Frostgrave Ghost Archipelago

Arpitan Greyscales is my Captain. Heavy armour and Harpoon are what I am claiming for him. With a single increase to speed to negate the -1 to movement for heavy armour.

His powers are Hurl, Evade, Mitigation, Sprint and Wraithwalk.

Lombard Occitan is my Vine Warden. His abilities are Plant Walk, Snare, Brambles and Earth Wave.

As I did with other crews I am giving him a throwing knife as a way to represent his pistols on the model.

The rest of my crew have found names and load outs and I just have Lombard and the last crew member to paint.

At Salute I didn’t spend much but had a great catch up with friends. I did pick up The Orc Officer (Lombard) and my last crew member. I found the Atlantic Miniatures stand and some gorgeous goblins and one of these will be a crew member that is never far from Lombard. They have come to the crew of the Good Ship Milicent as a package deal. Zebre the goblin carries a battle axe and I can’t wait to get him and his Vine Warden friend painted up.

Black Scorpion Miniatures are at Salute this year, (next week. Yay.) and so will I be. While I am there I will pick up an Orc Officer to become my Vine Warden. He is clearly mad though, because not only does he speak with the plants, but he even thinks he is made from fungus. Bonkers mental.

I feel that as I can only have 4 specialists in my list and I have 4 dwarves that I should try and use them in that role. The WYSIWYG is leaning me towards fielding the men with pistols levelled as Crossbowmen and having a shield added to one swordsman to become a Man-at-Arms, and a dagger added to the other swordsman to be a Tomb Robber.

This all would mean that Greyscales becomes my Heritor and I need to pick some appropriate abilities that hopefully tie in with his look.

The mice can be my basic crew list fillers and I have licence to think up one last crewman to join the ranks. Might try and find something with a double handed weapon or a hand weapon and shield to take advantage of the stat improvements that come with those.

Still unsure how best to bring this second crew together. Greyscales will definitely be the Heritor or Warden, but I am not sure my pistol toting dwarves should be crossbowmen, as the other crew already has these. I have 8 models already. The new Underworlds buccaneer expansion looks really cool and might be a neat fix, but I had hoped to find an Orc pirate that would fit the crew too.

This guy followed the same recipe for the paint job as the dwarves below.

Reaper Miniatures metal mouses. Mice mice baby. They caught my eye, didn’t have guns and though they look odd, being a barbarian, mouseketeer and pirate, them just having a simple hand weapon made them simple thugs.

They got a prime of black then a zenith of Army Painter Leather Brown. Then they each got a different wash. Barbarian with Reikland Fleshshade, the Mouseketeer in Agrax Earthshade and pirate with Nulin Oil. Then they all got a Zandri Dust / white belly and chin. The pirate was taken darker with some Rhinox Hide. The eyes were painted Wyldwood Contrast and the metals were a mix of Runelord Brass and Stormhost Silver. For the Mouseketeer’s hat and tabbard I used Macragge Blue, Nighthaunt Gloom and Nihilakh Oxide.

Still not sure how this crew will come together but I will keep painting and hope for inspiration to come to me.

Still undecided how to field him, but this guy’s nautical look made him a must have for my second warband. I had been hoping to get into guildball in a bigger way and got Greyscales in a sale.

I ended up gluing him down badly on a plank, but decided that it gave the base an interesting composition. I glued spare pieces of metal sprue under the base to ensure he doesn’t topple over. I added the chain, again to add a gram or two to keep him balanced. He is already a metal mini so he has quite the heft now.

Deathguard Green primed, with Contrast paints mainly for the leather. The GW camoshade colour was great for the clothing. Mephiston Red over a base of the dark red contrast paint for the scarf and the trousers.

I am still piecing together ideas for my second crew, but in the meantime painting a model I know I will definitely include in the party seemed like positive progress.

I am going to roll off the Heritor abilities in the book for the second crew and see if a model that suits those abilities stands out for me.

I also remembered I have a Fisherman Guild, Guild Ball mini called Greyscales who has a very dynamic pose I picked up in a sale years ago. It would be nice to use him as a Warden or Heritor but will paint up soon and check the abilities before I name and place him in the crew.

It dawned on me that this world is still in the Frostgrave model, so there’s no reason for there not to be other fantasy races in your crew.

I bought some Black Scorpion pirate dwarves just because I loved the look of them. Some have pistols which will pose me with a tough call to place them in the crew types, but I could also ignore a pistol in a belt like this guy and have him just be a thug with hand weapon.

As I typed this I remembered there are some really cool looking Pirate Orcs out there that might make for an awesome addition.

I think I may try to go for all fantasy characters and will look to the book and the Heritor abilities to try and inspire which models will be right to lead this force.

I enjoyed this project, but have slowly realised… I don’t know anyone playing this game, before or during The Event.

So, I will probably end up creating a warband for them to play against. Though with Frostgrave and the Frostgrave magazine providing solo ideas I could probably just take the Crew through some scenarios and just make the bestiary tougher or more plentiful to compensate for no opposition force.

But the second crew is probably a project for a little later. (Though I do have some Black Scorpion Pirate Dwarves primed somewhere… ?)

Cheers for all the likes and comments. Much appreciated.

Happy Hobbying.

Amory was a man-at-arms in his youth, but the years have slowed his sword arm and now he settles for a crewman’s cut of the spoils. Age hasn’t dampened his resolve or commitment though.

He was made from the Northstar Crewman sprue but with a GW head.

The mephiston red scarf and the Nighthaunt blue trousers set the pallet The skeleton bone primer shirt washed with agrax and built back up with wraithbone fits in with the rest of the crew.

Dakarai was made from a two handed axe right arm from the Crewman sprue, cut shorter and a mace head from a bits box added. I probably should have cut it slightly shorter because it is not meant to look like a two handed weapon any longer. The pouch at his hip is actually a crossbow quiver with the bolt feathers cut off. Other than that he’s all from the standard Crewman sprue.

Dakarai is a tough no nonsense crewman. Captain Thatchdagger trusts him to be loyal as long as the spoils are plentiful, but can see that Dakarai is ambitious, capable and as strong as an ox. His impatience and less than affable demeanor have made it hard for Dakarai to get promoted within crews, but his strength and martial skill does make him a very reliable and potent blunt instrument on expeditions inland as a crewman.

Basil was made strictly from the Northstar Crewman sprue. The base is another Renedra base and the earphones cable vines are in place again.

The blue and orange jacket is my favourite part, with the bit of freehand on the back. The theme of red sashes continues.

Basil has his chains, has his bangles and his snazzy jacket. Wanting the finer things in life has attracted him to the crew. Having a single-handed weapon would make grabbing spoils easier, but having seen a man devoured by a huge jungle beast holding a knife and a bag of gold… Basil puts the survival and beast sticking advantages of his spear over most else.

Bart is a crewman who has never walked off a battlefield without getting a nick, bloody nose or laceration. This has often proved his commitment and willingness to fight, but more often than not the wounds and pain have been the result of his chronic clumsiness.

Bart is made from Northstar Crewmen arms, a Frostgrave cultist body and a GW head. The left arm is a string drawing archer hand that just seemed perfect to wipe his face with and the right arm is obviously an axe arm. The base is from Renedra.

Hadn’t put paint to brush in about a month. Had this Hunter built and primed skeleton bone for far longer than that. Christmas Eve was for some reason the catalyst.

Watched the Frostgrave week wizard painting tutorial from John as I applied contract paint to my own mini.

The vine on the base is just wire with snips made to the insulation with red painted thorns on.

There’s a footprint on the base to demonstrate his tracking skill.

The base itself is a Renedra pavement base. Tried to make it like a jungle ruin feel.

There’s meant to be a scar on his head from a claw, but I think it healed too well because I haven’t made it prominent enough.

Happier with this paint job, probably aided by the dip in the UK heatwave.

All my photography for this project has been slightly off so far; may need to change the back ground.

The skin tone was different this time. Army Painter Leather Brown primer, with a Mournfang Brown and Bugman’s Glow mix base. Reikland Fleshshade wash. Then highlighted with a three way mix of the Mournfang Brown, Bugman’s Glow and Kislev Flesh.

Zandri Dust, Morghast and Wraithbone layers to give me the white I wanted for the shirt, but a lot less Wraithbone this time.

Steel Legion Drab for the jacket with Mephiston Red flares around the shirt frills.

The Crossbowman specialist is meant to have light armour and a dagger… Well he has got a nice helmet… phrasing, and I added a Gripping Beast Viking sprue pouch and dagger on his left hip.

Abner Cato and Cosmo Smallpiece joined the crew together more recently than the rest of the crew and impressed with their marksmanship. Cosmo would say that Abner is the better shot, for humility’s sake, but if there was money bet on a shot Cosmo Smallpiece would suddenly have a ‘stroke of luck’ and win the bet.

Cosmo and Abner are firm friends, to the point that if they were to find treasure but either man didn’t make it back to enjoy the spoils it would be a hollow victory and a terrible blow to the other.

Abner the musketeer (in-game Crossbowman).
Finding painting in the UK heatwave a challenge. Paint doesn’t seem to be acting the way I expect it to. Might have to revisit Abner after the weather changes.

Using similar paint scheme from Azadi.

Zandri Dust, Morghast and Wraithbone layers to give me the white I wanted for the shirt.

Steel Legion Drab for the jacket with Mephiston Red flares around the bottom.

The Crossbowman specialist is meant to have light armour and a dagger… Well he hasn’t even got shoes, but I really liked him as a sculpt so met the stats halfway by giving him a dagger from the NorthStar Barbarians sprue.

Abner Cato and Cosmo Smallpiece joined the crew together more recently than the rest of the crew. Some feel they may be on the run for desertion from the army to find their fortune when news of the Archipelago’s return reached the coastal Southern Sea ports. They remain tight-lipped about their past, but have passed every trial of marksmanship that Heritor Thatchdagger set for them. To prove worthy of their place on the expedition, quite publicly for the crew to see, they were able to strike birds in flight and deer at impressive long ranges and every one loves a man that can provide dinner and entertainment, so they were hired and embraced by the crew.

Azadi Solentii is my Wave Warden. Naturally his spells involve a lot of water. To hint at that, I add a shell from the NorthStar Crewman sprue and joined his left hand and the shell with a big gob of UHU tube superglue. When it dried it looked too much like ice, so I mixed some Citadel Contrast blue paint watered down with PVA glue and sparingly coloured parts of the gob.

Azadi Solentii has been with his Heritor for many years and, like many of the expeditions searching for the crystal pool, form the gel that binds the crew together. The Heritor, a great leader from the elite of society and The Wave Warden who saw that they were never becalmed or went thirsty. The two men have healed each other back from wounds and tropical diseases that would kill a lesser man and that has given them a respect and unrivaled friendship.

That said even though the crew looked up to their betters, Azadi has a mysterious aire that puts some of the crew on edge. He is a man of fewer words than his eloquent Heritor. He never talks about his beliefs or his past apart from one failed expedition and even then only because it was his part in a famous Crystal Pool quest story. The Heritor in the story had been involved in the last sea battles and posturing before the Ghost Archipelago appeared. A bitter struggle that broke out in the Southern Seas when a soothsayer sadly wrongfully predicted the resurfacing of the Archipelago. The Heritor had been arrogant, careless and risked the crew at every stage through his lack of experience and blinkered hunt for clues. The Heritor’s death had been used as a fabled warning to not rely too heavily on a Heritor’s abilities. The crew all asked Azadi how he truly had died because the rumour was that the amphibious Heritor ability had failed him during the heat of battle with another Heritor and he had drowned. Some of the crew took his lack of confirmation as a sign of trauma, a reminder of failure, he would rather not revisit. The more cynical amongst the crew were however convinced the look on his face showed that Azadi had seen this unlikeable, dangerous Heritor as a risk to the crew and had some hand in his demise.

My Heritor. Kingsley Thatchdagger.

My Heritor has abilities like Ironskin and Mighty Strength, so imagined that to deliver crushing blows he can make his hand metal at the opportune moment to give his blows extra bite. ?
You get to add a plus 1 to any stat to begin with so I added 1 to health.

For his abilities I chose:

Ironskin – mitigates some damage.

Mighty Stength – Choice of boosting damage by 1, or improving a fight role by 5.

Hurl – a free shoot action, where you have jedi-like throwing abilities, picking an inanimate object and hurling it at an enemy.

Mystic Energy – Gets to make his weapon magical for a moment, to strike at enemies that mortal weapons don’t harm.

Spark of Life – allows me to heal members of my warband (not able to use on self.)

Kingsley funded the expedition with the last of his family wealth. Seeing as not one soothsayer had predicted the re-emergence of the Ghost Archipelago accurately, Kingley has spent many years in the South Sea fighting fellow Heritors caught in the same drawn out waiting game as he.

In his youth he would have spent the lives of his crew cheaply and pursued the Crystal Pool at all costs. After fighting for so long with no promise of the islands surfacing in his lifetime, he has become more patient, more empathetic of the plight of his men, especially his Warden Azadi Solentii. He still felt the draw of the Crystal Pool, now more than ever, and was still a Heritor; plagued by self interest and chasing the former glories of his ancestors.