Sláine: Kiss My Paintbrush!

The three champions are now finished.  Still excited by this paint scheme.  See the how to guide earlier in this project.  The only addition to the regular Fomorians is the red crest which is straight Blood Red.

I’m back to this project as the second wave minis are waiting on the painting table.  First off though my favourite Slaine miniature – Warped Slaine by Wargames Foundry.

He was painted using a similar approach to the Warlord version.  I spent a bit more time on the additional low/highlights on the skin.  I alos wanted to reflect the woad tattoos with some extra blue in the hair and axe blade.  That meant adding Runic Grey to the Grim Black for the hair and Cloudburst Blue to the Gravelord Grey of the NMM steel.

No contest in the comparison.  I know what will be on the table in the next game.

It is the end of the Spring Clean Challenge and I’ve had a blast painting Sláine. Here’s the grand total of completions:

87 completed items including 67 miniatures and 20 terrain items.

There are 22 Fomorians, 19 Drunes and 26 Earth Tribes.

I used this as an opportunity to paint with a new product range, The Army Painter Speedpaints.  This helped me get a poppy, graphic style on the minis and I tried out NMM for the first time too.  Overall super happy.
Here’s my handy colour swatch for the different AP and Contrast coulors I’ve got.  I found the colour wheel really handy for deciding on colour schemes and picking appropriate contrasting colours.  Great idea, they are only £1 in most places.

And to top it all off I got a like from Pat Mills 🙂

The project will carry on.  The next wave releases in Augist and my pre-order is in.  I’ve also got some Confrontation Fianna and Alternative Armies Fir Bolg and Sidhe to provide some new factions.  I’ve also got the Foundry Sláine character minis to finish along with his chariot and a sky ship too.

I’m still playing simple scenarios and trying to figure out the rules.  The Let’s Play is super helpful, unlike the rulebook.  I’m hoping the rest of the Let’s Play series makes it out fairly soon as there are a few things I haven’t figured out yet.

Thanks for inspiring us with the Spring Clean Challenge.  Looking forward to next year already.

Decided to expand the Earth Tribes beyond the Sessair.  These are the Fir Domain who use their shields to help reverberate their battle cry.  Their king is Rudraige who bears the Silver Sword of the Moon.

I’ve been working from the Mongoose D20 Slaine RPG book for this tribe which has a useful illustration of this technique.

The figures are Roy Eastland sculpts currently available through North Star Figures.  AP Speedpaints for the main colours in the style previously described.  Tartan stripes are Vallejo Model Air Mediterranean Blue over the AP Fire Giant Orange and Vallejo Amarantha Red over AP Cloudburst Blue.

Here they all are with their King.  Not bad for scale as far as I’m concerned.

Had a go at the opening scenario tonight.  I have to say that these rules aren’t the easiest to get on top of for first time players.  We were very grateful for the OTT Let’s Play which definitely helped with the combat sequence but there are a couple of things that I’ll need to spend some time looking up.  I need to get my head around the Winded rule and as long as I can work through the references on pages 10, 15, 19, 23 & 28 I’m sure I can figure it out.  Is it just me or should that have been put in one place?

Anyhow, here are some shots from the playthroughs.  Game 1 was mostly for testing the play sequence and movement rules.  Slaine and Ukko ran away and were impossible to catch after good D6 rolls on their Sprints.

So far so good and onto Game 2.  This time combat would be the focus.  Slaine and Ukko reset to the central stone and decide to rush at the Skullswords and Drune Priest.  Mass combat ensues where all of the specialist cards are played and Slaine comes out victorious.

We’ll play the other starter scenario that introduces Blood Points and hopefully be a bit more familiar with some terms that the writers clearly think we know already.  I appreciate this is their second version of the 2000AD rules but I didn’t play Judge Dredd and the rulebook seems to be written for people who did.

I post on Insta and the Slaine, Ukko and Nest photo I put up this weekend got a like from Pat Mills – author of Slaine.  I’m never washing my Instagram again.

The starter set heroes, Sláine, Ukko the Dwarf and Nest the Druid.

King Rudraige with the Silver Sword of the Moon, King Gann with the Flaming Spear of the Sun and Mongan Axehead of the Sessair.

Thanks to @demonsub for the inspiration for the colours on the Spear of the Sun.  I was going to go for bright gold but was reminded that in the Bisley art it has this demonic possession look too so settled on this having seen it in demonsub’s project.

Sláine the King and Niamh.  This is the bonus Sláine miniature for pre-ordering.  This colour scheme for Niamh comes from the “Sláine the King” comic cover art and is a fantastic version of a 1980’s leotard in a Olivia Neuton John “Physical” video style (one for the teenagers there).

That’s it for the Warlord first release miniatures.  Whilst we are waiting for the second wave release in August I’m continuing with the additional miniatures and will start on the playthough of the game scenarios.  I’ll take a group shot once the table is set up.

The two Fomorian champions.  Alternative Armies sculpts – and very meanicing they are too.  These are bigger than the Warlord games models by a head (see my scale comparison earlier in the project) and they have been based on the 40mm rounds rather than the 25mm.  Painting method is the same as the other Fomor.