MERRY XMAS!!! LAST BLOG FOR THE YEAR

Well I would just like to quickly wish everyone a merry xmas and all the best for the next year where ever you may be. It's been pretty hectic of late so hopefully things will start to slow down a lil over the holidays. Off to the Goldcoast of Australia for a week in two days so all is good!!! YAY ME!!!!

Anyway just a quick update of a few more hobbits of the first bandit unit.



MORE REINFORCEMENTS


BILLY BAGSHOT



I couldn't resist this guy, he's an awesome sculpt by Victoria Lamb and I have absolutely no idea how he is going to fit into the scheme of the arm......well he is a halfling......vampire hunter maybe?




MAGGOT!!!





Farmer Maggot was scored cheap off e-bay primarily for the hounds and the guy on the right is a halfling but Eureka will probably be part of the Adventurer unit....yes.... oh no another unit.

FIRST HALFIE!!!

Well here he is my first lil halfie from my bandit unit. A nice Vendel mini. Was a nice change doing neutral colours like black and green which are so much more forgiving instead of the reds and whites of my British Naps. I actually did four layers on the black and tried to make them a lil Ring Wrathie looking!!! Overall I'm pretty happy although there is still room for improvement so any tips are appreciated.







Here is the Bandit unit all primed and ready to go.



Here are more of my recent arrivals

Halfling Fighters



The middle two are from Hasselfree miniatures (great customer service btw) and I especially love the Roman styled one probably one of the best detailed Halflies I have received so far. The far left is from Ral Partha which is also nicely detailed.

And Yet More Halfies



Three are from Ral Partha including the unusual leaf cloaked blowpipe sniper assassin guy thingy. I also plan to setup an archer unit.


VAMPIRE



This guy will form the basis for the Vampire/Undead unit, hes by Ral Partha also and looks very Vampirie or Vampirish if you ask me.


FOR INSPIRATION
I stumbled across these on painted by (permission to post here) by Johan, cheers mate. Stunning stuff, please note the following models are painted by Johan and not me.

Houston We Have A Scale Problem

The lil guys are really flowing in now but I seemed to have hit a snag with the scaling which has thrown a slight spanner in my works.



As you can see there is a rather noticeable size difference even with the three of the four being from the same maker Reaper. The majority of the Reaper Halflings are the same size as the one on the far right but the two in the middle are much smaller for some reason? As a result I have had to rethink the makeup of each unit more around the size as well as the theme but it still seems to be working out ok thus far.

So here is the start of the Halfling Bandit unit, the small female Reaper Halfling (she is a beautiful sculpt too) is actually a perfect size match for the Vendel models and the other small Halfling doesn't really stand out much either. The detail on the Vendel models aren't as sharp but the character and poses seem to get them by ok.



The next unit is the Ranger Unit which is made up of the wonderful Reaper models, the detailing on these guys are superb and the crouching thief is very dynamic and dark.








Next is more Reaper for the Vampire Hunter Unit, this will be more of a ragtag bunch of individuals who fit together based on complimentary skills, there will be a couple of gnomes and dwarfs in here for good measure.



The detail on the Reaper guys are great and should be more noticeable once painted. Hopefully the remaining 20 odd Halflings arrive safe and fit in nicely with the scale of these.

Now which unit to paint first? I'm thinking the lil bandits?

First Recruits Arrive!!!

Well the first minis have started to flow in



Mostly Reaper, gotta love the Dragon rider and I am looking forward to painting that guy. Ok there's two dwarfs in there...one a cute female dwarf with a massive chopping axe from Reaper....I couldn't resist the sculpt and she will take her place in the Vampire Hunter Unit as the offical head chopper along with mostly Halflings and a few gnomes.

The other guy is Handyman from Spinespur....I thought he was a halfling but turns out to be more like a dwarf, a cool looking dark sculpt however I was extremely disappointed when looking at his cloak which is covered with cutoff hands.....wtf? I spose thats what you get when you delve into Zombie styled miniatures. He might make his way into the Vampire/Necromancer unit as a bodyguard/henchmen?

The tall Halfling is a mercenary sergeant from Reaper that kinda looks a little like Michael Jackson (no disrespect intended).

The final halfling is a sweet lil and very detailed Pirate sculpt that I stumbled upon in the Frothers forum and he is distributed by a guy called Lupus in Australia who is getting round to setting up an online store. Below are the rest of the minis so far in his halfling range,please note they are not painted by me but Bruenor Odinson and I stole this image off the Frothersforum so I am merely showcasing them.....I reckon these will sell like hotcakes.....if I upset anyone I will take it down.


http://frothersunite.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=21320&postdays=0&postorder=asc&highlight=lupus&start=0





I have been painting British naps for around 5 months now so changing styles to these guys is going to be a lil daunting but I think I will tackle the female dwarf first. :-) I think I will paint naps one week and a halfling the next.

1st post!!!

Well I have decided to setup a small blog on the development of my Halfling army. I needed something to break up the repetition of my British Napoleonics and I needed something with character and variety.....and what has more character than Halflings?

Inspired by the beautiful Reaper range I decided to move away from the Fat and Peaceful halfling stereotype and build a darker and more battle hardened force, one that could hold its own on the battlefield or die trying.

So I have been scourging the net for a variety of halflings that meet this vision with the Reaper models to be the centre pieces......so I have slightly lost the plot and orderd around 40 halfling from a vareity of manufacturers including Vendel, Hersey, Ral Patha, Grenadier, Hasselfree, Spinespur horror, D & D and a few other lil gems off e-bay.

I plan to have 4-5 themed units of 8 figs, one unit will be Vampire/Witch hunters led by Van Halfling, Halfling Bandits, Halfling Rangers, Halfling City guard (armoured elite type), Halfling mercenary heroes (an assortment of diff halflings) and a Halfling Vampire and Necromancer unit with Halfling skeletons (most likely conversions on the skeletons unless you know of anywhere that does them???)

Each unit will be based on the LOTR movement trays.

So now I am sitting back and waiting for my parcels to roll in.