Pics, previews of new Alliance minis!

We know that Alliance is coming out with new fantasy sets, namely half-orcs, Amazons, and zombies. This coincides with this year's release of the new sets from Caesar, so this is shaping up to be a great year for 1/72 fantasy.

I was looking for info on these new sets at the 1/72 group on vk.com, a Russian social site that seems to be a great source for 1/72 news that doesn't always make it to the English-speaking part of the web. And I found these pics! Here are some masters from one of the zombie sets:

These seem to be more modern, but they look like they'd complement the new Caesar zombies quite nicely. A lot of kid zombies in this set, which I find slightly discomfiting for some reason. But they definitely look good in a duly horrible way. There's also some box art to see, but it doesn't tell you much about the figures.

No preview pics of the Amazons, but there is a preview of the box art. I suppose it's NSFW, so I'll just link to it. It does give a bit of an idea what the figures will be like; definitely Greek in style, maybe a little more cheesecake than it has to be. I am looking forward to seeing what the actual figures will be like. There will be two sets, by the way; one for infantry, and one cavalry.

The post I found these in describe the sets' release date as "not soon," but hopefully there will be some more info available soon enough!

Reaper Bones II minis for sale!

Okay, I'm jumping the gun a little, but I thought I'd better take care of this soon. Reaper just got the last container for their recent Bones II Kickstarter and have begun shipping this week. Mine went out today and should be here by the end of the week! The plan was always to sell many of these and keep the ones I need, selling at around $1 per medium-sized mini. I don't have a formal list yet, but that shouldn't stop you from checking out my sales page for instructions on claiming the ones you want. Go at it!

10-figure endrowment (drow and drider mods)

For my gnoll project, a bunch of Alliance elf figures donated their bodies, leaving me with a small pile of elf heads. So it seemed natural that my next project make use of them. Hence, dark elves, or drow as they are known in D&D.

The orange heads are from the Alliance elves. The gray bodies are either Caesar "conehead" elves or Caesar adventurers. The sorceress was originally human, but I borrowed an elf head from the Caesar set.

Some more mods with the Alliance elf heads. The bodies here are a Hat "Robin Hood" figure, a Twilight Creations cultist, a Hat Gallic commander, and an Arcane Legions warrior priestess. The cultist figure got a bit of a height reduction just by cutting off the base and part of the robes.

Figures from the back, mostly to show off how I kept the hair on the elf heads mostly intact. Note the yellow bits of Milliput that fill in the gaps.

While making the drow, I decided to make some driders as well. In D&D, these are drow that have been punished—or rewarded, depending on the edition—with the spidery form of their spider goddess Lolth. The "jorogumo" figures from the Arcane Legions Han booster provide the spidery body.

The drider sorceress' torso is from a Caesar elf. The others are Alliance elves. Without their gangly legs, they actually look pretty good as elfy creatures.

With the Caesar elves seemingly OOP, the Alliance elves are the only choice for 1/72 plastic, but they are awfully tall. As a source for headswaps, though, I hope you'll agree that they can be worthwhile.

I'm hoping to get these primed this weekend, then we'll see about painting. Stay tuned!

New Caesar fantasy comparisons

Thanks to a great trade with CFM reader Jeff, I now have figures from the new Caesar fantasy sets! There's already a great review of these figures at 1/72 Multiverse, so check it out if you want a closer look. I thought I'd show some comparisons with some of my other figures.

First, the Caesar lizardmen in unpainted plastic. My painted Warhammer skinks, plus a Caesar orc, are there for comparison. The Caesar figures are about same size as the other fires, though the Warhammer figures are a bit stockier, and they have bigger crests. Their bases are a lot wider than the orc's, such that I'll have to trim them if I glue them to 3/4" washers like I usually do.

Here are the ratmen. Interspersed are a Warhammer skaven clanrat, a skaven plague monk, a Reaper kobold, and a Caesar goblin. Like the skink, the skaven figures are about the same size as the Caesar ratmen, but have a much stockier build. The plague monk is much tinier of course, but it will make a good ratmen spellcaster. They are just a bit bigger than the goblin and kobold; I think with some headswaps the ratmen could be used as kobolds or other small monsters.

Finally, the Caesar fantasy zombies (I didn't get any of the "modern" zombies). Interspersed are a Twilight Creations zombie, a Caesar skeleton (from their "undead" set), and one of my kitbashed zombie figures. The TC figure looks a little big, but otherwise all these figures fit well together.

Finally, some rank speculation. The one fantasy set Caesar announced that hasn't been released is called "Orcs 2". If you look at the box art for the lizardmen set, you'll see that the lizardmen are fighting what appear to be armored orcs. Maybe the new set will also be armor-clad, to contrast with the more primitive-looking orcs from the first set.

Let's take the speculation further: it seems the original Caesar sets are for the moment out of production. In particular, their elves are hard to find. Now the elf set was evenly divided between elves with Peter Jackson-esque armor--what I call "cone head elves"--and more lightly outfitted elves.  It would be odd if Caesar started selling these less-popular races like ratmen and lizardmen without more traditional races to bolster the line, so one imagines that the new sets will soon be re-released. And as I'm guessing with the orcs, maybe the elves will be newly marketed as two new sets, one with armor and one without.

No promises, but if I guessed correctly, then you read it here first!

Ogre eager

Christmas is always a busy time, but now that the season is over, I had time to finish this guy.

It's a troll from the Mines of Moria set by Games Workshop, for their Lord of the Rings game. I got it cheap along with some other used bits from the set in an eBay lot. I painted it as a generic fantasy ogre creature. The sculpt is great, but the figure required assembly, and the lines between the kit parts are quite visible. I had tried to fill them with wood glue, but I probably needed putty to do a thorough job.

Painting was pretty easy. I like the skin tone, and the way the face turned out. My blackwash came out a little blotchy and uneven. Also, because I am on principle a lazy painter, I resorted to drybrushing to paint the scales or warts or whatever they are on the ogre's back, which looks okay yet fairly sloppy.

Still, for a quick paintjob, the figure looks alright on the table.

Here's the comparison shot with Sven the 1/72 comparison viking. That's one menacing creature!

Sven always regrets when he has to deliver a pizza in Moria.

"Create Your Minis" Kickstarter

Since I mentioned Hero Forge recently, I thought I'd mention another Kickstarter project for custom 3D printed minis. Create Your Minis is a French project that, like Hero Forge, offers web-based software for designing your own miniature, which they will then produce for you. Since they print the minis themselves instead of outsourcing to Shapeways, their price is about half that of Hero Forge. The quality is at least as good, if their photos are anything to go by:

Downsides: They don't at this time have anything like the options or flexibility of Hero Forge. Their site, while perfectly usable, is also currently a bit clunky, especially compared to Hero Forge's very slick, intuitive 3D design program. There's also no way to make smaller miniatures. Their FAQ says that they're considering other scales for the future, including smaller scales, but for now they're strictly a 28mm outfit.

Still, if the idea of custom miniatures at half the price of Hero Forge appeals to you, Create Your Minis may be the project for you. The Kickstarter isn't quite funded yet, but there are still a few days left, so now is the time to pledge!

Splintered Light and Rebel Miniatures sales

I've often mentioned that a number of 15mm metal fantasy mini companies have potential as 1/72 figures. Splintered Light Miniatures and Rebel Miniatures are two such manufacturers. They are both having sales until the end of the year; it's not too late to take advantage of them! For Rebel Miniatures, just enter coupon code Rebel2014 when you checkout for 20% off your order. Likewise, for Splintered Light, just enter code xmas2014 for 20% off. Splintered Light is also offering 30% certain items in their store.

I'll feature some of these figures in better detail in future posts, but I thought I'd show off what I bought to show the potential of some of these figures.

A Large Wolfhound, Dire Hyena and Dire Wolf from Splintered Light. They all look just fine next to Sven. The hyena will make a fine hellhound or direwolf.

Heroes of Shadow, also from Splintered Light. They're about the size of some of my halfing minis, such as Lidda from the One Inch Guild.

A Splintered Light hyenaman/gnoll and kobold are on the left. The rest are from Rebel Minis: a Deep One, two Wolven, and two Monkey Boys. The kobold is sold as 20mm, but is a little small for my taste. Most of these I think are a bit on the small side, but the Deep One works as a small fishman, and the Wolven are actually perfect as 1/72 werewolves (the "15mm Werewolves" that Rebel sells are probably too small for 1/72, so don't mix them up!).

Many of these figures I got as free samples on request. Both Rebel and Splintered Light are great companies that will happily provide such samples; just leave a note with your order. I'll definitely be making future orders thanks to seeing some of these figures in person.

Metal minis are a bit more expensive than plastic, and though I understand that these are delicate figures, I wish there were cheaper shipping options at both companies. Still, they often have figures that can't be found or made in plastic, so when they offer sales like these, it's a great time to stock up.