Thursday, June 12, 2014

"War of the Ring" minis (Thanks Sam!)

I've been uncharacteristically productive hobby-wise lately, so I have a bunch of stuff to show off. But first, some cool news. My perennially popular (okay, click-baity) "Where to buy cheap minis?" post included a mention of the board game War of the Ring, a strategy board game based on the Lord of the Rings, which contained many true 25mm plastic fantasy figures. I said it was promising if the price ever came down, but probably didn't have enough stuff I was interested in to be worth it.

Sam, at the excellent Sam's Minis World blog, saw my post and was motivated to track these figures down. He was kind enough to send me some of the fruits of his search, for which I offer hearty and sincere thanks. He discusses his haul here. Really, this post is more of the same, with shots of the minis and comparisons (with special appearances by the One Inch Guild, among others). I'm just so pleased to finally have some of these figures, and at Sam's generosity, that I wanted to share.

Elves. The gray is supposed to be Legolas, the blue is rank-and-file. A Caesar figure is for comparison, as is Sven the comparison viking.
Various dudes with swords. The unpainted figures are the Witch King, Aragorn, and Boromir. Another Caesar fig and Sven are included. The Witch King will make a fine evil knight, which are kind of hard to find in this scale

Wizards! Gandalf and Saruman are on the right. An unpainted Caesar wizard and a couple repainted Arcane Legions figures are on the left. The War of the Ring figures are arguably a little big, but will look fine at the table.

The dwarves have the opposite concern, as they are generally noticably smaller than my other plastic dwarves. Caesar and Arcane Legions dwarves, then Gimli and some dwarf troops. Gimli looks particularly odd with his smaller size and pointed head.
Hobbits! Very exciting to have actual in-scale halfling figures in plastic. In the middle are Pippin, Merry, Frodo and Sam. Frodo and Sam share a base, but I may be able to separate them. They are flanked by a Games Workshop hobbit and a D&D halfling. They are both noticeably taller than the WotR figures, especially the GW one. But as they are all shorter than Sven, it shouldn't be a problem, unless I'm trying to make a halfling army for some reason.

The Nazgul, with a couple tan Age of Mythology figures for comparison. These are the 1st edition sculpts; the 2nd edition of the game has less top-heavy Nazgul. Sam gave me two of these: If I can find a way to remove the chibi wringwraiths, they'll make great generic monsters.
I should mention that Sam, in addition to just plain old giving me cool stuff and having an awesome blog, also nominated me for a Liebster, which is a sort of combination attaboy and chain letter that lets lesser recognized blogs get some attention. I probably won't be nominating anyone myself, because I'm pretty close to the bottom of the blogger pile. Anything in my links sidebars is certainly worth reading, if you're interested. Anyway, double thanks to Sam for being such a kind and generous fan in so many ways!

8 comments:

  1. Sam the evangelist !https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/105877641390357082507/albums/6023041197316429009?sqi=113363218840328050806&sqsi=e0608bd9-e454-40b7-bb86-4a2346c5c7d8

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    1. I saw that! I assumed that was also a gift from Sam. I wonder how many other beneficiaries of his there are.

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    2. just you !! that's why the Blogs exist, in my opinion: to share with others !
      and if sometimes, it's "real stuff'", that's better !
      Raph is waiting for me with a couple of beers !

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  2. .... When I read first your post on my phone (good thing the "follow by email" : I will add this button on my page!), I was very touched, really ...
    There's a kind of magic in those exchanges, maybe like if the real life enters in the virtual life.
    Thanks : I feel alive !

    Like always, a great review, on a top level !
    The hobbits are very nice and in the good scale, that's a good new because they are the only ones.
    The dwarves are odd and too small ( .... really ?).
    The wizards are excellent in my opinion because it's more accurate that they should be taller than humans, on my taste.

    Good painting work on the "arcane legions" ! I'm surprised to see so good figures !
    (I remember also the ones that you have used for the centaurs ....)
    ... if Raph (Farfade) want to send me some, I'm ok !

    +I don't think that I will show on my blog the Jawas and Ewoks I've bought but I assumed that they are perfect for "our" scale!

    +Don't forget to add the "Award" on your page !

    +Do you think that the double moderation is useful ?

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    1. It was a very nice thing to do. And I agree; these sort of exchanges do seem more really than simply interacting on forums and blogs. Speaking of; I sent you an email about an order I placed for figures, and I may make another one soon. If you have a wishlist for sprues, let me know and I'll see what I can do.

      As for double moderation, it's hard to say for sure, but I think yes. I used to get a lot of referrer spam, so I wouldn't be surprised if the Captcha's are filtering out a lot of junk. And I've caught a few posts that seemed junky that I was able to delete. I'm pretty protective of my little corner of the web, I suppose.

      I'll see about showing off the award. And I wouldn't mind seeing the Star Wars stuff!

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  3. sorry for the mail, I'm busy those weeks and till the end of this month (and more) and I'm neglecting some important things!
    For your offer : it's yes if the cost (postage) is ... cheap ! ;)

    I've not a lot of spams without moderation and they are automatically filtered .
    I'm more infected by bots which impact my stats !!

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  4. Replies
    1. They had precisely one dwarf figure, in their Romans booster set. Apparently, in the Arcane Legions lore, the magical forces that swept world turned the Slavs into dwarves, except for a few who were turned into gigantic "great ones."

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