Quick Troll Army Update...

I havent really posted anything recently of the current state of the Troll army so I figured I would post a shot of what I have painted minus 3 fire breathers. So here it is, all 271pts of it:

Epic Madrak Complete!

Slowly but surely I am working through my casters in my Trolls (I own them all). As I mentioned earlier my newest tournament pairing is Calandra and epic Madrak. I posted Calandra last week so its time to show off her partner, Madrak. I went fairly simply with his paint scheme doing the standard rust armor with gold accents. In the Troll fluff Sorcerers are Albinos. I showed that with eGrim (more of a pinky colour) and with eMadrak I went even further with more of a white. I also decided that since Rathrok is a magic weapon I didnt want it to be covered with the same rust the normal stuff in this army is, so I made it look new. I think I am going to go back to pMadrak and update him so he looks like his epic version as I think he looks as I have never been really happy with how he looks. Anyways, here he is:

Witch Doctor Complete!

Another quick update. For some reason one of my fave things to paint are the minions I can add into my Army. It might be because it gives me a break from Trolls while still adding something to their army. The Gatorman Witch Doctor is one of my fave solos I have finished so far. Lots of fun details like his bloody knight, the snake on the other hand and the globes of liquid on his belt. Also had fun painting up the bloody body parts (which you cant see very well in the pics) on his base. I should have some more stuff next week too.

Warrors Complete!

Without a doubt this was the one thing in the entire army I was dreading painting. 15 models of old troll badness lol. It took me about a month to a month and a half of working on and off on this unit to FINALLY get it done. Figures that as I came close to finishing it PP goes ahead and releases a one box, totally complete, PLASTIC set that looks a million times better. Sigh haha. Ah well, they are done and I will never have to paint them again, so that is all that matters.

Calandra Complete!

Like most of the Trollblood players around the world I have been putting together Calandra's Environmental Evolutionism Tier Force(EE for shot). The army is made of of 11 light Elemental Beasts, the full krielstone unit, Calandra and Battle Moses. I have been collecting the lights for a while now...probably the only reason I have the complete list as everywhere is currently sold out. Getting Calandra herself finished though was the first step in getting this army up and running. I personally find the model super ugly (her hands are insanely big and she looks like she has the fakest breasts in history) and she wasn't terribly fun to paint. BUT! Man o' man playing her on the table is easily the most fun I have had with Trolls, so I will forgive her, also..Starcrossed haha. Anyways, here she is:

Rok Complete!

Been a long time since I have posted. Just finished going through my works busy season so I just hadn't had time to post anything. Rest assured though I have been busy at work and have tonnes of stuff to post.

With that in mind I am going to start off with my newest beast, Rok. He is the other close combat character heavy in Trolls, but sadly is basically Mulgs red headed step brother...minus the red hair (still no soul). He is a frost troll so I wanted to make him look like he was partially made of ice but still fitting into the scheme of the army. Oddly enough there actually is a lot of green stuff work on this guy. His right elbow and for-arm are completely resculpted. The original posing of the model made it look like he was trying to tickle his opponents balls, which to me looked...odd. I think now he has more of a "come at me bro!" style pose. I am really happy with his colour palette and I think when the Glacier King is released later this year I will paint him the same way.

Dozer Complete...Finally!

There isn't much difference between this and the last WIP pic, I just wanted to post some better pics of him. He is easily the most fun model I have painted for my Trolls, love the fig overall. The only thing that is a bit "off" with him is how insanely big he is. He is basically halfway between my Mauler and the Mountain King which is crazy. Although, with that being said all Trolls, including the re-sculpts of the Scatter Gunners and Warriors are all a larger scale. Bearka for instance is about as big as a Troll Axer if you could take him off the Bear.

Jarl Complete!

Even though I finally have the finished pictures of Dozer I figured I would give everyone a break and post something new. Below is Jarl Skuld, one of my favorite Troll casters both in regards to his model and to his rules. I really like how dynamic the posing is on this model, especially in comparison to some of the other figs. I am looking forward to finishing some more of my other Casters, although lately I find I am just having too much fun playing Epic Borka and I can't really seem to move on from him. Also, I am currently working on my unit of Warriors which is maybe the most painful thing I have tried to paint for Trolls. I *must* finish them before I move onto anything else lol.

Dozer and Smig WIP #3

Okay, so this isnt much of a "WIP" as he is almost finished. I have a few touch ups to do as well as finishing his base, other than that he is mostly complete. I gotta say he was one of the most fun models I have painted in a long time. All his details were so big and bold, lots of large areas to work with. I am starting to get really happy with how the rust effect is coming along for this army. Almost becoming second nature doing it. The green also is a nice splash of colour which I am going to incorporate into the Warriors when I start working on them to help make them stand out against the Fens and Scatter Gunners (which look very similar to each other). This weekend I will bust out the light box and take some final pics of Dozer. I have a few other smaller projects to post shortly as well.

Dozer and Smig WIP #2

Over the weekend I got in another good chunk of time. I finished the last of his main body and both his arms. I also almost finished Smigg (little troll riding his back) and the main gun. I *should* be able to finish him after work over the week and have the final pics up by this weekend. Been tonnes of fun so far.

Dozer and Smig WIP #1

I got a good 5 hours of painting over the weekend on this guy. I decided like any of the bigger models I have painted I was going to paint this guy in sections. One of the really nice things about him is how seamlessly his joints fit together, so its a non issue keeping him in pieces. The first thing I am going to finish is the main body. Once that is done then I can start adding all the extra pieces like his cannon and Smig. Here are some pics of the initial round of WIP shots.

I am hoping to get some more work this week, specifically on the armor. Once that is done it will just be small details and finished.

Privateer Press is Upping Their Game...

When trying to get friends (specifically 40k friends) into playing Warmachine/Hordes the single biggest gripe is how bad the models look. I will be honest that is why it took me so long to get into WM myself. Now that I am into the game my biggest gripe so far has been how impossibly terrible the materials they use for the models actually are. The metal is fine, its metal although sometimes how they fit or where they decide to break a model up leaves much to be desired. The plastic though...ugh. It's so terrible. Mold lines everywhere, normally across major detail, like around the mouth of the Storm Troll for example. That is all changing, and fast.

With Privateer Press's most recent release they have started using a new Resin for single characters and GW style hard plastic model kits for their large models. Both are massive jumps in quality versus what they used to employ. I recently picked up the new Dozer and Smig character Dire Troll. Check out how incredibly crisp this model is right out of the box. Virtually no clean up (small bits here and there).

With all my other Dire Trolls (especially the EBDT and Mulg) I had a couple hours worth of clean up and putty work just to get them to fit together and cover up the huge gaps were pieces didnt fit. Not this guy. Dry fitting him has almost no gaps. I will need almost no green stuff to actually complete him. I am going go paint him in stages starting this weekend (more pics). I am super excited that this is the direction Privateer Press is going as it looks like all new kits are this quality.

Storm Troll Complete!

It's crazy how much nicer the newer Troll models are compared to the older ones. Case in point is the Storm Troll (new) vs. The Slag Troll (super old). The only thing that sucks about this guy is the plastic material that PP uses. It's hands down the worst I have ever used for any type of model material. The mold lines are out of control and for some reason ALWAYS in the worst places (he has one going around his open mouth for example). Ah well. This guy was pretty easy to paint, but then again, I love painting the beasts, it's the units that I dread lol.

Long Riders Complete!

Both the Scatter Gunners and these Long Riders were painted for a tournament I did a few weeks ago. While I didnt do great for my overall record (Bearka failed TWO assassination attempts!) I did manage to snag best painted. I really enjoyed painting these guys and sadly they took less time to paint than the Scatter Gunners. I am slowly but surely knocking down units and beasts for this army bringing my fully painted total to 196pts, which I think is pretty good. I only have one large unit left (Warriors...14 models...ugh). After that its just 3 man mini units and casters. I want to get this army to 100% before I move onto anything new.

Scatter Gunners Complete!

Been a long time since I last posted but rest assured I have been busy at work. I finally got my lighting set up sorted out and took a few pics of the most recent things I have finished. First up are one of my least fave units in the entire Troll Blood army...Scatter Gunners! While I love the idea of them in game I gotta say they are just terrible rules wise. Played a bunch of games and they did sweet fuck all lol. Ah well, what can you do?

Hunters Grim Complete!

For my Trolls I have been doing the basic army at a fairly brisk pace. It's not that I am "speed painting" them, I am just working at a pace where they look decent...but I am not taking forever for one guy. What I am doing instead is really putting that effort into the Warlock models as I really want them to stand out, and the Hunters Grim are no exception. I tried doing some two brush blending as well as just taking my time on everything. These guys took pretty much all week of painting fairly regularly. I decided to do something different with Grim's skin just to help break everything up.

Lanyssa Complete!

Still plugging away at my two tournament lists for the Trolls. For my heavy armor list I have a few "Minion" solos (both for looks and because of what they do for the army overall). The first Minion is an elf named Lanyssa. She adds a bunch of utility to the list plus I thought the model looked really cool. The last benefit to her is I can use her in either my Ret list (they are incredibly limited as to which Mercs/Minions they have access too) or my Trolls. Because of that I decided I would just paint her in my Retribution of Scyrah's colours but did the basing of the Trolls so she fits in either army.

Horthol Complete!

Now that Horthol is complete I have finally finished off all my Solos, Beasts and my Battle Engine.  My main goal before was to finish each section one at a time (so all beasts, then all solos, etc) but now I think I am just going to start focusing on specific tournament lists which is why Horthol here is complete. First list I am focusing on is a "Bearka" (ie Epic Borka riding a bear) list. Has lots of beasts, lots of calv and a few support models. I am going to try to finish the rest of the support models for this list this weekend and after that its the Long Riders (calv) and my first 50pts tournament list is complete. Cant wait! Anyways, here he is!

Warders Competele!

Another weekend, another unit painted. Now that things have settled down at home (kids getting older, wife picking up hobbies) my painting schedule has really opened up from painting a morning or two every week to 4-5 days a week. Been making some real progress on my army the last two months and I have officially crossed the 50% completed threshold with the addition of these Warders.

Now that they are finished I really like how the unit looks. Actually working on them though was the definition of a real slog fest. Despite how much more (at this point) I like Warmachine/Hordes as a game system and how much the model ranges have grown on me one thing I will say is their current line of plastics is incredibly bad, like painfully bad. The detail is incredibly sub par and the mold lines are everywhere and always in the worst spots. They also have just slap-dash details everywhere over these models, most of which makes no sense and is just there to make them look busier than they are. One of my two main lists I am working on includes 2 units of these guys...but after building/painting them I dont know if I have it in my to do another unit lol. Ah well, onto more enjoyable models to paint!

Winter Troll Complete!

Since finishing 'Bearka' I have been working on Beasts for his battle group. One of the Beasts I thought would work well is a Winter Troll, problem was I didnt have one. So, in exchange for a wall section (like the one I did for Janissa) my friend Rob gave me one. I have to say this is one of the easiest models I have ever painted. From start to finish he took roughly an hour and a half. He is kind of a stupid figure (I think that is why Rob basically gave it to me). I always thought he looks like he is about to sing the opera or challenge someone to a dance off. Ah well, I guess he will have to bust out the mad beats on the field.