On The Painting Desk: Sacking Rome with the Vandals!

 

Faithful readers, you know that I recently closed a deal to write a new book for the Osprey Wargaming Series, Barbarians at the Gates.  As part of that process I also need 30 photographs of miniatures.  I also like to have two armies for playtesting and Demo Games.  That means, I need to paint up some models!  

These may or may not feature in the book later.  I am hoping to find some manufacturers to support me with the photos.  However, I still need some painted armies.  After thinking about it, I decided to focus on the Vandals as my Barbarian force.  Why the Vandals?  First, I have been fascinated by them as they were not 100% successful historically.  They faced a lot of set-backs and some victories in their history.  Sure they had some pretty big highs like sacking Rome and conquering North Africa but some big lows too.  I mean, they basically got expelled from Europe by other barbarian groups after they had been driven from their traditional homelands by Huns.  They also lost in Spain to the Romans.  Like I said, not always the best track record.  Sounds like my gaming history in a nutshell! 

The first step was to get a feel for what I wanted in the army.  Thankfully, I had an example Line-of-Battle for the Vandals in the draft rules.  I decided to use this as the core of my Vandal army.  This would be....

• 1 Unit of Heavy Cavalry
• 1 Unit of Elite warriors
• 1 Unit of Warriors
• 1 Unit of Militia
• 1 Unit of Archers

Of course, that would be the core of my force, but I was also going to make other units to be able to swap in and out.  That would include more of each unit type (except Cavalry) and some skirmisher units with Javelins.  

With the force selected, it was time to think about the models. I took a look at several lines and what was available to me from US distributors.  Ultimately, I decided to go with Gripping Beast plastics.  

The Goth Elites would be the main Heavy Cavalry unit, the Saxon Thegns would be the Elites and warriors, Dark Age Warriors would be the militia and skirmishers, and archers are self-explanatory.  I spent a weekend and built and spray undercoated the core of the army.  With that done, I loaded it up into my WIP box and ready for the road.  

I also built and undercoated all the archers, all the Javelin armed skirmishers, and spear-armed Militia.  However, I did not need these for the core army so left them to paint up later.  I still had enough miniatures for 2 spear-armed units of warriors that I did not get time to build.      

So, here is the core of the Vandal army.

Of course, I am going to be Batch Painting as much of this as I can all at once.  I will probably do all the infantry together.  I will be painting the cavalry on their own. Not to brag, but I tend to think I am a pretty good batch painter, but you will get to judge for yourself. 

On the next weekend, I made sure to drybrush all the minis with cheap acrylic white.  Those who know my process know that I skipped the Dark Grey wash.  This is a test to simplify my approach.  Using Speedpaints on Historical models is also a test.  I am not sure how these will turn out and how well they will fit in with my other Historicals.  

From there, I started the batch painting.  The first thing I did was to use Barbarian Flesh and paint up all the skin tones for the Vandals.  Painting has begun in earnest now.  This is real!   

After that, I picked out a few colors for footwear.  Graveyard Grey, Hardened Leather, and Dark Brown all got the nod.   All the boots got painted.  From there, is was time to make sure the horses got their feet colored too!  I made their hooves Graveyard Grey.  Then I used a variety of colors for their skin such as Hardened Leather, Dark Brown, Sand Golem, and Runic Grey.  The horses are mostly armored so only their legs, noses, tails, and ears really show.

Hard to believe, but with that my daylight for the second weekend day working on these guys was waning.  I had to pack it in for the day and do some sight-seeing!  Not great progress, but I am batch-painting 60 models, if you count the horses and riders separately.  Progress will be iterative!  

Here are some sight-seeing photos since I don't have that many miniature photos in this one.  This is Badlands National Park below.... 

Mount Rushmore.  I have been here a few times, and I always make sure I get some of the famous Thomas Jefferson ice cream when I stop by.  This was particularly fun as we had pre-planned to meet some folks here and hang out!   
   

The Mammoth Site in Hot Springs, South Dakota.  An active dig-site of Mammoth bones.  The area has a lot of fossils from the end of the Ice Age.  

You can see that I have had a hard time finding time to paint miniatures as I spent quality time checking out the Black Hills area of South Dakota.  There were plenty of others stops and discoveries as well.  However, not much on the gaming side of things or that would be of interest to wargamers at the moment.  

Keep in mind, there is a rather large delay between when these post on the blog and when I actually did it.  Therefore, by the time you read this I will be long gone from the area.  However, I expect I will be heading back through a few more times on my travels so let me know you favorite Black Hills related sights, and what game stores I should visit in the area!  Is there any local cons I should try to time my visit to attend?     

Until next time!  

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On the Painting Desk: Finishing off the Tormentors of Telor's Queen?

 

Back to finish off the final miniatures from Spirit Queen's Torment and The Prophecy of Telor.  I finished off the Greenskins and the Undead.  However, that left the forces of Dread and the Abominations.  So about 7 guys.  However, the Dread Warriors, Gargoyle and Wizard I typically paint individually while the Abominations I batch.  That means these guys took a weekend to complete.  

First off, all these miniatures were all ready base-coated and ready to go.  Therefore, I decided to work on one of the Dread Warriors first.  I had the idea of a fallen former King's Guard knight who did not really even know he had fallen.  Therefore, he was not in typical Dread livery, but instead Paladin like Golden armor with a white cloak.  

Thankfully, I have a set of Metallic speedpaints, and one of the colors happens to be Golden Armor.  How nice.  I also wanted to use White for the cloak and Loincloth.  The hardest part was the shield, because I wanted to incorporate the Golden Armor but not the whole thing!  That would be too gaudy.  Therefore, I used Zealot Yellow as the other color.  Finally, I gave it a nice Light Tone wash and based the usual Heroquest way.  

Behold..... Sir Beauregard the Chosen!  Once and future champion of Kings!  I guess I see him a bit like Sir Ragnar but this guy did not make it back.  

As Sir Beauregard was drying I also worked on the Abominations.  I had to go remind myself how I painted them in the Core set and Kellar's Keep.  I used Plasmatic Bolt on their leg plates and tentacles with Abomination Green for the skin.  That was the bulk of these guys.  Their eyes are Zealot Yellow and their teeth and claws are Pallid Bone.  Their loincloths are Zealot Yellow, Crusader Skin, and Fire Giant Orange.  They got a Light Tone wash and based as normal.  

From there, I went back to my last Dread Warrior.  My Core set Dread Warriors were all painted in the colors of a different Chaos god.  You may know them as Khorne, Slaaneshi, Nurgle, and Tzeentch.  Well, I wanted to keep that theme and there was one Chaos God I had not painted.  You know him, you love him; of course I am talking about Malal!  The Chaos God opposed to the Chaos of the Chaos Gods.... or something.  There was a concept and business reason he never made it into the big Chaos Gods club.  

Anyway, one of the challenges of Malal was that his color scheme is not easy to paint!  It is a Black and White checked or Quartered pattern!  I had never done a quartered pattern before because they look like a right pain to paint!  However, with this guy I was going to try it!  I did not want Malal to be left out of the Dread Warrior club..... that would be bad luck! 

I used the Black I use for the base edge to draw a line down the center of the model's chest and helmet.  I made the right side arm and leg white, with the chest black.  The opposite colors on the other side.  I used Grim Black on the black side and a mix of pure white and Holy white on the white parts.  I did the same on the hilt of his sword, and even quartered the cloak.  The shield I followed the design but used Black and White mix.  When I was done, I gave the whole thing a Dark Tone wash this time and based per usual methods. 

That left the female Dread Wizard and her pet Gargoyle.  Again, I had to recall how I painted the last Gargoyle from the Core set.  I wanted that trad stone Gargoyle look.  I turned out really easy!  Runic Grey on claws, teeth, and horns.  Red on the eyes.  The rest was a watered down Dark Tone wash.  Easy-peasy.  

The Dread Wizard I wanted in Magic Blue and Yellow as those were the colors of Tzeentch.  However, I also wanted to add the jewelry in Prismatic Green for a Jade style effect.  I also used Aztec Gold for the metallics.  It is one of my favorite of the metallics as it has a slightly greenish hue.  I finished it up, gave it a dark wash and based as normal.  

With that, I had two of my Heroquest mini-boxed sets finished.  The only carry-over from 2025 is the Jungles of Delthrak now, and I have painted all the Heros and Merc critters from that all ready.  Still a big accomplishment as I am now above 80+ models painted for the year.  

That said, I think I am going to pivot and paint something different next.  I need a break from Heroquest for a bit. 

And here is all the blue-ish and Orange-ish plastic minis from the two sets all painted up.  

Until next time! 

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On The Painting Desk: Prophecy of Telor about the Spirit Queen's Torment

 

I finished off the Frozen Horror so it is time for me to move onto my next set of expansions for Heroquest.  This time, I am going to tackle the miniatures found in the two "smaller" expansions, Prophecy of Telor and Spirit Queen's Torment.  These boxed sets came with alternate sculpts of the main enemies and a new hero each.  I all ready painted the new Heroes at the end of 2025.  

You may recall that these alternate enemy sculpts were new orcs with Hammers, alternate Abomination, some new Gobbos, female zombies, female mummies, sword-and-board skeletons, dread warriors with swords, a female Dread Sorcerer, and an alternate Gargoyle.  These minis were all also cast in transparent plastic.  Prophecy of Telor was an orange-red color, while Spirit Queen's Torment is a bluish-green.  Therefore, I hemmed and hawed about what I wanted to do with them.  Ultimately, I decided to just paint them up like normal minis for the game.  I think they will be more versatile and likely to see the table that way.  

So, that means the first step was to go ahead and get them undercoated!  Will my usual methods work with these transparent plastic figures?  To save time, and kill the suspense; the answer is Yes.  Yes it does.  Here they are after being sprayed in Grey Seer from GW, washed with dark grey wash, and drybrushed with cheap acrylic white.    

For my first painting session, I decided to start by painting all the Undead at once.  It did not matter which expansion they came from, I was going to paint them all together for ease and unity.  I was all ready concerned about matching with my previous minis, so no need to make it worse by splitting these up into smaller batches.  

The mummies are always where I start because they are super easy and you can build momentum quickly.  I painted their eyes Blood Red, any exposed flesh Malignant Green, and then their hair Graveyard Grey.  Then, I hit them with a Dark Wash.  All Undead get a Dark Wash to make them extra scary looking! 

Next were the Zombies.  I painted them Malignant Green flesh and then gave them a Green Tone ink wash.  From there it was simple to paint their dresses, belts, hair and gear.  I kept their hair Graveyard Grey or uncolored and just based.  Then, they got their Dark Wash and basing done.  

Finally, I did the skeletons and for these ladies (You can't really tell with Skeletons, and since almost everything else is a female version these must be too right!) I decided to go off the reservation with my usual paint scheme.  I decided to use Wizard Orb in order try to get a faded Bronze look to some of their gear.  I also used Fire Giant Orange for a rusted look on the metals.  The bones were of course Pallid Bone.  I also used Talos Bronze, and Copper from my Metallic Speedpaint set.  The final metal color was Graveyard grey.  These ladies took the longest, but they came out very different from my usual batch of skeletons.  Not sure my experiment worked 100%, but I will take it.  I never go back and re-paint a painted model!  

   So, after a day of effort, here is where the Undead ended up..... ooooh, scary! 

With the Undead finished, it was time to turn to the Greenskins for this effort. I had 4 goblins and 4 Orcs, all in the same pose.  I batch painted the Gobbos together and then the Orcs together the following weekend.  However, I swear these Orc models are cursed.  When I painted them up for Keller's Keep you may recall that I accidentally spray primed them instead of sealing them?  Well, this time I painted them all using Orc skin as the flesh tone, not realizing until I was done with the models that the flesh tone was supposed to be Malignant Green like the Goblins!  Arrrgggghhh!  Therefore, I went back and reprimed the fleshy bitz and repainted them.  I do not think it turned out that great, but they will blend in a bit better with thier fellows now.  

The Goblin gear I kept mostly Magic Blue and Runic Grey to blend in with the OG Goblins.  Weapons were Pallid Bone, Runic Grey, and Graveyard Grey.  The other assorted straps was either Hardened Leather or Crusader Skin.  The Orcs were pretty much all wearing Graveyard Grey armor which makes it look fierce and iron-like.  I also used some Runic Grey, Pallid Bone, and Graveyard Grey on the hammer's to make them distinct weapons too.  Their tabards were Blood Red, Magic Blue, Zealot Yellow, and Fire Giant Orange to help me tell them apart on the table if I need too.  

That was two weekends of painting down, and a hefty chunk of the models for Spirit Queen's Torment and Prophecy of Telor done.  These took about two weeks, and my painting total for the year is now hovering around 75+ models and they are all for Heroquest!       

Next time, I will get those Abominations and the Dread forces painted from these two supplements.  Once those are done, I will be at a cross-roads.  Do I keep on going on Heroquest, do I switch over to Late Romans, or do I paint up my Travel Battle game as a break?  Keep tuning in to find out! 

Until next time! 

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On The Painting Desk: The Frozen Horror is Finished!

 

After my last update about painting the Frozen Horror expansion, I did not have much left to paint up.  I had painted up the baddies, painted up the doors, and then finished off the Mercs.  That did not leave much left to paint except the big monster himself.  Therefore, no need to delay the inevitable, so let's get into the details shall we?  

You can see him on the right there.  He was all undercoated up the standard way.  I am assuming that you know the drill about how I undercoat by now.  I will spare you the details.    

Those with good eyes will also see a couple of minis from the Jungles of Delthrak in that batch of minis too.  Those with good eyes and good memories will recall that I painted the Man-Bear-Pig thing with the Mercs.  This time, I will be painting up the Raptor while I waited for the Frozen Horror to dry.  

The first thing I did was mix up some of the bluish undercoat I use for ice.  Therefore, I put in one drop of Voidshield Blue, one of Holy White, and two drops of Medium.  I then painted all the ice I could find on him.  That was mostly on his armor, axe, and a bit on his body.  For his body fur, I used watered down Sand Golem as an undercoat.  That would give him a dirty fur look under the white.  Then, I gave it a blast of Holy White.  

This guy's palette was pretty limited.  I mostly used Holy White, Runic Grey, Pallid Bone, Blood Red Hardened Leather, and a bit of Crusader Skin.  Those were all Speedpaints.  Pallid Bone was for his horns and fingernails.  Holy White was for his armor trim fur.  The bulk of any metal was that Runic Grey.  Browns were for straps and the like.  For some of the rivets and detail on his armor I used Enchanted Silver and Hoplite Gold from the Metallic Speedpaint set.  I used Magic Blue for his eyes and runes on his axe too.

Unlike most of the models, I wanted to darken him up a lot, so I gave him a Strong Wash.  The base of this one is black, instead of brown.  This gives nice dark lining, and I wanted and needed that with such a mono-chrome color palette going into the end stages.  

Oh look, his little lizard buddy is getting some attention to.  I used Malignant Green on his head, arms, and calves.  The rest of his main body was Magic Blue.  His eventual tail and feathers were Fire-Giant orange.  Tongue was Blood Red and claws were Pallid Bone.  Just like the Frozen Horror!  

Anyway, back to the big guy!  With him all base-coated and washed, it was time to make him look like a Frozen Horror.  I did this with a nice liberal drybrush of Cheap Acrylic white from a Big Box Retailer.  I used a fun dry-brushing brush that I got from the same store in a cheap set of paint brushes and it works great for a lot less money.  This dry brush included his head, arms, legs, feet, hands, and the fur-trim on his armor.  I also dry-brushed the "ice" patches on him as well.  

I then completed his base the same way I do all the Heroquest bases.  I used Runic Grey on the stone work and a Privateer Press Matte Black to trim it.  Here he is looking all cold, snowy, and frozen-like...

Of course, it took a while for the Frozen Horror to dry before I could Dry-Brush him, so I worked on the Raptor a bit too.  He got Grim Black eyes, and a Green Ink wash wherever he was Blue and Green.  The Fiery-Orange got a regular Light Tone wash.  

For some added fun, I also white dry-brushed the "feathers" on the Raptor, and once that dried I painted them with Zealot Yellow.  You can not really see it too much on the finished product, but I could not find my Daemonic Yellow.  I think that would have turned out much, much brighter in the final view.  He also got the usual basing.  

Here is the Frozen Horror and his little buddy from a different boxed expansion.....

So, now I can show off the fully painted Frozen Horror Expansion with everything painted for it.  That is a pretty decent chunk of models that I took out of my pile of potential.  To finish them all off, they got a nice protective spray coat too.         

What's that you say, you also want to see the two Jungles of Delthrak minis I painted up with this group?  Okay, okay...... since you have been good little readers...... Here you go.....

So, now my WIP Box that I started my journeys with is done.  It is time to change it up.  If you thought I was going to paint the Jungles of Delthrak expansion next..... I have some bad news for you.  I am going to be painting up Prophecy of Telor and Spirt Queen's Torment next.

Until Next Time!  Another Heroquest Expansion down!  

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On the Painting Desk: Return to the Frozen Horror!

The large box expansions for Heroquest definitely do not skimp on the miniatures.  I probably have enough miniatures now to play full-fledged wargames with them.  I know I can use them for skirmish wargaming.  I have plenty of Orcs, Undead, Ogres, Wolves, furniture, and other odds and ends.  These sets are also really useful for Fantasy RPGs too.  The downside of such large box sets full of goodies is that it takes me a while to paint them all up!  That brings us to today's post!  Look at that transition, what a professional!  

I got started on Frozen Horror and worked on the monsters and doors.  That left me to tackle the Mercenaries and the Big Bad himself.  The last batch took me about a weekend to complete.  This weekend I got started on the mercenaries that you can hire to help you get through the Quest.  It is not for the faint of heart.  

Before starting, I wished I had Wizards of Morcar because that also came with a bunch of mercs.  I wanted to get them all batch painted up together.  I am pretty good at batch painting, it makes sure they all fit in together, and would take out a big chunk of my Pile of Potential.  Too bad I have not been able to find Wizards of Morcar.  Hasbro/Avalon Hill sort of botched the release with their distributors and it came out before Christmas when it was not supposed to release until March.  Now, everyone seems sold out of it.  I really hope that Hasbro decides to re-release it, because I do not want another Rogue Heir type situation.  However, I get the sinking feeling that I may never see Wizards of Morcar available again.  Oh well.  I guess that gives me time to get the rest of my Heroquest expansions painted up and spend my money on other games. 

Anyway, I did my usual undercoating and the like.  What, you don't know what my method is yet?  Oh, their maybe some folks new to the blog?  Okay, I undercoated them with GW Grey Seer, gave them a dark Grey cheap acyrlic wash, and then drybrush them with cheap acrylic white.  This method really helps the SpeedPaints shine. 

  ^^^ That should give you an idea of what they look like when they are ready for paint.  

The keen eyed among you might notice a couple of Mercs from Jungle of Delthrak.  Yup, I am painting up the Man-Bear-Pig with this batch.  I will save the Dino for a palette cleanser when I work on the Frozen Horror himself. 

So, I got set to paint with my Mobile Painting Station.  In a surprise to no one, I am mostly using Armypainter Speedpaints, some regular Armypainter paints, cheap Acyrlic paints from a Bog Box Retailer, and the new SpeedPaint Markers.  I painted all the skin tones first using Barbarian Flesh, Monster Brown, Fair Maiden, and Tanned Flesh to give me a variety of skin tones.   

 It you know about how I batch-paint, I typically start with the boots and paint upwards from there. For boots, I used a combination of Hardend Leather, Sand Golem, and Crusader Skin.  I then went up to the pants and start painting lowest layer first so skin --> boots/shoes --> pants ---> shirts ---> Outerwear ---> armor ---> belts and straps ---> weapons and gear ---> and I save the fun of picking hair colors for last.  

I used a wide variety of colors for the clothing including Highlord Blue, Slaughter Red, Zealot Yellow, Orc Skin green, Fire Giant Orange, and some dark Purple color.  You know, all the classics.  I wanted each Mercs to look like an individual and be distinctive on the table.  These guys are not part of a military unit afterall.  This variety slowed me down a bit.  

I tried to stick to three main colors for metals.  First I have good luck with Graveyard Grey and Runic Grey for a non-Metal Metal look.  From there I also mixed in the occasional, Zealot Yellow,  Broadsword Silver or Hoplite Gold.   Those last two are from the metallic Speedpaint set. Since most of the metal in my Heroquest is not a true metallic I stuck with the non-metallics mostly.    

The Man-Bear-Pig I painted with a thinned Sand Golem, then a thinned Holy White.  From there I drybrushed Skeleton Bone from the non-speedpaint range.  I painted his claws Pallid Bone, eyes Blood Red, and his teeth cheap acrylic white.  I also painted the pads on his paws with Grim Black.  

For hair colors, I stayed pretty conservative today.  These are not main characters, they are mooks!  I don't want them to hog the spotlight!  I mostly used Dark Wood, Sand Golem, Grim Black, Graveyard Grey, and one got Zealot yellow and another got Fire Giant Orange.  See if you can find them in the group photo! 

That left them with all their basecoats on.  They were looking pretty.  I gave them all an Armypainter Light Tone wash to fill in any gaps.  Once that was dry, I did any touch-ups or finishing touches.  For example, the Man-Bear-Pig I drybrushed some white on his chest.  Others I highlighted to bring the colors back up where they needed it.  

From there, I painted their bases Runic Grey and gave them the traditional Black Trim.  Once it warms up a bit more, I will spray them down with a protective coat.  Here is where the Mercs ended up.....

Boom!  In one day I had painted a dozen+ guys.  All that was left of this expansion was the Frozen Horror.  However, I decided to leave him for another weekend effort.  A dozen miniatures in a day is a respectable days work!  That means I have painted over 50+ Heroquest models this year.  

Sounds impressive but I still have to paint: 

- The Frozen Horror Himself

- Jungles of Delthrak

- Prophecy of Telor

- Spirit Queen's Torment

- G.I. Joe Heroscape 

Man, that is a lot of stuff to paint.  A bit daunting as I need to build and paint some Late Rome stuff for Osprey now too.   However, if I see Wizards of Morcar I am not waiting.  

Until next time! 

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On the Painting Desk: The Frozen Horror on the Road

 

The main goals on my painting desk for 2026 were my Heroquest expansions.  In order to get all the Heroes for my games, I splurged last year and picked up all the Expansions with Heroes.  This left me with a pretty hefty Pile of Potential to work through.  Before I could start working on my Late Roman project for Osprey I was going to need to clear this backlog out.  Early this year, I had managed to finish of Rise of the Dread Moon so now it was time to focus on The Frozen Horror expansion. 

This expansion was a snow themed adventure for the barbarian and his pals.  That was going to be a very different look from what the Elves looked like.  There were an assortment of winter themed minis and a number of human mercenaries to go in this set.  Before I began traveling, I was able to get them all base coated and stored away in my WIP bin.  

Not much to say about the undercoating process you do not all ready know.  Grey Seer undercoat GW spray, dark grey cheap acrylic wash, and then a dry brushing of cheap acrylic white to get them to this point.  I have had good results with this undercoat process for speedpaints.  The first minis I painted from this set were the Yeti.  They were a test of my mobile painting station. 

With the pre-amble out of the way, it was time to get going on the rest of the models.  

At this point I was Mobile.  On a nice sunny, spring day I pulled out the paints and decided to give painting a go, my first real time working in my new space.  I pulled out my WIP bin and decided to give my Polar War Bears a go.  I think we have all read or seen some version of the Golden Compass now, so you get the idea of what these guys are.  Interestingly, in this expansion they get the ability to attack twice!  Plus, they hit pretty hard too!  

This gives you an idea of my painting space

I decided to use a watered down Crusader Skin on one bear, and Sand Golem on the other.  After that, I used a drybrush of cheap acylic white with a blast of Holy White speedpaints as well.  I used a dot of Grim Black of nose and eyes, and a dot of Blood Red for the tongue, and a spot of Pallid Bone for the teeth.  A surprising amount of detail on the face of a Warbear.  From there it was pretty standard suff.  I did use Absolution Green for the "fur" trim of the lighter bear.  For those following along at home, I use that color for Ogre hair, meaning that this guy had been killing Ogres and using their scalps as fur trim!  Turn around is fair play I guess.  For armor I used Runic Grey, Graveyard Grey, and Talos Bronze.  I have had good results with the greys for armor and they did not disappoint.  

            

From here, I packed them back up and let them dry overnight.  At this point, their basecoats were on and they were ready for a nice coat of Light Wash and then touch-ups and highlights.  Nothing too fancy.  Once done with those, I painted the bases with Runic Grey and then the traditional black trim to finish them up.  

Not a bad first effort at painting while on the road.  However, I still had things to paint for The Frozen Horror expansion.  After the Polar War Bears, it was time to get a bit more fiddly-foes.  I grabbed the Gremlins out.  These guys are really annoying because they do not do damage, but they DO steal your stuff!  Gross.  I wanted them to have the same skin tones as the Yetis I painted, so I went back to the Magic Blue and Holy White mix and three drops of thinner as their skin tone. 

I used a watered down Voidshield Blue as the base for their hair and beards.  I wanted them to look "icy".  From there, I painted over it with Holy White and then drybushed it with cheap acrylic White.  I did the same thing with their wands too.  The rest of the minis were standard natural colors like Hardened Leather, Pallid Bone, Crusader Skin, Runic Grey, Gravelord Grey, etc.  The details were mostly Golden Loot from the Metallic Speedpaint sets.  They were washed with a light wash and then touched up again.  The bases were the usual stuff of Runic Grey with a black rim.  

From there I had a few loose doors.  Two were ones I had missed from one of the Elven Sets, but I am not sure which one and it doesn't matter because I am painting them now.  The other two were snow and ice themed doors from The Frozen Horror.  The two sets of doors would require very different painting techniques to complete them.  I had two wooden ones and two iron ones.  Typically, one of those types is the start of the Quest while the other is an exit.  

For the Frozen doors, I used a Dark Wood for the planks, while for the Elf ones I used Sand Golem.  That tracked as all my Elf wood is Sand Golem paint.  The iron ones I used Broadsword Silver and for the Elf one I used Pallid Bone.  Again, my elf metal was always Pallid Bone so I was staying consistent.  Where the elf one was covered in vines, The Frozen Horror doors had icicles and snow on them.  

The elf doors were fairly straight forward using Magic Blue and Plasmatic Bolt for the runes and such.  The stone was Graveyard Grey and the vines were Malignant Green.  Give it all a Light Wash and they were done.

The frost and snow of the other doors required a different effort.  The runes were Magic Blue, this time with Markers.  The stone was Graveyard Grey.  The fixtures were Broadsword Silver from the Metallic Sets.  The snow and icicles I started with a Voidshield Blue wash.  Then, I painted over it with a light coat of Holy White.  Once dry, I drybrushed cheap white acrylic over it with a make-up brush.  I used watered down black to give the whole thing a dark wash.  

Final Thoughts

That feels like a good place to leave it for this post.  11 models painted is a good weekends work.  All that is left from this set is the Mercs and the big, bad himself.  I look forward to painting the Frozen Horror himself but I will probably save him for last.  

Until next time! 

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