A Fistful of Hobgobs

I fancied a bit of Oldhammering recently, so I dug out a fistful of 1980s hobgobs to colour in. They're all Citadel C36 hobgoblins sculpted by Aly Morrison. The chap on the left (Dut Doomaxe according to the old catalogues) is an early slottabase miniature from 1985. The other 3 are unnamed pre-slottas from 1984. 

There's an excellent potted history of Citadel hobgoblins on ...the Leadpile blog which goes someway to explaining why the early ranges were such a hodgepodge mess. Hobgoblins had been depicted as generic barbarian-types for the Fantasy Tribes range, proxy bakemono opponents for the Samurai range, militaristic baddies with Chinese-inspired arms and armour for the AD&D range, and eventually Steppe nomads in WFB 2nd ed. Despite having mercenary contingent lists for both 2nd and 3rd ed., this iteration of hobgoblins would be killed off at the end of 3rd ed. I guess the niche for nomadic, wolf riding marauders was already well served by the evergreen orcs and goblins (not helped by the fact that all the hobgoblin miniatures were footsloggers). There also seems to have been little appetite at GW for developing the East of the Warhammer world. For my money, though, the C36 range knocks the later Big Hat hobgoblins into a cocked hat.

Hobgoblin banner designs from WFB 2nd ed. Ravening Hordes book

I'm fortunate to have previously collected several dozen C36 hobgobs (the going rate on eBay is currently a bit too spicy for me). So, given that I recently took Tolkien to task for Orientalism, why am I so enamoured with this range? I suspect it's because they're peak 1980s fantasy. The aesthetic is 1-part Conan the Barbarian to 2-parts NWOBHM* sleeve art. In fact, while I was painting the latest batch, this tune from The Comic Strip presents... More Bad News was firmly stuck in my head!

For my money, though, the most metal of all the Citadel hobgobs are the Despoiling Hobgoblins of the Darklands (Regiments of Renown RR15 - 1985) sculpted by Jes Goodwin.

I still need to track down Grunmunter the Beast and a few more troopers, but no self-respecting hobgoblin horde should be without these scallywags. And on the subject of hobgoblins I'd like to track down, if anyone has a C36 Baron Brightgore they're willing to sell for less than the price of a kidney, then please do get in touch.

*New Wave of British Heavy Metal 

Smøl Saxons

 

Wiglaf Miniatures 18mm unarmoured Saxon warriors

I’ve been obsessed with post-Roman and early medieval Britain for decades. It was only a matter of time before I decided I wanted to game the period. For a ruleset I picked up a copy of Dux Bellorum: Arthurian Wargaming Rules AD367-793 by Daniel Mersey, which is essentially an update of his 1998 Glutter of Ravens ruleset. Mr Mersey is probably best known as the author of Lion Rampant and Dragon Rampant, which have been our go-to rules for beer and pretzel games nights for a fair while now.

Dux Bellorum itself is an ‘element’ based wargame and uses a system of Leadership Points to represent charismatic warlords attempting to influence the battle. I like this mechanic as it presents an opportunity to use cunning to break the grind of shieldwall-style combat. The rules also allow you to purchase Strategies for your army, everything from an experienced general to excessive amounts of mead to stampeding livestock. 

Ruleset chosen, it was time to build some armies. While there are many wonderful 28mm ranges for this period available, I don’t actually have enough room to play 28mm mass battle games at home. For this project I wanted a game I could play on the kitchen table.

The obvious solution would have been DBA-style basing, but 3-4 guys stood in a line just doesn't do it for me. I thought maybe I could fill up a 40x20mm base with 10mm minis instead to get that 'warband' look, but having bought some packs of the lovely Pendraken Late Romans I realised my eyes just couldn't take it. Damn!

Forged in Battle 15mm Saxon raiders

Plan B was to increase the base size and go with 15mm. 60x30mm bases is definitely the upper limit of what will work in the space I have, but at least I'd be able to cram the minis in. I bought a couple of packs of the Forged in Battle Saxons to get me started. These bases are predominately from the WE-GX05 armoured raiders pack, with a few bods from the WE-GX01 noble infantry adding a bit of variety. 

Forged in Battle Saxons

I made a schoolboy error on the first two bases and forgot to leave space for a cohesion die holder. As a workaround, I mounted the dice holders and some extra nobles on 2p pieces to accompany their units across the battlefield.

Cohesion markers

I really like the Forged in Battle range. There’s a bit of variation in scale, between 15mm to 17mm to the eyeline, but the sculpts themselves are a cut above most of the other offerings out there. That said, when I heard that Daniel Mersey was launching his own 18mm minis line, Wiglaf Miniatures, specifically designed for the 7th century and sculpted by the genius that is Mark Copplestone, I knew I’d be going all in.

Wiglaf Miniatures unarmoured Vendel culture warriors

At the time of writing, Wiglaf have minis for armoured and unarmoured Saxon and Vendel culture warriors, some personality packs, skirmishers and Saxon cavalry. Welsh and Irish are in the pipeline, but may not be available for a while. I have enough Wiglafs to build the majority of options on the Saxon list. I just need to finish painting them…

Wiglaf Miniatures armoured Saxon warriors and Warlord

With the cavalry I reversed my basing policy of cramming on minis, as I think that cavalry in this period would have operated as ‘light cavalry’. If I ever get round to going back a couple of centuries and building an Arthurian force, then obviously King Arthur would be based as heavy cav to capture that Sword at Sunset vibe.

Wiglaf Miniatures Saxon cavalry

I was dubious that Forged in Battle and Wiglaf would work together. You can see from the size comparison photo that the Wiglaf lads are noticeably larger, but I don’t think this will be as apparent at 2’ away when the dice start to roll. I have a vague plan about finishing the Saxons and some Welsh opposition in time for Xmas so I can play some knockabout games with the kids over the holidays. There, I’ve written that down now so I can’t weasel out of painting the rest. 

Forged in Battle 15mm Welsh heavy cavalry and Wiglaf 18mm Saxon cavalry

Cracked Rock Orcs

I love orcs, me. Reading The Lord of the Rings as a kid, I really wasn’t too fussed by elves singing about the stars (large chunks of poetry were skipped on the first read through). What I liked best were the bits where we meet the orcs: Shagrat and Gorbag talking gangster then murdering each other or Grishnákh trying to shaft Uglúk and swipe his prisoners. The orcs were all total bastards and, I thought, thoroughly entertaining. I don’t think the Professor would have been impressed.

The term ‘orc’ is used occasionally as a synonym for goblin in The Hobbit, but it was with the publication of The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers in 1954 that the ubiquitous baddies of the fantasy genre properly burst onto the scene. In recent years, however, Tolkien’s orcs have become controversial figures. A blog about toy soldiers is probably not an appropriate forum for a deep dive into these debates* but, for what it’s worth, I’m not sure that the way in which the orcs were developed within the Legendarium or are written as characters indicates a racist intent. If anything, orcs are probably best imagined with Brummie accents! On the other hand, the physical descriptions of orcs have not aged well. These tend to lean into the worst kind of Orientalist stereotypes and use some particularly unpleasant tropes to 'other' the orcs. While this may not have raised so much as an eyebrow 70 years ago, for a modern audience it can make for an uncomfortable read. I started to wonder if I could build a recognisably Tolkienesque orc army but without all the problematic bits?

 

The Class of 1954

 

1954 also saw the publication of The Broken Sword by American science fiction author Poul Anderson. As with Tolkien’s works, Anderson was inspired by the Matter of the North – the myths, sagas and heroic poetry of early medieval Northern Europe. However, where Fellowship… begins with Bilbo’s birthday party, The Broken Sword kicks off with an entire family being burned alive. The story is set in Viking Age Britain, with the conceit that mythological beings live alongside but beyond the sight of most mortals. There are two main warring factions: elves, who are thoroughly nasty pieces of work, and trolls, who are much, much worse. The main protagonist, Skafloc, is a human raised by the elves to wield a cursed sword (elves can’t touch iron). The sword makes him invincible in battle but will ultimately extract a terrible price. It’s a visceral read with child abduction, black magic, incest and fratricide all major plot points. As an aside, the book had a huge impact on a young Michael Moorcock, who’s own work would go on to inspire Chaos as the big bad of the Warhammer franchise.

This, then, was my way in. After Tolkien, my orcs would predominately be smaller in stature than men, fanged, twisted and ugly (but hopefully not in a problematic way). I’d use ‘goblin’ and ‘orc’ as interchangeable terms; the bigger warrior-types would be ‘uruks’ and the smaller types would be ‘snaga’. The aesthetic, however, would be an alternative Dark Ages Britain. Most troops would have a spear and central grip shield. There would be lots of mail coats (which is happily how orcs are also equipped in LotR). My one concession would be equipping some officers with scimitars, mostly because I think scimitars look cool.

Dear reader - meet the Cracked Rock tribe.

The Cracked Rock is the orcish name for the high pass cleft through the northern mountain range. The goblins use the same name to refer to the imposing fort which guards the mouth of the pass. The fort was built before the Fall and was once garrisoned by Imperial troops. When the Empire withdrew from these lands the fort was occupied by the Cracked Rock tribe.

Until recent times these creatures had contented themselves with internecine warfare with the surrounding orcish tribes and murdering anyone foolish enough to traverse the Old North Road through the mountain pass. That was until the rise of the Cracked Rock tribe’s current Boldog. Within the span of a few years nearly all the neighbouring tribes of the mountains and foothills have been subjugated. The Boldog maintains his position through distributing plunder to his warriors. With the mountains now conquered his roving eye will be looking further afield for richer pickings.

As I started to look around for miniatures to use, I came across an orc kitbashing thread on Lead Adventure Forum. While I’d never used plastic kits or  green stuff before, this looked like a lot of fun and a great place to start.

I picked up a couple of sprues of the Gripping Beast Saxon thegns kit to use as a base. I’d read that the Gripping Beast plastics were slightly smaller than other modern 28mm kits, so they sounded ideal for my purposes. To give them a proper goblin stoop I cut off the necks and then set the heads lower and slightly forward. I then pimped them with orc-y bits from a selection of sprues – Oathmark goblin infantry, Wargames Atlantic goblins and the old Wargames Factory orcs (now produced by Warlord Games), who have some brilliant Angus McBride-style heads. Neck joints and crucifixes were then disguised with my rudimentary attempts at sculpting furs. For a first crack, I think they came out pretty well.

This meant I had quite a few leftovers, in particular Oathmark goblin bodies. These seemed pretty close to what I was after, and once kitted out with Saxon spears and shields really did look the part.

While I enjoyed my first foray into kitbashing, my preference is for miniatures with a lead content. Discovering Ragnarok Miniatures armoured goblins was a bit of a eureka moment. Not only were these exactly what I was after, I also realised I was not the first person to think ‘orcs, but Dark Ages’. They are fantastic sculpts. The banner is from Myriad Miniatures’ Osmoticmeld range – a collab with Ian Miller.

The Ragnarok range is owned and sculpted by Colin Patten, who, it turns out, is a massive Tolkien nerd. What I hadn’t realised was that Colin had previously founded several other miniature companies, including Gripping Beast (who now distribute the Ragnarok range). One of his other ventures had been Vendel Miniatures, who carried a substantial ‘not-LotR-honest-gov’ range. The range is currently being produced by Thistle and Rose Miniatures in the US, but I couldn’t justify the cost of UK import duties on top of the shipping. I began to stalk eBay instead and months of patience was finally rewarded with a job lot of Vendel orcs.

The orcs come in three sizes – small, large and massive (I think the really big guys are from the command pack and are meant as champions). I’ve a decent sized stash of these left to paint, meaning the Cracked Rock tribe is now sorted for rank-and-file uruks. The banner below is an old Grenadier wolf rider banner. I'm not really satisfied with how the banner and shield design turned out and intend to re-do them at some point.

Next priority was for some snaga meat shields  skirmishers. My main gaming buddy likes to pack a firing line, so I know from bitter experience the value of screening troops. The archers are from Crusader Miniatures and the slingers are from the Oathmark goblin slaves kit.

I've made a start on some character models. The standard bearer on the left is another miniature from the Osmoticmeld range and based on Ian Miller's Helm's Deep illustration. I tried to paint him to match the illustration, but I made a right hash of it. In the end I settled for a much simpler scheme (which works OK). I also wasn't intending him to be part of this project. The miniature seemed too high fantasy really. However, he's sort of attached himself to the tribe, so I guess he's here to stay. The miniature on the right is the Great Goblin from an Oathmark character pack sculpted by Mark Copplestone. I think the sculpt is an absolute belter and will likely be used as the Boldog himself. I'm looking forward to painting up the shaman and musician from the same pack.

Ian Miller - Helm's Deep (1979)

A start has also been made on some cavalry (or is it wargary?) The wolves are Reaper Bones dire wolves while the riders are predominately the Oathmark wolf riders kit with a few extra odds and sods. There's plenty more of these I still need to build.

And finally... they have a cave troll. This chap is a Knucklebones Miniatures digital sculpt. He's a bit short for a troll (only 35mm tall). I suspect the vendor I bought him off may have printed him out at the wrong scale. Even so, I love the McBride vibes of the sculpt and painted him up accordingly.

MERP cover by the late, great Angus McBride

That's the Cracked Rock tribe to-date. There's still plenty to add to this force, most obviously I need more wolf riders, but there's also enough here to throw down for a game. It's been a really enjoyable project to work on so far and I've developed some new skills along the way. As always, constructive criticism welcome.

* For a balanced discussion on the issues around Tolkien's orcs you could do worse than this episode of the By-the-Bywater podcast.

Hello, good evening and welcome

 

I know what you’re thinking. What sort of idiot starts a miniatures blog in 2024? Hi there.

Mine is a familiar tale. As a kid, between the mid-80s and early-90s, I was obsessed with miniatures and RPGs. This just so happened to coincide with the Golden Age of Oldhammer, and it was glorious! As the 1990s rolled on I discovered sex and drugs and rock n’ roll (although possibly not in that order) and my little lead people were left behind. And yet the dream persisted: of an evil horde, resplendent with chaos spikey death bits, sweeping across a ping-pong table, driving their enemies before them. So, come the recent global pandemic, isolating at home and with time on my hands, I thought, ‘Sod it. I’m going to paint a goblin.’

From the 'Golden Age of chaos spikey death bits'

There were a couple of resources that really helped ease my way back into the hobby. One was the advice and support from the wonderful folk over at the Oldhammer Forum. The other was the wealth of brilliant miniatures blogs. I’ve been looking for a home to document my ongoing gaming projects that isn’t across disparate forum threads or a churn of social media feeds. A blog seemed like the natural option. Even if no one ever reads it I will derive great joy from the alphabetically ordered labels.

Anyway, that’s enough navel-gazing. Bring on the orcs!

Nick Lund wolf jockeys

These were all sculpted by Nick Lund in the 1980s. The orc on the far left and the second from the right are Chronicle N15 orc wolfriders and were distributed by Citadel back in the day. The other orcs and wolves are all from the Grenadier Fantasy Warriors range, which are happily still in production in the UK by Forlorn Hope Games. The Grenadier orcs are absolute units even by today’s standards. I think the Chronicle wolves look nicer, but having seen the prices they go for on eBay I decided  the Grenadier wolves are nice enough! I painted these a couple of years ago but had recently dug them out to try taking some photos with my newly acquired Jon Hodgson Backdrops Book from Handiwork Games. Anyway, hope you like them. Cheers.