Hero Quest

As a relatively new painter, I've recently learned that over-complicating things is a bad idea. By that I mean that in my impatience to paint like the painters in the White Dwarfs of old I had been practising every technique every time. Ink washes, two brush blending, detailed faces - the lot. With the result that everything took ages to paint,and then as often as not looked pretty ordinary at the end.

So I decided to go back to basics - keep it simple, with the aim on speed rather than perfection. And Hero Quest seemed like a perfect project for this new approach. The miniatures are pretty simple, and there's enough variety not to get bored.

I don't really remember playing it heaps back in the day - I couldn't even say that my brother and I got through all the quests - but it still has a nostalgic flavour to it, and once the children are older it'll be a good intro for them. And the game will have that extra something special if it's played with painted miniatures!

Here is the result...

The gang's all here

Given the time I spent on each figure - not much! - I'm happy with how they've turned out. To be honest, if I'd slaved away for twice as long trying to blend highlights and so on, I don't know that they  would have been much better.

Orcs...

These guys include the first two that I painted ages ago, as a test pair before I painted a Ruglud's Armoured Orcs.

... and their smaller cousins

Technique-wise, after trying a couple of different ideas I settled on something I pinched from a chap on the Oldhammer Community Facebook group - black undercoat, drybrush white, base coat, wash with Nuln Oil and you're done!

I felt that it worked better with darker colours than lighter ones...

The chaos types

Swamp-dwelling rape monsters

Although I did use Agrax Earthshade where I thought that would give a better result -

The dead walk - or at least shuffle- upon the Earth

We'd lost a few minis over the years, but I replaced all of the missing ones thanks to the Oldhammer Australia group and a bargain purchase on Gumtree. The only one of my original set that was (part) painted was the barbarian (by my brother most likely). In honour of the old days I left the paint (flesh and boots) and finished the paintjob.

Our heroes

And there we are! For now I'm sticking with my keep-it-simple philosophy, and just painting up simple figures using basic techniques. Stay tuned to see how that all turns out...

The builder's apprentice - making buildings

As a bit of a side project while working on my Hero Quest miniatures, I decided to have a go at making a couple of buildings from scratch. My only other attempt at a building was the fantasy townhouse using the template from WD137, and I wanted to try designing something myself.

To keep it simple I decided on a cottage, not dissimilar to one featured in a slightly earlier White Dwarf. I used graph paper to draw the design, then put the paper over a piece of foamcard, used a pin to mark holes through the paper into the card, then joined the dots and cut out the pieces with a knife.

I also made a small outbuilding. It was supposed to be stables, but I don't think I quite nailed it. The finished products looked like this...

That orc is a long way from home

I didn't take any WIP shots, I'm afraid. The outbuilding is covered in planks made from a sample sheet of veneer that I picked up from Reverse Garbage roughly cut into planks and glued to the card. Same for the roof. The door and frame is balsa, with the hinges made from cereal packet card and the handle from copper wire looped around a paintbrush to make a ring.

Quick and easy!

It was undercoated with black spray paint, drybrushed with burnt sienna, then 2 shades of burnt sienna and white, the second lighter than the first. Easy!

The cottage had the planks and door made from balsa. The doors and windows had been cut out early on, and backed with cereal packet card. The render is  polyfilla diluted with water to paint-like consistency and painted on. The roof, which I'm quite happy with, is a pot-scourer that I've peeled apart to form two thinner scourers, then cut to shape and glued on with superglue (PVA didn't really work). The door knob is a small ball of air-drying clay.

Spray-painted black. Roof painted with a couple of coats of burnt sienna, then yellow ochre, then drybrushed with yellow plus white. (By the way, all the paints are artists' acrylic from a $2 shop - cost about $2.50 for 100mls, and just get thinned down with water a bit as needed). The render is white with a bit of burnt sienna added to give an off-white, with a lighter shade stippled into the centre of the panels. Timbers are painted as for the outbuilding. The chimney pot is a piece of drinking straw.

They didn't take a huge amount of time, and I'm quite happy with the results. I learned a few lessons along the way:

• Allow for the thickness of the foam card when designing. 5mm card adds 1cm to the overall length, which is a noticeable amount.
• I won't bother cutting out the doors and windows again - the rough 'inside' of the card shows through on the inside of the frame and looks a bit untidy.
• I'd make the chimney a bit bigger, and the cottage a little smaller.
• Ditto the doors and windows, which are a bit bigger than on the townhouse and make the two buildings look a bit out of scale.
• Need to cut the scourer just a fraction larger, to overhang the card of the roof so the card edges can't be seen.

Anyways, at some point soon hopefully I'll get them on a table and into a battle!