State of the Orc Army, November 2025

 So looking back...I haven't gotten my entire Oldhammer orc and goblin army out on the table since May 2024. I have added a couple of units and big figures to the army since then, and some discussion around Warhammer: The Old World and One Page Rules Regiments with the guys I've been playing Dracula's America with got me inspired to carry everything up from the basement, array it out on the dining room table, and take stock of where I'm at.

This is my midlife crisis, by the way. No sports cars, or giant tattoos, or peroxide-blonde mistresses half my age. No, my midlife crisis is building an all-metal Warhammer army that weighs 30 lbs. The mistress might be less expensive...

First up, the goblins - 39 (plus shaman) with hand weapons, and 20 (plus shaman) with bows, two small units of 5 wolf riders with bows, and a wolf chariot, plus a character riding a wolf. I need to dig out and paint some shields for the hand weapons unit. I've got figures here from Warmonger, Knightmare, Black Tree Design, Midlam Miniatures and Games Workshop; I have another unit of wolf riders from Satyr Art Studios, as well as a couple of frankensteined chariots (including one being ridden by a shaman) in my project box still.

Next up, "Da Red Bastids" - 25 Orcs with hand weapons and shields from Warmonger Miniatures. Behind them are four Bog Trolls sculpted by Drew Williams of Satyr Art Studios years ago; I bought them from him before he sold the molds to the now-defunct Troll Soup Miniatures. I have another four Bog Trolls (purchased from Troll Soup) in my project box.

I better look at the trolls. I would run these as River Trolls in Warhammer, I think. The little runt is from Warmonger Miniatures, and the Empire casualty is a Landsknecht casualty from Warlord Games.

Up next are the Old Guard - this unit is made up almost entirely of eBay rescues, and are all sculpts initially released between 1985 and 1996. Figures here are from Games Workshop, Marauder Miniatures, Alternative Armies and Heartbreaker Miniatures.

Behind them are some artillery pieces - an eBay rescue "Doom Diver" from Games Workshop (I have another, new in box, that a friend found in their attic 20+ years after buying it), and an "Orcquebus" from Warmonger Miniatures that I proxy as a Rock Lobber. 

Up next are the "Kingbreakers" - another unit of Warmonger Orcs. I had two figures on a 25x50 base in the back row that the spaced out movement tray didn't allow me to use, so I've subbed in two orcs I painted for a baggage train. 

Behind them you can see my giant, from Old School Miniatures - I've named him Simon, after the friend who gifted him to me. The runt on the base came with the Doom Diver. 

"The Blackfire Boyz" are "Mercenary Orcs" from Warmonger Miniatures and in some of my favorite orcs that Kev Adams ever sculpted; they're encrusted with detail that brings them to life without bogging down the painting. I've painted them in the colors of Averland, the Imperial Province bordering on the Black Fire Pass and frequent defenders against orc raids in the lore of Warhammer Fantasy. The idea being, they've begun imitating the tactics of their imperial foes, and dressing in uniforms stripped off the dead. This was my first big paper banner (and first time drilling a hand for a 100mm steel flagpole) and I'm still really pleased with how it turned out.

Behind them are kind of an odd unit. These 10 "Barnorsk Great Orcs" I got from Black Tree Design in 2018, and were what initially sparked my desire to build an all-metal orc and goblin army. The paintwork is not up to my current standards and I was never happy with the old Citadel shields I put on them, so I'm not sure I'd put them on the gaming table these days; I have quite a few more (obtained with no small degree of frustration given the issues one has these days trying to buy figures from BTD!) primed and awaiting painting, so the thought is always in the back of my mind to retire these fellows and honor them as the progenitors of the entire project. 

I'm really proud of my Boar Boyz. These are from Knightmare Miniatures, and I did a fair amount of converting on these with weapon swaps, creating a standard bearer, and a musician who has a lute on his back. I'm proud of how many pig jokes I worked in - "Sum Pig," "Pork Chop," "Hog Wild," etc., and the banner is a flying pig. I think the supersized banner didn't work out quite as well this time.

"Harboth's Orc Archers," from 1987. I feel a special affinity to these guys - they first released right around the time I was born. I managed to score a phenomenally good deal on a full box set, plus some extra figures, back in 2020, and doing a full unit of 20 with freehanded face shields and a paper banner felt so satisfying. I think I can honestly say this is my favorite unit in the whole army. They're on a split movement tray so I can readily deploy them in two ranks of 10, or four ranks of 5. 

And then the characters:

I'm still really pleased with the Shaman on Wyvern figure I painted earlier this year. Still have to paint some banners for him though. 

So what's next? I have a half-finished unit of orc boyz with a shaman accompanying them, and two more units primed and waiting their turn, plus a couple chariots primed and awaiting painting/final assembly. Then there's a unit of night goblins that could be primed, more goblin archers, more trolls...I have a lot in the back log. 

I think I got demoralized for a while with this project between not having a nice display cabinet for them and realizing I just wasn't enjoying Warhammer: The Old World. The guys I played with during the summer were nice enough, but having to stop every turn and consult three rulebooks plus an errata document wasn't my idea of a good time and the other guys at the game store were quickly leaning into tournament mindsets, and that's just not me. 

Talking about One Page Rules with the guys I play Dracula's America with felt reinvigorating; I've always treated this project as some blend of actual gameable army and art project, a means of saying "Hey, 14 year old me, we finally have a really cool Warhammer army! We did it!" and I think right now I feel like gaming with them again for the first time in months. And maybe that means I'll finish painting another regiment, maybe some more chariots. Maybe I'll finally get my second orc on wyvern out and assembled in 2026. 

Returning to The Old World

 I got invited to a group chat organizing regular games of Warhammer: The Old World at my local game store. The people in the group seem nice and are painting their miniatures - and playing at a points value where I'm not going to destroy my back lugging my all-metal orcs and goblins to the store. 

So I sat down and sorted out a 1000-pt army that should be relatively well balanced. I asked for a little bit of help on Reddit, given my past experiences with being left to my own devices to build army lists. If all goes according to plan I'll be playing games on both Wednesday and Thursday this week - and with my wife's blessing and encouragement, no less! 

Da Pig Hussas - 5 Orc Boar Boyz (Big'uns), with full command, cavalry spears and shields. Standard bearer has the enchanted Banner of Butchery and the leader is wearing a 'Eadbuttin' 'At.

Dem Wots Got Stickas - 20 Night Goblins (pretend they have hooded cloaks) with shortbows, hiding two manic Fanatics in their ranks. Next to them is Wee Whistle, a Level 3 Night Goblin shaman.

Da Red Bastids - 25 Orc Boyz with hand weapons and shields and a full command.

Harboth's Orc Archers - 15 Orc Boyz with warbows, shields and full command. Behind them is a Doom Diver catapult with an Orc Bully to improve morale.

Big Boss Yorzolg - Orc Big Boss, army general, great weapon, Trollhide Trousers and a Charmed Shield on a Boar Chariot.

How they're shown here is more or less my plan for deployment as well, though if I can put the Doom Diver Catapult on a hill I will do so. Hopefully the Pig Hussas and Yorzolg can hit some enemy units in the flanks and cause some extra damage that way while the orcs soak up some charges and the Night Goblins...well, they're mainly there to launch the ultra-destructive and uncontrollable fanatics into the center of the table. 

October Progress Report

 I'll be honest, I've slowed to a crawl with the goblins. I've painted 16 over the past month, but I'm kind of feeling burned out and maybe sludgey towards the orc and goblin project right now. Some of that is, I just painted 16 goblins and a giant and I'm ready to do something else for a bit. Some of it's that anything I paint is going right back into storage as soon as it's varnished because we're having trouble finding space in our house for me to put a display case and put my army up on display. It's a small house and other things have gotten prioritized; things we might have put downstairs in the basement otherwise have to be upstairs for my wife to be able to use them - her MS has left her with nerve damage in her legs that makes walking up and down stairs challenging for her. At this point, if I get a display case it will probably end up in the basement next to the laundry area. C'est la vie.

Goblins aren't much of anything to look at, but I am well pleased with how the giant (Bert from Old School Miniatures) has turned out:

And I've also painted the first two figures for wargaming with samurai:

The figure in the blue kimono is "Toshiro, Male Ronin" from Reaper Miniatures:

And his companion is an unnamed ronin from Bad Squiddo Games. Yes, her kimono is based on the Arizona Green Tea can.

They kind of have a "winter and spring" vibe that I think means I'm going to end up painting a "Summer" and "Autumn" ronin to go with them. 

January Painting

 *blows off the dust* I guess it's been a minute since I updated around here, huh? Well, I do have some painted miniatures to show off.

First up are "Totleger's Carvers," my first regiment for the "Defenders of Vogelburgh," my 3rd edition Empire/Halflings army for this year's Old World Army Challenge. A unit of halberdiers (or Helblitzen, as they're called in the 3rd edition Warhammer Armies book), the human figures are War of the Roses infantrymen from Front Rank (since as of 1987, GW hadn't settled on a landsknecht aesthetic for the Empire yet), supported by a mercenary ogre from Knightmare Miniatures and a particularly feisty rooster from Dunkeldorf. Chickens of various types are going to be a theme throughout this army. 

The banner is painted on graph paper and entirely freehand. 

Here's a better look at the ogre; the barrel on his base is a resin bit from Dunkeldorf, and represents the regiment's lager ration.

With these figures finished around January 21st, rather than jumping right into the next unit for the Old World Army Challenge, I decided to paint up eight more orc archers from the 1987 Harboth's Orc Archers boxed set. I painted a dozen of them, including Harboth himself, back in 2021 as part of my first entry into the Old World Army Challenge, but wanted to finish the rest of the command group and enough rank-and-file to bring the unit up to a proper 20 figures. And that meant I also had to paint shields and a banner for the regiment.

The box describes Harboth and his boyz painting their shields with the faces of particularly noteworthy enemies; I went instead for a variety of grinning, disgruntled and suffering faces, with pallid green skin and glowing orange eyes. Are they orcs? Zombies? Who knows!

I went for a similar face, framed with wild white hair, for the banner; in retrospect it's got a little bit of an Eddie vibe from the band Iron Maiden, which I think works well.

 

Again, the banner is freehand on painted graph paper.

Finally, here's a shot of Harboth's shield; I had originally done a plain shield for him back in 2021, but pried it off and replaced it with an original Citadel plastic shield from the 80s. As I painted the face, it started to look like one eye was squinting a bit so I added a little Carroburg Crimson wash for a bleeding, empty socket. It differentiates him just a little bit from the boyz under his command.

All in all, January was a very productive month for me; February is shaping up to be less so, but we'll see what the next 12 days bring.

Also, I have bought the rulebooks for Warhammer: The Old World, as well as movement trays with spacers to adjust for the changed base sizes for the new game. I am hoping to be able to bring out my all metal orcs and goblins army and begin actually playing with them!

Old School Miniatures "Starship Skirmishers" Kickstarter

 Old School Miniatures has a Kickstarter going for scifi skirmish figures, and you know me, I love scifi skirmish gaming. Jamie was kind enough to put a call out for volunteers to paint up some of the new figures, and I volunteered, receiving one figure. Between Royal UK Mail and the US Postal Service, I didn't receive it until November 22nd, halfway through the Kickstarter! I knuckled down though and got my contribution cleaned up, based, primed and painted - with 90% of the painting happening TODAY. 

And to top it all off, I can confidently say it's one of the best paintjobs I've ever done.

There's only four days left in the Kickstarter if you want to get a head start on adding this figure, and some other great Rogue Trader-inspired figures, to your collection.