Lead Legionaries: 'I Don't Take Orders from Stinking Morgul Rats'

Monday, October 6, 2025

'I Don't Take Orders from Stinking Morgul Rats' - Gripping Beast Armored Goblins

First batch of 28mm Gripping Beast armored goblins for my Dragon Rampant army

The 2026 project -- an orc and goblin army for Dragon Rampant, 2nd Edition -- continues to move along. I chose seven figures from the horde of unpainted 28mm Gripping Beast lead I picked up from my friend Jeff, and got them ready for painting. I believe all the poses are from the Armored Goblins pack. I had to glue on their shields and put weapons into their hands, which at times is a blessing and a curse. It is nice to be able to create a little more variety with the weapons, but equally it can be a pain in the butt to attach the darned things sometimes! I used Gorilla Glue superglue for the initial attachment, then reinforced it after it had hardened with two-part, 5-minute epoxy. Sometimes, I have to use soft gray tack to hold the figure in an odd position while the glue dries, but it all worked out fairly painlessly this time.

Poses are fairly similar as I sorted through the unpainted horde looking for ones that looked alike

When attaching the weapons, I immediately forgot about the advantage mentioned above and gave spears to all three of the under armed poses and short swords to the three with their arms held back. D'oh!! The one with his arm over his head was given an ax. Thanks to my brain lapse, there isn't as much variety in pose and weapons as I'd like with this batch of seven figures. And why seven? Well, I was looking for a group that had similar equipment and dress, and these seven fit the bill. I guess that I was thinking that it would make it quicker to assembly-line paint them if they were dressed and equipped similarly? Of course, seven figures is a pretty small assembly line, by most people's standards. However, it is right in the six to eight figure batch "sweet spot" I prefer for my 28mm figures, though!

I really like the expressions & animation on these goblins -- they look to be snarling or semi-scared!

After the epoxy had dried thoroughly, I primed them with Liquitex White Gesso and let them dry overnight. I gave them my standard recipe for orc and goblin flesh that I have used so far on my other three batches. I begin with a Walnut Brown base coat, dry brush them Raw Sienna, and then highlight them Khaki. Next, I used one of my all-time favorite colors for the base coat on their chainmail -- Iron Wind Metals Steel. This is a very dark metallic, which I then dry brush a silver over once it has dried and "shrink wrapped" to the miniatures. I had recently purchased a new Brushed Silver craft paint and decided to try it out on these. I liked the effect. However, I admit I would be hard pressed to pick out the difference between mail highlighted with the Brushed Silver as opposed to my normal silver!

I used the same basic dark or pale clothes colors I've been using for this army, so far

At this point, they were ready for their clothes to be painted, which in this case was a tunic. Some of them also had trousers underneath the tunic, but some did not. I referred to my list of acceptably ugly colors to paint orcs and goblin clothes and picked one out for each figure and set those bottles behind it. While painting this project, I will stay on the lookout for more colors in a grayish, pale, or dark versions of colors so that my entire army isn't painted just the same 8-10 colors...haha! From that point on, it was my usual routine of base coat one day and dry brush the next. Tunics, then trousers, then footwear, and so on.

All of the shields lined up so you can see the designs I chose -- I'd love to hear feedback on these!

However, for the first time in four batches of orcs or goblins, though, I had to paint shields! I didn't want to limit myself to Mordor orcs with their red eye, or Isengard with their white hand. I wanted them to be more generic. I didn't want them all be blank, either. So, I sat down and brainstormed what types of things orcs or goblins would put on their shields: skulls, moons, mountains, spiders, wolves, flames, fangs, etc. Then, I did Google Image searches (with the key word "clipart") and copied and pasted images of these things that I liked into a Word document. I even did Google searches to see what the internet said about what designs orcs or goblins would have on their shields. One page mentioned "tribal symbols," so I did a search for that and found several really cool pages of crude, tribal-like images that I thought would work perfect for my army's shields.

For most of the shields, I painted it a base color, dry brushed it, and then used my black or dark brown micron pen to draw the design image on the face. I filled inside the pen outline in with paint most of the time, or if I wanted the design to remain dark dark, sometimes just colored in the whole image with the pens. I felt that the designs stood out too much, though, and looked a little too bright. However, when I did my last step of painting, the black wash, it seemed to fix that. I felt that the black wash did an amazing job of muting the shield. Will I continue to give every orc or goblin their own unique shield design? I'm not sure, at this stage. I am happy with how these looked, though!

Final look at my first armored goblins -- many more needed to fill the ranks of my orc & goblin horde!

I know seven figures doesn't go a long way towards finishing a Dragon Rampant army, but these are the size batches I like to work with. I just don't see myself ever priming and painting 50 miniatures at a time, nowadays. That's. Too. Much. Like. Work! So, this will have to be incremental progress for the rest of the year and possibly well into next year. Since I've decided to also work on my Devilry Afoot project simultaneously, that will likely slow it down even more. Oh well...that's the way it goes! I will get the figures I bought all painted someday, though I'm not sure my 2025 totals for Acquired Miniatures vs. Painted will ever make it into the green and "positive" range. To get there, I need to paint 57 more miniatures AND not buy anymore by the end of the year. Will I make it? My pessimistic guess is no, but we shall see!!

MINIATURES Acquired vs. Painted Tally for 2025