Paul's Wood Elves of Avelorn - Leader Month: Lords and Ladies (315 pts)

Painting delayed - insert holiday here...

We had to alter plans this month as despite having our fourth and final rank and file months scheduled and underway, a very busy but enjoyable month away from the painting table got in the way so we have swapped over to Leader month

However, we did have great fun visiting cathedrals to look at tombs of kings and crusaders, and a spot of light weapons drill with reproduction medieval weaponry, and we managed to squeeze a game of WFB5 in with some mates using the minis we have painted so far this OWAC, so it wasn't all bad :p

Phwoar! Look at the patina on that!

As is often the case at this stage in the OWAC I found myself making some compromises on quality but finding previously unapproachable models half painted themselves because by now I knew the colour scheme and recipes I wanted to use to represent different parts of the army.

Firstly my general, the Lord of Late Summer, using the same deep reds and greens, and golden browns as my core archer unit(s).

I kept to a very restricted colour scheme, even with the mount, although I enjoyed varying the colours so that the mount has a slightly more fey appearance with its green mane and red hooves. It's not my best work but I think it's punchy enough to get away with it.

Next up is the Elven Sorceress on (Bl)Unicorn, which ties in with some rider/mount swap possibilities with my High Elves, and gives me a possible mated pair for D&D and narrative games etc. (I think the Blu-nicorn is the stallion).

In fact, although I've shown the Blu-nicorn and Wood Elf sorceress together as that is what I have painted this month for the OWAC, I think they are unlikely to team up together in games as the Chrace themed revamped Unicorn from a previous OWAC now fits much better with the Chrace/Winter themed side of my Wood Elf army, as shown below. The Blu-nicorn will better suit the Ellyria/Tiranoc elements of my High Elves (also shown below with the High Elf Sorceress from a previous OWAC).

Total for the month:

Wood Elf General (steed, lance, light armour) - 166 pts
Wood Elf Sorceress - 59 pts
Unicorn - 90 pts

Total: 315 pts

No extra points for these but I have been meaning to finish the banners for the archer units and in an effort to get things done and the spirit of compromise (for me the OWAC is about getting stuff finished, not necessarily perfect), I've added these pennants in the unit colours as my planned designs would work much better on standards with cross poles rather than the Wood Elf icons which I find tend to dominate. They could definitely be better, and I may revisit the banners with more iconography in the future, but they will do for now and certainly make the units look more complete.

Tom's Bony Bit

Having changed plans to paint my leader this month, I had the chance to use contrast paints as he is a D&D mini with a pre-painted white undercoat. The sculpt was hard to paint because it is all in one piece with lots of hard to reach places, and the white undercoat shows through. I liked using contrast paints because I could cover more area quickly, but the sculpt still made this tricky.  

I have tried to use the same colours as the rest of the army, although matching contrast paints to Vallejo and Citadel acrylics is not always easy, I think I did OK. I used purple again for his magic, this is a mix of purple tone and Vallejo acrylic, and the black body suit is Abaddon black citadel acrylic. My dad thinks he looks like a Marvel Supervillain, and I'm happy with that description.

Here he is raising a refurbished skeleton warrior to add to next month's unit

Total for the month:

Necromancer Lord - 410 pts

Total: 410 pts

Now for the good stuff - we finally get to play a game with our painted minis!

Battle Report - Undead vs Wood Elves 1500 pts (WFB 5)

In which mistakes were made, hopes crushed, and Elven reputations restored!

As the two sides lined up against each other the generals surveyed their troops. Much smack was talked about the terrifying wraiths and the potency of Elven archery, but it remained to be seen if the Elves would be able to prevent the evil forces of the Undead from encroaching on their sacred forests.

Elven archery did indeed prove potent, as did Elven magic, and the Undead Cavalry saw their numbers reduced in the first turn, and then were stopped in their tracks by pesky Elven magic. Heads up on our two big mistakes, we gave Wood Elves too much High Magic and we didn't make enough use of the Necromantic magic ability to cast spells multiple times until too late in the battle, tbf I think this did have an effect on the result, but it didn't stop us having fun!

The Undead marshalled their own pesky magicks unleashing the banner of wrath against the Elven archers and starting to whittle them down. The Wood Elf mage champion took aim with their Wand of Lightning and blasted the unit of Spectres that had been floating menacingly towards the Elven left flank. With lightning flashing back and forth between the forces it seemed like magic would be a deciding factor in the battle.

The manoeuvrability of the Undead army also became a factor as the fast moving Cavalry became isolated and were picked off by Elven magic and the special attacks and defences of the equally fast moving War Dancers, the main blocks of both armies moved only a short distance from their back lines. It was cunning Necromantic magic that summoned skeletons and then reinforced units to keep the right flank of the Elves engaged in dogged hand to hand combat for a number of turns before they were finally defeated by a flank charge from the Wardancers late in the game.

Meanwhile the advancing Wraiths had been causing much more terror in their real life commanders than in the Wood Elf units, with the high LD value of the General meaning that they withstood the effects of both Terror and Fear and stood their ground.

The magic weapons wielded by the General, and the Wardancer Champion combined with the special attacks and defences of the Wardancers proved enough to defeat the Wraiths, who had already been weakened by magical lightning. Phew! 

This was a turning point in the game as if any of those psychology tests had gone the way of the Undead then I don't think victory would have been quite so secure for the Elves, but at the end of the game the forces of the Undead melted back into the mists as their Necromancer turned tail and fled back to her master!

As you can see the Wood Elf general was magnanimous in his victory :p 

Dave's Charging Chariot (303 points)

Bursting through the underbrush and roaring onto the wild heath comes the mighty Wood Elf Chariot, crushing all foes under wickedly scythed wheel and madly stamping hoof!

This is a true rarity in my collection. I personally count it as more rare than the regiment of Dark Elf Executioners painted in the first OWAC—models which never had an official release. It is so rare that I am guessing many of you kind readers did not even know it existed! Now then, there is a story to be had... what is this thing, and how did it come about?

Coinciding with the 1996 release of their army book, the Wood Elves received a slew of new models. Between April and August of that year, nearly every Warhammer release was dedicated to supporting the new army. After Warhammer Fantasy Battle 5th Edition was released in October, however, the new models slowed to a trickle. Nevertheless, by the end of 1997, every regiment in the army book had been released. Well, nearly every regiment... one unit remained elusively unavailable: the Wood Elf Chariot. Finally, at the very end of the 5th Edition era, the long awaited chariot would arrive, albeit not as a full release. Rather, for a very short time, interested parties could telephone the Mail Order Trolls and make a special request for a made-to-order kit comprised of parts from various other models.

Together, these pieces would fit together to create the missing chariot. The body, haft and yokes of the chariot came from the 1993 High Elves Tiranoc Chariot. The walls were made from Orion's cloak, carefully sawn in half. The scythes were taken from the 1998 Chaos Warrior Chariot. Adorning the haft end was the deer skull standard top and the yokes bore no fewer than three Wood Elf Lord Shields from the Forest Dragon kit. The crew were made up of the recently released Wood Elf scouts—one standard bearer and a regular scout with a bow. The chariot was pulled by up to four Wood Elf steeds.

Being that it was not given a normal release, and it was only on offer for a very short time, and it was very poorly advertised to boot (I have found only a single reference to the Wood Elf Chariot offer in Citadel Journal #42, although supposedly there was an advertisement in White Dwarf #236 as well), I consider this to be one of the rarer items in my collection. Of course, its rarity really comes from the fact that it is so little known and there are so few of them in existence.  Being that it is entirely composed of parts from other models, however, it is not that hard to collect the parts and build one yourself! Indeed, I would recommend nothing less, for it really is a wonderful model! It was not all that difficult to put together (although mind your fingers while sawing the cloak in half!) and it was an absolute pleasure to paint up. Not only is the model very dynamic, but it is also extremely flexible. I pinned the crew so they can be removed as casualties, pinned the scythes so that option can be removed as desired and each horse is actually loose and can be removed easily. Despite the fact that the steeds are not actually attached to one another or the chariot, the convenient overlap of the yokes means that the whole model slides easily across the table and the steeds stay snugly in place as you launch a ferocious charge. I prefer the fully-upgraded four steeds and scythed wheels, but I may field the lighter two-steed chariot sometimes as well.

Finally, we also have a Wood Elf General, the commander of the Guardians of the Grove, the noble-born Galadrin himself. As before, I did my best to recreate the Games Workshop Studio paint job, as found in the 1996 Wood Elves army book. This was also my first attempt to make a homemade banner—it is a very simple design but I am happy how it came out, although perhaps I will not seal the banners with clear tape in the future as it gave it a bit of a glare. All in all, a very fun model to paint.

So for this month, that makes a total of 303 points! There is only one regiment left in the army, and they are some of my all-time favorite models and indeed the very figures that won me over to Warhammer and tabletop gaming many long years ago. But that story will have to wait till the next post!

Wood Elf General (Lance, Longbow, Light Armour, Shield on Barded Steed) ~ 175 pts
Chariot (Light Armour, Shields, Longbows, Spears, Extra Steeds, Barding, Scythed Wheels) ~ 128 pts

Andrea's High Elf General and Repeater Bolt Thrower (213 pts)

Hi folks,
so here is a quick and easy start for OWAC3, like a sort of warm up (still, two miniatures more than my OWAC2 first month!)!

Let me introduce the army General (163 pts) and a Repeater Bolt Thrower (50 pts), for a total of 213 points.

I always found the first month very important for the whole challenge as the choice of colors palette start here and had to be maintined throughout the work. I was considering replicating the colors of the army book, with limited use of metallic paints and many bright pastel(ish) colors, but this is not clearly my coloring style. Therefore, I opted for a more personal coloring style but still recalling the bright tones of the past.

The general is a 6th (or even 7th, perhaps) edition miniature, still in metal. I have a lot of these recent High Elf characters and I had to say that they do not perfectly fit my taste; however, this is one of the my favourite. High Elf heroes are noble, rich kids so I thought to a general clad in a burnished gold and mithril armour full of gems. The fiery colors remind to the phoenix on the helmet, and definitely characterize the general as an emissary of the Phoenix temple sent to lead a Sword Masters-based contingent into a secret mission. And it is such a secret mission that I don't even know what it is!

Though, the presence of Repeater Bolt Throwers makes this secret mission something a little more complex than, for example, a "behind the enemy lines" mission! Here is the first out two Bolt Throwers. Much of the gunners' colouring scheme is inspired by the old army book, although revisited as said before.

While taking photographs for the post, I took the occasion to show you part of a hill I have made for a terrain project I am pursuing since a while. As the challenge goes on, I should be able to add more new terrain features; of course, only old style stuff!

Well, I hope you will enjoy my start!
Ciao, A.

AdamH's Brets - Follow. But! Follow only if ye be men of valour... (295 points)

...for the entrance to this post is guarded by a creature so foul, so cruel that no man yet has fought with it and lived!

So this final month was a light one for me, because I hit all of the other months (i.e. didn't use my joker) then technically I didn't need to paint anything for this month however I didn't want to lose my momentum and I still needed to paint a model to finish the Grail Knight unit:

Also since I was done with the challenge I thought I would paint the best model in the Bretonnian line, perhaps even the best model GW have ever produced...
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Are you ready for this?
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I'm not sure that you are...
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OK fine, since you kept scrolling this far, I present to you...
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King froggy frogerson! Master of the whole of Bretonnia, the most fearsome warrior to ever step... foot? in the old world.

So there we have it, my entire month of painting in these two models:

My submission for this month is:

45 - 1x Grail Knight

0 - King froggy frogerson

For a total of 45 points.

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What is that you say, you want to see more of one of the models? I think I know what you mean and I have your back don't worry:

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Hmm... more?
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OK sure:

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Still not enough?
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fine:

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Man you really love this frog don't you? I don't blame you, he is pretty rad.
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Well here is the french view:

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Oh crud...
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It seems he got snuck up on by something a little meatier... I suppose you want to see that now as well:

So yea I may have also painted the lord for my army, I used the old Louen Leoncoeur model simply because I liked it. I don't plan to run it as him though, just as a regular Lord on a Griffon. Although if you have this model and have a keen eye you might notice that something looks off/different with the right arm. The model I had was missing this piece so I had to sculpt a new one myself. I would be keen to hear what you think. Now that it is painted I think it looks OK, although it was a bit touch and go when I was sculpting it.

So therefore my actual submission for this month is:

100 - General of Bretonnia

150 - Griffon

45 - 1x Grail Knight

0 - King froggy frogerson

For a total of 295 points.

So there we have it, it looks like I made it through the challenge. I had a few touch and go points and had to pull a few long knights of painting but I am quite proud of the army I have ended with. Still a few little touch-ups here and there but I will go into those in a bit more detail in my wrap-up post. Until then best of luck to the other challengers, I can't wait to see all of the glorious pictures of fully painted armies!

- AdamH

Victor´s Night Goblins - February (183 pts)

Hi mates!!

Here you have my share of minis for this month!! Unfortunately, I have not managed to achieve the same level of quality in painting than previous months due to lack of time.

Anyway, I will solve this in the next days.

20 Night Goblins with Bow + Boss + Mus + Stand    78 pts
2 Squig Hoppers                                                       50 pts
1 Night Goblin General + two handed + Heavy Arm  55 pts

TOTAL      183 pts

TOTAL CHALLENGE  593 pts