Orcs Revisited

As with the Dwarves, earlier this month, I've been rebasing and reorganizing the Orc collection... well... ONE of the orc collections. This is collection that is mostly metal miniatures, from a wild mix of manufacturers, and mostly painted with orange skin. 

(the OTHER collection of Orcs is a mix of metal and plastic Orc miniatures from Citadel Miniatures/Games workshop and painted with green skin)

Some time ago, when I was painting (or, in some cases, RE-PAINTING) these for use with Hordes of the Things, I decided I was tired of painting orcs with green skin and, partially inspired by the orcs on the cover of Keep on the Borderlands and partly by the orcs in Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings series, I stopped painting them green and started painting them a mix of reddish-orangish-brownish colours, before finally settling on Orange.

Many of these were previously based for Hordes of the Things and were rebased individually to use with... well... OTHER GAMES!? Largely I am organizing them for Dragon Rampant, but they could totally be used for Song of Blades and Heroes or Rangers of Shadowdeep, or Frostgrave or any number of assorted Fantasy Role-Playing Games or other skirmishy games. 

PAINTED

Here's what I have painted so far:

For a Dragon Rampant army, I could currently field them as 

• Heavy Rider - 4 points
• Heavy Rider - 4 points
• Heavy Rider - 4 points
• Light Missile - 4 points
• Scout - 2 points
• Offensive Heavy Foot - 6 points

Total: 24 Points - Ready to go! 

Orc warlord and his closest cronies - Heavy Riders. 

These, and the others below, are from Old Glory miniatures. I like the idea of having a Orc Hordes of the Things army that was primarily MOUNTED. I think I ended up with eight of twelve elements being mounted...? I wanted them to be analagous to Mongols or Huns - fast moving raiders (or conquerers!?) that could sweep across the lands (and battlfields) sowing death and destruction in their wake!

The Dragon Rampant force won't have nearly the same proportion or mounted Orcs... but not an insignificant amount! 

I can't recall if I counted them as Riders or Beasts in Hordes of the Things, I think it suggested that Orc wolf-riders could be classified as Beasts - as they move through rough terrain without slowing down...? Which made me wonder if these should have been classified as Lesser Warbeasts in Dragon Rampant. After thinking on it, I decided to go with Heavy Riders... for now... 

More Orc Heavy Riders 

STILL More Orc Heavy Riders 

Currently being fielded as Scouts, I do have 6-7 more, which could fill out a full unit of Light Missile... or... just be a second unit of Scouts

These little goblins are some of the oldest miniatures I still have. They were part of my first miniature ARMY. I'd had individual miniatures or heroes and assorted monsters for role-playing games, but the first ARMY I build was orcs and goblins and mostly made of Ral Partha miniatures. These were originally painted green. They were stripped and repainted when I rebased them to make a unit of Bow for the Hordes of the Things army. 

For a very brief time, these may have been a first unit built for AD&D Battlesystem, but I couldn't find anyone to play with and were never actually used with the game. Eventually I met guys that were starting to build armies for Warhammer Fantasy Battle (4th Edition). No one cared about using Citadel miniatures then. We just build our armies with whatever we could get our mittens on - which was, for the most part, Ral Partha and RAFM minaitures (and a few older Citadel miniature, produced under license in Canada)

Light Missile - Mostly Celtos miniatures, but there are a few repainted Ral Partha Orc archers mixed in there because I didn't have enough of the Celtos minis... I suppose at some point I could order a few more from Brigade Models in the UK (as they still produce the old Celtos minis!) 

(There are actually thirteen here, so one - or two - of the Ral Partha Orc archers will likely join a different unit, when others get painted) 

Offensive Heavy Foot. 

Some of the first Citadel Orcs I owned - "pre-slotta" 

Not a full unit - These are more Celtos orcs I think they were originally part of a Warband element in the Hordes of the things army. I have seven more I've started to finish off a unit of twelve. Then I have enough of these for THREE MORE units!? I think I'll classify them as Belicose Foot. 

An Orc catapult from RAFM. I thought I COULD use it as a Heavy Missile (Single Model Unit)... Maybe add some fantastical rules to make them a bit more brittle (less survivable in melee (like FEARFUL -2 points; -1 to all Courage and Rally tests?)

Orc Casualty/Broken markers - made from some spare Mantic Orcs that Finnegan had. 

I think this was a "pre-slotta" Citadel female orc (produced under license by Rafm). I had a few of these that I used as Orc Cheerleaders for my Blood Bowl team at one point. 

At one point I made Army Markers to move about a map when playing Hordes of the Things campaigns. This was the one for the Orcs. 

Still TO DO

All (well... MOST) of the stuff I still have to do for this army. 

The spare Celtos Orcs I need to finish up the unit above. 

THREE MORE units of Celtos Orcs that I could use as Bellicose Foot. 

More of the Ral Partha goblin archers. They could be added to the six above to make a unit of 12 Light Missile... or just make up a second unit of scouts...? 

There is one extra here... it might be added to the unit of Celtos Goblin archers to free up another of the Ral Partha orc archers to add to the four below to make a unit of... scouts!?

six little goblins from Harlequin miniautres (or was it Heartbreaker...? One of those GW knock-offs that started with an 'H')... They would be used as Scouts. 

MORE Goblin Archers (later Ral Partha/Iron Wind Metals, I think...?)

Four more Ral Partha Orc archers. as noted above, I could free up two of the ones currently in the unit of painted goblins archers to add to these to make a unit of Scouts.

An assortment of odd and extra goblins and orcs from a variety of manufacturers that I could, someday, use as RAvenous Hordes (they're fairly low on the priority list....)

More odd, assorted Orcs that don't really fit into any particular units for Dragon Rampant. 

Orc and Goblin Sizards/Shamen. I think they're all from Black Tree Design...? Two are on flagstone bases as I though I might make an Orc and Goblin warband for Frostgrave...? 

Still more stuff that I haven't even based or primed... 

Not sure what I'll ever do with those gigantic orc archers!? I have enough goblins for THREE units of Light Missile. How would I differentiate these from the Goblins!? 

So... I have a viable army that could be used to start a campaign, and LOTS of others I could finish up to expand that army! 

OTHER STUFF

Other stuff that is Orc and Goblin related, but not really part of the above force.... 

Drawer full of assorted Ogres and Trolls. These have been nominally associated with the above Orc and Goblin collection for years. Some of them were previously based for Hordes of the Things and included in the Orc army.... Really, though, I have LOADS of Orcs and Goblins, and there are enough of these that I could really make an entire Dragon Rampant warband/army of just these!? 

One of the OTHER Collections of Orcs (or... ORRUKS, as they are now known) - these are the aforementioned mix of metal and plastic orcs from Citadel Miniatures/Games Workshop that I'm painting with green skin. There are three different Warhammer Underworlds warbands in here. I figure I could use some as WarCry warbands... but there is almost enough to field as a Dragon Rampant warband. 

The Brutes of Morgok's Krushas could be a reduced model unit of Elite Foot. 

The 'Ard Boys of Ironskull's Boyz could be a reduced model unit of Offensive Heavy Foot (4 models = 3strength Points per model) 

and then I have enough assorted other older GW/Citadel orcs (which are considerably smaller than the Ard Boyz and Brutes - but still much bigger than most of the other orcs in the collection above) that could be two more units of Offensive Heavy Foot.

And that would be 24 Points! 

MORE GW/Citadel green guys- Goblins, Trolls and Ogres. Goblins are no longer associated with Orcs in Games Workshop armies. Gloomspite Gitz are a mix of Goblins and Toggoths (trolls) and are completely separate from the Orruk Wartribes.

Also in the drawer are Ogres (also a separate faction - Ogor Mawtribes). 

There are two different Warhammer Underworlds warbands here, and a few things I thought I could cobble together for Warcry Warbands. Not really enough here to make a separate Dragon Rampant army - though they could be extras in an army of the Green Orcs above. 

A unit in the works that would be in the drawer above, but it's been in an 'on deck' box near the workbench for some time. They are all old GW/Citadel goblin miniatures. MOST of them are pre-slotta goblin MUTANTS from back when goblins were (sometimes?) the minions of Chaos!