Oggi, tunnel dweller, and some skinny neighbours

This post is to show my latest painted Dwarf who is joining Sven's group in the next episode, plus some enemies.

The Dwarf is from BTD and sculpted by Kevin Adams and the skeletons from Foundry.

I love these Dwarfs so full of character.

I went for a quick and easy painting in black and bone. After that, I splashed some diluted pigment on them to get that brown touch on bones.

Happy Christmas to you all, fellow wargamers!!!

A fool and an assassin

Little after they return to the nearest town with the woman and the kids, a short tempered Dwarf, with an axe bigger than him, approaches to the group with some urgent information.

His name is Grom and he has lost everything to the Greenskins, so he hates them like only a Dwarf can hate. He tells Sven he knows the hand who is behind of all this lately Orc unresting. An Orc shaman has come to the valley and he is rising all Orcs from the hills with a mysterious and dark objective in mind.

Grom tells them that to stop all this Orc unrest they must kill the shaman, and that he knows he is not far, and with just a bodyguard accompanying him. They must hurry and strike before dawn!

This is Grom, my latest painted Dwarf and new companion to the group. They are now Sven's six.

So they send Bubba the Halfling armed with a poisoned dagger to kill the shaman. Being more a minstrel than a warrior or an assassin, the troubled Halfling sneaks behind the encampment and through the bushes, while the Dwarfs take position around it, and as close as they can without raising the alarm.

It is still very dark and the sentinels do not see them coming.

Finbul kills the first sentinel with a clean shot from his crossbow,

whereas the rest of the Dwarfs dash into the Orc encampment.

Grom in his eagerness foolishly impales himself into the spear's sentinel!

Juggo wounds another sentinel but does not kill him. Suddenly all the Orcs come out from their tents and Sven and Snorri face two Orcs each! Bubba keeps approaching from behind, waiting for the shaman to show up.

Fortune smiles the bold and so Juggo, Sven and Finbul kill one Orc each. But now Snorri is in trouble.

The shaman appears and Bubba tenses in anticipation. Snorri is fighting for his life.

Snorri disengages and one of his opponents is distracted by Sven, and now Snorri wounds the other Orc.

He finally kills him but now Juggo is down and Sven is slightly wounded!

Snorri runs to help Sven while Bubba faces the Shaman, who casted a spell but failed.

He poisons the shaman, who disengages and runs to escape pursued by Bubba, who finally finishes him. Snorri falls.

After much fighting and bleeding, the rest of the group surrounds and kills the last and most fierce of the Orcs.

Valley run

I've just painted this little guy sculpted by Copplestone. His name is Bubba Oddfoot, a merry little Hobbit or Halfling who gets a food and a pint by telling funny stories, riddles and songs.

Going back to the story, Sven and his friends come to their senses and see they are locked in a cabin in the Goblins encampment. There are also some people with them; a terrified woman with her two children and a little Hobbit, staring intently at Sven.

As soon as he sees you are awake, he introduces himself and then tells you they have all been kept alive for next morning Goblin's fun breakfast, but that he can sneak out, get the keys and all their gear and escape together, as Goblins are not very good at being on guard watch.

So this scenario starts with the Dwarfs, woman with children and Bubba, running down through the valley to escape from the Orcs and Goblins. The sun is already up and the Goblins have noticed their prisoners have escaped and now are on their pursuit. 

Sven party has a slight advantage but Dwarf short little legs are not good for a run.

They know they have been discovered when they see a pair of Wargs coming their way. They have to run faster.

Finbul puts down one with his trusty crossbow but now a pack of them, leaded by a male alpha, appears in front of them!

Finbul kills another one before the clash.

Bubba moves aside with the woman and the children, leaving the fight for the Dwarfs.

But one of the Wargs charges them and he has to fight it off.

With one mighty blow (white die is Sven's) Sven kills both the male alpha and another Warg. Juggo has no problems killing a Warg and neither Snorri with his spear. Bubba barely survived to his encounter with one.

As the party resume moving they are ambushed by two Goblins coming out from the nearby bushes! Goblins have the initiative this turn.

Juggo kills one Goblin without trouble but Bubba does not and he breaks away from it. 
More Goblins are pursuing them from behind.

And yet more come to their right, and Orc and a Goblin archer. But now they are pretty close to the exit.

Snorri stops the ambushing Goblin, who is then wounded by his chasing comrades when they loose some arrows at them. Finbul is missing all his shots, he better keeps running with the rest.

"Hurry up!"

In the last moment an Orc boss rushes from the bushes on their left. They should run faster before he catches them up.

Bubba and the woman with children have all escaped but Sven and Juggo halt to wait for Finbul and Snorri. So the big Orcs finally get them while the rest of Goblin archers loose many arrows now they are finally in range.

After an epic fight the Dwarfs kill all the Orcs and Goblins close to them, and finally escape, leaving Goblin archers behind. In the last moment Finbul is hit by an arrow and falls down but it was not fatal.

Old Snorri and Finbul.

These are Snorri and Finbul, my latest painted Dwarfs. They are neighbours and good friends since the beginning. Snorri is a very old and honorable Dwarf who has seen many things in his long life. He has to lean on his spear from time to time, but his arm still remembers how to thrust through.
Finbul is a practical Dwarf who trusts only his crossbow, as he thinks that though he is not fast enough, nobody is faster than one of his bolts.

So Sven and Juggo hurry for Snorri's homestead and when they arrive they meet him at the entrance of it, which has been completely destroyed by the greenskins, fully arrayed for battle and ready to chase them. 
Then they can see some smoke coming up from the nearby Finbul's farm and the three of them run there fearing the worst.

When they reach Finbul's farm they can see some greenskins around it taking cover, and one Goblin dead on the ground with a crossbow's bolt on his chest. It seems Finbul has locked himself in his cabin and that they have arrived on time to save him!

The cabin hasn't got removable roof so I deployed Finbul on its border, representing he is actually inside.

The Greenskins ignore Sven and Juggo and hurry for the house, starting to bang on boty doors with their axes.

As they run towards the house, a Goblin in ambush pops out and looses an arrow to Snorri, seriously wounding him.

While they are attacking the Goblin archer, three more come out from the woods at their backs.

The doors won't hold much longer so they resume running after killing the Goblin archer, with the rest of pack right behind them.

Snorri hides behind the hedge to take cover from arrows as well as to delay the Goblins while Sven and Juggo engage with the other greenskins, who finally destroy the door and enter in the house to kill Finbul.

They kill the greenskins inside the house but some more are coming down the hill behind the cabin, and Juggo shelters behind the hedge and waits for them.

Many arrows missed Snorri until one of them hits home and finally puts him out of fight!

Sven joins forces with Juggo to contain the Orcs and Goblins on the fence.

They kill them all but more are coming from behind. Two of them corner Juggo who was already badly injured from the previous melee, and he is finally down. Sven goes for the Goblin archer.

Now Sven is surrounded by three Goblins whereas two more are coming for Finbul.

Sven breaks and seeks refuge in the cabin but he is engaged again but two of the Goblins. Finbul comes out through the other door pursued by two Goblins, and he falls down by an arrow fired but the Goblin who was left alone at the bottom.

Sven fights desperately against the last Goblins but has no luck with dice rolls and after several wounds he is finally knocked down!

There were 23 greenskins in total and there were only six of them remaining when Sven was taken down. They almost made it.
Anyway, after that I rolled to see if they were dead, and all of them turned to be alive, so I considered they had surprisingly been taken alive as prisoners to be interrogated by the greenskins' mysterious boss.

To be continued...

Sven's Seven

As I did about ten years ago with a couple of Fantasy campaigns (Einar saga & Beran adventures ) to keep me motivated to paint some miniatures, I decided to start a new one to paint a handful of Dwarfs that have been gathering dust since ages in my wardrobe. 
So this little campaign is going to be about a Dwarf called Sven, who is going to meet fellow Dwarfs as I am painting them. And this is his story:

The Dwarf Sven was grandson of the famous Sven who went to Lustria decades ago and fought an epic battle of seven against hundred of Slanns. Young Sven is on his 140 birthday, and after much daydreaming, he has decided to become a legend like his grandfather, and many others before him.

It is deeply settled in his mind that to achieve such a glorious renown, he must not only undertake an almost impossible deed, but it must be an epic saga involving the number seven. His granddad's saga was "The Magnificent Sven"; and this epic tales run together with others equally or even more famous like "Seven against Teclis", "Gandalf White and the Seven Dwarfs", "The seven works of Hyrklyl", "Sven of the Seven Seas" (another Sven), or the infamous tale of "Seven brides for seven Dwarfs". Heck, even his own name, Sven, means seven when spelt it in a different order.

Sven also thinks that the best place to properly start his adventure is his granddad's mausoleum, which has been neglected for a few years and lately, it has been invaded and desecrated by foul Goblins.

So he must first gather a band or seven worthy members for this saga, and his first choice to start with is his neighbour Juggo Junior II, also grandson of the famous Juggo Jorikkson from the Magnificent Sven's tale, and slayer as him. He recruits him by making him think there is a troll in his grandfather's hall.

Thus, Sven and Juggo prepare for the journey and set off on Sven's Hall in the mountains at the top of Meledire valley.

At the next day they reach Sven's mausoleum.

As soon as they enter they meet a strange man. Sven angrily demands an explanation of his presence. His name is Tak and he is looking for his young brother as they split when running from a band of Goblins.

They decide to join forces and enter into the tomb. It seems to be empty but the floor is littered with dung and rotten half eaten animals. Juggo's beard bristles in anticipation.

Tak walks faster than Dwarfs and reaches the next door first, stumbling into a group of Goblins!

He manages to hold them until the Dwarfs come to help him...

and then they quickly dispatch the Goblins.

They resume walking towards the main chamber.

As they move forwards they find Tak's brother, who is hiding behind a rubble. Sven also spots a Mithril chainmail hidden in the rubble. It was his grandfather's.

Then some nasty spiders attack them but are easily eliminated.

But they keep coming and Tak succumbs to them.

More and more spiders come so they form a line to hold them.

Tak's brother is also put out of combat and now some Goblins come to support the spiders!

Soon they clear the room but as they keep going they are attacked again by two giant rats.

They run to the final chamber with the rats chasing them close...

and there they are ambushed by two more rats and get surrounded.

 Sven finally cleans his grandfather mausoleum with the help of Juggo.

Neither Sven nor Juggo got any advancement from this little adventure, but Sven now wears a Mithril mail shirt and they also looted 6 gold coins from the dead Goblins.

They also find out that one of the Goblins is still alive. From him they learn Greenskins are on the path of war and that several war parties are attacking the farms in the valley. Old Snorri's homestead is nearby so they quickly set off on there, fearing for that old Dwarf.

To be continued...