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Looking great

Try to avoid doing pictureless updates, but I've done a pile of work without any chance to photograph it since I'm at my parents place for the holidays. Hopefully have the last section of the Infernal Crypts plus the completed Warlord of Galahir fully photographed and posted pretty soon.

Apart from socks and a book on megalithic tombs, my only christmas present was Descent: Journeys in the Dark. Got to play a few missions with my brother. It's pretty good, but much more of a tactical battle game than a dungeon exploration game like Dungeon Saga, but I gotta say FFG's presentation and components beat Mantic's hands down. Looking forward to painting that up next - I've already got a bunch of their Hero and Monster sets done for D'n'D, so I should post those up soon too.

Cool I keep hearing about that game, maybe you painting it will convince me to try it too.

Phew! I've been busy. Prepare for a monster photo-dump!

First up is the last bit of the Infernal Crypts expansion. The only thing left to do is the Naiad, who I had accidentally left in Ireland. She's back with me in Nuremberg now, so she'll be getting painted with the Paladin and Halfling from the Dragon expansion shortly! To make up for her absence I painted a couple of Descent figures from a Hero and Monster set.

I really enjoyed painting the Infernals a lot. I think they came out really nice with the vivid red skin and green eyes, and I'm really pleased with them as sculpted. The process of painting them has definitely sold me on the "style", which is cartoony and reminds me of Dungeon Keeper. Once I had that in mind, they suddenly clicked with me and now I love them - thinking of picking up an army set in the future! I chose to keep all the horns flat black for simplicity, and I think it looks good enough, though a small highlight might improve them.

Here are the Hellhounds, who look okay but were a bit of a bugger to paint with three heads all wearing collars, hats, and needing eyes and teeth detailed. Still, they look pretty good:


After that, the Succubi. Nice design, but they came out a bit shallow in detail so they were tricky to paint. I'm happy with the bright blue hair though.


Then the Molochs. I love these guys, very intimidating and unique sculpts with their big bellies and demonic faces. Might be my favourites from the entire set, but I might highlight their horns a little as the flat black doesn't bring the nice detail out enough:


And the Abyssal Champion. I didn't like this guy in concept, but again the mini won me over. Will make a decent D'n'D Devil


I actually got them finished around the 20th, but I had to rush off to get a plane home so I didn't get to post them.

While I was at home I got the entire Warlord of Galahir expansion done, minus the Warlord himself as Mantic didn't send him to me yet. I really like the sculpts in this set too. I have a bunch of different greenskin forces, so I decided to go for a bit of an experiment in different skin tones for this one. Dark greyish for the Orcs, greenish brown for the Gobbos, and a brighter green with flesh areas on the lower jaw, underarm and abdomen for the trolls. I think it came out well, and I stuck to a limited pallette of browns and greys for the clothes to unify them, along with bright reddish/orange eyes.

The heroes from this set are pretty cool in concept - the Druid and the Salamander. Both sculpts are alright, but the Salamander is missing a bit of definition on his head to make him really stand out. I included a couple of Descent heroes with these two to make the numbers up, and the detail and proportions on them are much sharper to be fair. I figure the female orc can find a lot of use in Dungeons and Dragons as an Orc Barbarian/Ranger/Rogue/Whatever, and the Lizardman can be a Dungeon Saga Salamander Spellcaster, or a Dragonborn player character, or just a Lizardman NPC. The two of them are from the Bonds of the Wild Hero and Monster expansion set, which I actually bought with Dungeon Saga in mind.


Greataxe Orcs - nice sculpts with a lot of character. Getting the eyes without messing up the rest of the paintjob was tricky.


Morax, a slightly silly pose but pretty nice sculpt anyhow.


Sneaks - my favourite orcs in the set, they ooze character. The hoods are great.


The goblins as a whole I'm less happy with. Too much shallow detail on the minis made it difficult to do the nice designs justice, so I figure these guys are just okay.


These goblins are supposed to be wearing hats, but because of the shallow detail I didn't notice til the end of the paintjob and just decided to leave them as they are because picking the hats out would be a pain:


Again, the archers are the nicest looking of the lot:


Orclings: These were a pain to paint! lots of fiddly details. I noticed I forgot to do the warhorns on the guys at the back right. Still, they're very characterful and even with my slightly lazy paintjob they look nice.


Ugh, my least favourite minis from the set, Fething Mawbeasts. I hate these designs and the entire concept of them. Are they squigs? Mutant dogs? What? I'll probably only ever use them in Dungeon Saga, possibly they might do as the "wolf form" of a Barghest for Dungeons and Dragons, but that's a bloody stretch when I have lovely GW Worgs that could do the same job a mile better:


And the Trolls. I really like these! You can't see well in the photos, so I might take another to show it off, but I did their underarms and stuff flesh coloured and I'm very happy with both that, and the nice green colour I got on the skin. I think their armour plates could maybe do with a little more detailing, but on the whole I really like them both as sculpts and the paint job. If only the other Trolls Mantic released looked as good! These guys may see use as Fomorians for Dungeons and Dragons as well, seeing as they are super-beefy and well armed.


I've got 12 barrels, 3 book lecterns and 10 doors drying from their brown undercoat downstairs. Currently I'm on 280 minis for the year. I wonder if I'll be able to get that lot painted and break 300? Was supposed to go to Vienna, but we're all sick, so we're staying home tonight.





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12 Barrels and 3 Lecterns painted, and 5 doors to go to hit 300!


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Phew! A bit of a rush job, but 5 doors done, and 300 minis for the year. Chuffed, that's a record for me.


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For the sake of completeness - here are the 12 Barrels, 3 Lecterns and 5 Doors that got me from 280 to 300.

Since the done thing seems to be Goals for the Year, here are mine!
1. Keep this blog going!- I have struggled in the past to keep blogging stuff. I think I have a better shot now because my photo set up is a little better so my pics don't look like COMPLETE arse, even if I have a ways to go in that regard.
2. Finish Dungeon Saga - I expect to have this done before the end of January. I've only a few bits of furniture, the Dragon and a few heroes to do. I also want to do minis for all the missions in the Dungeon Journal though, so I will be doing a set of ruffians and thugs as well as an ogre, a manticore, and a ranger dual wielding pistols.
3. Paint up Descent plus any Hero and Monster sets- I have a good few Hero and Monster sets done already so I'd like to get the Descent core set painted up. I'll probably actually use it for a Dungeons and Dragons campaign more than the base game due to lack of someone to play the board game with, but that's fine.
4. Paint up Wrath of Ashardalon- I bought this like, 6 years ago, but when I moved to Germany it got separated from me for years. I recently got it back and I'm looking forward to painting up the contents. Again, probably see more use in 5th ed D'n'D than for the actual game.
5. Paint Space Hulk - the last of my minis heavy board games, and sort of a fond farewell to GW for now at least. Space Hulk: Vengeance of the Blood Angels on the PS1 was my introduction to 40K, so this set has a lot of nostalgia value for me. I have avoided it for a few years as I wasn't sure how I would tackle the red armour, but I'm happy with my formula for the Abyssals here, so I will stick with that.
6. Paint my Red Box Games stuff - I have a pile of RBG Aenglish, Dwarves, Goblins, Orcs and Ruffians that need painting. I'd been holding off for fear I wouldn't do them justice, but I figure, feck it, I need to get them done and get playing with them! Looking forward to this. I've made "counts as " lists for Saga for all of my stuff. Will also see use in Dungeons and Dragons.
7. Paint my LOTR purchases, and perhaps finish my collection of the plastic kits - I've some Rohan, Corsairs, Elves, Dwarves and a lot of Evil stuff that either needs painting or repairing and touch ups.
8. Historicals - In a way the big one, I've been wanting to get my historicals projects off the ground for years now but lack of available players saps my motivation. I have vikings, Celts, normans waiting to go and I want to do themed scenery for them as well. I want to do the history of my home area of County Wexford, which saw those three factions clash and mingle. Saga Warbands for Irish, Vikings, Normans and Hiberno-Norse should be easy. I have the models already, just need the motivation! Also should decide whether that goes in a separate blog to this or not. If that gets finished, I would like to do some 16th/17th century stuff with Cromwell and all that.
9. Scenery - I started this last year, but I want to make a dark ages themed board with forests, bush and rivers as well as structures to play KoW, Saga and also to use for Dungeons and Dragons.

Great job! Wish I could paint this well at my slow pace!

Thanks for the comments about the mini's.

Thanks ced!
I used to agonize a lot more about paintjobs, but I've found painting board game stuff really liberating because I feel like I can sort of relax a little more and keep it simple. Most of these guys are just basecoat -> drybrush highlight - > detail -> wash with eartshade, so they're easy to paint in batches and they look fine for tabletop use.

I also enjoy painting only small groups of similar models over the regiments and squads I'm used to from GW games!

 Da Boss wrote:
Thanks ced!
I used to agonize a lot more about paintjobs, but I've found painting board game stuff really liberating because I feel like I can sort of relax a little more and keep it simple. Most of these guys are just basecoat -> drybrush highlight - > detail -> wash with eartshade, so they're easy to paint in batches and they look fine for tabletop use.

I also enjoy painting only small groups of similar models over the regiments and squads I'm used to from GW games!

Amen to that idea. Painting Zombicide has really broken me free of some of my painting ideas. I always hated my painting quality, but now i feel so much better because i have enough for a game and it looks great and cohesive.

Once you realise that a painted mini always looks better than bare plastic or metal, you can get a lot more done.

That said, one of the big challenges for me next year is going to be doing tartans and checks on my planned Celt force for saga. *shudder*

But even messy tartan is going to look better than if I didn't try (is what I tell myself!).

I did a flannel shirt on one of my wargames factory survivors. It is not the best, but you can tell what it's supposed to be from tabletop distance. A worth endeavor I would say, as will be your Celt fabrics.

Dungeon saga stuff looks great. I'm gonna steal your demon scheme, maybe it's the stock scheme too, I dunno, but I like how yours look.

Cheers Grim!

The only difference from my Abyssals and the stock ones is that I've kept all the spikes, horns and claws black instead of bone coloured. I think it looks better that way.
The fleshtone is successive drybrushes of Khorne Red - Mephiston Red - Wild Rider Red - Evil Sunz Scarlet (I will check the order again, but in increasing brightness) and then I think Fire Dragon Orange. Then it's washed with Carbourg Crimson.

I got some gaming with my set in last night, and took some (crappy) pictures. I figured it would be cool to do an after action report. I may spoiler the images though since they are ugly!

We'd previously played through the two introductory missions (Fighter and Barbarian, Ranger and Wizard) and had one go at the first "real" mission where the heroes meet up. My fiancee had lost that one, and wanted to play it again before we moved on. The goal is to get through a door, as many of the goals are. My fiancee is not the biggest fan of tactical games, so she's a total hero for playing this with me, and she is getting into the swing of it now, but commanding all four heroes is a lot to think about! Unfortunately I didn't make notes of exactly which overlord cards I got, but it was a mix of extra commands and the odd interrupt. I got 1 interesting card, which I will mention when it comes up. Also, I'm pretty sure Danor cast Crystalise a couple of times and may have done some other minor spells, but I can't recall them all!

Starting positions:


With the first turn, the Barbarian raced down the central chamber towards the door and the skeletal archer at the far end, ignoring the skeletons in the first chamber. The Dwarf Fighter trundled into the Archer hiding in the corner and smashed it into a pile of bones. Meanwhile further to the west, the Ranger and Wizard headed down parallel corridors towards the skeleton. The Ranger's arrows and the Wizard's spells bounced off harmlessly and the skeleton stayed standing.

Round 1: Heroes


In response to the Heroes advance, the Necromancer caused the piles of bones in the central chamber to begin to animate, as well as one up the corridor from the Elf. Skeletal warriors shambled into attack, but failed to do much damage to the heroes. Danor, the Wizard, received a cut as he ran past a skeleton, but made it to the relative safety of the next chamber with only a minor scratch. The Barbarian started his round with a heroic feat - slashing at both skeletons in front of him and smashing them to piles of bone. The Dwarf likewise reduced his assailant to bones, and this time the Ranger's arrow struck true, totally destroying the Skeleton that had accosted the Wizard. The skeletal archer snapped off a shot at the Barbarian, wounding him lightly, and the skeleton who had risen the previous round shambled into fight with the Dwarf, his rusty sword clanging uselessly off Dwarven plate. More dead rose near the Wizard, increasing the threat on him.

Round 2-3:


The Dwarf Fighter began trading blows with another recently animated Skeleton, but the fight was inconclusive. His hammerblows were too weak to smash the skeleton, and his armour too thick to be pierced by the skeleton's blade. The barbarian continued to run headlong at the skeletal archer guarding the treasure chest and door. The Elf Ranger raced to keep the Wizard out of danger as he moved to break the wards on the chest sitting next to the door. In the battle of the Archers, the skeleton came off worst, and crumbled to nothing as the Elf fired on him. The skeletons continued to shamble towards the heroes. As the necromancer Delayed them with a cunning ploy. the heroes realised time was running out.

Round 4-5

In the chest, Danor found spidersilk armour and a healing potion, which he gave to the now wounded Barbarian. The newly healed Barbarian began battering down the door as the Dwarf traded blows with his skeletal foe, again to no conclusive outcome. Danor's Feet of Stone spell locked down the skeletal warrior for the Elf to destroy with her arrow, and she finished it off. The Necromancer raised another Skeletal archer to harass the Dwarf and a skeletal swordsman to attack the others as the scythe wielding skeleton attacked and wounded the Elf Ranger.

Round 5-6


The Barbarian broke down the door, and the stench of rotting flesh wafted from the dark opening. The Elf archer moved in to destroy a zombie with an arrow, and the Dwarf finally dispatched his foe and began waddling towards the others as fast as his stumpy legs could carry him. The Wizard's Burn spell proved ineffective against the zombie hordes, and he was left exposed to attack by the zombies which surged from the room in a horde (I had a "Dance Macabre" card that allowed all the minions on the board to move one space and fight, which was cool!). Mauled by the zombies, Danor was close to death!

Round 6-7


Seeing the Wizard about to be pulled down by the stinking Dead, the Ranger unleashed a flurry of shots from her bow, killing those closest to him. The Barbarian also fought against them, but to less success, as the dwarf continued to run through the musty halls. The Wizard decided that discretion was the better part of valor and staggered past the zombies in the entrance, fending off their blows with his staff. He had to get the door open in time...

Unfortunately, the Necromancer had other plans. With a surge of power he directed all of his minions into the fray (I drew Double Commands) sending skeletons shambling toward the beleaguered fighters and one lone zombie to attack the Wizard from behind. As the cold, lifeless hands closed around his throat, Danor recalled the first lesson in Practical Wizardry - "Always let the meatshield go first!"


The wizard down, the group were forced to retreat.

After this loss, my fiancee was fired up to try again. This time she played much more cannily - remembering to cast Crystalise on turns where the Wizard had nothing else to do, keeping the barbarian and dwarf together with the others and generally moving everyone more as a group than individual heroes. She also made much better use of the entire groups' feats, and the Dwarf Fighter's proved invaluable at the inevitable wave of zombies when the door got broken down. She had a hairy moment when Danor stood out exposed to fire from the Skeletal Archers, but in the end he survived long enough to crack the door open and win the day. The big lesson (from this and previous games) is: Guard the wizard!

I felt as Overlord that this is a tough enough mission for the heroes, as they start separated and I got three actions a turn which with extra command cards is plenty to keep the pressure on. The zombies after that big door are a perfect roadblock, taking a surprising amount of punishment to down. It's important not to let the skeletons slow you down as you move through!

We also played the second mission, which I will post up in a few minutes. I was a little less careful taking photos of this one though!

After reading the cheesy flavour text (to groans from my other half), we were about ready for the next mission. She's got a grudge against the whole door based exploration mechanic (she thinks the Necromancer needs a new interior decorator who was more into open plan) so she was delighted to see the starting positions for this mission:

Starting Positions:


The heroes had gotten a little more dangerous, with the Barbarian getting Frenzy (1), the Elf getting to keep her Spidersilk armour, the Wizard getting 2 Power 2 Energy Crystals and a new spell, Corrode, and the Dwarf becoming something of a juicer with 2 battle potions.

I, on the other hand, had only 2 commands per turn, but the foolish heroes had fewer turns to achieve their objective, and a much bigger dungeon to slog through.

The heroes moved and engaged the first zombie, between them pounding it into greenish mush on the floor. Danor began getting to work on the Warded Door, apparently oblivious to the Zombie directly behind him. He took some damage as the zombie mauled him, and the necromancer animated the skeletal archer at the top of the room.



The zombie's triumph was shortlived however, as the two fighters minced it in short order. The Ranger casually dropped the Archer Skeleton into a pile of bones and then the Wizard could finally focus enough to crack the ward on the door and reveal what was beyond:



Oh dear. (after some hectic tile and monster placement) The Zombie Troll lumbered forward to block the entrance, and a revenant began to shamble forward.



The Dwarf yelled a battle cry and charged in as the Wizard hastily retreated, ineffectually flinging fire at the lumbering Troll. The Fighter's axe proved more useful, causing some damage to the beast's huge frame despite it's regenerative properties. The Barbarian began attempting to hack down the other door as the Elf stood ready, bow nocked, for any chance to fire.
The Zombie troll swung the massive brick it carried into the dwarf, wounding him slightly, and failed to regenerate it's damage. The necromancer reanimated the Archer to put pressure on the heroes.

The combat remained fairly static here for a couple of rounds - the Dwarf guzzling Battle Potions and stacking up damage on the Troll who failed to regenerate and only did minor damage to him, as the Ranger continually Boned the Skeletal Archer and the Necromancer reanimated it over and over. Not sure how many rounds went by in total but at least 2. Danor stockpiled crystals and lowered the Troll's attack and armour with his spells. The Barbarian broke down the door and killed the zombie on the far side, and eventually (having not regenerated a single point of damage!) the Troll fell.


The Necromancer called on the unholy powers of the Danse to shuffle the undead into position and attack the Barbarian, but his retribution was swift and conclusive as he cleared the attempted Armoured Zombie blockage in record time. His Dwarven compatriot was having less success with the armoured and deadly Dwarven Revenants, but he held his own.

The Wizard continued to skulk around the back of the crypt, waiting for his chance to sprint for safety as the Ranger moved to back up the barbarian.



The heroes fought through the enemy with focus and determination, Danor's spells downing at least one Revenant as Riordan's hammer felled the other. The Barbarian Orlaf and Madriga the Elf ran for the exit door, finding only a single zombie between them and their goal. All the necromancer could do was reanimate the skeletal archer and move his zombie into position...



Orlaf continued to move towards the door, but the Necromancer unleased a surge of energy and began animating skeletons left right and centre. Back in the entrance, the archer shot Danor, wounding him badly. Suddenly, Madriga found herself accosted, and what had looked like a simple victory began to look more complicated!



(There's definitely a few rounds left out between this picture and the end of the game).
The heroes continued to battle the undead as they tried to keep each other alive. Danor was forced to flee into the shelter of the top corridors to avoid the skeletal archers who had been animated at either end of the dungeon complex. The necromancer's closest chance at victory came when Danor stood in the open for one round and was shot, but not enough damage was done to drop the wizard. In the end, Madriga and Orlaf dispatched their oppenents and the barbarian battered down the door to victory!


That scenario went pretty well for the heroes, but I was actually pretty close to victory at several points due to Danor being in risky situations. Archers are the bane of his existence as you really have to think about where they are at all times in relation to him because with Armour 1 and 2 defence dice, he is easy pickings for any enemy. I can't remember when the heroes feats were used in this game but they weren't particularly spectacular - I have a feeling they were used on the Dwarf Revenants. I also have no idea why the Dwarf seemed to be stood in the doorway for several turns but I'm sure there was a reason for it...

The Troll was a major disappointment, but I can easily see how he could hold up the heroes in that little room for a long time with some more luck on the regeneration roles. The time limit is tight on this one and the heroes cannot afford to dawdle at all - they won on the last turn in our playthrough. Still, a fair win to my other half here - it's not stacked in the heroes favour at all!

I'm loving this game for the exploration and ease of play. The fact that I can play it with my Fiancee means it's probably the game that will get the most play for me this year, and the dice mechanics are simple and fun enough that it still feels satisfying. It's also pretty tactical and unforgiving. The Wizard is definitely a big challenge for the hero player, and "kill the wizard" is going to be the default win condition for many necromancer players.

Awesome stuff, thanks for sharing

Some great painting on the DS models; very impressed with 300 models done in a year! Puts my total to shame

Good job on this! Impressed you got it done so fast. Impressed

Cheers! I paint fast when motivated, but then I often have long periods of doing absolutely nothing.
Next up is the Tyrant of Halpi expansion. I'm annoyed that he comes with a detail-less base, so I'm going to try sculpting on some flagstones using Milliput. After that, I just have to do Keldan, Blaine, the Halfling Fighter and Rogue, the Paladin, the Dwarf Bartender, 15 Doors, 3 Book Shelves, 3 Weapon Racks...

8 Footpads (Corsairs of Umbar with Bows)
8 Ruffians (Corsairs of Umbar with Swords)
8 (I forget the name but some other sort of street tough) (Corsairs of Umbar with Spears)
2 Brutes (Red Box Games Berserkers)
1 Gang Leader (I will find a mini for him - probably from RBG as well)
1 Ogre Brute (Descent Ogre)
1 Manticore (Descent Manticore)
1 Human Druid (RBG Valderman)
1 Human Ranger (Converted from Warlord Plastics)

... that's all!

Fantastic progress, nice extra list too

That BatRep was epic. Now I want to start cranking out more DS models.

Thanks guys!

Here is some stuff I painted in 2015 for the 5th edition game I ran in school. I started running it with just the Expedition to Castle Ravenloft figures, but soon decided that I wanted to expand my bestiary (and selection of hero figures) a bit. I was looking at options and came across these hero and monster sets which are pretty reasonably priced on the whole (even with the mark up some american board game stuff gets over here, it's usually around 25-30 quid for around 15 or so figures with some large ones in there).

I found the sculpt quality to be sharp and the figures are very robust, and I enjoyed painting them, though I did rush them a bit to get them ready for play (most of these were painted in a single weekend!)

The monster groups are all identical, but one monster from each should be identifiable as a "master" monster for play in Descent. They come in Tan and Red plastic to distinguish them, but I tried to do it with a paintjob rather than a ring of colour around the bases, which I find distracts from the model.

Anyhow, the first set was Oath of the Outcast.


Giant spiders are something every GM needs, and these guys fill the role admirably. Simple paintjob, but the arachnophobe in the group attested to it's effectiveness.



Giant bats (or Razorwings, as they are called in Descent) are less common, but useful fodder for Vampires and can sub in for other flying beasties. The ranger in the party really liked these so I let him take one as a beast companion.



I really like these Beastmen. Not the GW style, but they're pretty flexible for Roleplaying. I used them as Quaggoths, but they could just as easily be Bugbears or whatever else you needed them to be.




And the Heroes. These come in 4 archetypes usually. The Fighter was used in the campaign, and the Orc spellcaster is really useful as Half Orc spell casters are rare enough. The Elf was good as she expanded my range of female figures, and I wanted to be welcoming to any girls that wanted to join. The last figure is cool and I think got used as a hermit drow spider-wrangler or something. I think he could also make a fine Tiefling.

Next set was my favourite, the Crown of Destiny.



The main draw of the set are these lovely Giants. I used them as Hill Giants in the campaign - a dangerous enemy for the low level group that taught the kids the value of subterfuge and negotiation. It lead to a memorable sequence where they fled from the Giant they had tricked and infuriated "back to town" and it followed them in, killing lots of guards and townsfolk in the process before it was finally killed.



The utility of the Giants is nearly eclipsed by the cool factor of these shapeshifting Chaos Beasts. I really like these and would reskin some sort of demon or aberration to fit them. They can fill in as a trash eating Otyguth as well, which is what I used them for. The players ended up bribing it with food to accompany them for a little while. Fun to paint, but I still want to go back and finish the eyes, which I didn't have time to do in my speed run.



Lastly, a dungeon staple - Fire Beetles. I really am not happy with my paint job on these guys, they deserve a better go in the future and I plan on stripping and repainting them. They saw use as both fire beetles and giant scorpions in the campaign.



These guys actually all saw use in the campaign - an Elf Ranger, a Human Wizard, a Dwarf Cleric (he's a bit more fightery, but the player wanted to be a healer and why not!) and a Half Elf Warlock (Blade Pact). The Warlock could do with some tidying up and finishing on his robes, but I'm happy with the rest.

Lastly, an interesting set: The Crusade of the Forgotten.



These Golems are kind of the stars of the set, and I had one controlled by an evil wizard with a control rod that the players were smart enough to loot and therefore they gained control of a golem for a while. They had no way of repairing it so it was basically an expendable resource, but they thought it was super cool that that was "allowed". I use these in my KoW dwarf army as Earth Elementals too. Very useful figures.



A bit more specific but still interesting and unique, these Medusae also saw use in a fairly exciting encounter (the fighter got turned to stone ). The design is very nice with the serpentine bodies and four pairs of arms. They could also be used as Yuan Ti spellcasters or something. I am quite happy with the simple green and red scheme - I think it's pretty striking.



Mentioned above, here is a cabal of evil sorcerers. Very useful to have, I painted these guys as Red Wizards of Thay. I like the Master especially with his reversed colour scheme.



And of course, the heroes. In this case, an all girl group, which I am more than cool with. The pirate/Rogue is an especially nice model, and the Elf Rogue is very dynamically posed. But I guess I really like all of them - the Paladin/Cleric is really cool looking too and the magic user is really well executed too. These only saw a bit of use and I never actually got around to finishing them, because I didn't want to rush on such nice sculpts. I must actually do the last touches on them before I start again.

So, I hope you liked that mini-retrospective. I really like the Descent Hero and Monster sets, and now that I own the core set they have even more value to me. I actually have another set, Visions of Dawn, which has some nice heroes, Ogres, Trolls and Manticores, and I'll be doing that as part of my Dungeon Saga run. I'm probably going to pick up all of these, though Guardians of Deephall has noticeably worse sculpting quality than the others. Some really cool ones coming out soon too with giant demonic apes, nagas, and all sorts of undead nastiness.

I had picked up that oaths and outcasts set a while back, nice figures and you did a great paint up on them. I've seen some of the other sets come up cheap (damaged at miniaturemarket) but I keep passing them up, I'll have to reconsider them again after this reminder.

Thanks Theo! I wish I could find them at half price here - the local shop is currently charging 35 euro for the Bonds of the Wild set, which is a bit too pricey for me when I don't love all the minis in there.

As I mentioned, I started the campaign with the Expedition to Castle Ravenloft set. I'd been running a board game club, and this was a popular choice among the kids. I hadn't bothered painting it at that stage. One of the kids asked if this was "real" D&D, having seen the game played on Community and Big Bang Theory. He nagged me to set up a "real" game for them, so I thought "Why the hell not..." and painted up the set pretty quickly just to give the kids some visual aids when we were doing combat, and also just for something to do. We played 5th so I was fast and loose with positioning and movement, but it actually worked really well and the kids liked the tactile and visual elements of using the minis.

The minis themselves are nothing to write home about, being unpainted versions of the old D'n'D minis prepaints. But they're good enough as game tokens and importantly for my purposes they were robust enough to survive transport and regular contact with very excited teenagers.



This guy is the centre piece of the set, a Blue Dracolich. It's an okay model, and I didn't spend too long on it. The example dracolich in the 5e MM is a Huge Blue, which I don't think is a coincidence. They players never encountered this guy, which is probably for the best as I think we topped out at level 6 or 7.



I didn't like this model until I painted it, and now I think it's a really cool Flesh Golem. Just a shame about the warping on the base. This was found also in the employ of some evil wizards and went berserk.



This is a nice Zombie Dragon. My paintjob here is pretty basic, and it's actually a White Dragon, but it's good enough. It was fodder in a combat at some stage too, and it can sub in for any Large sized Dragon if needs be. I like the sculpt, though it is simple.



This wolfpack and werewolf was the first encounter the guys met, as they decided to take a short cut through a large forest instead of going the long way round. It was my first time running 5e, so I wanted to see how robust it was, and this Werewolf turned out to be a fearsome challenge for the level 1 party with no magical weapons. They ended up hiding in a tree I think, and only barely drove it off.



The Green Hag is a nice enough mini - a bit soft detail wise on the face, but a cool pose and useful enough. I intended to have her show at some point as a minor villain but the players never followed any of the hooks leading to her - c'est la vie!



Very useful minis if not very interesting to paint, these rat swarms have the advantage of being flat, so players can stand on top of them. Pretty useful staple in a lot of dungeon situations.



Similarly, medium monstrous spiders are a staple foe, and combined with the Descent large ones, they make a nice themed encounter. The sculpts are nothing to write home about, but they get the job done.



Who doesn't love Kobolds! These never saw use, because frankly 4 kobolds is too few for an encounter, but I love these guys. I still regret selling my D'n'D minis years ago and losing my Kobold collection! With the 4 Kobolds in Wrath of Ashardalon and the prepaint I recently got, I'm getting close to having enough for gaming purposes. I love these old sculpts.

Here's the most recent prepaint for comparison (just washed with Earthshade). I don't think he's nearly as nice!



I'd kill for those Kobold Miners they used to do - lovely characterful miniatures!



The Zombie minis were actually Wights in the prepainted line. They're nothing special, but added to my Dungeon Saga Zombies and Descent Zombies I've now got 17 board game plastic shamblers, which is nice!



Ghouls I have in plenty from Mantic, but these guys are a lot more durable for play with students so I'm happy with them. The sculpts are a bit outsized and overly beefy, but they get the job done.



Pretty mediocre skeletons, but hey, you can never have enough of these adventure staples either.



These guys were a bit more interesting. They come in Transparent plastic with a blue tint, and I decided to pick the bone out and leave the flame as spectral and ghostly blue. I used the Flameskull stats slightly modified to represent these guys. They were a big hit.



These Wraiths are similar, but I'm not as happy wth the effect. Dead easy to paint though! Ghosts and Wraiths are always a useful mini type to have to hand as well.



Another easy paintjob and dungeon staple - Gargoyles. I enjoyed painting these and I quite like the model too, sitting there all smug on his plinth.



And last of all, the big baddie, Strahd. In the game I ended up using a Barrow Wight to represent him, as Vampire is a bit too tough for the then level 2 party. He's a pretty nice model, among the best in the D'n'D prepaints line, and shows what they can do when they are "on".

Of course, that leaves...


The heroes! Hmmm. You may notice that the Dwarf in the middle is not from the set - he's a prepaint that I washed Earthshade and am using to represent the Cleric. My set didn't come with a Cleric, I had two Wizards instead, so this is a convenient solution. He seems to fit in fairly well, but I think the new wizkids prepaints are lower quality than the older prepaints.

The Rogue has a weird pose like she's sitting on the toilet, and the Wizard is an odd sculpt that I didn't do a great job with, but he's got a fireball which is cool I guess? The Ranger is pretty nice though, and I love the Dragonborn Fighter. The Dragonborn was one of the main players in the Campaign, and ended up branching out from fighter into Eldritch Knight. The Ranger also saw some play when some of the girls joined in for a session or two.

I reckon these sets are a good source of staple minis for D'n'D campaigns - robust, simple to paint and generally useful in a variety of campaigns. I reckon Wrath of Ashardalon actually has the best selection of miniatures of any of the available ones, so I'm looking forward to getting to grips with that later in the year. The games themselves are good fun too if you want a co-op tactical dungeon bash that's pretty light and easy.

Wow great stuff! Jealous of the game time too.

Really cool stuff! A very nice selection of monstrous minis there!

Cheers! This was such a random "project" that sort of snowballed out of nowhere, but just the chance to play was such a powerful motivator after a few years of pretty much zero miniature wargaming that I had a major burst of productivity.

As to the gaming time, yeah, it was actually a lot of fun. The only issue was it was my lunchbreak but I waited til my exam classes were on study leave to start and initially kept it limited to a small group of nerds. As time went on more kids joined and it became a bit more of a pain to run.

That's the only thing that makes me hesitant to do this again in the new school - any club should be open to anyone who wants to take part, but I can't really run for more than 6 kids and even that is pushing it. Ideally, other kids would step up and GM and we might end up with multiple parallel games going, but then the mini supply begins to dry up/lead to conflicts, so it'd almost be better to do without them. Kids also prefer to have an adult to adjudicate for them because they feel that it's "fairer" so they'd want to stay in a group I was running if possible. I'm keen to get the minis some use but they unfortunately do present organisation issues in a school based club. I'm sure I can get around it all with some good ground rules and I have counters printed to represent all the monsters in the MM so technically there shouldn't be too much issue, but...

There's that, and I do worry about some of the less scrupulous kids making off with a model or two. Never happened yet and it's pretty unlikely, but it's a worry if there's a lot going on O_o

I would be furious if someone ever ganked one of my minis, would certainly stop dming for a group that harbored such an individual.

Yeah, it's the problem with running a school club - ready stream of eager players, but I sorta have to leave it open to all comers.

I think it's pretty unlikely with the kids in my current school though barring absentmindedness. They're all pretty good kids.

So, the big centre-piece of the Dungeon Saga set is this guy:


I'm not the world's biggest fan of the sculpt, but he's pretty good for a huge dragon that fits into a defined footprint for gaming, and he's durable as hell. But I was very disappointed that he didn't come with a Dungeon base the way the rest of the minis did. I've set about rectifying that with some milliput:



I've basically got zero experience with milliput and my greenstuff experience is limited to gap filling, so even doing something as simple as flat irregular shapes is proving difficult and time consuming for me! Keeping the tool wet seems to be vital, but I do find the milliput a bit nicer to work with (and certainly cheaper!) than Greenstuff, which I guess is more for detail work and actually competent sculptors? I'll be happy if it looks alright from tabletop distance when finished. I was going to try and do interesting things with the fist cracking and throwing flagstones out of kilter, but I think I'll keep it simple .

I have to mark a pile of tests and write some school reports now, because the holidays end on Thursday. Boo.

He doesn't come on a tiled base? I didn't notice that. I look forward to seeing how yours turns out.

Yeah, it is a shame they didn't go for a sculpted base. Doing this myself was a pain!




Not 100% happy with the result but it's good enough I guess. No finger prints in the putty anyhow, and hopefully when painted it will look good and match up with the others. Getting in around the feet and under the tail to place them was very fiddly! Hopefully get some paint on this sucker over the weekend.

Base is looking great. Might I suggest taking some plastic rod, really small, and cutting little slivers around on the base. Paint them up as gold from his treasure trove.