Anglo-Saxon Warriors Ready to Take the Field

    Eight 28mm Anglo-Saxon warriors from Gripping Beast to augment my Saga forces

My painting intermission between finishing my Moorish army and beginning my Carolingians is nearing its end. The next-to-last step was the completion of 8 Anglo-Saxon warriors from the 28mm Gripping Beast 4-point starter pack. I had purchased the box because I was short of unarmored Dark Age infantry, which I use as "Warriors" in Saga. I like to use the guys in chainmail as "Hearthguard," if possible. When I started playing Saga, I had lots of armored guys, but few unarmored ones.

    Each of the figures in the box had a nice variety of poses, clothes, and overall looks.

I love the variety of poses in this pack. I've yet to see a duplicate model, all of them have noticeable difference. The eight figures I chose to paint out of this box all were bareheaded. I'd used the guys with helmets as Vikings in the previous batch. Like I tell a lot of people starting to get into playing Saga, many Dark Age warriors looked somewhat similar. In fact, these figures were going to be part of one of my loaner armies which could be fielded as either Vikings, Anglo-Danes, or heck, why not Pagan Rus? Most of them I armed with spears, although there was one guy who looked better suited to holding a sword. Thankfully, the Gripping Beast box contained a handful of swords and axes I could use. The spears were the normal wire spears I used from North Star.

    I painted the warriors in muted or faded colors, such as these faded greens

I painted them in a variety of dull, faded, or muted colors. I know that I am in a minority in using craft paints as opposed to the hobby varieties out there. I really enjoy the huge amount of choice in tones and shades in greens, blues, reds, yellows, purples - you name it. And at only $1 or so a bottle, I can afford so many more shades than my usually cheapskate nature would let me purchase if I used Vallejo or some other manufacturer. Of course, each base color gets its dry brush to make it look more faded and worn. In fact, I have steadily expanded the parts of figure that gets a dry brush. It used to be just the main areas, such as tunics, cloaks, etc. More often now, just about everything except a tiny bag or pouch will get dry brushing or highlighting. Once the lines of the dry brushing are muted by the brown or black wash I apply, I really like the effect.

    I really like the action of the pose stabbing with the spear

There were a couple poses that I'd picked out that were stabbing with their spears held two-handed. I could have put a shield on their back, but liked the variety they gave to this batch. One of my favorites of the batch was the guy above stabbing overhand with his spear. As another example of the variety, this guy was shoeless, but had leather wrapping around his legs. I've always been amazed by the idea of ancient or medieval warriors running around barefoot like Hobbits. I can't imagine the effect of stepping on an unseen rock might have as he was charging into combat!

    The guy in the pale blue was one of my favorites from this batch -- I really liked his facial features

Of course, all of the shields were hand-painted. One of these days, I'll get around to trying decals, again. I thought these attempts turned out okay. I didn't try anything particularly fancy with these - they were common, run-of-the-mall warriors, after all! I did cheat and mix in a couple Foundry (I think) shields with this batch from my large supply. All in all, it was a fast and easy group of miniatures to paint up. I highly recommend this box to anyone looking for some Dark Age warriors.

Next up? Four chainmail armored hearthguard to finish off the 6 points (plus) for this army. And then, finally, the Carolingians!