Aragorn, You Need More Men (Backlog Clearing: Jan-Feb ‘25)

Hey all, we begin another year of SBG, in a new edition! While we wait for the much desired 'Armies of Middle Earth' and Legacy PDF, I'm not too concerned, as I have plenty to get on with for my painting.

I expect this year to take a bit of a hit for my painting numbers. Firstly, we shall be moving house in the next few months (at last!), and also my partner has got herself a place on an intensive course that'll mean I need to pick up the slack at home to help her out. This is obviously fine and worthwhile, but just some things to consider so that I set myself reasonable goals for the year.

Beginning this year on 316 models in the paint pile, and bearing in mind the limitations that I shall have, I'm going to set myself the target of painting 90 models and getting my painting queue down to less than 240 models (as I will almost certainly...probably already have bought new models for the pile).

So with that target in mind, my first two months of 2025:

Jan

I decided to start the year with an easy model, something heroic that would hold my attention. So it made sense to kick off with Aragorn, who I had received from Mr CJ, a good while ago. I had long admired the Weathertop Aragorn in his nice action pose.

I found that his naturally dark tones played nicely into my painting style, as I tend to avoid bright and vivid colours, unless the model cries out for them.

My next project was a community donation that I took last year, promising to paint up for our local league...and then promptly forgot until a few days before our opener. 

Luckily, this was just a matter of drybrushing up layers of stone, using the Osgiliath recipe James and I used at last years Seven Stones. For the statue itself, I started with Warplock Bronze covered with Leadbelcher. I then glazed it with Gulliman blue (to help with the bronzed look) and washed it twice with Agrax Earthshade to darken the tone right down again. In my opinion, I nailed the shade.

With that sorted,  I was able to start topping up an existing army, for an event in April, where I shall be taking Defenders of Edoras. So I decided to start off with Helm's sons, first up being Haleth. I decided to make a few changes to his colour scheme from the films, not out of any dislike for the appearance, but to make him match my existing Helm better. My Helm's most prominent feature is the green enamelled armour (pictured below), so I opted to use that for Haleth also. 

I also changed the leather colour of his horse and went for a shade that I felt suited the colours better.

This then led onto Hama, I did originally intend to paint in the film's design. But as I began, it seemed to make sense to keep the green theme as a Royal family theme. So I changed his armour to match Haleth and Helm.

Feb

I began February with a quik repair job, replacing a broken Rider's sword with one of Eomer's spares from his sprue.

Next, I did the 6 Riders of Rohan that had been sat awaiting their moment in the Battle of the Pelennor box from 2018, finally seeing their time!

I thought that I would include a side by side of two Riders here. On the left, a newly painted one, and on the right, one that I painted back in 2013. I thought this would be a nice comparison of improvement over the years.

Finally for February, I cracked open the first of my new plastic warriors, getting the first 6 Warriors of Rohan painted. They are absolutely gorgeous models while still looking similar enough to the old ones to not ruin it for old fans.

And that was me done for the beginning of the year. Next up for me will be the other 6 Warriors of Rohan  (the last 12 of the set will be used for Lord Thorne's naughty boy brigade). I'll also get a handful of models done for Seven Stones, where James and I have come up with a completely original theme.

Clearing the Backlog, Part 19 – Well, I'm back.

First and foremost, I need to apologise for barely posting any blogs last year. To cut a long story short, I found myself struggling to find time to write a blog, take photos for it, and then actually post it – as the year went on, I ended up losing my motivation for posting. Fortunately, after a respite, I'm back and will hopefully be posting a bit more regularly this year [and I really hope that's not famous last words!].

My hobbying in general suffered from a lack of motivation last year. I believe I can put this down to missing the Middle Earth Grand Tournament – this event is normally the motivation to kick-start my hobbying for the year, and without it, my productivity did suffer as a result. 

Not to say that I was completely unproductive across the year – Sam and I put a tremendous effort into our Seven Stones project for 2024, focusing on the Kin-Strife. Our army was almost entirely converted, and we had the sacking of Osgiliath display board to boot – our efforts resulted in us taking home the coveted Best Army Palantir! It honestly still hasn’t quite sunk in that we won it, almost a year later!

With our Seven Stones done, I turned my attention to my second major project of the year – a Khandish army. Khand was an army I'd wanted to collect for some time, but as it would consist entirely of metal models, I decided to keep it small, roughly 500 points worth. I started with a Khandish King in Chariot, added another four chariots, and then filled out the rest with a warband of horsemen, led by a Chieftain. Paired with a small contingent of Easterling cavalry I already had painted, my plan was to take them to the Warhammer World Teams event in September. 

Fortunately, when it comes to painting them, Khand has a fairly limited colour palette, consisting of dark greys, reds and a cream spot colour on the sashes. After a few months work, my army was ready for the tabletop. It went to Teams, where despite only winning one game with it, I had a lot of fun using them, and to cap it off, we went home with another unexpected prize in the form of the Most Sporting Opponent Trophy! 

Sadly, my Khand are unlikely to be making a future appearance at Warhammer World, as the entire range became "legacy" profiles in the new edition of MESBG, which are sadly banned from GW events. However, I'm still really pleased with my efforts on them, and they will always have a place in my Middle Earth collection. And who knows, they may one day see the tabletop again – I've already converted a second Chieftain to lead my horsemen into battle!

Following Teams, this is where my motivation really took a nosedive. I was painting very sporadically, meandering from project to project with no real aim. I did however manage to find time on a Battle Streams night to paint up Arwen and add her to my Rivendell Army, plus a box of Morgul Knights and the original Glorfindel got some love. I also spent a lot of time assembling my Bretonnians for a planned Old World army, so there are plenty of future projects in the pipeline.

Painting aside, I did make a conscious decision to try and clear some old projects out of the backlog – I promptly raided my project boxes, pulled out everything I still had unpainted from my Moria collection, which consisted of around 30-odd goblins, a couple of captains, a shaman, and the biggest model of the lot, the Balrog. 

The Balrog has been in my backlog for a long time, so I decided it was time to finally finish it. It can be a daunting model to paint at first, due to its size and the tricky nature of painting the flames on its back. I painted mine by using contrast paints, starting with red, working up through orange and eventually to yellow on the tips of the flames, adding a white drybrush in between each layer, so that the contrast would stand out more. I then carefully picked out all the black areas, before going over them with drybrushes of very dark greys, before using a very light khaki drybrush for the horns and wings – Durin's Bane was ready for the tabletop!

As to the goblins, they were pretty straightforward to paint – I used a simple scheme, basecoating the metals, leather and the cloth, before applying a brown wash and then applying highlights. Rinse and repeat that 30 times, and my Moria army was finished!

Well, nearly finished. There was one last model in my backlog that would mean my Moria collection was complete – a Cave Drake. This model was very easy to paint – I basecoated the scales and skin, washed them with Agrax, and then drybrushed lighter colours until I was finally using a pale khaki for a final highlight. I then picked out the eyes, teeth and spines, and he was done. As the nest that comes with the Cave Drake can be used as a marker in games, making it fearless within 3" of it [or rather, it did in the previous edition – at the time of writing, we're still waiting for its new profile in the Armies of Middle Earth book], I incorporated it into the base, using a wooden ring, building up around it with cork, and then going over the base with modelling compound. I painted it to match the rest of my Moria army, and it was done!

So, with those models done, my total number of models painted for the year came to… 135 models! Whilst this is considerably lower than the last two years (having painted 250 models in 2022 and 200 in 2023), I still consider it good progress – I've cleared over 100 models out of my backlog, two of them being large monsters, and finished off three army projects over the course of the year. Plus, this year, I am happy to say I am once again going to the Middle Earth Grand Tournament, and have already started painting my armies! This and the new edition of MESBG have got me super motivated to crack on with hobbying in 2025 – I look forward to sharing my journey with you!

Aragorn, You Need More Men (Backlog Clearing: Sept-Dec '24)

 It's been a while, as my last update was early September and I ended up being too busy to get this done when I hoped in late Oct/early Nov. So here we go.

September

With nothing on the horizon (that I was yet aware of) to paint for, I decided to clear my three Vault Warden teams from the pile. Doing these in the same style as the team that I did previously, but I did the original one as a Scottish flag. Looking at the old Shadow and Flame book, I wondered if I could do some hidden meaning with it. Seeing that the X looked the same as their symbol for '4', I decided to make them all have the symbols for 1-4.

It was then as I was checking over my army for the Warhammer World Teams event I realised that I was short 4 elven spears, so I hurriedly bought some out of CJ's for sale pile and got them done up to match the others (essentially traditional colours with Incubi Darkness cloaks).

Finally in September, for the one day event on the Friday before Teams, I wanted to take Arathorn's Stand LL. This would require me painting up the last six Rangers of the North in my pile. In the rush to do them, I forgot to take a photo, but I did them the same as the others (typical Ranger colours with grey cloaks).

October

I began October by finally doing the new mounted Elrond, using the same approach as I did for his foot version last year. This was similar to the elven warriors but mixing gradually more Caledor Sky into the Kantor Blue to give stronger highlights and doing the same with the Lupercal Green adding Waaaagh Flesh and then Deathworld Forest.

After doing him, and looking ahead to my Throne of Skulls army (Leaders of the Fourth Age), I realised that there was a handful of other models that I would need to paint up. So I grabbed my mounted Arwen when the BSIME stream for Fellowship week came up. I painted her up similar to my foot version from several years ago. I also tried a tip mentioned by our local, Will, 'Never go for pure white, always do an off-white, even if it's very slightly tinted'. So I made Asfaloth a very pale grey, and tbh it was great advice.

The next BSIME stream was Merry and Pippin week, and I had got the new Gandalf box a few months prior. I was happy with most of the model, but don't think I quite got the face right.

Next up, I started doing some of the new Arnor/Angmar releases for a large scale scenario we were going to play in early December. I needed to paint Aranarth, Aldrac, Fraecht and a warband of Carn Dum warriors. 

I kicked off with Aranarth, figuring he'd be the most straightforward and had a nice striking pose. I changed the scheme from the official one and made it more green/brown to be more Ranger-esque.

Next up, I went for the two heroes that I was most keen to get stuck into, Aldrac and Fraecht. I scrapped the red from the Carn Dum colour scheme as I wanted a more rugged and nomadic look to them, so opted for a dirty brown look.

November

Off the back of those two heroes, I did the warband. And I knew they were going to be a very long winded effort with all the bones and details across their models. They took me a little over three weeks in the end, but I was happy with them.

It was as I got to the end of the Carn Dum job, that I realised that I needed Eomer foot and mounted done for Throne of Skulls still, so he was quickly dragged through the queue. I made a cock up as I put the heads on the wrong way round (foot on mounted and vice versa) and it left a bit of an awkward fit with his plume against his spear. But a little knife work and green stuff fixed that.

It was a gorgeous model to paint and one that I've put off until I could give it the time it deserved.

With a week to go until Throne of Skulls, I finally got a ticket, but also realised to my horror that I wasn't done... My mounted Elessar was painted, but in an old scheme that I had tried but was a little off put by now. So I hurriedly resprayed and got him done with a couple of days to spare.

December

With Throne of Skulls done and no more events to paint for this side of New Years Eve, I was free to pick as I pleased. Another BSIME stream came up and the theme was legacy-ed models and profiles. I had claimed a couple of the named Ringwraiths that I had always admired yet never bought, the Dwimmerlaik and the Tainted. So I put them together that night and in early December, decided to polish them off and remove them from the pile of shame.

I decided against the coloured robes in the official paintjobs and kept them as the wraiths are in the films, as I've seen others do it before and appreciate the darker look to them for it.

The end of the year was now looming so I chose something that had been neglected and just needed finishing, a few leftover and forgotten Morannon Orcs from my Battle of the Pelennor box back in 2018, finally done and ready to fight.

With a handful of days left in the year, I wanted to finish with something cool, ideally retro and that I have a particular fondness for. 

Digging into my pile of shame, I found something that I grabbed last year at the 7th City Grand Prix, a model I had great memories of from 20yrs ago, but sadly lost to time. Now I could redo him, and although I usually paint his kin in blue, black and white, I decided to do him in his traditional look.

Old 'Old Dain', I figured that I could use him as a Dwarf King in my Army of Thror next edition to represent Nain, Dain's father'.

I did his red with a base of Khorne red, highlighted with a mix of Khorne Red/Skrag Brown and his green based in Waaaagh Flesh then highlighted with a mix of Waaaagh Flesh/Deathworld Forest.

End of year round up

In the end, this year I had painted far less than last years, but I'm not unhappy with that as 2023 was an insane push and I spent a lot of the early year sorting out the Seven Stones project for May. Compared to 2023's total of 217, this year I managed 124. This reduced my pile of shame from 316 to 229 (due to new models bought), which isn't a terrible effort. Although the new War of the Rohirrim starter box and my b'day/Xmas has undone all of that progress (back to exactly 316), but never mind, it's cool stuff!

The effort for Seven Stones did deliver as James and I managed to win the coveted Palantir for best theme as one of our two big achievements for the year. The other being our team (Tom and the Mellon with Tom and Vince) winning the Most Sporting trophies for the Warhammer World teams event in September. With those two big awards won, the year was automatically considered a big success to me.

 

I kept track of my game results in tournaments for the year too and in total, from a pool of 80 games, I had won 34, drawn 6 and lost 40, so also not a bad mix. I also tracked the heroes that I had slain, and my biggest victim ended up being Mauhur, who I killed a total of six times!

Finally, we look at hobby Bingo, I managed to fulfil it last year. But this time, I didn't quite manage it, simply because time wasn't on my side, but I gave it a good bash.

Shockingly, I didn't get around to watching LOTR nor the Hobbit all year, we were expecting to move from April onwards and it never happened. I had been holding them up my sleeve as entertainment whilst we sorted out internet service after the move. For a display board, I had ideas of doing one for my Kings army in November, but simply couldn't make the time. I almost achieved the man/dwarf/elf one, but never got a third elf nor two more dwarves sorted (I realise as I'm posting that I hadn't added Old Old Dain to the list). Finally, I intended to paint mounted Dwalin on goat for my favourite character, but again never got the time.

All in all, I left behind 2024, feeling like I had achieved a lot and could look back fondly. Now let's see what 2025 offers.