Beastie Boys

Here's a couple more Citadel broo from the RuneQuest box set 4(v3) from way back in 1983. Apologies that the photo's a bit naff, but the light is rather poor today. Anyway, that's two more done and dusted and I can move on to the next thing.

Judging from the Blanche concept art, I think the tail on the big lad is supposed to part of the pelt he's wearing as a skirt. I decided to paint it as if it's his own cute little goat tail, though. Ah, bless.

All-in-all, I've really enjoyed painting these. They have bags of character and they're not too fiddly. I'll definitely be painting a few more in the near future.

Knowing Me, Knowing Broo

Aha!

These two chaps are broo (the OG beastmen) from Citadel's RuneQuest range, which were produced under licence between 1982-3. The inclusion of 'Chaos Beastmen' in WFB 1st ed. was, of course, so you could use Citadel broo miniatures in your armies. Bryan Ansell certainly did (see Warhammer Armies, 1988). When Ral Partha acquired the miniatures licence in 1984 it brought the end to one of the finest beastmen ranges ever produced. To be fair, the same year Citadel launched their C38 Chaos Beastmen range, the first range sculpted by Trish Carden, which is chock full of weirdness and features some absolute classics.

These guys are specifically from RuneQuest boxed set 4 (v3): The Broo 2. Miniatures from this particular set seem to be more common and less insanely priced than the broo released in blister packs. That said, given the short time these were in production, along with miniatures of this vintage being prone lead rot, they're still hard to snag for a reasonable price. I'm not sure my pockets are deep enough for a large broo collection.

I couldn't find the sculptor credited anywhere (they did a really nice job on these). But certainly one of the reasons that the Citadel broo are a notch above the Ral Partha range has to be because they were based on concept drawings by Big John B.

EDIT: The Perry twins sculpted this set (thank you to Hobgoblin over on the Lead Adventures Forum for the info).

Broo concept drawings by John Blanche, reproduced in Heroes for Wargames (Paper Tiger Books, 1986)

Painting-wise, I've not done anything too fancy. The grey skin tones are a tip of the hat to the bestmen hordes featured in the Mighty, Dark-Winged, Avenging Lord of Chaos' Mighty Avenging Chaos Army in Warhammer Armies.

Yes We Khan

The hobgoblin horde (literally dozens of 'em!) need a khan to lead them in battle. I thought maybe the Ghazak Khan miniature would fit the bill. I believe he's from WFB 5th ed. and sculpted by Michael Perry. As this wasn't my era, I've only recently clocked the 5th ed. hobs. They seem to share more aesthetically with their venerable 2nd ed. ancestors than they do with the ghastly 4th ed. chorf hobs. I like them.

I got this mini for a bit of steal, but it was missing the bow and quiver and the sashimono pole. I looked for replacement bits on eBay but they were going for the same price as I'd paid for Ghazak and his wolf chum! Screw that. So I filled in the pole-hole in Ghazak's back with a wee bit of green stuff and moved on with my life.

For a replacement bow and arrows, I had a dig around in my bits box and found one I'd clipped from a plastic goblin sprue back along. Looks like a decent fit to me.

The mini came with it's original plastic shield, but I opted to use a metal one from a Vendel Miniatures orc. It does make Ghazak look a little like a waiter bringing over the main course... but it also provided an opportunity to paint a freehand face shield. These are always fun to do.

All in all, I feel I made a decent fist of this one - a good tabletop standard.

I bought a handful of his mates as well, but I'm still trying to decide on mounts. The GW plastic wolves just look like fat dogs to me. Maybe I could use Chronicle wolves instead? I'm still chewing that one over.

 Cheers.