Tag Archives: troll

2025 Wrap-up & Happy New Year!

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Hi, folks. Happy New Year to you all!

I always tire of typing it, but it has been a while. I’ve been distracted towards the end of last year, not so much from hobbying, but more from keeping the blog up to date. Daily life and writing have been getting in the way, though I have been able to use painting and building minis as a stress reliever.

The last couple of months, I’ve been looking into skirmish gaming, looking to do more with the collection of minis in my cabinet. I was looking into Assassins & Templars: A Ruckus Game, from Wargames Illustrated’s November issue, as I really liked the models that were being used to show off the game. These are from Gripping Beast, which has a lot of very cool pieces in their shop. I had to show some proper restraint; I started with a small retinue of assassins, which draw in part from their Arab military kit, as well as a few standalone metal minis. Pictured below are two assassins, a long range character, as well as a priest mini I was using as an imam.

I have also been working on some fantasy minis, including my Lord of the Rings models, and finishing up work on this proxy mini of Buhdur the troll cheiftain. I had recently acquired a pot of AK Interactive’s snow terrain mixture, having really enjoyed their battlefield mud tub, and used it on our wholesome troll here; my plan is to use him as a random encounter in Frostgrave, which is another skirmish game I have been diving into.

My son recently showed an interest in Mordheim and Frostgrave, and I have been grouping many of my minis into warbands with a new spark of excitement. I also picked up a few sprues from the Frostgrave kits and began kitbashing every manner of unit I was planning, including many Mordheim warbands. Pictured below are a Grave Robber warband, the rules of which I found on the Mordheimer site. These include a lookout, a graver, a junior medic, a couple of grave diggers, and a thug.

Trench Crusade remains in my brain also, and I have been chipping away at the remaining minis that are grey, of which there are few. The Observer has been relatively straightforward to paint, sticking with the colour scheme from the rulebook, as I liked the contrast between the red and gold.

Finally, I have been painting up a warband for Frostgrave, as my son has also been showing an interest in playing the game, mainly due to the wizard creation system. I’m helping to paint a warband of his own so we can play together, as well as some terrain. There are many scenarios in the rulebook that we’re keen to try, and I’d like to write about these as I go.

I hope you all had a great Christmas and New Year’s Eve, and I wish you all the best for 2026.

Take care.

Angmar army: warband 3

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Hey folks, I have just finished the last few Orcs for my Angmar army now, and finished warband no. 3.

Led by a Barrow-Wight, this warband has a few nasty tricks up its sleeve packing some archer Orcs, a mix of sword & shield and two-handed Orcs, as well as a Dead Marsh Spectre hidden among the ranks. There is also a Cave Troll for landing some extra heavy attacks in close combat, giving the warband some hard hitting backup.

I’ll aim to get a pic of the whole army now that it’s completed. I’m extremely tired from a busy day that culminated in a huge curry feast, so I need to go lie down haha.

Thanks for reading, and take care.

Angmar Cave Troll

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These last few weeks I have been painting up more of my Lord of the Rings minis, including a few more Elves and Orcs. I have just finished work on my cave troll for my Angmar army, a hefty beast of a creature that adds some heavy hitting to the army.

He was easy to paint, being based with Mechanicus Standard Grey followed by a blue ink wash. The rest of his features were standard Leadbelcher and Steel Legion Drab; as for his belly, this was achieved through drybrushing Rakarth Flesh (my favourite of all paints) across the blue flesh. I thought this achieved what I was looking to do in terms of painting his undersides, including blending in with the blue flesh towards the bottoms of his arms.

I gave him the snowy base to fit in with the rest of the hordes from the North, and there you go. A fun model to paint, and less of a pain to actually glue together than I initially anticipated!

In other news, since getting an additional shelf for my model cabinet, I took the opportunity to pick up some Minas Tirith models in some sort of competitive mood to fill the damn thing haha. I’ve always liked the models for Denethor and Boromir (two of my favourite characters in the book and film) and I would like to explore some of the units that the army has to offer.

Anyways until next time, stay safe and take care.

A more recent progress update

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It’s been nearly 2 months since I posted last, and I have been using the time to work on writing projects. I’ve had 5 pieces published in the last couple of months, so it’s been getting off to a great start.

In recent weeks, I’ve picked up a paintbrush and started working on my LotR armies once again. A recent addition to my Angmar force has been the lovely cave troll, as I felt they needed some muscle in the army. I managed to get him primed this afternoon before the thunderstorm, and after filling in his belly with plastic putty. I’m surprised he is still holding together; Army Painter’s super glue is mighty strong, I’ll say that much.

So far, I’ve given him a blue ink wash and I intend on giving his belly and underarms some fleshy tones when he dries.

As for the troops, I am still painting orcs and elves. The orcs just need alternating between colours to give them that variety; the elves are a massive line of identical troops that I’m trying not get bogged down with. I like the effect when they are all together though, they do properly radiate light, as elves should!

The model at the front is Cirdan, a minor hero for Rivendell. I actually found him on a genuine model shop site, brand new, for £8. I snapped him up instead of being ripped off by everyone on eBay, and have been painting him in similar colours to my troops. I love how much detail he has as a model, and always looks so dignified no matter what haha.

There are a number of extra models that I purchased during the last few months for LotR that I will show in subsequent posts. I also managed to finish my mounted Witch-king, but still need to take the pics for that one. It’s been relaxing getting back into painting and modelling, and not feeling so much of a chore as it kind of did in June. A rest has done me good I think, and I look forward to checking out all of your work that I might have missed.

As always, take care and catch you next time.