A Gathering of Mighty Painters

As  I mentioned in the previous post, I plan taking part in the painting challenge called "A Gathering of Mighty Painters", that is organised for fans of 4 edition WFB. Such events are good additional incentive for painting miniatures, and help accomplishing your painting goals.

The army of the Cynath twins is in need of infantry reinforcements, and so I composed a 2000 point army list, that will feature stuff I shall paint in the first half of 2022.

The part that is most important:

Dark Elf General (helberd, heavy armor, shield) – 160+2+3+1 = 166

Dark Elf Battle Standard Bearer (cold one, heavy armor, shield, lance) – 98+10+3+1+2 = 114

3 Cold One Knights - 126

19 Executioners (standard bearer, musician) – 336

Champion (great weapon, heavy armor) – 48+2+3=53

18 Black Guards (standard bearer, musician) – 300

Champion (helberd, heavy armor) – 48+2+3=53

2xScythed Beastmen Chariot (dark elf chariots proxy rules) – 2x106 = 212

5 Ogres (proxy rules for snakemen miniatures) (additional hand weapons) = 5x(40+1)= 205

TOTAL: 1565

The part that is optional:

Assassin – 56

 10 Crossbowman – 130

10 Crossbowman - 130

TOTAL:  316

Here are the miniatures unpainted/in need of stripping ;) The Snakemen are still missing, as I am waiting for the latest DieHard Miniatures kickstarter package to reach my destination. I added them to the roster to spice things up for myself, have a April - monster entry, and also because I want to have a "monster unit" worthy of entering a painting competition on next Oldhammer Poland event, and think that normal, 20mm based units don't make such a striking effect as ogre/troll sized ones :)

Depending on the amount of time I have for painting, I can paint the optional part, or just fill the missing points with magic items for my general, champions and banners. Using just the "sure / probable" part of the roster, the 7 months rotation could look something like that:

January: Unit - first half of the Black Guards or Executioners

February: War Machine - Chariots

March: Unit - second half of the Black Guards or Executioners

April: Monster - Snakemen Unit

May: Unit - first half of the Black Guards or Executioners

June: Character - Cold One Knights / Army Standard Bearer

July: Unit - second half of the Black Guards or Executioners

If you wonder, why I included the 4 cold one riding models in the "infantry reinforcements roster" - I have only 8 knights painted so far, and  it is not enough to field to small units, or one that is really big. Guess that with those additional knights, the cavalry part of the army will be 100% complete too. Also, I really like to paint cold ones, they are totally different than elves / infantry in general, so painting some colourful skin and scales will spice things up a bit.

Chariots were added for a similar reason - currently I only have one chariot painted, and I find them to be much more effective when used in higher numbers. Also, as the February rotation is "war machine", I needed something fitting that spot:)

Here are some of the cold one knights that I have already painted, although they still need a banner, and the "little banners on their lances thing";):

As we are not allowed to paint anything before 2 January, I shall spend the next two months on preparing all the models, removing mould lines, converting the command groups for the infantry units, the general, the army standard bearer, priming and basing. I must admit that the prospect isn't 100% exciting, but on the other side, I also plan on trying out airbrushing the basic colours on these models, so perhaps it will be a useful "mass painting" endeavour. 

Depending on how terrible my efforts will turn out, expect some WIP photos of the above mentioned process in the coming weeks :)

Introduction and what is coming next

 Greetings venerable visitor! I planned to start using this blog again over a year ago, when I decided to join the Crown of Command Challenge. Yet, it didn't exactly work out, and here we are at the end of 2021.

Still, another edition of the Crown of Command Challenge will begin next year, and I also applied to the Gathering of Mighty Painters, that shall start 2 January 2022, but cleaning/priming/basing work can commence already.

I started working on my dark elf army at the end of 2020 summer, after finishing few dwarf units that I painted after Oldhammer Weekend Poland rekindled my Herohammer interest. 

I honestly didn't expect that I will stick to the project for so long, but it turns out that podcasts and audiobooks make wonders for my painting tenacity. In the past, I felt that both reading and painting miniatures are sub optimal ways of spending my limited free time. Now thanks to podcasts/audiobooks I can combine those two activities that I liked together, and suddenly I am in love with it:)

What I have painted up until now are the things that I lacked in my dwarf army. Having played an army consisting of warmachines and infantry blocks for the last 23 years (not playing much, but aaaanyway...;) ) meant that I want to use everything else - various cavalry units, monsters, scouts, magic users. I must say that it makes quite a formidable force, that I used with quite nice results in fifth, sixth and seventh edition games already. 

Having said that, I feel that the army deserves to be completed, it is now my most cherished force, and also I like the foot models from the 4 edition dark elf range. So the plan for the next year or two is to finish it, by adding all the other roster entries. Units that are 20-25 models strong are most pleasing to my eyes, so I aim to do regiments of 20 strong. Cutting it down to 20 from 25 means I need to paint around 30 models less, so it is quite a difference...

The plan is simple, I need to paint:

20 Black Guards

20 Executionners

20 Spearmen

20 Crossbowmen

20 Corsairs

20 Witch Elves

This is the most important part of the mission, but there will be some things to spice things up a bit - up to three chariots, up to three repeating bolt throwers, cauldron of blood  and probably a manticore / another unreleased chimera model.

I think I will leave the corsairs for later, as they are my least favourite 4 edition dark elf unit - look wise. 

I will soon add some army fluff, photos of what I currently have painted and dedicated Gathering of Mighty Painters post. That's it for now, thanks for visiting!