As the weather has turned decidedly chilly as we venture into the penultimate month of the year, here at the Buffet we turn our minds to things frosty and hirsute.
Which is my way of saying welcome to Frostgrave Mo’vember! For this month, myself and fellow bloggers Roger over at Rantings from Under the Wargames Table and Simon at Fantorical are indulging is a combined project – Mo’vember, where the goal is to paint one moustachioed figure each week and Frostgrave, where we each paint a warband for the game. Should any of the members of your warband have the requisite facial hair, then you’re already ahead…
However, whilst I jumped at the chance to paint up a suitable warband, as I don’t actually own the game, I was initially a little perplexed as to what exactly makes up a warband. However, the author of said work, Joseph A McCullough, posted this handy guide on his blog, detailing the costs of each type of troop, making my life a little easier.
So, for my 500 gcs, I decided to take an Apprentice, a Templar, a Barbarian, an Archer and an Infantryman, which along with my free Wizard, means that I’ve got 6 miniatures to paint. However, of the figures I’ve selected, only two had the requisite facial hair, so I needed two additional figures to ensure I had the four necessary for Mo’vember, so that’s another two figures, totalling 8. For one of these, I decided to paint up a handy dwarf, but have yet to decide what the final figure will be…
So, without further ado, let me introduce you to my wizard and his apprentice…
The figure on the left is my apprentice and is the Wizard character from the HeroQuest boardgame, who looks sufficiently young to be an Apprentice, although he does appear to have chosen his outfit from the Seventies. The figure on the right is my Wizard, and came from Black Tree Design’s Fantasy Realms line, until they sold this on. I believe that it was supposed to represent a certain wizard famous for his fireworks and the wearing of grey clothing and is still available, from Scotia Grendel, as Godefridus the Wizard, for £3.00.
It would appear that having read far too many AAR’s for Frostgrave using scenery sourced from Christmas decorations, the colour scheme for my wizards was influenced by this, hence the festive colours above.
The next shot shows the first of my troops and my dwarf.
The figure on the left is a GW man-at-arms with a halberd, who is my Infantryman. His colour scheme echoes that of the wizards, without being an obvious copy. The figure on the left is a dwarf arquebusier from Ral Partha Europe, available from their site at £1.75. This is a lovely little figure, with plenty of detail, including a pouch, sheathed dagger and strap with pouches of black powder across his back. However, as he is bearded, he fulfills the criteria for Mo’vember, although he can’t be part of the warband, as his weapon is a little too advanced…
I apologise for only showing WIPs this time around, but hopefully by my next post, we will have some completed figures, along with my Templar and a very familiar Barbarian…
Comments and feedback appreciated, as usual.
Carrion Crow's Buffet 
Great start Jez, and a cracking quartet with which to begin. The “Heroquest” apprentice in particular brings back loads of memories of a misspent youth playing that wonderful game – great fun!! You’ve also fiendishly distracted me by posting up that helpful link to Ral Partha Europe, courtesy of your splendid-looking Dwarf. I wasn’t aware of their UK site before now and was horrified to see they do the “Battletech” metal minis!! The only thing keeping me from this range in the past was US postage… 😉
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Thanks Simon. Felt a little bad that I hadn’t completed an actual mo’vember entry by this weekend, but should have two done by next weekend, so it should even out. And you weren’t aware of RPE? Glad to have made you aware of it then, as they have a lot of nice figures, including the one I’m using as my Templar.
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Nice start Jez, I too remember that “heroquest” wizard, and I seen to remember that man-at-arms figure from your site a couple of months back? but I cant for the life of me remember who he was meant to represent!! (it’ll come to me….man-at-arms….man-at-arms….man-at-arms, no, no idea, oh well).
Glad you were able to get a breakdown of the point (sorry cost in gold coins) values of the figures, I’ve been meaning to send this too you but haven’t had time. Also I didn’t want you to think you to adhere to the 500gc rules (we don’t need no stinking rules, man!!) though it is nice that we are all do this.
It seems we are all doing barbarians as well, must be holiday season in Cimmeria.
Cheers Roger.
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Thanks Roger. I’m not sure which GW boxed game these came from, but I ended up with 6 of these chaps, two with halberds, two with swords and two with silly looking spears. The spear wielders became my MOTU Man-at-Arms and the Frostgrave Archer.
As for keeping to the rules, I wasn’t overly concerned with the points cost, more what the options were, as I could have painted any old figures and then found out that they didn’t constitute a warband.
And who doesn’t like barbarians? Certainly livens up those stuffy dinner parties “treading the cucumber sandwiches beneath his sandalled feet..” 😉
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What a fabulous idea, looking forward to seeing what shuffles off the desk this month.
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Thanks Michael. As we’ve all got completely different figures, there should be a nice variety of fantasy fare to look at. Plus the bonus non-Frostgrave Mo’vember figures. All we can guarantee is facial hair of some description.
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Not Having any hair left in RL will dream of hirsute freinds and the hairiest of fantasy figures this month [ hmmm no hairy females chaps ] i guess you are all “NORMAL” after all
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Not true, Chris. You have got hair – it’s just migrated south…
Of course, now I’m tempted to do a bearded lady. Must…resist…lol
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