Aragorn, You Need More Men (Backlog Clearing Jan-Feb '26)

 Hey all

It's the first hobby post of this year's progress. And I'll try to be more consistent this year. 

I'm off to a bad start for getting the grey pile down, having bought quite a few second hand Haradrim warriors from local guys. But I have plans for them, so it's not buying for the sake of it.

Kicking off with January, I had received a secret santa gift at Xmas, and vowed to make whatever I got one of my first projects for the year. What I received, having asked simply for 'Warriors (not Moria Goblins)' was a box of Mirkwood Knights and a box of Dragon Cult Acolytes.

So I kicked off with the Acolytes. The idea behind asking for warriors was to make whatever I got a total surprise. And if I was given something that I already had, I'd use it as a chance to convert a little or a lot depending. Since I have some already, I played around with them in building and managed to make them a little different to add some variety.

Then I had to put the Knights on hold, as we had a big siege battle coming up, so I had to quickly paint up the siege equipment for it. A handful of ladders and a couple of battering rams (one made hastily with sprue).

After this, the Knights got held up again, as we had our league opener approaching. I needed to paint up my new Theodred for this and I didn't want to rush, as I wanted to mix loads of colour into it.

I'll list below the mixes that I used (all were 1:1 for ease of matching, when I needed to come back);

Brego- A mix of Dryad Bark, Mournfang Brown and Doombull Brown.

Armour ?plates?- Corvus Black and Waaagh Flesh mix

Shield- Lupercal Green and Catachan Green

Red trim- Khorne Red and Doombull Brown mix

Trousers- Rhinox Hide and Dryad Bark mix

Saddle- Castellan Green and Waaagh Flesh mix

I felt that this gave plenty of different shades to differentiate between the different parts of the model, without changing the look too much.

With all that sorted, it was finally time for the patient elves to get sorted. I painted them to match the ones that I had done several years ago, but adjusted the builds, like the Acolytes to vary the poses a little.

With those finished, thanks again to my secret Santa! I'm trying to think of an event that I can take them to!

Now entering February, I managed to swing a ticket for the GT in Warhammer World, and needed to think about what to take. I decided to do one all hero force, to make unpacking/packing a lot easier. So for my good force, I chose Assault on Ravenhill. It'll be 50pts down, but I like the look of it and am not expecting to win.

So for my evil force, I was thinking, when our local Tom asked if I wanted some spare models before he sold them. And I ended up exchanging a spare plastic Bolg to him for a warband's worth of Haradrim warriors, adding this to the eight archers that I needed to paint. Inspired by this, I decided to do Grand Army of the South, using a mix of Harad and Easterlings.

First up, I sorted out all the models that I had got from Tom and tidied them up. Then got them painted nice and quickly by my standards. I decided to also do a custom paint scheme based off my portion of the Seven Stones winning army that James and I made in 2024 (example pic below.

After they were all done, I had another offer from our local Phil, who also had some Harad to get rid of. Since I was still pretty short, and these were a decent price, I thought 'Screw it!' and grabbed them too. 

While they were on route, I got my Suladan out his box and sorted out a repaint for him, as he didn't look quite suitable to lead a freshly painted army. There wasn't much in the way of custom colours here; just a mix of Hobgrot Hide and Pallid Wych Flesh for the horse tail, Administratium Grey and Pallid Wych Flesh for the horse fur, and Naggaroth Night and Phoenician Purple for Suladan's top. I figured that this blended him into the paint scheme nicely and would match up the customised Hasharin that I made back in 2024.

I also had to decide what symbols to do on his banner. After a little browsing, I decided to use the Sauron's eye symbol from Rings of Power on the side banners and the snake symbol featured in dungeons in Skyrim.

 

One little trick that I have used before on Gamling, is to draw out the freehand design onto some paper, then fold it up into the same shape as the banner. This helps me know how the design should look when it's creased up.

It took me a good while to get him done, but I was very happy with his new look.

And that is it for the first couple of months. I feel like I've been good and productive, so am happy that I'm on track for a good year (even if my starting number of unpainted models has climbed from 327 to 350 🥴). Until next time!

Aragorn, You Need More Men (Backlog Clearing Dec 2025)

Hey all

The biggest update since my last paintblog was that the house move finally happened in mid December! And finally, I was able to crack out my hobby stuff again!

This obviously didn’t give me much time to work with before the year ended, especially with Christmas round the corner. But I managed to get a small handful of things achieved.

The first project I did in our new home, was started as the BSIME Christmas stream was on, and what is more Christmassy than a Central European demon, who punishes naughty children? I, of course, refer to Krampus. Or in this case, his Middle Earth doppelgänger, the Snow Troll, along with Shank and Wrot. Getting them built up alongside Bolg for later.

I cracked on with the orcs first, as I’m a little rusty on my painting. I had an issue, in that I couldn’t find any of my greens after the move. So had to improvise for the skin, mixing Incubi Darkness with Steel Legion Drab, giving a mint green colour. I then washed this with Athonian Camoshade to give it a nice green hue. I didn’t do anything particularly fancy for the metal or leather, just my usual approach. 

For the troll, I took a similar approach to Gandalf the White, much earlier in the year, colouring parts of him with Steel Legion Drab, various greys etc and would build up the colours with increasingly pale off-whites. 

Once I had fully painted him, I then took the plunge, mixing Administratium Grey and Pallid Wych Flesh to make a pale off-white, then drybrushing the entire model. This risked ruining the entire thing if I went too heavy so I took my time with it. But eventually got a nice frosted look all over. Finally, I finished by colouring his eyes with Khorne Red, a small highlight of Mephiston Red and then dotting his pupil in.

I had finished that small project just after Christmas and didn’t have long left before the New Year. When I started the last hero for the year, Bolg. He’s been a personal favourite to use for years, so I had been itching to do him since seeing the new models for him. I hadn't glued his mounted model onto his warg for the sake of not worrying about remembering a warg for him being dismounted. The first part that I painted was his warg with a variety of shades of brown, making it darker at thicker fur and warmer in the thinner patches.

I did a few colour mixes to sort him out, including Corvus Black and Leadbelcher for his armour, highlighted in plain Leadbelcher, Mournfang Brown and Rakarth Flesh for his face loin cloth, yeah it’s faces, I always forget that, and Baneblade Brown and Administratium Grey for his skin.

In the end, I had to allow myself New Year’s Day to finish his mounted half, so I gave myself the break as I had lost a lot of time in the year. But I was really happy with his look!

And that was what I managed in those two weeks. It may not be much but it’s the start of a new base for my hobby. And also just looking back at these before i post this, I do feel really proud of how good that I feel that they are for me.

End of year round up

So to summarise the year’s painting, I had a long hiatus between May and September, when I couldn’t do any hobby, due to the expected move. And, even when I did get back in in September, it was only a small handful of projects. I got a fair bit done in preparation for Throne of Skulls, but not a lot. Obviously, Hobby Bingo wasn't such a priority in this time and so a lot that I intended, didn't happen. But next year I'll get back on the horse.

Because of this, I didn’t get anywhere near matching previous years totals (typically 100-200 models) and only got 51 done (2546pts worth). But I’m not going to beat myself up over this, as it was just bad luck. I had intended to get my grey pile down from its starting point in Jan of 316, to 250 or less. But instead, it is now at 293 (with Xmas models yet to be added). 

In my gaming, I’d had a bit of an off year, winning about 1/3 of my games. And my best event result was breaking even, but that’s not too important, more just an interesting thing to track. The unique hero that I’d slain the most was Legolas (4).

It appears that I hadn’t set a target last year so I shall do so now, I’m going to try to get my paint pile down below 240 by New Year 2027. I’ve chosen a good and evil army to do as big projects with a few dozen models each; Numenor and Lurtz’s Scouts. I’m thinking I’ll crack on with the latter first as a potential evil army for the GT (if I can get a ticket).

For now, onto 2026!

Aragorn, You Need More Men (Backlog Clearing (Sept-Nov ‘25) Seven Stones Prep

Hey all

It’s the penultimate blog for the year and I’m still waiting for the house move and so still haven’t done much in the way of hobbying. I had the impression that it’d all happen in August/September, but here we are now in November and still waiting. 

Because of this, it dawned on me that I had to get the ball rolling with Throne of Skulls prep. 

But first, I had an event in September, where I was using Khazad Dum, and realised that I needed mirrors to use with the army. I scraped together some loose bits from my box of goodies, 4x 25mm bases and a paperclip. 

I cut a short length of paperclip for each one, then glued it at an angle to the two bases that I’d use. Next, I wrapped the other two bases in kitchen foil and, after painting the floor bases, then glued the newly created mirrors to them, resting against the stands. Not the prettiest work, but they would suffice.

The PS1 graphics 'beaver' was the unexpected theme for BSIME stream that night, so ended up a part of it. I had no access to any supplies so threw him together with excess tin foil.

With that sorted, I was very aware that TOS was quickly approaching, and I had multiple things that I wanted to get done…

Earlier on in the year, James and I had decided to do a joint display board. And he was keen to do the defenders of Minas Tirith, so that left me with two options. Either I make my army an ally; the fiefdoms, maybe the relieving force of Rohan. Oooor, I could besiege him…

While I liked the idea of the Fiefs, and have the models, not many are built, nevermind painted. (Particular gutting was then seeing an awesome new Imrahil released in the year.

My Mordor forces however, had many Morannon Orcs, several of which had already had hand swaps for variety, and were all painted. Which was a big positive while awaiting the move.

So I threw together my list, I wanted to have at least one troll, I also wanted to have Easterlings, and also to have my catapult for ‘releasing the prisoners’ at the beginning of each game. I’d have liked to include Goroth and Zagdush, but they fall into Legacy, which isn’t accepted at Warhammer World anymore.

I had picked up a new Gothmog to lead my forces, and so threw him together one evening at my other half's nan's and then got him painted up a few days later. Doing him in a similar style to my Morannons (dark metal armour, and red clothes) but I differentiated his clothes by changing some to black or brown, as all red just doesn’t look right to me. I was happy with the end result.

 

Next up, I had Amdur, who was already painted, but done about 12yrs ago or so.

 

So I wanted to give him a glow up, with better gold, varying reds and maybe some black on his clothes. I went for this pattern and thought that he now stands out a lot better for a leader of the black dragons. I felt it was a nice display of my progress with paint quality over the years.

With time marching on, I had to make a move and get the display done.

With James doing the walls of Minas Tirith, the edge of the Pelennor Fields and attacking siege tower, I would make more of the fields with the attacking army upon it.

I had several ideas that I simply wouldn’t get around to with the limited time I ended up with including a destroyed siege tower with dead orcs surrounding it. I’d also liked to have tried building Grond, but admit that it could have been beyond my capabilities anyway. Lastly, I wanted to do some objective markers, but decided that this was a luxury that I could, sadly, do without, if needed.

The display wasn’t going to be very difficult, as I was essentially making a field. I had several packs of scenic flowers and moss that I could use to stop it being just a grassy plain. I also remembered that when I did my Mordor Catapult several years ago, I had put wheel tracks in the mud beneath it, so decided to include them onto the display, leading to the catapult. 

I got ahold of a 1’x2’ MDF board and covered one side in polyfiller, to make it a more uneven and natural surface. While it was wet, I also added in the tracks. With all my tools packed…I didn’t have my filler knife (if that’s what it’s called) so had to improvise, using a leftover pumpkin scoop that my son had leftover from Halloween.

With the Polyfiller dried a day later, I then sanded it down to make it smoother and remove the loose pieces off of it. After which, I then sprayed it black all over.

After the spray had dried, I went over the board with a layer of Steel Legion Drab, then drybrushed with Baneblade Brown, and then a lighter drybrush of Karak Stone. This was not my usual mix, but the objective was to blend with James’ board and it looked pretty great to give him credit. I finished off the painting by doing the tracks with Dryad Bark and washing them with Agrax.

After the paint had dried, I stuck down several flowers and mossy bushes and began the most arduous task of adding the flock all over. Three short hours and a locked back later, it was all done!

 

With a smug swagger, at being ready so early, I started packing all my models together, as I would need them for our League Finale prior to TOS. It was as I was doing so, and thinking about how nicely the whole army was coming together with relatively little effort (do to earlier conversions, little extra bits etc) that I put my hands on my Mordor Troll…and while he’s been fine for local events and GBHL tournaments…I felt he wasn’t up to the standard of the rest of the army. Since I had supported his arm (he’s a metal troll) with a loose piece of sprue, looking like a walking stick and having an old paintjob…

I had two choices. Either, fix him up and repaint him. Or I dig into my Battle of the Pelennor box, and find my plastic troll, build him up and paint him, hoping that I don’t get halfway through the process when the move is announced. After some umming and ahhing, I settled on the simplest advice I know: 

‘Fuck it’

I slapped him together on a BSIME stream one evening and got on with painting him up. I find with these bigger models, my best way to make progress, is to focus down one body part at a time. So I get all the base colours down, then focus down one arm, then the other, followed by each leg, then the torso and finish with the head. 

 

 

And despite giving myself that timed challenge paintjob, we still didn’t have a completion date. So let’s make the most of that, and I went digging into my bits box and found several things that I could make use of; a couple of broken orcs, a broken Minas Tirith archer, a paperclip and a couple of pieces of hardened green stuff. 

I had several ideas of what I could do with these. Needing 6 objective markers, I decided to build the following;

1/2: ‘Prisoners’ for Gothmog to ‘release’

3: Rocks for loading the catapult 

4: Orc that’s been shot (arrow embedded in him)

5: Squished orc under stone from a trebutchet 

6: The stone wot Gothmog sidesteps and spit on 

I felt that these would all be nice and thematic and blend into the display nicely.

The first one I started with was 6. I beheaded the Minas Tirith warrior and kept the head to one side. I then used his body to frame the stone, which I then built up the green stuff around, using a paused YouTube video to get a rough idea to aim for.

Second, I took one of the broken orcs and tried lying him down. At a certain angle and with a bit of green stuff beneath the shoulder, it looked like a naturally proned dead guy. I just had to adjust his arm a touch as it would be hovering. So I cut it off and rotated it as well as the hand to put it to a more natural position. With this done, I drilled a small hole in his neck, cut a small piece of paperclip and glued it in. Then finished by putting a small amount of green stuff around the end and roughly shaping it into the feathers. 

Third, I took the other broken orc and split his shield, figuring the weight of a landing stone would break one. This would also allow me to lay it flat on the floor. I then cut the orc in half and laid his legs over the edge of the base. The top half, I sat upright beside it as a frame for the stone, which I then made with green stuff.

Fourth, this was probably the easiest, as I just made several rocks using the limbs I had taken off the broken models and covered them in green stuff. Gluing them into a pile of stones. 

And finally for the last two, I took the head from the Minas Tirith warrior that I decapitated earlier and used it to make seven moulds in blue stuff. Ideally, I’d have five on one and three on another objective, but if one goes wrong, I have flexibility. Naturally, two of them were completely deformed and had to get canned. But I could still get three on each and that, combined with the handful I have on the base of the catapult, would do. I stuck them down in a varying manner across the bases and that was all the objectives built.

A couple of days painting later and the task I had written off was done!

With them all sorted, I could have a cheeky layout of my army across the board. I spread the orcs out in a chaotic manner to fill the board out and kept the easterlings in a tight formation, as you’d expect of them.

And then, on the Saturday morning, we finally got the magical moment when we laid the two armies side by side to complete the look!

And there we have it, despite the issues, I managed to do what I’d vowed to myself and make more effort with this years TOS! The board was sadly not nominated for a best army award, but with the level of competition, there's no reason to be shamed by that. I was just happy to have built one.

Let's hope that I can get some painting done after a move in December!