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This time we have another couple of figures started decades ago and finished a couple of years ago. A couple of the old-school Citadel (or Oldhammer) Trolls.


C20 Cave Troll
The first guy is a C20 Cave Troll. I started painting him in the mid-1990s with the skin tones of a Stone Troll, for my WHFB Orc and Goblin army. Finally finished him 2 or 3 years ago, and stuck him on a slate base from back-to-base-ix


C20 Warrior Troll
Also from the old C20 range, this guy is known as "Warrior Troll". No D&D style misgivings about metal armour for him, no indeedy! Also started around the same time as his mate up there, and finished at more or less the same time, when I dug them out of half-painted purgatory and finally completed them.


C20 Trolls. Two thirds of a unit!
Both of these guys were sculpted by Aly Morrison, who really did quite a good job on the Troll range of the day. I have to say I've also liked pretty much all of the subsequent renditions of trolls that GW has come out with over the years. The stone trolls, the LotR-inspired Trolls, the plastic Swamp Trolls... all good stuff. Well, except for the Chaos Trolls, I guess. But I don't really consider them part of this range, which I've mostly thought of as a subset of the O&G one, with a side range of being really useful for tabletop RPGs. These guys will have a new lease of life at some stage when I finish painting their mate, and then convert my old O&G horde over to Kings of War. But working on 5 armies already at once means the Orcs and Gobboes will need to wait a little while.

Looking at them today, the golden yellow-blonde hair does look pretty garish, especially with the bright blue skin, but hell - that's how I started them, and it's not something I'm willing to mess up, change or repaint. I'm just happy to have them done. I've got their mate on my painting shelf as well. A mid-90's stone troll who I selected to finish this unit off about three years ago when I finished these two. He's been partially painted and sitting on my painting shelves ever since... funny how these things work, eh?



And finally, a request to those who read this blog. Inspired by the fast work in finding out the identity of Farendil, Elf ranger so quickly, I'm again asking for help in identifying this guy.


Oldhammer Wizard - seeking his name!

I've been looking through SoL a bit, and he's not a C02 wizard. There's no pic of the TL2 wizard on SoL, so that's a possibility - it's certainly from the right timeframe. He's not from the DungeonQuest series, or any of the other board games of that time. He's listed as #19 of the Wizards in the Blue 1988 catalogue, but that group is a mash-up of several previous ranges, and I'd like to find where he comes from originally, and if he had a name as well.

This is actually his second paintjob. I first painted him bright blue and red, with brown hair back in the 1990's, then repainted him in the 2000's in the darker blue scheme with grey hair. I don't intend to repaint him again, just rebase him this time. I figure he looks the part to play the Necromancer that Marouda's KoW Undead army needs for their next battle, so I'm rebasing him and might just add a tiny bit of edge highlighting.

Nice stuff! The trolls are old but totally still work. Can't help on the wizard/soon-to-be-necromancer though.

The trolls look excellent! Lovely bright and vivid colours.

The one with the rock above his head is great. That one was featured on those old Citadel Combat Cards they did, I remember it well (although I think in a green colour scheme).

Like the old-school skeletal steeds stood there in the background of that shot as well..

 Pacific wrote:
The trolls look excellent! Lovely bright and vivid colours.

The one with the rock above his head is great. That one was featured on those old Citadel Combat Cards they did, I remember it well (although I think in a green colour scheme).

Like the old-school skeletal steeds stood there in the background of that shot as well..

I remember those cards- I had the Dwarfs deck. There was one really badass Chaos Dwarf warlord card that I liked. I can't remember what happened to mine :(

I've still got my cards. In this very room, even. I can't for the life of me remember what those icons are. I've even got that Chaos Dwarf, and he'll be getting painted soonish - hopefully this year!

Thanks for the comments on the trolls. Once I finish their mate, I'll probably do the next few a bit more naturalistic, but more beyond that one will be a low priority for awhile with so much other stuff on the plate.

The figure I'm showcasing today was painted quite some time ago, and has only been rebased in recent times - so not quite enough work for me top count him as part of my finished figures for this year.

It's Bob Olley's Ogryn Sergeant, which to me is the truly Archetypical Ogryn. Not the first Ogryn model, mind you - that particular honour goes to Jes Goodwin's effort of 1988. Regardless, and despite my own huge preference for Jes' work over Bob's, Bob's Ogryn here remains the most defining figure of the range ever sculpted - and never bettered or even equalled in my opinion.





I originally painted this model back in early 1989, not long after it's release. It got stripped down and repainted in the early noughties, this time with Auscam fatigue pants to match my Imperial Guard Regiment (who I need to update and photograph sometime as well) and a Māori-style arm tattoo, following my repeated travels to New Zealand. I blame this figure for starting my long love affair with Citadel's (and others') Ogres. I just wish Bob's later Ogryn efforts (for Citadel, and even for Maxmini) lived up to this figure's quality, but alas - nothing yet. Perhaps we'll get lucky one day and Bob will sculpt some more fantasy or Space Ogres to compliment his range of Scrunts (not-Squats)?

More pics on the Wordpress blog, as usual.

I love those Ogryn models. A clear inspiration for these. Actually, I suspect these are new Bob Olley sculpts.

Yep, those are the new Olley sculpts I mentioned. I'd have been all over those if only the guns weren't awful.

Yeah those guns are not the best are they.

They would probably be fairly easy to convert, no?

Nicely painted ogryn sir

 Fifty wrote:
They would probably be fairly easy to convert, no?

Depends on how easy/hard it is to cut the weapons off. The Maxmini ones also seem to have the same body and left arm (just the heads and right arm/gun are unique).

 GrimDork wrote:
Nicely painted ogryn sir

Danke'

I'm assembling those new plastic ogryns for my Astral Claws and I must say, those old ones have so much more character! I really like 'em.

Anyway, you gave him a very nice paint job!

Nice work as I have come to expect from you. You have such a wonderful collection of the old stuff, the stuff with real character. Makes me misty eyed about all the models that I have had and lost over the years, really makes me wish I had the presence of mind when I was younger to not throw anything away.

Then I see those hoarder shows and get the shivers....

Thanks guys for the kind words. I would like to categorically say that only parts of my house looks like one of those crazy hoarder shows. The toilets look perfectly normal!

What's next in the painting cue mate. I love your wonderful little(I use that term loosely) collection of different genres and sculpts.

WIP - Citadel Craters!

No, not the new ones made from dead Cadians and Skullz, but the older ones, made from cheap, vac-formed plastic with the softest of soft details. I got these around 8-10 years ago when a friend of my wife’s got me a GW voucher for Christmas. By this time I was buying most of my stuff from overseas, due to Australian prices being a rather steep gouging. So when I went in, I found something that seemed reasonably priced, so I picked these up. They then sat in various boxes, uncared for until 2014, when I was going through my stuff as part of getting the War Room into shape. I put them in a box I marked “Fast Scenery” while sorting through stuff. Fast scenery being scenery that I felt like I could paint… you guessed it – fast!



A couple of months ago I was moving stuff and spied the box. I pulled the craters out, and sprayed them with grey. They then sat around until tonight, when on impulse I brought them inside and gave them three layers of drybrushing to get to the stage in the photos. Now I’m putting them on my blog, in what must be the most underwhelming update I’ve posted so far. So why do this? Because I want to make myself finish the damned things, so maybe this will help me guilt myself into doing it. Also, because I’ve barely been updating for the past month or so, despite still doing a bit of painting. I’m just worn out, and a large amount of what I’ve been painting have been plastic Minas Tirith troops, which are about as uninspiring as it gets in terms of WIP (right up there with drybrushed craters, in fact – but a hell of a lot more of them!) The Gondor guys look great all ranked up on the table, but until then, they’re just meh.



To be fair, I’ve been finishing off some stuff that’s marginally more interesting. A little bit of undead, an Ogre got renovated, as did some old Familiars. I guess I’m just tired and a little burnt out. Hopefully the end of winter and the depressing gloomy weather we’ve had for so long now and a bit of time off work to sleep and recharge in a few weeks will renew my interest in blogging, and I’ll show off some newer stuff. Until then, let’s just hope I can wash, airbrush, powder and varnish these craters instead of put them aside for another 2 months (or 8 years!)

Craters are looking good, all progress is good progress in my books.

I also spent a day before spraying them going roun dthe edges with textured paint. Of course, you can't really see it in the pictures, or even on the models now. Come to think of it, those edges and various questions about basing them. gluing them down and so forth were big reasons (along with the super-soft details) why I never actually id anything with them.

Luckily these days I'm far less of a perfectionist about things like battlefield craters. Also luckily, I'm a bit better at painting this sort of thing as well, so I figure it evens out, and gets the suckers onto the table.

So far today, I've done a little bit of airbrushing to them, and just now a drybrush over the edges. Next will be a thinned brown wash, and then a good coat of polyurethane gloss varnish to protect them - which will probably finish them out for today since the varnish has a long drying time.

Later in the week, matt varnish and weathering powder. Then done!

Nothing wrong with those craters, and I'm guessing they'll end up looking quite good once you get done with them!

As for the rest, it all makes an awesome sight, both the old and the new!

Any progress is good progress. It's when things grind to a halt when you start to run into trouble. I loved doing the craters I did, coat of paint, heap of drybrushing then flock the hell out of them and hey presto simple terrain that makes for an interesting addition to the table top.

Yeah, I thought the craters worked just fine for what they are. I have enough trouble getting myself to build terrain that even something as minimalist as these felt like a real accomplishment.

There is nothing I enjoy more than painting up some "fast scenery" and the craters are looking good already. I get that thing too when you start/undercoat a project and then leave it for weeks/months/years before a fit of pique sees you finish the project with gusto one unexpected day.

Do not let the Gondor troops get you down, as you say when they are all together they will look brilliant.

My brother and I have been on a bit of a DIY craters binge recently. Though I wouldn't mind having some GW Quake Cannon craters. Apparently you can split them in half as a sort of foxhole for your troops to use as cover.

Thanks guys!

They looked alright in the half-done stage they were at yesterday, but I wanted to really make them a bit darker and create more contrast in the bombed-out centres. I've got more than enough other stuff that's sitting in the semi-perma-stalled situation right now, unfortunately. I'd love to see what you guys have come up for craters. I might consider buying the new Quake Cannon ones if they look good enough (and easy enough to paint) - not to mention seeing what you guys came up with.

Anyway...

So between not needing to work today, a small sleep-in until 7:30am, and the morning being a beautiful blue sky morning, I decided that instead of going back to bed, I'd go out to the shed and try and see what I could get done on those craters that I started yesterday. Luck was with me, and I managed to get them finished. Good thing, too. The weather is turning back to it's normal foulness tonight, and will stay that way all week...



Turned out alright, I reckon. Just enough contrast between the light and dark, and a bit of weathering powder to represent the dirt underneath being thrown up. I kept the palette to grey and brown, so that they can work reasonably well on a variety of table surfaces.



I really enjoy finishing up pieces like these - they work well across a variety of genres, as our Dark Angels, Heer, WarZone Imperial and other friends here demonstrate. I also very much enjoy being able to quickly turnaround pieces. Being able to go from basically unpainted (ok, it was sprayed and had some texture on the edges) to finished in 24 hours or so (under in this case) is always incredibly rewarding and appealing. Even more than the usual feeling of accomplishment that I get when finishing a model.

Maybe I should start showing some of these Gondor bastards in here. Might motivate me to finish more of them. We'll see next weekend, if there's any decent light...

Nice looking craters- are you going to put a few bits of flock on there to give it the freshly blasted look?

Nice work, those craters should spice up any battlefield.

Craters did turn out fine, with extra credit points for the quick job.

If you need/want some more, and are in the mood to give a try at DIY ones, there's a good inspirational reference (not that you seem to need much) here: 3T-Studios: Making Wargaming Craters That Don’t Suck.

Even simpler, I've used one single piece of expanded styrene, heartily attacked with a hobby knife and "finished" going over it with a heat source (I used a hot air blower, a flame would do if carefully used and kept at a distance, always outside, fumes and all), textured paint and/or sand and gravel and you'd be set for paint again in no time.

Nice one mate. Those look really good. Nice way to chuck quick terrain down.

Looks solid! Well... not *too* solid, they are kind of holes/blown up.