Work in Progress Wednesday: Aenor Miniatures Goblins

As well as the trolls I picked up during the Aenor Miniatures Kickstarter, I also ordered a whole ton of goblins. While Aenor do both metal and resin, I'd picked metal to go with the rest of my planned goblin army at the time. I've since seen sense and am offloading a lot of goblins, but some of them were just too characterful to go, so I've kept them as a little painting project.

Here's the brains of the outfit - a goblin wizard. He's definitely the brains because he has both a book, and a big fancy stick.

This adorable bell ringer was going to be a musician in my Oldhammer style goblin Age of Sigmar army, before I gave up on the idea. But I had to keep him. He looks so put upon. Unfortunately, the metal chain attaching the bell to the rest of the mini fell off as soon as you sneezed on it. The bell is now firmly pinned to the hand of the goblin, because life is too short.

Goblins are mean little beasts, and these three, I think, really sum up that aspect of them. Sword goblin really looks like he wants to be hiding behind some big orc or something, shaking his fist from behind the big guy. Crossbow goblin is one of the bigger goblins, and has both a fancy crossbow and much bigger armour. He's clearly some sort of bully who isn't afraid to beat up the smaller goblins. And bow goblin is a nasty little sneak who doesn't just want to shoot you from range, but in the back as well.

These two are clearly on guard duty. I think they remind me of some Fighting Fantasy illustrations of goblins, all long and thin, but also massively different creatures one to the next, like Froud's work. They are sad, and bored. And probably a little damp. It's dark and there's a dripping noise around them.

So, that's my little tribe of Aenor goblins. They're in the queue to get painted one day . . .

A bit of assembly

With an operative hobby space once more and a free weekend, it was time to get some hobby going. The first job was unpacking and sorting the large package of models for "Dahshat Company" for Infinity.

All of these models had transported fine without any problems. Although I was a ham fisted clutz and managed to break one of them trying to put it away.

Meanwhile, here are all of the repairs. I also found a mini I'd forgotten to paint the fire arc marker on months ago, so quickly got that fixed while I was at it.

Some of the fixes, mostly on newer models, were nice and easy. Some of the older ones, however, were an absolute pain and I spent a good hour or two swearing and letting super glue dry before scraping it off and starting again.

It is, of course, my cursed luck that the model I broke (the Rui Shi) was satan's own challenge to put back together. I ended up leaving it overnight and fixed it Sunday morning. I was very glad when I got it right second time. Sometimes walking away and leaving it is the best option.

All told, there's only two things that need pinning now - both older remotes. I haven't been able to find my pinning set in the unpacking yet, so they'll have to wait a little while.

I am a great believer in having fun little quick painting projects to do in between your big projects, so as a break from Infinity, I thought I'd quickly clean up the mould lines and base a few Reaper 25 anniversary figures I'd picked up for just that purpose.

This model is Elanter, the Lost Prince. His spear tip needed a little careful bending back into shape. I ended up using the flat of my scalpel blade as something to press against and make sure it actually ended up flat.

Here's Darius the Blue. All these miniatures came with cast in bases, so I glued them to some round bases and used my favourite basing solution. This is using Vallejo Coarse Pumice first to build up shape and texture, then Vallejo Sandy Paste to add variation and finer grains where needed.

Trista the Loremistress was the third blister assembled. The previous two wouldn't fit on a 25mm so I used 32mm bases there, but for Trista, a traditional 25mm was sufficient.

I hadn't really realised what Hecklemeyer and Styx were when I picked them up. Or maybe I forgot? Anyway, I am beyond delighted to have an undead jester puppeteering a tiny magical wooden puppet. They're the two I'm most looking forward to painting, so I'll likely leave them until last, or if I'm having a particularly bad day and need cheering up.

So, no paint applied so far, but we're back underway and getting models prepared and ready for paint! How was your hobby weekend?