More Olderhammer Dwarfs - The Doughty Dozen Part II

The continuing tales of a pre-slotta dwarf project. 

I was born in the suburbs, into the agony of hope. I was born on a Friday. On the same day in 1974 that Richard Bingham, 7th Earl of Lucan, disappeared. 

It was the same day that Japanese Manga author and writer Masashi Kishimoto was born. 

In November 1974, Democrats made significant gains in the U.S. Congressional mid-term elections, as the Republican Party suffered losses over the Watergate scandal. 

In November 1974, Ron Defeo Jr murdered his parents and four brothers and sisters in their family home in Amityville, Long Island, NY.

In November 1974, the United Nations general assembly granted the Palestinian Liberation Organisation observer status; terrorist bombs blew up pubs in Woolwich and Birmingham and former Chief of Staff of the I.R.A. Sean MacBride won a Nobel Peace Prize. 

'Everything I own' by Ken Boothe was the UK number 1 single.

"Should this be dull green or gloss black edging to the base chaps? Is this Oldhammer??"

Then came toy soldiers. Then girls. Then Rock and Roll. Then work. 

The office blocks' sick yellow glow dulling the stars. 
Following tacked-orange roads home, from the grey neon of the city to the scattered glitter of the suburbs. Then toy soldiers again.

From the Summer of 2009 until the autumn of 2016 I worked on the corner of King Street and Dalling Road in Hammersmith. Number 1 Dalling Road was about 100-yards from my desk. When I used to shop miniatures in the mid-to-late eighties in Hammersmith the Games Workshop store had already moved to King Street, where it was within about 30-seconds walk of the independent “Games World” store. 

The closest Games Workshop store these days is the Warhammer store on the corner of Goldhawk Road and the Chiswick High Road by Stamford Brook station. It’s kinda, sorta where the parliamentary reserves would have been in August 1642 – I’m not sure how many GW stores actually sit on genuine battlefields, I'm sure somebody knows the answer to that question.

I only found out a few years ago through the Oldhammer Facebook page what no. 1 Dalling Road’s history was. To me it was a building that looked like it was built in a hurry by the builders from Fawlty Towers. 

There were various businesses in no. 1 Dalling Road while I worked the day job (terrifying myself simultaneously analysing the finances of three local authorities) – they were mainly immigration advice centres as I recall. The last I remember was the “Bosnia & Herzegovina Community Advice Centre”. 

In my last couple of years it became a yoga club / pole-dancing training centre. Today I believe you can buy this hastily constructed two-story shack that smells of frying from the café next door, for a modest £550k. Rumour has it – O.K. I admit it…I still have contacts at City Hall – that it’s for sale with pre-approved planning permission to make room for what will probably become a couple of million quid’s worth of London-W-postcode accommodation. Trust me - it's not listed and it's not likely to get a blue plaque any time soon. So it may not be there much longer. 

"This two-storey shack can be yours for just half-a-million quids…"

"The bed may look like a weights-bench but it's very comfortable. The all-in-one Bathroom / kitchen requires a little modernization," 

"Multiple red-cloth sky swings come as standard...the ground floor is only over-looked by lots of properties on the opposite side of the road or anyone driving up one of the busiest streets on Planet Earth..."

That’s the somewhat laboured introduction to a pre-slotta dwarf collector’s confession, that even though Gee-Dub had stopped selling their own pre-slotta stuff by then – you could still buy them in Games World on King Street. For around 40 to 50p for one in a blister. And I didn’t. And I loathe myself.

But back to the tin-soldiers. There's a happy-ish ending to this not very interesting story. 

As I said in my last post...I got some.

So here are my first 12 pre-slotta dwarfs, "The Doughty Dozen". The paintjobs are a bit basic but I wanted to get them done and I also didn't want to overdo it on such cheerfully uncomplicated sculpts. 

"Allaric One-Horn of Ravenscar"

Shameless comic-tie-in alert...

Prince Allaric One-Horn is the incompetent hero of my embryonic Oldhammer comic. This miniature has little to do with him (and certainly doesn't bear his raven heraldry) although it did give me the idea of a dwarf noble with a single-horned helmet. Obviously the original miniature had two horns. The truth is that this was one of my most sought-after dwarfs from childhood and I therefore bid on two with the hope to win one. I ended up getting this one for a quid as it was "damaged" figuring that I could easily remodel the missing horn with some wire and some green-stuff. 

I also won the second model, but once they had both arrived I fell in love with the character of this damaged copy and gave away the intact one. He's a beautiful sculpt with a massive tankard on his belt. The shield is a home-made decal copied from an online source which has been painted and washed over with standard GW washes before a lot of Dullcote! I have no idea what his previous owner did to lose the horn as there is absolutely no way it would "snap off", but that's part of his charm.

 "Rodulfr"

  

This is a great sculpt which I believe was used as the base of the "axe over the shoulder" ME33 LOTR dwarfs and at least one later dwarf adventurer. He was a joy to paint. Great detail on the fur and just enough face to have some character. The shield is a decal cut from a larger "Little Big Men Studios" shield design and weathered with my home-made powders. I'll explain in the notes at the bottom of this post.

"Borri - son of Gorin"

Even amongst the later Perry sculpts this is one of my favourites and harks back to a time when miniatures were sculpted by artists who understood what gamers liked to paint. It has no needless fiddly detail, plenty of character and a well-detailed face. I've used a fairly muted palette with the blues supplied by Foundry (the "Union trouser blue" triad) and Vallejo "Blue-Grey". The shield is a detail again cut from a Little Big Men banner decal and weathered with my own powders. In fact...if that is NOT the case with any of the Doughty Dozen I will specify. Seems easier.

  "Snorri - son of Gorin"

Obviously sculpted from the same dolly as Borri, I've made these guys brothers. And why wouldn't you? For the sake of colour theory their genes gave them different hair pigmentation.

"Elfric the Red"

Despite the horrendous weirdness of his helmet - which obviously looks like it was 4:45pm on a Friday and the Andover Arms was calling so no-one could be bothered to finish off the horns...I still enjoyed painting this chap. Mainly because of his massive "please paint me ginger" beard. Yet another huge tankard and just enough belt to not have to paint it "generic belt brown". Yummy.

"Thorek Thrungfleg" 

Thorek came from (what I believe was) the first iteration of Bugman's Rangers. The more knowledgeable and observant amongst you will have noticed that the finial is not the original. I have heard the original called "the horns and hairy scrotum of Bugman" - but for whatever reason it was missing on this model when I acquired it and again I therefore got it for next to nothing. 

There was plenty of room in the metal, sculpted banner to drill in and pin on this hammer and wings from my bitz box. I've used a garish colour scheme on the banner and a muted colour scheme on the dwarf, using the oil wipe-off technique for the buckskin. I paint purple rarely, so genuine thanks and much love to Blue in VT and Darkblade for their advice and help with the cloak.

 "Ulther Tvagorz"

 Although the sculpting of the cloak is superb, this figure has very delicate detailing - such as on the beard - that does not have much depth. Some people like this, and I did find it quite nice not to have to drybrush fifty gradually lightening layers. But it did require a bit of a technique change (as many of these figures did). The cloak is painted in one of my favourite greens Humbrol #88 "Deck Green". It's nice sometimes to be able to paint something without having to mix in Tamiya "flat base".

"Grimnir"

There's not a great deal to say about this guy. He was one of the ones I really wanted from "Heroes for Wargames" (see previous post). I gave him a fairly basic paintjob and I'm not massively happy with the shield. But he is what he is and looks great ranked up with the others.

"Ragnar DenJeger"

Another mini that was a joy to paint, I decided while I was collecting these that I was going to be as muted as possible with the colour schemes. A dull green, against a red-brown beard with leather gloves. This chap has a lovely characterful face and I think the unbleached woollen cap sets him off nicely. It's hard to stop yourself overcooking these but I've done my best!

"Okri Ulfarsson Den Armborst"

I'm not sure why but pre-slotta dwarfs have a lot of bare forearms. I have no idea why so don't ask. I've found there's also several (like this chap) where a beard falls over a fur shirt. I have to admit to finding painting natural looking fur a bit of a challenge. On this chap I'm hoping the expanse of forearm flesh and a shiny bronze helm draws attention elsewhere!

"Loki Svensson-Varag"

Like "Rodulfr", I think one of the ME33 LOTR dwarf poses was based on this guy. I love the massive nose-guard for what I assume is a huge Paul Bonner-sized dwarf nose. I gave the shield a red rim to brighten him up a little and to tie it in with the red in the wolf on the shield design.

"Fimbul Katalhuyk"

To say I hated painting this sculpt would be an understatement. I have two copies of this sculpt, one has a spear broken off at the hand and this one whose spear broke off while being painted. I therefore had to drill out a glove I'd already painted and pin the spear back in. You can tell by the close-ups that it doesn't quite line up properly. But I really couldn't be bothered to remodel the hand for a sculpt I don't particularly care for. Aside from the fragile spear this sculpt suffers a massive helmet which prevents any character in the face; a cloak that has little definition meaning you have to paint it in yourself (heaven forbid) while also being a dwarf who has a moustache and huge sideburns but no actual beard. Perhaps he was modelled on the Mighty, Dark-Winged, Avenging Lord of Chaos. Perhaps someone should check.

And...Next...Some of these?

Shield and Weathering Notes:

Just some notes on the shields as touched on above. Most are details carefully cut out from Little Big Men Studios shield and banner designs. I'm lucky in the fact that a few Christmases ago my family found that LBM decals were a good "stocking filler" for me. To be honest, unlike fridge magnets for football teams I don't support and six calendars they are incredibly welcome.

I've found that they don't age particularly well, and that the cover sheet often becomes catastrophically inseparable from the decal. I've been told that placing them in a bag of rice for several generations sorts this, but my own several-month-long attempts at this have still resulted in around seventy-percent of the decals becoming unusable.

As such I often cut out small details from both shields and decals when they are new to at least get some use from them. If you've never thought to do this, just use nail scissors or an X-Acto blade to cut out the raven or dwarf or rune you need. Then apply according to the instructions. GW Lahmian Medium is fairly decent at sealing them. All decals dry glossy so you usually need several coats of matte medium. I use Testors Dullcote but other matte varnishes are available. Apparently.

With weathering, I make my own powders. I'm a pagan / heathen / infidel from the point of view of some armour specialists. I'd link this post to them but I want to save you two hours reading about pigment powders that you'll never get back. I do fine art and comics too in several mediums, so I understand pigments - but like public sector audit, it's really knowledge that most people in the world really don't need in their life.

I'll post in-depth science stuff at some other point as to why many modelling companies want to convince you to pay lots of dollars for weathering "pigment powders". But I pay £0.80 for an artist chalk pastel and scrape along it with a knife to get powder and then apply at the bottom of cloaks and at the bottom of shields with a really dry Citadel drybrush.

No. I don't seal powders with spray because the spray can act as a carrier and alter the finish or discolour the pigment. Chalk pastels are cheap, and I don't mind reapplying for 10 seconds every couple of years. It takes less time than repainting the whole thing.

I understand that this was a lengthy and unwieldy post. If you made it this far. Thanks for being on the journey. Things aren't great at the mo!

Much love x