Retrospective: A Ship of Fools - The Crew of Gilliam's Folly

The allegory of the Ship of Fools might be rather pertinent at the moment here in the UK and elsewhere, however I am using the phrase literally to introduce this lot - the crew(s) of Gilliam's Folly!

Chariots of the Gobs

Today I have some models I've been wanting to get to grips with almost since I began this hobby as a spotty little thirteen year old!  

Gobbo Chariots!

Ready 4A 'nother Kickstarter?

I certainly am having just gone for the Full Monty in 4A Miniature's second Kickstarter!

Saelian - Goblin Champion featured in the Kickstarter

I'm a Gobbo!

This has to rank as one of my guiltiest listening pleasures of all time but since I stumbled across this track on Youtube (probably thanks to one of Orlygg's posts on the Hungry Troll games I might add) it has oft times been played on heavy rotation to get me through large swathes of batch painting what else - Gobbo's!!!

So here's a slightly closer look at the smaller and more wretched end of my Goblinoid horde.

Belly's Gonna Getcha...

Grom - Soldier. Tactician. Fat Bastard.

According to legend he initiated the Goblin Wars by slaying Wulfrun Willowhand, King of the Northern Dwarves in some kind of drunken bar room brawl. Many victories and atrocities have been attributed to "The Paunch of the Misty Mountains" - so named because of his morbid obesity. In fact it was said that Grom was so huge and ugly that he almost resembled an ogre - not sure about that one but I do love the minis! Chiefly remembered among his many black deeds were the atrocities of Zhuf Field. After the Goblin victory there and subsequent looting of the Dwarven Smithies and Armouries, Grom called for a hundred Dwarf captives to be brought before him each day. Each day he personally suffocated each and every one of them - by sitting on them.

Grom was not a pure breed of Goblin (if there is such a thing) and neither were the Goblins he selected to make up his Goblin Guard - large and vicious creatures of mixed Orc/Goblin parentage. I'm thinking of upping their stats and points value to that of Half Orcs.

Enough of the history lesson and on to the miniatures! The troopers were all speed painted in batches using the usual grey basecoat with drybrushed white highlights and black ink wash. Then the base colours were applied in thin washes with ink washes to bring out shadow and colour. Ironically the shields took about three times as long as the Goblins themselves!

The designs were rather fun to do. They are supposed to represent various aspects of the death of Wulfrun Willowhand at the hands of Grom. There is a somewhat veiled reference to Grom's personal shield design in that it depicts the death of Willowhand with a great deal of blood and the fabled toasting fork very much in evidence!

Well I couldn't resist a reference like that so various troopers ended up with crossed toasting forks in tribute to their leader...

and various bits of Wulfrun Willowhand being toasted on said toasting fork.

There is little mention about how this epic altercation started other than the fact that the relative merits of Bugman's Best and Old Sam's Brown were being discussed at the time. This also provided some inspiration for shield designs - a brown take on the Bugman's Rangers' shields for Old Sam's Brown - every Goblin's favourite!

Some of you familiar with a certain Brown Ale from the North East of England might recognise the logo on the following shields...

Old Pukey Brown certainly is a refreshing brew and the choicest of spoils for any self respecting Gobbo.

Ironically Grom's champion, Crud Longbone, happens to be extremely skinny and lanky. Canon and Ball anyone?

Interestingly several variants of this chap are included in the larger unit of regular Goblin warriors I have yet to paint.

Grom himself in all his Ogre-ish(?) glory.

And his shield - I restrained myself from depicting the toasting fork stuck in the part of Wulfrun's anatomy that immediately sprang to mind and went for a more tasteful depiction of his head held proudly aloft on the improvised weapon. Thanks to a large shield boss he seems to have taken on a bit of a likeness for either Statler or Waldorf from the Muppet Show.

The Regimental musician - love the puffed out cheeks on this chap. I should probably give them a bit of a red tinge, although I'm sure Goblinoid blood is supposed to be green?

And the standard bearer with a slightly less cartoony representation of Willowhand's head toasting nicely before the fire.

I think I was running out of ideas for shields by then so both he and Crud ended up with the Pukey Brown logo.

The Command Group together.

And the whole regiment once more. The more keen-eyed of you might have noticed the lone Gobbo on the back rank. Yes, annoyingly I have 31 minis for Grom's Guard and could really do with another 5 troopers to round them off nicely.

An Orc-ward Moment...



 

Well thank goodness we've finally got January out of the way - now I can make some New Year Resolutions safe in the knowledge that they won't have to survive the rigours of the grimmest month!

 

As you might gather from the post title I'm going goblinoid again.

 

 

Heroes in a Half Shell

Right another WIP here - having finished my Blood Bowl team (still got the pitch to do) I thought I'd wrap up a few more loose ends before plunging into preparations for the Oldhammer Weekend in the summer.

I got into a great discussion on the LAF about using Eureka's Turtle Tank with Four A's fantastic Goblins. Huge thanks to fellow LAF'er Scurv for sorting me out with said Turtle, minus the Turtle warrior crew and at a very reasonable price too.

On a more personal note I also need to thank Scurv for very kindly taking my brother and his mate, who are taking a year out travelling round Australia at the moment, under his wing, providing accomodation and other assistance and some excellent nights out I gather! If you're reading this and ever find yourself in the UK as far North as York I'd be happy to repay the favour.

Anyhow - here's a few shots of the Turtle Tank and its new owners -

Time for Anniversary Celebrations and a Stock Take...

Greetings all and welcome to my 200th post!

I had hoped to post this a little earlier in the week to coincide with the 30th Anniversary of the phenomena that is Fighting Fantasy! I've said before on various forums (fora?) that Heroquest was my entry drug - I take that back as I was adventuring and killing Orcs and other monsters in the pages of these game books way before that huge box of Dungeony goodness appeared under the Christmas tree. Having said that, I am rather enjoying playing a Heroquest Game book, The Tyrant's Tomb, at the moment. Might have to revisit The Fellowship of Four next...

Erm boss - not sure this egg hunt was such a....

Another old LPL entry folks - unfortunately these chaps got a good pasting in the voting stakes, up as they were against some rather fine looking and beautifully painted and converted Tintin minis from Mancha - hats off to you sir!

I went for a somewhat tongue-in-cheek Easter theme as it was about that time when I entered them - seems like years ago now!

Thanks to Dolmot again for the excellent gobbo's he furnished me with - Two of the Goblins by the Griffin nest are in fact crewmen from the old Machinerie of Destruction, Skull Crusher - the chap with his hands on his head is a Leadbelcher Crewman.

I painted the loaders stone up as an egg (may paint it back as a stone one day when I get round to procuring Skull Crusher itself...) and filled the nest with some of the Wife's baking beads painted up to look like more eggs - Cheers Love! The other Gobbo's and the Griffin are of course more of Citadel's finest from the 80's.

My daylight bulb went a while back - overuse I think during the 10 week LPL! Forgot I'd taken the above close-ups while it was working so took some more with regular bulbs - hence the change in light quality -thought I'd include them anyway.