3 D's: Daemons & Dungeons & Dragons

[Brother Muninn]

Very interesting. I tend to base once or twice, then a wash then 3 layers, max. So perhaps I should just up my time investment. I'd never get anything done!

Great work.

It takes a while, but after a bit it does get faster.


This wasn't the mini I was referencing yesterday. My workday ended up lasting several hours longer than expected so I switched days with this one.

This mean looking fella is a Red Mantis assassin from Reaper's pathfinder line. I bought him to be a part of my Dark Sun game as well. Once the adventurers had become a big enough nuisance the main antagonist would send this guy to take care of them. The reason I stalled on this mini was because I was at a loss for how to paint his weapons. Although now that the game is over I figured I'd go ahead & try a fancy colored metal technique I'm trying to figure out. This probably wasn't the best mini to try it on, but it does make it stand out a bit.


~Muninn

[mdiscala]

I remember those guys from the Dark Sun video game. They all had names like Clik'liki.

[Brother Muninn]

I remember those guys from the Dark Sun video game. They all had names like Clik'liki.

You're thinking of Thri Kreen, which are a race of six-armed mantis people like this guy.


The other one is a dude in a mantis helmet, which I thought would be perfect for the setting considering the Thri Kreen.

~Muninn

[Maglok]

Sweet, I have that red mantis assassin mini myself.

[Brother Muninn]

This was the mini I was planning on painting Tuesday. Years ago I was part of a Legend of the Five Rings campaign & bought up a big mess of old Clan War minis to go along with it. For a while I really liked the idea of playing a Phoenix Clan bodyguard, so I started painting up this gal, Shiba Tsukune.

I actually based the color & scheme from a really well painted mini on CMoN, by a mini painter named "mrika." A year or two later I actually met mrika at a convention where she was painting to kill time while her boyfriend played cards. She's a phenomenal painter.

Just so you don't think that I busted my hump painting those robe details, here's what she looked like before I started yesterday.


I have some concerns about today's mini. It's big & awkward, so I might have to switch mid-day.

~Muninn

[Demoulius]

Hmmmm hump why is there armour in the way though

Another question... Aside from the 40K deamon prince beholder thingy have you actually got (or got plans for) a beholder? With that I mean D&D beholder Theyre so awesome ^^

Also those guys remind me of something... Maaantiiiis people maaaantiiiis people.

Talk like mantis taste like...people?

[Purplebeard]

The last two figures (the Red Mantis Assassin and Shiba Tsukune - hope I have that right) look especially good.

[Brother Muninn]

Hmmmm hump why is there armour in the way though

Another question... Aside from the 40K deamon prince beholder thingy have you actually got (or got plans for) a beholder? With that I mean D&D beholder Theyre so awesome ^^

Also those guys remind me of something... Maaantiiiis people maaaantiiiis people.

Talk like mantis taste like...people?

Well crab & mantis all taste like chicken, so it'd make sense. Probably related somehow. I don't have any plans for a Beholder, mostly because I don't have any minis of them.

The last two figures (the Red Mantis Assassin and Shiba Tsukune - hope I have that right) look especially good.

Thanks, they were both mostly done prior to my painting challenge so that probably has something to do with it. Or just the fact that they're both great minis to begin with.


The mini I intended for today was a total time-sink. I based & washed & started on the details, but it just wasn't working out for me. So with a few hours left in the day I brought in a new, unpainted mini & started from scratch. Meet Ember.

For those of you who remember the D&D 3rd Edition release 12 years ago you might also remember the line of metal miniatures that came out at the same time. Along with generic heroes, they also put out minis for each of the iconic class characters like Regdar (the Fighter), Jozan (the Cleric), and the rest. Ember here is the human Monk that was released. I think I picked her up about 8 years ago online while i was living in Japan.

Either way, the mini is simple, clean, and easy to paint. My only gripe is that she's a little small. I don't know how large the character is, but if I were to judge from the mini I'd guess maybe 5'1".

~Muninn

[Brother Muninn]

Today's offering is a little later than usual. Normally I can shoot and upload before work , but I had to start at 7:30 a.m., and have only just now been able to take a break.

I originally bought this mini to be an Eladrin Warlord for a D&D game that never actually got off the ground. I loved the way the mini looked online, but once I got my hands on it I noticed the head has some odd proportions to it. The cheeks are sunken, the ears are high on the skull, the eyes aren't quite level, etc. The forehead was also really high, so I modeled her a circlet to mitigate that.

If you're curious, & you don't know 4th edition D&D, they divided elves into two categories. Woodland type elves (copper & wild elves in prior editions) stayed "Elves", while magical leaning subraces (like the sun & moon elves) became "Eladrin". Eladrin also tend to have seasonal themes, so I picked a summery green.

~Muninn

[Brother Muninn]

With this, I'm done with my second week of painting.

This is Hiruma Tokaji. Years back I played a Crab Clan samurai with few social graces, and fewer qualms doing whatever it took to complete a mission. A very ends-justify-the-means type of character. He was a tough, sneaky scout character, so this mini seemed to fit well. Later in the game he ended up getting horribly burned by some fire shugenja, so the bandages across his face and arm ended up being completely appropriate.

I know I've got the calendar in my other plog, but here are all the minis lined up together.


So now that the week is done I'm moving on to my week of 40k Xenos minis. Since they aren't Fantasy figs I probably won't post them here, but you can pop into my Mini Challenge log to see them.

~Muninn

[Satan]

Loving the diversity, and I think you've gona for a great variety of colours too - it's easy getting stuck with a few ones you like the most.

[Daniel36]

I really need to do this too. It would motivate me like crazy. And it would get my "special miniature" stash painted up too.
Maybe just a mini per two days... Anyways, lovely collection so far.

[Brother Muninn]

Loving the diversity, and I think you've gona for a great variety of colours too - it's easy getting stuck with a few ones you like the most.

Thanks, I've been trying to avoid doing too much of the same colors/techniques. I have noticed that I've used red the most so far (The Cleric, the Fallen, Mantis Assasin, & Shiba Tsunune) but I dont think I've overpowered it. I imagine this week there will be a bunch of green.

I really need to do this too. It would motivate me like crazy. And it would get my "special miniature" stash painted up too.
Maybe just a mini per two days... Anyways, lovely collection so far.

It's a great way to get a few done that you might not do without it. I tend to look forward to future projects & leave unfinished ones behind, so I don't know if I'd have ever picked up some of these minis otherwise.

Thanks for your regular comments/support guys.

~Muninn

[Brother Muninn]

Now that I'm into the Warhammer Fantasy Week of my May Challenge I thought I'd show you what I'm up to: The first mini is an old Black Guard figure that was given to me about a decade ago.

I always see Dark Elves with purple or red so I wanted to blay around with an alternate, but equally malevolent scheme. My idea would be a black armor with gold edging, and ochre yellow accents. The skin didn't turn out quite how I'd have liked it, so that'll be someting for me to play around with in the future. Maybe something a little more purplish to balance out all the yellows.

Monday's mini I picked up at my local stores discount shelf. People drop off bunches of metal minis for him to sell on commission, & I happened across this one. I don't play Skaven, but it's nice to have a couple tunnel crawlers around.


I only have three minis left to do and it should be smooth sailing since today's shouldn't be too much trouble and Wednesday & Thursday happens to be my weekend. Hope you like what you see.

~Muninn

[Brother Muninn]

Today's mini came from the Storm of Chaos a few years back. A Dwarf Doomseeker.

Yorrik & I split a blister back in the day since he only wanted one, and I like to paint all sorts of different minis. I kinda feel like I slacked a bit on this guy, like I've got a bit of tunnel vision going on with the end of my challenge so close. As great as this challenge has been I'm ready for it to be over.

~Muninn

[Brother Muninn]

Well my May challenge is over, and in the last two days of it I painted up 5 new minis.

I figured I'd finish big, so Wednesday I finished an orc champion, then Thursday, the last day of my challenge I painted four: A Night Goblin Shaman, a Fanatic, and a regular troop, as well as a Dwarven Cleric from the D&D Chainmail line years ago. They're harder to come by, but there were some quality minis.

~Muninn

[Brother Muninn]

Here's the final photo of all the minis I ended up painting in May.


Now back to your regularly scheduled Daemon log.

I had the chance to refresh & recalibrate my plans a little bit, & I noticed that one thing I wanted to make my list more versatile (& more easily transferable to fantasy) are a few more Daemonic Heralds. I have five planned at the moment: Two Tzeentch Heralds on chariots and three Heralds on foot (Khorne, Slaanesh, & Tzeentch).

Here's the progress on the foot-sloggers:

You can see that the Herald of Khorne is actually a previous edition Bloodletter Champion. They're big, they're beefy, and they stand out nicely compared to the plastics, so I figured he'd make a great Herald.

The Slaanesh Herald is the Masque. You can't go wrong with a special character to fill the role of your Herald. Plus if I ever felt like adding the Masque into my army list I'd have one at hand.

The Tzeentch mini is the oft-maligned finecast Herald that comes with the Disc. It's pretty darn expensive, so if I was going to shell out the coin for the disc, I was going to make use of the mini too. It's actually not a shabby little model, & I think it'll look pretty nice once I apply my Blue Horror scheme to it.

& Here's the first Chariot:

You can see he's pretty much just blue-tacked in place at the moment, nothing glued. I ordered a pair of 60x100mm blank assault bases from Dragon Forge, that should serve perfectly. I attempted to draw in the bases on the photo below the mini. I really like the way the guy is turning out, but one of the things I'm not totally fond of is just how high up the mini is. Sure he's on a flying chariot, but he's gonna be really visible and get shot. A lot.

More when I have the chance.

~Muninn

[Demoulius]

So much demon love (not the Slaanesh way )but no Beholder? I feel cheated...

You can always make one of your out of a ball of greenstuff

[Brother Muninn]

It's been a while since I last updated. A few months ago I started a small miniature's blog, and have been failing to update my project logs along with it. Longs story short: I'm not dead, just blogging.

Since my last update quite a bit has happened like 6th edition, Dark Vengeance, some commission work & a FLGS painting competition. The most important thing though, is that my wife & I are expecting fraternal twins.

My short list of potential names include: Luke & Leia, Romulus & Remus, Mario & Luigi, Padma & Parvati, or He-Man & She-Ra

Back to the minis though.

I've started back in with my Keeper of Secrets Conversion, and here's how he looked as of two days ago:


I decided to make a few changes:
* I no longer like the shoulder spike. The mini had enough jutting spiky bits, it didn't need two more to distract attention. I fashioned jewels for the brackets of the shoulder guards instead
* One of the big selling points of the mini is how it hovers above the base. To give it a little elevation I tipped over some imperial bastion terrain and attached the flying base to that instead.
* Once they were in place, the tentacle clusters made the torso look too small, so I added a pair of hip plates from parts on the Talos sprues. This will also help when it comes to painting to be able to pull colors from the upper body to the lower body as well, hopefully giving it a more uniform look.

Since then I've been working on the base, using greenstuff to add elevation & extra detail bits.

The last thing I'm waiting on before getting into painting is a spear. I decided that the Prince axe, while burly and violent, doesn't really fit with the aesthetic. Slaaneshi daemons should be impaling enemies, not chopping them (subtle, I know). Instead I'm going to do a weapon swap with a spear from the Tomb Kings Necropolis Knights box. I don't know if it'll fit just right, but I should have the bit in the next few days, and we'll see then.

Either way, the mini has come a long long way, and I'll be excited to get it to the next stage.

~Muninn

[Thitanium Prince]

That's what I call a creative conversion really looking forward to see how the changes will work on the mini