House Stark – Part 2

I’m not usually one for batch painting but if I’m honest the House Stark Sworn Sword miniatures I have are both straightforward to paint and not very interesting so I decided to just power through without delay. 

With this little lot done the squad was almost complete and just needed a man with a banner to help them stand out in the thick of the fray.

With him done the unit could actually be called complete, as Robb Stark will be taking the final slot and acting as the leader. However there will be days when I feel like having someone else in charge of the army, or Robb will be attached to a different unit or busy doing something else like helping Uncle Edmure to plan his wedding. At such times I’ll need someone else to take charge of this unit – enter the Sworn Sword Captain.

The unit still isn’t done though, to be called complete it needs a movement tray so I got that painted up as well. 

And as I was doing so I realised I still hadn’t painted the movement tray for Grey Wind either, so I painted it at the same time.

Here’s the full squad of Sworn Swords, ready to take to the field.

In theory my next move will be to paint up some more units from the Stark vs Lannister boxset but having painted these Sworn Swords I’m in the mood to tackle something a bit more fancy from the wider Stark range so I might veer off and do that instead – watch this space I guess!

House Stark – Part 1

This month I’ve mostly been concentrating on painting the Lannister half of the Starks vs Lannisters starter set for A Song of Ice and Fire (expect to see them here soon!). Lately however I fancied a bit of a change of pace so this time we’re going to be looking at the hardy northerners instead of their fancy-pants rivals.

So far I’ve not done much with the Starks but what I have done is tackle a couple of the key characters for the faction and a few troops. The leader of my Stark army, for now at any rate, will be Robb Stark so he seemed like a fine place to start working on the faction. When Lord Eddard Stark is called away to the capital King’s Landing he leaves his eldest son Robb to command the North in his absence. Soon garnering the title “the Young Wolf” Robb proves himself to be a capable leader and a cunning and determined tactician.

I really like this miniature, it’s not fancy but it contains a lot of personality and really suits the character of the young northern lord. However anyone who’s read the novels will know that the younger Starks seem to get into trouble the moment they’re separated from their pet dire wolves, so I reckoned I’d be wise to paint Robb’s canine companion Grey Wind as well.

He’s better sculpted than pretty much any wolf Games Workshop has managed over the years but he’s still not the greatest model, the head especially is really poor and from some angles looks quite squashed and misshapen. In the end all he needed was a fairly quick and dirty paint job, and to be honest that’s all he really deserves as well. 

Just a boy and his dog, going for a walk… to King’s Landing…

Of course even these two stalwarts aren’t going to defend the North without a little help and as it happens I’ve got a whole heap of Sworn Swords on my desk ready to heed their liege lord’s call. These are not the most visually interesting sculpts by any stretch of the imagination – they’re not bad but they’re not all that exciting either. I do have a lot of them however so I went for a scheme that was quick and easy to replicate but nothing fancy.

All being well I should be able to rattle through the rest of the squad in short order – but first; some Lannisters!