Lord of the Rings 2023 update...

 Well okay, here are a few things for the Lord of the Rings 2023 project:

Picked these two hero's for my Rohon force i am working, since I have the plastic Theoden, figured I would also get Eomer and Eowyn. Nice models but they are a pain to assemble.

Since I am doing Riders of Rohon, here is a shot of 21 riders that I recently completed:

I also got the plastic Nazgul from the Pelenor Fields box set:

In the picture above you can also see a ring wraith on horse back. This is a converted model that was missing the arm, or so I thought. When I assembled the Nazgul, it came with a few arms for different poses for the model. So I took the extra and thought perfect I can use it for the one missing an arm.

Well when I pulled the model out not only was the arm missing but the legs for the right side of the model were I harvested the legs I needed and went to work.

..

So, the moral of the story, dont throw away those bits, even if you had them for almost 15 years as they may come in handy sometime!

There you go a little WIP of the Lotr2023 project.

TK

Return of the King!

So,

After a very long hiatus, Lord of the Rings is back on the table! About two years ago I picked up the newest rulebook that came with the Pellnoir Fields set. Well GW released a new box set and updated the rules that a few of the guys picked up.

New Old rules!

So after some online discussion, we all decided to take the dive back into one of our favorite games. Many of us still have armies and I have been working on models here and there. But after this past weekend I needed to pick up the new armies of Middle earth for LotR in order to conform to the new rules.

Newest book for me!

So Just before Christmas on a whim I bought two of the Dol Guldur kits to add to my terrain collection. Also since my original LotR forces were based on Dol Guldor, I had to have the kit. Now it took a few weeks of building, but I got to a point that I am happy with, next will be texture, basing and paint. But little did I know that I was going to be using this terrain piece sooner then I thought.

Back side of Ruins!

Now needs a base and paint!

So as I mentioned above, this past weekend a few of us got together to push some models around, well actually Robert and I did the pushing. Robert and I just sort of grabbed models and put about 400 points on the table. Thanks to Tom we used the new Armies book for the points, this day would be Wood Elves vs Orcs.

The battlefield, the Wood Elves trying to stop the Orc invaders.

Elves take up defensive positions near the ruin

They have a troll!

The last few Elves

The game was great and a very tough match for sure, which the elves got a minor victory as we were both broken. It was a great game and was also a good game to look at the new rules which have minor changes from the Big One Rule book we used to use.

All in all I am very happy that we are back to Middle Earth and we are starting a small slow grow league and plan to have a friendly little tournament in a few months.

TK

Fellowship of the Rings

So,

As some know, I loved the Lord of the Rings movies and when GW released their miniature game along with the first movie, I was hooked. I spent a ton of money on buying models for the game and one of the first box sets I bought was the Fellowship of the Rings. 

Now the only models that I actually painted were Legolas and Gandalf, the others got primed and then forgotten as other LotR projects came up. Well this past weekend I decided to watch the Josh Gad Reunited Apart series on Youtube and he brought back the original cast from the movies. Then we got word that Ian Holmes (aka Bilbo in the movies) passed away. So with that I decided I wanted to paint up some hobbits, which were primed up well over ten years ago. So while listening to my buddy's Video Pod cast (Whats Up with Mike & Jeff) I started painting the below models.

Hobbits

Well as the show went on, I was able to get two of the hobbits completed and I kept on going working on the other two. By mid afternoon I had them all completed, but as I looked in my project box, I still had Gimli, Boromir and Aragorn to complete and it did not feel right to leave them out, so I started working on them as well.

Well i am happy to say that I completed the Fellowship of the Ring Sunday afternoon and now well over ten years later, one of the first sets I bought for the game is completed! Here they are in their glory.

Fellowship of the Ring

So there you go, it took many many years to complete, but the orginial bad of adventures I fell in love with as a young boy reading the Fellowship of the Ring is complete. Now what other old models do I have to paint, hmm we will see...

TK

For Mordor!

So,

With the Stay at Home order still in effect in AZ, I worked on a few more figures this weekend. This time there were 15 Lord of the Rings models lurking at the back of the desk that I decided to paint.

First up, Nine Morgal Stalkers, I forgot ai had three packs worth (9 total) and I was planning on using these in a Minas Morgal list for LotR. Well better late then never I suppose!

9 Stalkers for Mordor!

 I also found that I had 6 Orc trackers that I had pulled out, so these guys fell to the paint brush and are now ready for action!

Orc trackers

 Now, all I need to do is talk a few friends into playing some LotR again! LOL

TK

Video Games are bad...

For me anyway,

Here is why, they sometimes inspire me to paint things I haven't painted in years! So a little back story may be needed, so as some know, I have for the past 9 years I have run Saguaro Painting Service. Well after painting countless miniatures for others, I decided to retire my brush and get back to painting for myself.

But now with nothing pressing on my bench for the first time in 9 years, what would I paint? So I did what I think most painters do, I flopped down in front of my TV and started playing some good old fashion video games on my PS3 (Don't judge, I love my PS3!) One game that I got a few Christmas's ago was Shadow of Mordor.

Now when you run a successful painting business, you do not have time for such luxuries as playing video games, there is always a commission that has to be painted (or something for the house, or wife or...). So while looking through my games, I decided to drop in Shadow of Mordor and spend some quality time hunting Orcs!

Well first off I have to say this is an awesome game and I am enjoying it very much. (Makes me want to go buy a PS4 for the new game in the series). But something foul started to take seed, I didn't realize it at first and I should have seen it sooner. But after the first night, of playing, I went and dugout and old Reaper Dragon that I have had lying around waiting to be assembled and painted.

Big ass Dragon from Reaper, that's a 6"x 6" tile he is sitting on!

So out came this dragon and after hunting orcs, I spent about an hour cleaning it up and assembling it. It felt very good to go and dig this model out and start working on it, I had no plan, but it just felt right. This should have been the first clue to me that evil was taking root inside of me, but I thought nothing of it.

Well a few more nights of hunting orcs with Shadow of Mordor and I had this idea of painting up some orcs. Why? I can not tell you, but that is how evil works my friends, there is no rhyme or reason to it, it just happens! So yesterday I went into to my game closet and grabbed a box of miscellaneous Lord of the Rings models that were waiting to be assembled and painted. This should have been my second clue that something evil was afoot, but alas I did not see it.

It smells like orcs around here!

So I happily dug threw the large collection to find bags of plastic orcs that I had assembled and a few were primed awaiting paint. So I dumped out a few models and started to paint while listening to some Rush! Well after a few hours of painting, I found that I had a small army sitting on my table. It seems that I was really excited to paint up orcs, it is that evil seed I am telling you!

We are ready for war now boss!

So after the painting, what started out as a few turned into 38 orcs painted! As I sat thee looking at what I painted, the real world realization hit me like a ton of bricks, what would I use these for??? Well the oblivious answer was Lord of the Rings, I sent my buddy Drunkensamurai a FB message, but he cleverly saw thru the evilness and didn't respond about playing. The evil magic did not effect him it seems. So with that, I came to realization that I painted these just for the heck of it and I am okay with that. It feels great to be able to paint what I want, when I want. It has been a long time since I have been able to do that.

Now lets see, now I need to figure out how to get these onto the table...

TK

What is going on????

So,

As many of you know, I have a certain fondness for the Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle game by Games Workshop. In fact I enjoy the game so much, I wrote a little pirate game based on the rules. I also run a Lord of the Rings tournament called Gathering in the Desert and it is going into it's 5th year.

But today I need to do a little ranting for a minute. It seems that Games Workshop has no clue what it is doing with the Lord of the Rings game. Let me explain, for years while the movies where out we (the LotR community) had support from Games Workshop with them releasing Source books. We also had articles in White Dwarf (which many WHFB and 40K players hated!) Times were good for Lord of the Rings players.

But recently GW has been doing some strange things with their 3rd Core Game (Yes GW thinks of LotR as a Core Game!). I started noticing that it was getting harder to get Source books. In fact many were taken off the GW web site. As someone who runs tournaments for the game, this made it hard to get new players into the game. But there was a bright spot, GW released a PDF of the special rules and stats for entries that were found in the source books.

The bad thing was that they did not include points cost, but we still had Legions of Middle Earth. But now, LoME is out of production! So where do players get the point cost? What the heck are they thinking??And how the heck do I as a tournament organizer, recruit new players? It seems that Games Workshop is letting LotR die a slow painful death.

So where does this leave us (LotR Players)? Well there is always hope that with the new Hobbit movies there may be a re-do of the game. I am hopeful that the new movies will be an new resurgence in the game. Although I am worried that GW's track record of late with rules may see some drastic changes to the game that I love. Only time will tell, but for now, I will be left scratching my head and wondering what the heck GW is doing with this game!

Sorry rant over...

TK

It is Finished!

Well,

The Moria Goblins are done! I started the last push on Thursday and I completed all 48 models on Sunday. Now as I said before, my goal was to finish up all of my Goblin models (some of them from the first release of the game!) and now I can say that I have done it!

So to recap the 48 models I had 20 Goblin Archers which you see below.


There were 17 Goblin spearmen.


And there were 6 Goblin Swordsmen with shields.

Here is a shot of all 48 models together finished.

And here is a shot of the whole models completed for the challenge.


So, I took a picture of all of my Goblin collection together, that is 116 total models in the collection! I did not know that I had this many Goblins and it is a nice looking army (too bad I can only field 75 models in most games!) and it gives me many options when I do field the army.

Here are a few close ups of the whole army.



So now, all I have to do is play some various point games (175, 350, 525 & 700). We are all (Rob, Jerry, Mike and Myself) going to get together and try to play through our catch up games to see how the points shake out.

I have to say, that this little challenge was very fun to do. At first some people were worried that they could not stay focused to do this, but in the end we all did a great job of staying focused. And this show just how easy it is to paint up a army over a few months time. I have heard that our little challenge has sparked a few other LotR SBG gamers to do the same sort of thing. Once I here for sure I will post a link to their little challenge.

So there you go, I will post up more photos once we play our catch up games and off course I will let you all know who won and where we went to eat! I hope you guys enjoyed the coverage and I will leave you with one last shot of the whole Moria Goblin Army...
TK

The Final Stretch

So we are all now in the final stretch of our Tale of Four Lord of the Rings Gamers, and it has been a great success. While talking to Rob (Drunkensamurai) the other day, he mentioned that he was amazed that we have all been able to keep this little challenge going. As of yesterday two people (Rob & Jerry) have completed their armies and that leaves Mike & I to catch up before the end of the month.

So today I decided to put together my last 175 points for the challenge. But my motivation with this challenge was for me to paint up all of my Goblins from the start, in which there are more than 700 points worth! So after pointing out my next 175 (which would be 35 more models!), I noticed that I still had 13 models left over out of my collection. So I have decided to paint up all 48 models by the end of the month! I will still only use the 35 models for my list, but now I will have extra options.

So here are 6 more Sword and shield equipped Goblins that will be in the list.


Next up are 17 spear armed goblins, a bunch of these are going into the list as well.


Next up are more bow equipped goblins that I can really use, there are a total of 25 of these little buggers.

Here is the group shot of all 48 models ready to go to the paint desk! So wish me luck since I have less than 2 weeks to get these little guys ready. Once we get to the end of the month, the four of us need to play a few more games (since we have not had time to do them) to see how the armies shake out at the various point levels.

One last thing, you may have noticed that these guys are sitting on desert terrain, well these will be covered in the next post and these are two new boards for GitD 2012. If you remember the last post, I had just gotten in a 4'x8' Realm of Battle table. Well last weekend with the help of Jerry, we got them all painted up, so stay tuned for that coverage and a few other bits I did.

TK

Better Late than Never!

So my last update was back on June 24th and I only had a few days to get my next installment of 175 points four our little competition. Well as luck would have it, Life got in the way and I missed getting my troops painted by 7/1 by only one figure.

You see the one model happened to be the Cave Troll, for some reason I hate painting cave trolls. No other model in the LotR range gives me more issues other than the Cave Troll. I don't know what it is, it is not a hard paint scheme, I just have built up this weird mental painters block for the Cave troll.

Anyway, on to my 175 points, first up are the 10 Goblin archers. I needed some long range fire support and these little guys are it.


After that comes the Shaman, although as I admitted in the last post, this model was already painted. In fact this little guy was part of my Dwellers Below list that one best painted in the Mayhem in the Mountains in 2010. but since I have only one Shaman, I was not going to strip him and re-paint him for our little challenge.

Last but not least is the one model that held me up, yep it is the Cave Troll! I went with the Spear armed model just because I liked how it looked and I hope to stick some Elves ad Dwarves with it!

So here is the whole army all 32models (346 points) all together. So far the army is looking pretty good on the table and these little guys have been waiting forever to get painted!


Now just to clarify, since the Cave Troll gave me so much issues, I also decided to paint my last Cave Troll along with this one. Now here is a shot of all three of my Cave Trolls. The model on the right was painted about 5 years ago, the center one is this months and the one on the left was an added bonus so I would not have to paint him later on. Now all my Cave Trolls are painted!


So what next you ask? Well first up are 36 points of Goblins with Shields. This will add a few more goblins to the army and these are the last of the few I used converted shields on.

Next up is a Goblin Drum for 100 points! What you say? Why is he taking this you ask? Well part of the reason why I choose Goblins for this little challenge was to get the army painted. I bought the Goblin Drum some time ago and heck, I just thought it looked cool, so there you go!

So I am up to 136 points spent out of 178 (3 points left from last month) so I purchased a Goblin Captain with shield for 40 points.

So for this month that gives us this break down as follows

Rob has 30 points
Mike has 25 points
I have 16 points
Jerry has 15 points

So stay tuned for more action...

TK