Host of the Dead- Draugar

Draugar (or the singular form, Draugr) are undead from Norse legend, which form from the corpses of especially malevolent warriors. It was said that, as these warriors died, their will to live proved so strong that their soul could not leave their body, and reanimated it as a Draugr. They retained a semblance of their intelligence, and were tied more or less to the place of their burial, typically a large barrow. 

While many modern sources, from D&D bestiaries to MMORPGs have portrayed the Draugr, the original creature of legend was much less well defined- depending on the power of the soul animating the Draugr, it could have different powers and appearances. Some sources even differentiate between standard and aquatic Draugar.

The method of destruction also varied: while some were 'killed' by the same methods as a living man, others could only be destroyed by fire, or by spending the night in its barrow with its severed head on ones knee.

These particular miniatures are from Games Workshop's LotR line, sold as Army of the Dead. I prefer the sculpts as Draugar and thoroughly enjoyed making them look as nasty as possible, adding mold, leather rot, verdigris and rust to the clothes and gear.

This mostly entailed drybrushing in probably 8-10 different shades, along with some overall ink washes. The subtle differences in color  make a large difference in the effect, although it can be difficult to tell in pictures.

The sculpts and design are excellent, looking ancient in comparison with a medieval Norse aesthetic. The later medieval 'heater' shields are a slight anachronism, and when I paint more I'll probably replace them with circular shields, but I got these three used, and already assembled. 

Men of Ograviss

The Ogrons are a race of ape-like humanoids who hail from the planet Ograviss in the far reaches of Mutter's Spiral. They are unintelligent, and highly obedient servants, which makes them ideal for the purposes of the Daleks...

The Ogrons appeared in a pair of serials with the Third Doctor- Day of the Daleks and Frontier in Space. In both they were agents of the Daleks- in the latter serial also working with the Master- providing brute force to supplement the Daleks' cunning.

Classic Doctor Who creatures are often tough to paint, and the Ogrons proved no exception. There is a dearth of good reference material for them, even in their original episodes the often patchy studio lighting and deteriorated tapes make an accurate color assessment difficult. 

Also, the original costumes for many of the creatures used mixed, low-quality pigments- so even when the colors can be identified, matching the tones proves tricky. For example, the flesh tones on the original Ogrons appear, under different lighting, black, brown or even a dark blue. I wound up painting it with my standard black/dark grey tones, but adding a slate blue between the base color and highlights. 

I'm fairly happy with how the colors on these Ogrons turned out, they're recognizable, and as close as I could get to the on-screen appearance. The dark vests were made of a glossy material- almost a cross between cheap leather and satin. I chose not to attempt this effect on the miniatures, as I felt it would look too noticeable, and overscale.

The Ogrons are also one of the many classic creatures I'd love to see return to the show. An episode revisiting the intrigue of the Third Doctor's adventures with the Galactic Federation and its diverse aliens (perhaps in the aftermath of Empress of Mars), would make an excellent addition to the new series.

Fighting Uruk-Hai

Perhaps the blackest deed of the fallen wizard Saruman in The Lord of the Rings was the creation of the Uruk-hai, half men and half orc. Taller and stronger than other orcs, they made up the elite forces of Isengard's army, leading lesser orcs on scouting parties and into battle.

In the books, the Uruk-hai served, as I said earlier, as leaders for lesser orcs. Parties completely composed of them were uncommon- at Amon Hen a mere four were slain by Boromir, which reflects both how few were there, and their fighting prowess compared to standard orcs. In spite of  this ability, there were too few Uruk-hai to make a lasting difference on the War of the Ring.

This is changed drastically in the Jackson films, where the entire army at Helm's Deep is composed of Uruks, and their ferocious cousins, the Berserkers. While this made for some formidable battle sequences, it also made the Orcs of Mordor which appear later seem tame in comparison. This resulted in an expanded role for the Easterlings and Mumakil at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields to increase dramatic tension, which, in my opinion, was a mistake. By taking the focus away from the central evil of Sauron's Orcs and increasing the ability of his servants like Saruman and the Easterlings, Jackson put Sauron on more of a level footing with his lieutenants.

Despite this, I do like the design of the film Uruk-hai, especially lightly-armored Scouts like these, with the White Hand of Isengard smeared on helm and shield. The first copy of the Hobbit I read was filled with the illustrations of Michael Hague (I believe I also mentioned his work here). His goblins were an inspiration for the skin tones and hair of these Uruks.

I've worked on these off and on for the past month, so there are individual differences between the models, easiest to see in the warpaint (or lack thereof). I'm happy with that, as it makes this group look more like a disorganized mob, as fits a band of orcs.

The best known use of scouting Uruk-hai was at Amon Hen, where a mixed force of Isengarders, Orcs of the Eye and goblins from the Misty Mountains attacked the Fellowship, killing Boromir. Archers played a memorable part in this assault, probably allowing the Uruks to weaken Boromir before coming within range of a sword-thrust (overly represented by Lurtz in the Jackson films). 

Rule-wise, I'm interested by Mauhur (mentioned by Ugluk as the leader of another band of scouts) and his "lads", fast as horse-riders. I like playing mobile, bow-heavy forces, and the added clout of the sword-armed scouts seems like it would make for a good army.

I've also painted up a Warg Rider to provide some support to the scouts. I'm particularly pleased with the demented look and dark hide of the Warg, and the primitive look of the rider.

I'm happy with how this force has turned out. Although I may add a few more models to it, I've got a fair sized core of warriors, plenty to play some Battle Companies or a small-scale SBG.

Cold Steel

Cold, Logical, Emotionless...

...the dreaded Cybermen are one of the Doctor's oldest villains, returning time and again to threaten the universe. These particular Cybermen are (in their timeline, at least) the most recent incarnation, first encountered in the 11th Doctor episode Nightmare in Silver, and are, like my recently posted Daleks, intended for Warlord Games' Exterminate! game.

Being one color, they were a good bit easier to paint than most, but I really like how my paint triad (Army Painter's Gunmetal Grey/Plate Mail Metal/Shining Silver) turned out. They look as bright and as menacing as the onscreen Cybermen- especially their expressionless faces.

As well as the humanoid Cybermen, small animals, converted into Cybermats are also used to further the Cyber cause.

Upgrade or Delete!

City of the Daleks

While I don't think I've actually posted any of the miniatures on here, I've gotten into Warlord Games 's Exterminate! game. It's a fun game, and has the advantage of an excellent range of miniatures to support it. Warlord has had, over the summer, a painting contest- the existence of which I was unaware of until recently. Thankfully, I still had time to put together an Dalek-themed entry (the contest closed last night), and, now that it's finished, detail it here.

While the Daleks are Time War Daleks from the new show, I based the city on the original Dalek City seen in 1963's The Daleks with a few touches from other episodes. Also, like the original show, the set is very low budget. I constructed it from thin, cereal-box cardboard to replicate the plywood used on the original set, adding details using common items- Davros rests upon a small jar lid, while the display screen behind him is an old electrical outlet.

To add some depth to this control room, I added a pair of halls running off of it. Probably the most memorable part of the original Dalek city were these long, low halls. The distinctive geometry of the inner doorways were a little difficult to replicate, but I'm happy with how they turned out. You can also see wire inside the vent above the doors- for some reason, this fails to show up in any of the other pictures, but it is there!

This is a good shot of one of the standard Daleks- we'll see how long I can keep this up, but so far all of the Daleks have unique name tags under the eyestalks.

I really like this shot of Davros- he looks ready to command his pepperpot creations. Like the Daleks around him, he is from the new show- the control panel is much different from that on the original chair. The stellar chart behind him is from the Seventh Doctor adventure Remembrance of the Daleks, and shows the Skaroene system.

I'm very pleased with how this vignette turned out- it's a good homage to one of my favorite enemies of the Doctor, and displays my creations to good effect. 

Tales From the Magician's Skull

A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to try out an RPG called Dungeon Crawl Classics- for those of you who don't know what the game is, it's a D&D-based RPG which seeks to capture (quite successfully, in my opinion) the spirit and 'feel' of the fantasy stories that inspired the original edition of D&D- authors like Howard, Lovecraft, Vance, and Moorcock (for a full list, try searching on D&D appendix N). This particular branch of fantasy happens to be one of my favorites, second only to Tolkien, and so DCC is proving an excellent fit with my tastes. I'll try and get a full review of DCC up once I've gotten another game or two under my belt, but, in the mean time, I'll talk a bit about a connected magazine- Tales From the Magician's Skull.

I'll preface this with a short disclaimer- like I've mentioned on here before, I don't tend to read a lot of really recent fantasy- it's not because I dislike what's currently published, it's simply that my particular tastes tend to lead me to older authors- like those which inspired DCC- so I'll be comparing Magician's Skull to these authors, rather than to its contemporaries. This shouldn't be a problem, however, as the magazine intentionally harks back to this era anyway.

It's a fantasy fiction magazine after the general fashion of Weird Tales, published by the same company (Goodman Games) as DCC and has a definite link to the game- stats for everything that appears in the stories are in the back- but it can certainly be read without having any knowledge of DCC- or even RPGs. The printing and binding are high-quality, more like a slim paperback than a standard magazine. I especially appreciated the heavy, almost parchment-like paper- very unlike the pulp magazines! My one issue (and this is fairly minor) is the use of a thin, laminated plastic over the cover- while this makes it look great when new, once the magazine starts taking some wear the laminate begins to peel at the corners (as it has on mine), and can be very difficult to deal with.

The art is also high-quality, in the style of early D&D art- this is something of a trademark with DCC, and one I like. Each story has a full-page illustration proceeding it, and map-like illustrations for some major locations. This last, I would imagine, is primarily to aid those (like myself) who may try and run the stories as an RPG module, although it is also a help to the mere reader as well.

There are seven stories- all by different authors and in a variety of different styles, although all harking back (more or less) in substance to the 'swords and sorcery' fantasy published in the first half of the 20th century.

The influence of RPGs is also strong in these- the first story, "What Lies in Ice", is especially easily transferable to a adventure format and all, to a greater or lesser extent, draw on the lore of D&D. Perhaps my favorite part of early fantasy is its often startling originality and creativity- while none of these authors extend to the ranks of a Howard or Moorcock in creating these strange scenes and creatures, there are still some glimmerings of the same ability here- like the Kraken's "chapel" in "What Lies in Ice", or the assault of the guai on Long-He in "Beneath the Bay of Black Waters".

My two favorites from this issue (I won't spoil either) would be "Beneath the Bay of Black Waters" and "There was an Old, Fat Spider"- the first of these features an Imperial commissioner taking down a drug gang with very interesting allies in a Chinese inspired setting, the latter has a nicely portrayed relationship between a vengeful woodcutter and an aged giant spider.

There are also directories of fantasy discussion groups and bookstores from all over the US- I appreciated this addition, as I'm always on the lookout for more used bookstores!

All in all, Tales from the Magician's Skull proved a very enjoyable read- I look forward to reading more issues soon.

Elric!

A while ago, I posted a picture of Michael Moorcock's book, The Silver Warriors. That was the first Moorcock I had read, but it was certainly not the last! Since then, I've read just about the whole of the original six book series starring Moorcock's greatest protagonist, Elric- this series has quickly become one of my favorites. Elric is an albino, the last Emperor of a decadent, elf-like race, the Melniboneans. I'll try not to give the story away, but, before long, Elric is in a self-imposed exile, and has gained a sentient soul-drinking runesword called Stormbringer, which urges Elric towards his final doom.

The books highlight the eternal struggle of two opposites- but, rather than the usual Good and Evil, this battle rages between the Lords of Law and Chaos- neither of these factions are good or evil, but balance between the two. In fact, it's suggested that the victory of either would result in the cessation of life. Elric reflects this conflict, constantly see-sawing between a fairly well-developed conscience (not as much a good conscience, as a lawful one) and the bloodthirsty and Chaotic urgings of his heritage and hellsword.

One of my favorite parts of 'swords and sorcery' style fantasy is the extremely memorable monsters and villains- Moorcock has an excellent imagination for these, and creates some of the most vivid adversaries I've heard of. Two of my favorites would be the Hill-King of Org from Bane of the Black Sword, and Voilodion Ghagnasdiak's Vanishing Tower, from the book of the same name.

All the book covers (save the last, by Michael Whelan) shown in this post are by Robert Gould. I really enjoy his art, and his depictions of Elric are spot-on.

On a final note, these books are a foundation of modern role-playing games, especially Dungeons and Dragons. I use them frequently when Dungeon Mastering (even going so far as to run entire stories), and I'd suggest anyone with an interest in these games to try these books out.