The First Law – Rudd Threetrees & His Named Men

So, the first thing is to make the miniatures. I got myself a couple of sprues for the Frostgrave Barbarians and, using the wiki as a guide, started work on each of the characters.

I will list them all below with their name underneath so you can see who is who…

The idea is to paint them all up mainly as something nice to look at but also maybe for use in Rangers Of Shadow Deep?

I could substitute the Gnolls for Shanka then you see!

Painted up the old tired leader of his Named Men, Rudd Threetrees. Still a hardy fighter, armed with his sword and shield.

Had a lot of fun with these miniatures. They paint up very well as the Barbarian plastics are packed full of detail and a lot of the accessories etc were taken off and instead added as optional extras. It means that you’ve got a lot more clean lines on the miniatures.

Will most likely be moving onto Black Dow as the second miniature. Looking forward to how the whole group will come together in the end.

Worked on the second character last night. Here we have Black Dow with his axe and dagger in hand. Tried to make him look a bit grimmer…

The Blood For The Blood God paint from Games Workshop is blooming awesome and works so well once you get used to it. Wanted to try and tell a story here, as if he’s just stabbed someone and is following them through the snow as their blood drips down onto the snow.

Think I’m going to do Harding Grim next as I do love archers!

One of the hardest characters to make from The First Law is Logen Ninefingers. He is, for me anyway, the best representation of a Barbarian and a Berserker in literature when he turns into The Bloody Nine. However, he’s really tough to get right!

Some of the only good evidence for his look comes from the graphic novel for the series…

…and a little bit of fanart include this work on a 3D render of his facial features. This is more how I see him during a later book which I won’t mention for fear of spoilers.

So, I have to look for a gruff looking Barbarian/Fighter type but one who is a lot leaner than you’d imagine a Barbarian to be. I could run with the trenchcoat/duster look that he has in the graphic novels or try and go past that and run with a look more in-line with a typical Northman.

Either way, it’s going to be a bit rough finding a good model for Logen! Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Finished up another character for the warband today, Harding Grim, the archer of the bunch. Tried to get him looking a little younger than the others with that blond beard going on.

Really enjoyed painting him up and getting used to the Barbarian plastics a lot more now, exploring the details a little and tweaking things with the shading and highlighting.

I just need to add a little bit of blood into the mix for the base to show that they’re currently off hunting something!

Another day and another miniature finished. Now we have the bullish Tul Duru Thunderhead with his hefty sword in hand, ready to cut down some Shanka.

He was very much the simplest model I’ve worked on so far but I think the paint scheme worked out well. He stands out very much from the others which is cool too and the weapon swap from the Soldier kit worked out which is good.

So, I did a bit of headhunting (literally) and found this Marauder head from an old Warhammer Chaos box that I had been thinking of for use with Logen.

I need to tidy him up a bit here and there and the old head was a bit ratty so cleaned up the paint job to work with a new undercoat, but otherwise, it looks like it will work.

I think it works nicely as a shaggy-bearded version of Logen with his angry ‘berserk’ roar on his face. He is also carrying allllll the knives, as you can never have too many. I think once he has been painted up he’ll look the part!

So, last week I actually took some time to finish off Logen Ninefingers before the weekend. I think he has come out rather well and would be a good representation of him when he would have been stomping around with Rudd and the gang.

As befitting the man who can never have too many knives, he has them stuck into his belt on either side and he’s carrying one PLUS his sword. That seems like enough to get the job done right?

Time to send some fools back to the mud! Oh, and finish painting Forley and Dogman…

So I got stuck in yesterday and finished off the last two members of the Named Men under Rudd Threetrees. Here we have Dogman…

…and the very unfortunate Forley The Weakest. I think the group ties together really nicely and it was fun to look at the research for each character and put my own spin on them.

It is always good to be able to finish off something and put a cap on a project. These fellows will now sit in pride of place on my bookshelf next to the books that inspired them.