Tribe Skeletons

Citadel Miniatures - 1982-1984

Many of this range came in multiple poses (marked with an asterix), others in just one.

Multi-pose figures came in typically 4 or 5 variants with different helmets, cloaks, etc. 

Figures sequentially after FTS18 were released in the US by Ral Partha using these codes. In the UK they were rolled into the new system as C17 Skeletons. The FTS undead riders are below.

Note that skeletons who appeared in the FF range are not duplicated here.

They can be seen here: http://leadnpaint.blogspot.com/2014/09/

My photography has improved since 2014.

FTZ - Fantasy Tribe Zombies

Citadel Miniatures - 1982-1984

There are only 8 main poses in this range with a huge amount of variety within each pose.

Details are here: http://www.collecting-citadel-miniatures.com/wiki/index.php/Zombies_-_FTZ_Fantasy_Tribe_(solid_base)

The ones at the bottom are late editions release in the US as part of the FS range. 

In the UK they were rolled into the C18 Undead code. And I've added the wonderful zombie from the 1983 Monsters box set. 

C18 Undead

Citadel Miniatures 1983

Another short lived range that rolled in many of the FF undead - see link above

 and added new ghosts, wraiths and spectres. I don't have them all so this is a representative sample

with a couple of FF repaints.

C21 Undead Riders

Citadel Miniatures 1983

Very Short lived range (at the tail end of pre slotta bases) - appearing only in the First Compendium.

A few of the FF & US FTS codes were rolled into this.

I'm currently working on the wonderful FTG Gnolls. But if you follow this regularly you know not to hold your breath. Three posts in 2020 is more than the two previous years combined!

Cheers and happy painting

Caius

Torchlight Resin Accessories

When I bought Games Workshop's Dungeon Floor Plans my games (usually Tunnels and Trolls) went from being largely abstract to a full experience, My growing collection of mostly Citadel miniatures populated a realm suddenly much easier to understand. Although I never felt the necessity to move past the 2D floor plans and into a fully 3D realm, doorways and furnishings were suddenly of interest. These resin pieces were bought in a single purchase from Torchlight after sending an SSAE for their mail order catalog. That I still have almost all of them nearly 40 years later is remarkable. Particularly when I think of the all lead I lost or mistreated over the years.

I decided not to repaint the Tomb - So its shown with its original Humbrol and Airfix enamel teen applied paint job.

C13 is missing a small cupboard. The extra bed in the top pic was modified with greenstuff

The full range is on display here: https://torchlightresin.webs.com/

Cheers

C