The Oldhammer Dwarf Army Part III - The Raven Company

The Raven Company have long travelled the Old World and the shores, mountains and marshes of  both Albion and Little Albion, in search of fame and fortune (mainly fortune actually) prospecting long disused mines and panning mountain streams in the most isolated and dangerous places. 

In times of need these hardy dwarfs are willing to fight in dwarf armies in return for cheese and ale, cheesy ale and cider-soaked pipeweed, and as such are rugged, grumbling veterans of many battles. The colours of the unit are red and gold and most members of the Raven Company display these colours in some way, whether they be personally wealthy enough to afford a full surcoat or just on a shield or sash. The red represents the blood of fallen comrades and the gold represents the elusive fortune they seek.

The leader of the Raven Company is one-eyed, one-legged "Lucky" Longjonnsen Syllvar.

Longjonnsen lost his left leg when he was attacked in his bed by a jealous love rival who mistook his leg for his legendarily proportioned "Long Johnson".  His adversary severed his leg with an axe. 

The ensuing single combat was not witnessed by any dwarf, but according to Syllvar he was unarmed and beat his axe-wielding assailant to death with his Long Johnson before using it to fix a tourniquet around his thigh to prevent death by blood-loss from his severed leg.

"Lucky Longjonnsen" claims he lost his eye in a fist-fight with a giant, but rumours abound that he was hit in the eye by a troll's toenail clipping while he was hiding in a cave.

The ravages of time have not been kind to Longjonnsen, it is said that even before age and facial battle-scars took their toll, that Syllvar already had a face that looked like two-old hands wringing out a damp cloth. In tribute to their very-nearly, almost legendary leader - many troopers choose to paint or sculpt their shields with grotesque faces. This had led to them being occasionally known as "The Ugly- Faced Boys."

The more observant of you will have noticed something about the stats on the playsheet above. Give yourself a second or two and I'll see you in the next paragraph.

Yep - you've got it. I twatted up the Strength and Initiative stats which should read "3" and "2" respectively. The playsheet itself is in Excel so I had the worksheets set up so that I could pull through the stats from a master sheet just by specifying "warrior"; "+2 shock elite"; "Lvl 10 hero" etc. and the card would pull through the points value based on the number of troops in the unit, the equipment and the champion value.

Unfortuantely, while rushing to get these ready for BOYL 2017 I seem to have used a function not normally used in Excel called a "V-COCKUP". Several of my playsheets (seemingly the ones for ordinary warriors) are incorrect. I seem to have mislaid the file in my laptop but I promise to find and correct these as soon as I can. Yes. I am a colossal pillock.

 

Unit shot(s) of the Raven Company 

I know that people get annoyed when I complain about the quality of my own painting, but in the case of these chaps I was somewhat rushing to get these done for my first game of third in a long time back in maybe 2015 or 2016. As such many of them are somewhat rushed and as I photographed them I notice little unfinished bits and pieces on them which annoy me. I just haven't brought myself to sacrifice otherwise scant hobby time to spend a few hours finishing these up.

These first five include the command and two troopers. Longjonssen Syllvar is obviously "Owd" Tom Thyksson from the Bugman's Rangers Regiments of Renown box. I have a spare of this guy and haven't decided yet whether to add Owd Tom to my Rangers which are currently half-completed on my workbench. The banner is a decal applied to tomato paste tube. This one has been cut from a larger Little Big Men Studios banner and then painted over using the raven decal as a guide. The bearer is a marauder spearman that I had a double (or triple) of which I have added in an extension to the spear to allow a larger banner. The musician is one of my favourite models and I may move him into another regiment as I added him to the Raven Company just because I wanted to paint him. I have a hornblower (not pictured) who bears the red and gold of the regiment who I will draft in once this chap has a unit of this own. The other two models are a slayer ("berserker") in chainmail and a converted adventurer. The lantern this chap came with was damaged so I replaced it with the head of a 15mm "Hordes of Things" ogre or giant.

A rear view showing the shields. Longjonssen has an old Citadel metal shield; the adventurer with goblin head has a shield from Bood Miniatures; the standard bearer has a more modern plastic shield that fitted in with the narrative of "The Ugly-Faced Boys"

The next five are from the Perrys' adventurers and imperial dwarf ranges with the chap in the middle being an alternative model from the ME33 LOTR range.

 

The shields are left to right: another Citadel "ugly-face", a "paintbrush-enhanced" LBM decal on a classic Citadel plastic shield. I cut the boss off an Essex metal shield to cover the hole. The ME33 has a simple design painted on an Essex metal shield. The next complex design is another LBM decal applied to another Essex metal shield. The observant will notice that he has a replacement axe. This is from my bitz box and probably Essex again. I got this mini for abouot £0.70 because it was damaged. The last chap is again carrying an Essex metal shield, the kite design I use quite a lot. The design is a LBM decal.

Four more Perrys and one Marauder. Part of the narrative of this unit is that they are part-time warriors and part-time prospectors and miners - hence I have tried to get at least half of them lugging their adventurers packs around and am happy to have a few troopers rocking weapons like this chap with the grappling hook!

 

I'm not one-hundred percent sure but I think the shield on the far left came from the dwarf in Advanced Heroquest. I remember having the model but sold him because he was plastic and probably kept the shield. The next chap has another Citadel "ugly-face" shield. It's not to everyone's taste but when I first got fantasy minis in 1986 and was painting them with my dad he was not constrained by fluff that suggested that dwarfs had to have a certain kind of shield. I wanted to reflect that unconstrained fantasy philosophy in one unit of my army and this is why its part of this regiment's story. The two shields on the right are yet another Essex kite with a simple, free-handed design and what I think is a Marauder plastic shield.

Some of the last five are to some extent slightly unfinished. They still look fine in the regiment but I will get around to finishing things like the guy on the far left's axe and backpacks.

The middle shield is I think from the Warhammer Regiments plastics box and the shield either side is another Essex metal. I think these came with javelins which I removed with cutters.

I love the fact that this guy is missing the ring-finger on his right hand. In this unit this berserker has probably bitten off his own finger to remove a wedding ring due to some unbroken vow!

That's all for the Raven Company. Next up we'll probably take a look at the Artillery and some of the baggage train.

Cheers x