Painting Challenge Report #2

This is long overdue post, as the original entry published in the Painting Challenge blog was dated January 7th 2024. My second contribution to the Challenge this year is a unit of Late Roman mounted light archers.

The unit is part of the project that slowly is taking shape to have an 8 points Saga Late Roman warband: more cavalry will arrive soon and I have the Heavy Cavakry and Light Infantry boxes already at home. 

The models are part of the multi-pose Gripping Beast plastic range (Late Roman Light Cavalry) offering two different options (armed with bows or with javelins). These are vey well designed minis and the box offer (in my humble opinion) one of the best quality for price combos in the market.   

The unit together with some bonus points add 100 points to my Challenge score, to a total of 140 points. I'm now at 35% of my Challenge target of 400 points by March 31st, and I'm confident that will reach the target on time with the pipeline of models currently sitting on my desk.

Painting Challenge Report #6

 January is gone and I'm happy with my progress so far in the Painting Challenge. Usually, by this time in the competition my painting mojo suffers; but not this year. I think the Saga project is keeping me engaged and committed.

The past week I finished a second unit of 8 warriors (1 Saga Warband point equivalent). The minis are from the Gripping Beast plastic Dark Age Warriors box, straight from the sprues. Shileds as usual from the superb Little Big Men Studios range.

 

The unit is generic enough to play a rol in any Dark Age warband and even later periods, like for example acting as light infantry for an El Cid/Reconquista army. I'm now close to conclude a 4-point starter warband: I already painted one levies (1 point) and the two warriors (2 points) units. I only need now to paint the Guards, which hopefully should be ready next week.

 

I have also started looking for a suitable warband leader.For a cavalry-free army, I have already prepared this chief standing on a boulder. Happy with the final work but I may add in the future a stardard bearer. I'm planning in any case to paint some other warband leaders, and at least one riding a horse.

 

Following this week's submission my accumulated scoring has reached 442 points, representing 63% of my 700 points target for this year's Challenge.

 

Painting Challenge Report #5

 Time flies, I can't believe that 5 weeks are already gone since the beginning of the Challenge (and the winter period)

Very satisfactory progress this week. Despite having less time available for painting, I managed to finish another 8-men Warrior unit for my Saga warband. These were initially to be part of an Anglo-Danish warband, bu the models are so generic that can be part of any Saxon, Viking, etc unit in the Dark Age period.

 

 

The second part of the entry are Saruman and the Palanthir. These were painted to win some bonus points by visiting the 80s Studio site of the Challenge Studios. The model is from an (very) old Mithril range bought in the 80s literally (it was even in the sealed original blister pack!)

 

Quite happy with the painting work, depicting Saruman in the act of conjuring Sauron's Eye in the Palanthir.

This week I scored 67 points, taking my Challenge's accumulated to 377 points. I have already covered 54% of my March 21st deadline target of 700 points, so not bad at all. Now I need to keep the momentum.

Painting Challenge Report #4

As expected, the end of the Christmas holidays has reduced my total paint time and slowed the output. In any case I have been able to produce one new 12-men levy unit for my Saga Late Roman Army warband.

Being levies I wanted the unit to lack uniformity. So instead of using the Gripping Beast Late Roman Infantry box, I decided to scavange different pieces from the Dark Age Warriors box and spare heads with helmets from other different boxes.

My idea was that likely they were supplied with helmets,  Roman army tunics and shields when called for service. But being conscripted, some may be have been arriving late or the army's depot may have been depleted, and therefore they had to provide their own clothing and weapons.

 

Another example of the flexibility allowed by the Gripping Beast plastic boxes, many of whose parts can be interchanged, providing endless configuration options. The shields are transfers from Little Big Men studios. I went for a similar pattern to give the unit some uniformity.

With this entry, my scoring stands now at 310 points, representing 44% of my Challenge's 700 points target this year. 

 

Painting Challenge Report #1

The first week of the Challenge is over and I have managed to score 80 points total in two different entries, 60 points coming from the painted models and the remaining 20 points the bonus from one of the Challenge Studio locations.

 

This firrst week I focused my attention in completing a Moor/Sarracen warband unit: 12 archeres for 1 point Saga levies section. This comes to complete an old (actually very old) army project of early 2000s when I was heavily playing WAB.