Tanares Heroes - Fantasy RPG Miniatures

 

A while back, I backed a Kickstarter for an RPG extension to a board game called "Tanares" to pick up a whole bunch of cheap D&D miniatures. I sent the first "Hero Pack" off to Blood Medusa Paints to get them painted up.

There were a good variation of miniatures in the set. The variety gives a good bunch of generic fantasy miniatures. The generic nature of the miniatures means that they won't suit a setting with a strong established aesthetic - but that's always going to be a problem that requires shopping around and specific purchases rather than generic ones.

I feel the best use of these characters, if not happening to match a description of a player character in an RPG, are as inspirations for friendly NPCs or dangerous antagonists for your PCs. Some are more generic - our rams head wizard here would make an excellent bandit mage, while the gold robed character could be a good cult leader or priest.

The samurai is a bit of an odd one, and I don't expect to be running a game that wholesale lifts the aesthetic of medieval Japan without any changes. On the other hand, the winged character or the lady with the snake and the raven could be a good inspiration for an unusual character your players could meet.

There's also some pretty generic options that can easily fit into any campaign - a werewolf, orc barbarian or swashbuckler holding a gem could easily slip into any campaign, though the idea of some kind of swashbuckling villain fighting with a magical jewel or spell focus could work really nicely. Jumpy lady is a bit weirdly niche too, but I'm not sure when I'd want to use her.

Finally, not part of the hero pack, there was a medusa who was a free gift with the original Kickstarter. I felt given my painter's business is called "Blood Medusa Paints", I was kind of obliged to send her this one...