Rangers of Shadow Deep – Ghouls

Another off shoot of my huge Rangers of Shadow Deep – solo play project. This time I was looking at the bestiary options for ghouls. I love the Mantic Games zombies and ghoul sprues, but I felt that even with a decent paint scheme the poses and look of the ghouls would be too similar to my zombies.

I called upon the hive mind in The Rangers of Shadow Deep Facebook group to see their solutions to this problem. Some just relied on a different skin tone and happily used the Mantic Games options, but some had used the GW Goblin Warriors.

I tried several ways to buy these cheaply, or just get one sprue but this never came to fruition.

I gave in and went direct to GW. I would usually visit third parties and enjoy the 5 to 10% off, but the minis came in above the £20 minimum for free postage and packaging so it worked out cheaper buying from GW even at RRP.

I decided that I wanted a similar look to the actual official paintjob, but realised that painting them all the same would make gameplay difficult.

There are four ghoul types in Rangers of Shadow Deep, but I started by priming the minis on the sprue, then cutting them off and set them in the slotted bases and dry brushed them.

I dry brushed them with a mix of Army Painter Barbarian Flesh and Vallejo Light Flesh and then considered how to differentiate them and get full use of the box of 36 minis.

Rangers of Shadow Deep is minis agnostic, but the game is well supported by NorthStar miniatures and most players are leaning on D&D and fantasy battle game collections, but apart from a brilliant bits box I picked up ages ago, my options are sometimes limited.

The four main kinds of ghouls are:

Ghouls – unknown cause for the transition, but appears to be from eating infected / magically poisoned meat and the individual becomes a cruel beast intent on feasting on the living and the dead.

Ghoul Fiend – Meant to be larger and proof of a hierarchy of sorts amongst ghouls. These ghouls seem to have been warriors in their previous life, and prove to be harder to kill.

Ghoul Flingers – These creatures seem to have garnered a knack for bringing down their dinner by throwing bones at them, tripping them and attacking them once they’re down.

Ghoul Rotters – For some the infection seems to progress to a phase where they rot to death. All the time just as hungry as before and perhaps are meant to infect more meat and animals so that the ghouls continue to spread their insidious infection as they travel.

WiP

Test schemes to ID different ghouls.

The Flingers (Right in pics) will have bone weapons and something on their belt to suggest a supply of bones to chuck. The addition pictured is from a NorthStar Gnoll sprue.

The Fiends (Left in pics) are meant to have been warriors before becoming ghouls and be bigger. Don’t really want to bulk out the minis with green stuff or put on pedestals to look bigger. I have added bits box Mantic Games skeleton armour as hints to their military past and chose the ones with weapons rather than the standard dagger most are wielding.

The standard ghouls (middle in pics) are going to have colourful loin clothes and have gore on their weapons. Might try to use basing as an identifier too.

It seemed like an easy and obvious place to start with rotters.

My zombies have white eyes, so my ghouls will have red eyes.

I hit all my ghouls with a Reikland Fleshshade wash and then considered how to separate them easily.

I started to separate by weapon type. I found that there were 4 or 5 minis that have improvised wood or bone weapons (my flingers hopefully). There were 4 or 5 with axes and a mace (my fiends to be) and vast majority have daggers of one size or another.

I chose to just work on one of the 18 mini sprues at a time, because the second sprue is identical to the first.

I chose to look at the dagger wielding minis and decided on my rotters just by the poses less animated and active than the others. I figured that if they are rotting it will limit their ability to run and leap around.

I used a Citadel Camoshade green wash around the spots. I picked out the spots with Vallejo Light Flesh and then used Blood for the Blood God and Nurgle’s Rot technical paints to get them looking rotten and oozy. ?
I used Flesh Eater Red Contrast Paint for the eyes.
I decided that the rot would transfer to their weapons, so used Leadbelcher, orange and Typhus Corrosion brown for a rusty look.

The added pieces of armour are from a Mantic Games bits box I got on ebay a few years ago. I think they are from a Mantic Games skeleton sprue but not sure which type as it as it was just bits in a bag. Some of the bits are meant to be chest plates, but fit better and look more ancient strapped to a shoulder etc.
I believe they all had a small amount of Agrax Earthshade around the spots and mutations before I picked them out again with the Valejo Light Flesh. I left the metal fairly clean in comparison to the rusty rotters.

These were a lot of fun to paint.

The bags with the hands and feet are from the Mantic Games Ghoul sprue. I liked the blood soaked bottom to the bag idea. After using some Blood for the Blood God paint I hit it with some Nulin Oil to try and give it blood stain / dry and recent blood mix. I think it came out well.

For the tan and bone colours I used Zandri Dust, Morghast Bone and Wraithbone.

I used different washes for the hair and on the loin clothes to give some variety. Seraphim Sepia, Athonian Camoshade, Snakebite Leather and Darkoath Contrast worked really well.

When I did my Gnoll Archers I added white flowers to the basing as a useful signifier and it did help when playing. So as it worked before I went back to it for these ranged ghouls and I think it will help and it looks cool too obviously. ?

These four basic ghouls rap up the first 18 minis on the first sprue.

I will check the scenarios that involve these minis and see which type is more prevalent and focus on making more of those.

Now I have a concept and a method I imagine any additional minis I need will be easier and faster to complete. I am guessing I will need more basic ghouls with their colourful loin clothes.

I used winter grass and leaves, punched using my Greenstuff World punch, to decorate the base. These basing choices look different enough to help ID them as my basic ghouls but with the same earth flock etc to unify the ghouls overall.

I used some bold citadel base colours for the loin clothes as planned and Blood for the Blood God technical paint on the weapons, with some splash back on the attacking arm to suggest some recent bloodletting.

I am happy that I will be able to play with these minis in game without being confused as to which type they are and I am happy with the paint jobs.

I might share the other paint jobs when I paint the second sprue, but for now I am moving on with my main project, mainly terrain, to get more games played of my main playthrough.

Thanks for all the likes and the mention on the unofficial hobby hangout with Gerrcinn and the German. ?

I was asked about the scale of these minis.

So…

Left to Right.
NorthStar female soldier sprue
Gandalf
GW Goblin (one of the taller ones)
Nighthaunt
GW Goblin (one of the smaller ones)
Scibor Dwarf
NorthStar Barbarian

Hope this helps if you are considering these as an option for you.