On The Painting Desk: Anglo-Saxon Shieldwall for Fury of the Northman

 

The first big painting project of 2025.  I am working on an Anglo-Saxon army for Fury of the Northman.  I picked up the miniatures for it in 2024 but did not get the time to work on it back then.  However, it is winter time and there is no better time to paint a big project than now.  I am using a combination of Victrix kits, the Late Anglo-Saxons, the Early Anglo-Saxons, and the Dark Age Archers kit for this army.  The army will look like this: 

• 1 Unit of Shieldwall Nobles as Thegns from the Late Anglo-Saxon kits
• 3 Units of Shieldwall Militia as Fyrd from the Early Anglo-Saxon kits
• 2 Units of skirmishers/irregulars from a mix of Early and Late Anglo-Saxon kits
• 3 Units of Archers from the Dark Age Archer kits

That is enough for an army plus some swappable extras to play against my Dark Age Irish and my Viking force.  That will allow a pretty decent campaign mix.  Still thinking about a Muslim army for this period too. 

I decided to get started on the Shieldwall infantry first.  That is the heart of most armies in the Viking Age isn't it?  Well...... no..... but it is for this one!  I have been spoiled by all those Heroquest models because I forgot what a pain it is to actually assemble your models!  That really slowed me down.  However, I soon had the 40 shieldwall models all assembled and put on washers.  Then, before painting I of course gave them an undercoat of Grey Seer.  

Before I got started, I decided I was NOT going to be using Speedpaints on these guys.  All of my other Historical models I use the base coat and a wash method.  So these fit in, I decided I wanted to do the same with this army.  Therefore, after spray undercoating it was time to start batch painting.  

Here is a quick look at my batch painting technique.  I have obviously batch painted a few armies in my time, so I think I have a decent technique down for it.  First thing I do, is paint all of their flesh and all of their shoes/boots.  I typically use three different colors for their footwear.  

From there, I start painting from the lowest layer up.  Typically, that is the pants!  I decide on the various colors of pants I want, then I start to break them up into smaller groups, so that each unit will only have one or two guys with the same color pants.  

I then, do the same thing with the next layer.  In this case, it was going to be the leggings.  I typically use the same colors I just make sure a guy with that color pants doesn't get the same color leggings.  I then make one last mix up for their tunics.  I tend to do the same thing but with fewer colors and larger batches for all the colors as I move up the model, so belts, hafts, armor/helms, etc.  You may have also noticed that I keep all the shields off, I paint those on the sprue separately and add them just before basing.  

Of course, I got a bit impatient and spent some time away from the Fyrd, and focused on the Thegns and got them done the fastest of all the Shieldwall infantry..... woops......

All that chainmail was just begging for me to finish it off.  Afterall, they look so... unfinished... in all that gun metal and polished silver.  I couldn't let that stand!  I finished the base colors with a nice coat of Strong Tone wash. The guy in the purple cloak is supposed to be my Earl.  I like to give my officers purple..... it is a hang-over from my ancients painting.  Any excuse to use purple am I right!  Like the Fyrd, I will be painting the shields and adding them last.  

With a small hit of Dopamine to help me get to the end, I went back to working on batch painting the Fyrd with my tried and true method.  I mean, it is only 30 of them right!  The biggest "batch" to batch painting with these guys will be their tunics.  I mean, these look super comfy and I am hoping one day they come back in style!  It is basically a really long and flowing shirt belted around the hips?  I would wear that.  

Look, it's the Power Rangers: Dark Ages!  Go, go Power Rangers!  Here the Fyrd are about half finished.  From here, it is about painting up the belts, pouches and gear that they are all wearing.  This is mostly Skeleton Bone, Dessert Yellow, Leather Brown, and Fur Brown.  Again, each model typically uses two different gear colors to mix it up.  Since I use those colors on their tunics (or are they tabards?) you have to make sure you don't make the belt and gear the same color as the clothing.  Easy to do when batch painting.  

It is always amazing to me how "finished" a model becomes when you paint their weapons.  I could have a full unit painted, but not their weapons and it would look like I still had a ton left to do!  Since they are spears, I mixed it up with different colors on the hafts using the same colors as their belts.  Then, I painted up all the metal, including helmets, buckles, spear points with a variety of Plate Mail, Gun Metal, Bronze, and a few Metallic Speedpaints for variety.  Once again, hair color was one of my favorite parts using a some yellow, and orange, but mostly ash grey, dark stone, fur brown, and monster brown.  The base colors were all in place! 

The last step to finishing the basics on these guys was a nice Strong Tone wash using my Armypainter washes.  The Strong Tone is black based and it works well with Chain Mail and armored minis.  These guys are not wearing chain, but I used it on the Nobles.  I felt like if I switched to a Light or Soft Tone they would not blend in as well.  Those tones are sepia based.  So, with some trepidation I hit them with the Strong Tone......

Oh yeah, that darkened them up.  However the blend in pretty good with the leader squad.  The only left to do is to base them and get their shields painted.  Man, I hate painting shields, but especially Dark Age shields.  You can see how it went last time with my Vikings, but you will have to see how these turn out.  

Painting these 40 guys to this level took me about 4 days of work, spread over a couple weeks of time, a few colors here and there.  I rarely get to just sit down and paint for 3 days straight!  Most of my painting projects I pack up in between sessions, but these guys just sat on the desk and waited pateintly.  I do not think I would enjoy just sitting down and painting all day!  I tend to do a color or two, get up, do something else for a bit, and then come back to it.  

Next up, I will go over the shields and start in on the Skirmishers and Archers.  Probably another batch of 30-50 guys.  Until next time! 

Bonus Content! 

I managed to go down and play some of the new edition of Kill Team with the True Crit Gaming Guild.  I took the Hand of the Archon out to play since it had an actual Kill Team box and I hoped the rules were still current.  No idea still, but my opponent was nice enough to let me use what I had.  

I honestly only picked up on a few differences compared to the last edition.  Of course, the missions changed, some of the keyword rules changes a bit, assets changed, and the way Conceal/Engage worked changed a bit.  They also ditched the stupid shapes instead of numbers thing.  However, it seemed to play pretty much the same after that.  However, it is also possible that I never knew the old rules well enough to notice the differences!  

This was a classic battle of dwarves vs. elves, as my friend took the new League of Votann Scavengers for their list.  I couldn't tell you too much about them, except they seemed to be a close ranged team.  They had shotguns and a lot of pistols and CC dudes.  I had them pretty well shot up, and managed to out flank them.  We scored points by being in the enemy control zones and deployment zones.  They had some resourceful tricks, but ultimately the Dark Eldar were nastier this time.  

I saw the Hivestorm box at the store, but ultimately I doubt I will pick it up unless I come into some sort of windfall.  I really do not need two new Kill Teams when I all ready have more than I will probably use!  Plus, I am not sure the rules changes are enough where I feel like I need the update to the newest edition in order to keep engaging with it on a casual level.  

Until next time!  

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5-Day Challenge- Epilogue

 

Long time readers will know that I have been actively engaging in community building in my local area.  Thanks to other champions in the area, we were able to launch the True Crit Gaming Guild.  This is a gaming group in Northwest Wyoming dedicated to miniature wargaming, role-playing games, board games, and card games.  It is a non-denominational gaming guild!  

Those who have known me for a long time will know that I love campaigns!  I first started getting into wargame design after having such a great experience with the old Eye of Terror and Fall of Medusa 5 campaigns from Games Workshop.  The community stories and creativity unleashed was some of the best I had ever seen.  I wanted to recapture that and started running a variety of online campaigns with smaller, localized forums and online communities.  Almost all of these had little campaign specifics rules and scenarios.  

Well, thanks to the True Crit Gaming Guild, I am going back to the well and trying my hand at a fun Narrative Campaign.  This time, we are keeping it focused to games of Kill Team.  Kill Team is a Guild favorite for a variety of reasons.  

The campaign is a simple warzone control campaign set on a nominally Imperial world on the Eastern Fringe.  It is designed to be an Imperial vs Chaos themed campaign, with other factions being able to act as mercenaries or allies.  The focus is on giving us a setting to theme our games around and give us a good excuse to play games, paint models, and build terrain.  

Of course, you can follow along with the campaign on our True Crit Gaming Guild Facebook page as well.  In addition, I am also going to make the campaign booklet available to you for free as well.  Feel free to launch your own Siege Perilous campaign with your local community as well.  

To prepare for the campaign, I ordered a Blooded Kill Team to be part of the forces of Chaos.  However, it soon became clear it was not going to arrive on time.  I went to the FLGS and picked up a Sister of Battle box and resolved to create, assemble, prime, and paint a Kill Team in 5-business days.  Hence, the 5-day challenge was born!  

That challenge started 5-days ago and I managed to get the Order of St. Augustine Martyred was ready to take the field of battle!  

I packed up the Order as well as my Hand of the Archon along with my DIY terrain for the big day.  I managed to get the Terrain made on our groups Project Social day.  This day was intended for folks to build terrain, get their Kill Teams ready, work on various projects, and be ready for the big day!  I packed up my Hand of the Archon in case their were too many Imperials and I had to fight for the forces of Chaos! 

This was the big day that I had been doing all the work for!  Today would be my first wargaming in 2024.  So, as an epilogue for the 5-day challenge, here are a bunch of photos from the event. I was paired up against an Imperial player, so the Hand of the Archon took to the field instead of the Order of St. Augustine Martyred.  Maybe next time? 

This was my first time using the Hand since I painted them, so I was not 100% sure how they worked.  Thankfully, the Imperial player I was paired against was new to the Veteran Guardsman as well.  We worked together to help each other out, and had a good time playing the Looting scenario.  

You can see we used my DIY terrain for the table I was on.  I was pretty happy with how it looked and played.  The Cigar Box Battles mat really helped to make it POP.  This was also our first time really taking advantage of the Tac Ops deck.  I had no idea what was on them, and randomly drew 3.  This was a close run game all the way down to the final turning point.  

However, my ability to get 3 Dark Eldar in a concealed position to activate Objectives allowed me to pull out a very close win.  In addition, I was able to take advantage of my random Tac Ops to net some final victory points to put me over the top!  A close run thing, but victory for the Hand of the Archon and the first Chaos victory in the campaign! 

Here is the Order of St. Augustine Martyred on the table with some Legionaries.  This was not an actual game, but I promised you guys some shots of the Order on the table.  Here it is!  Hopefully they will get to hit the table soon and bring victory for the Emperor!  

Thanks for all of your comments and well-wishes as I pursued the 5-Day Challenge to the finish.  Perhaps when my Blooded Chaos Guard arrive I will do something similar with them.  This was fun and I recommend doing something like this to help you finish a project too.   

Until next time!  

Become a Patron and get access to all the cool stuff, a peak behind the curtain of Blood and Spectacles, and early-access to playtest games!  

Blood and Spectacles Patreon! 

You can follow Blood and Spectacles Facebook page or Instagram for more fun! 

Check out the latest publications and contact me at our Blood and Spectacles website

Or purchase all out games at the Blood and Spectacles Publishing Wargames Vault Page!