"High" Elf Army #5

And so it begins!

I've built a number of High Elf armies for Warhammer Fantasy Battle over the past couple of decades, and had been steadily putting together models with the aim of doing a fifth one.

Fifth? You say?

Yes, and I tend to have them classified in regards to colour schemes..

The first was Black.  The first army I ever painted - and it was black, white, and silver.  No shading, nor highlights, nor conversions.  If I recall correctly I painted it using Tamiya paints as well.  Sadly no photos of this fine glittering horde still exist.  I sold them to a friend who was starting out in the hobby, and moved on to build another High Elf force.

The second was Blue.  Something of a more "traditional" colour scheme, and again not overly well painted.  I did paint it using Citadel paints though, and started to learn about these things such as shading and highlights.  I'm not sure what actually ever happened to this army.  It wasn't large, and if memory does serve me right, was sold off in order to begin a Orc n Goblin force.

The third was Green.  And I believe may still exist in some form in the collection of another player here in New Zealand.  I was harassed somewhat by critics calling it a Wood Elf army due to its colouring - but I assure you it was nothing so filthy!  I do remember being particularly pleased with how the gold armour came out in this army, and the technique I used then is much the same as the one I still use to this day.

The fourth was Red.  There were lots of "fire" highlights on this one - and certainly I retain more photos of it than I do of many of the other armies I have owned throughout my time as a Warhammer player.  The army itself has been added to since I sold it, but I believe the overall colour scheme has remained.

So we turn now to the fifth.

With the "death" of Warhammer as we have known and loved it, I have turned my love of square based ranked fantasy battles to the next big kid on the block.  Mantic's Kings of War has been around for a number of years now, but by and large has been ignored by many of us gamers - other than the occasional read or a check to see if any of the cheaper Mantic models were suitable for our Warhammer armies.

Given my "elven history", how could I not thus then also choose Elves to be my first Kings of War army?  I discovered when putting an army list together that I did indeed already have all the GW High Elf models I required to do so, and that some minimal purchases only would be needed to flesh the army out and give me "options" in regards to army composition.  WIN!

Colour wise I am not too sure yet...  but with a decision to "flavour" my Elves fluff-wise from the Eastern or Southern kindreds, I am looking toward something on a brown variation.  Sure I could redo one of the colour variants I have previously - but that just doesn't somehow feel right - and I am a bit funny in regards to such things.

Being also that the kindreds I mentioned tend to live in desert-like terrain areas, I wanted something that would fit that also.  Gold armour of course - and brown, especially of a darker shade, would compliment that nicely I believe.  The wooden elements of the army... spearshafts, bows, etc, would of course be a very light shade...  bone like almost.  And thus I then have the 3 main colour types for my models.

Some experimentation will be required to get the right shades of those colours that I like, and some thought musst also be given to how to base the models.  With the way Kings of War works, and the opportunity to create mini-dioramas on each movement tray as a result, some fun could certainly be had from a modelling perspective.

It is not my intent to do much converting for this army, I would rather focus on a clean and striking paint job for them, some themed basing, and ideally a fully painted army on the table sooner rather than later.  I have plenty of other projects that I can spend time with in regards to conversions at a later date.

I'll go into more later on in regards to the specific models I am using, and the sort of list that I am starting out with.

But in the meantime, as is my wont when beginning a new army, I'll start cleaning flash from the models I have, and mull over different painting ideas whilst I do so...  I like doing this because it creates a familiarity with the models when one comes to paint them...  and you can build an "artists impression" in your head as you do so of how you want the model to look when done.