A Tale of Four Gamers: The Director’s Cut part II
Earlier this year Simon Grant, the man with the most impressive beard in the Studio, approached myself, Nick Bayton and Dom Murray (my boss) to see if we would like to take part in A Tale of Four Gamers in White Dwarf. For those of you that are well-versed in White Dwarf lore, you'll know that A Tale of Four Gamers has been around for many years, but this was the first time that we had taken it to Middle-earth.
Because there's only a limited amount of space in White Dwarf for all our pictures and experiences, I borrowed Simon and Nick's miniatures from last month to show off on the blog. Here's what they had to say about their armies as they stand so far:
Simon: Silver and black are the dominant colours of a traditional Gondor army and mine are no exception. I've found from experience [Si has painted many Gondorians over the years - Dan] that to rush either of these colours is a mistake - they are so prominent on the miniatures that a poor paintjob will really show up. My advice is simple: take your time and they'll look great. On my Gondor army for A Tale of Four Gamers, I painted the armour with the new Leadbelcher metal colour before applying a wash of Nuln Oil. I then layered the armour panels with Ironbreaker, then with Runefang Steel as a final highlight. For the black cloaks and tunics, I picked out the rippled fabric with a 1:1 mix of Abaddon Black and Dawnstone, then edge highlighted them with Dawnstone.
Nick: The Uruk-hai Scouts are such great models, full of flair and dynamism - they were a real joy to paint. I wanted the force to be unified, yet be able to tell the war bands apart, so each warband was given a specific colour - black for Mauhúr's Marauders, dark brown for Lurtz and his crew, and light brown for the drummer and his followers. I then fell back on one of my army painting tricks - highlighting everything by mixing in the same colour. The flesh, the cloth colours, the leather work, the hair, even the bases, were highlighted by mixing Kommando Khaki (now Karak Stone) into whatever I had used as a basecoat. This provided a drab, realistic look, which unified the models and made the force look cohesive.
We started A Tale of Four Gamers before the new paints came out, and ensuring consistency in my paint mixes was difficult. Luckily, when the new Citadel Paint range came out, it included many of the colours I used to mix. So rather than spend ages getting a mix right, I can now use the paint straight from the pot - much better. For the flesh of each warrior I now use a Base of Doombull Brown, a layer of Reikland Fleshshade, a further layer of Doombull Brown and then a highlight of Tuskgor Fur. For the cloth I used two methods: Abaddon Black highlighted with Skavenblight Dinge and Stormvermin Fur; and Rhinox Hide highlighted with Gorthor Brown and Baneblade Brown.
