Bakshi's Lord of the Rings

I re-watched it yesterday. Not seen it in 40 years, and I have to say I think it stands up pretty well (Mrs. Orc and Orc Minissimus disagreed and gave up round about Lorien I think).

It has got me thinking. I have a few 'spare' LotR minis that have not yet been painted up. Due to having a couple of different sets (a Mines of Moria set and a box of Heroes of Helm's Deep) and then a few random ebay purchases I have in total (as far as the Fellowship goes anyway) 1 plastic Gandalf, 1 plastic Boromir (for certain - I think I may have another in a different box, maybe 90% convinced of that); 2 Legolases (1 plastic, 1 metal); 2 Aragorns (1 plastic, 1 metal); 3 Gimlis (2 plastic, one with a broken weapon, 1 metal); 2 plastic Merrys; 3 plastic Pippins; 3 Sams (2 plastic, one with his pan broken off, 1 metal); and 4 Frodos (3 plastic, 1 metal).

I definitely have some spares is what I'm saying... so I think I shall paint some of them up in colours matching the Bakshi versions - though to be honest, several of them have been partly-painted anyway. I definitely started painting the metal Legolas and Aragorn figures back in the day (The Two Towers was released in 2002 so it's quite likely I've had some of these figures for upwards of 15 years). Checking on the others, I think I remember at least putting some paint on Gandalf, but the plastics of Boromir, Aragorn, Legolas, Gimli and one of the plastic lots of the four Hobbits have been painted to a greater or lesser extent, and not by me.

The almost-complete paints somewhat resemble these outfits:

Sam, Merry, Frodo, Pippin, from Jackson's Fellowship of the Ring

Painting them up Bakshi-style might be easier with the Hobbits than with some of the characters. The clothing worn by some of the characters is not really so similar (well, Gandalf is pretty much the same) but the Hobbits aren't massively different. Aragorn and Boromir, definitely different. Legolas and Gimli, pretty different. The Hobbits' clothes are similar, without being identical.

Pippin, Sam, Merry and Frodo, I think about to hide from the Black Rider, from Bakshi's Lord of the Rings

Essentially, they wear breeches, shirts and waistcoats, with green cloaks over the top (Bakshi doesn't have them given new cloaks in Lorien, but that doesn't matter, I'm painting up 'Moria' Hobbits anyway). Unlike the others, Sam doesn't wear a shirt-and-waistcoat combo, he wears a sort of tunic or smock. The modern GW Hobbits (I'm old enough to remember the original GW Lord of the Rings range from the '80s - in fact, I have a few of those too, in with all my 'Oldhammer' minis) are obviously designed to be faithful reproductions of the Jackson film versions, so they wear jackets as well as waistcoats, and the waistcoats themselves have a considerably higher neck-line than the Bakshi depictions. So I'll have to use a bit of creative licence with transferring the information.

Frodo, Sam, Pippin and Merry, at the Prancing Pony, from Bakshi's Lord of the Rings

The notes I made (with occasional corrections to something I misinterpreted in bad light):

All Hobbits wear dark green cloaks

Frodo - red hair, brown tunic waistcoat, white shirt, dark brown trews, black belt, brass (gold?) buckle

Sam - black dark brown hair, red-brown tunic, dark brown trews

Merry - blondish hair, tan mid-green waistcoat, white pale green shirt, mid- darker green trews

Pippin - brown hair, tan waistcoat, yellow shirt, lightish mid-brown trews

This was after getting Merry and Pippin confused, but afterwards I sorted out which was which. By the time I thought about this, it was difficult to tell Merry and Pippin apart, Merry had already gone for his walk in Bree and Pippin had dropped the stone down the well. I should have just waited and got some images from the web.

So that's the next task I've set myself, getting them painted, the Hobbits first. I shall have to paint over the blue breeches one of them has already been given but it will be fine I'm sure. Whether paint will touch any of the rest of the Fellowship in the near future remains to be seen. From one point of view, it is unfortunate that both Legolases have been painted, at least to some extent. I don't intend to repaint the plastic Legolas to match the Bakshi version, and I'm definitely not repainting my metal Legolas that I painted all those years ago. A bit of a touch-up maybe, but not a total repaint. Perhaps I can paint a different Elf for the Bakshi version, I have plenty. Trying to work out how to paint Gimli, however, in fairly different clothes, will be a bit of a challenge. Aragorn too, their costumes are very different. But maybe instead of the greenish palate of the Jackson Aragorn, I will paint one in more russety tones. But for the ones that are at least partly done, I'm going to finish them Jackson-style.

Legolas, Aragorn, Boromir and Gimli, at the death of Boromir and the breaking of the Fellowship, from Bakshi's Lord of the Rings

So that's it - painting of LotR characters. There should be an update 'soon'... whatever that means...
.

Rift City vague update

Where does the time go?

The Rift City campaign is continuing - due to social distancing, it's happening on Discord. We're still getting together once a month to dungeon the heck out of the caverns of the Rift. The PCs (now mostly around 4th-5th level) are currently beating up an area of Level 3. But, somehow, I never get around to doing the write-ups. Part of the problem is that I make fewer notes running the game on Discord and it's harder to reconstruct in the end. But really I'm just bad at this.

Lyracian, who plays in the campaign, has written up some of the sessions on his blog. Some recent sessions, only partly covered by me, can be found here:

Sessions 30-33 report

Session 34 report

What happened in Session 35? Well, the PCs were exploring the same area of Level 3 as in Session 34. One peculiar thing was that they found a room that contained four curious devices that seemed to be a bit like a cross between a chair and a covered bath. Three were empty but one contained a (possibly sleeping, possibly dead) occupant. The PCs prised open the lid, and the occupant woke up. It was a male Elf, who seemed somewhat bemused. There was also a cat in the ... sleep-chamber... which also woke up. Berg tried to kill it but the Elf cast Hold Person on her, and then berated Galen and Karensa in somewhat archaic Elvish about keeping their servant under control. It seemed the Elf had travelled in the sleep-chamber with other companions, but also inside another metal ship, a great distance from another star. What the PCs made of all of this is anyone's guess, but the Elf announced his intention to see the world of two suns (news to the PCs, they only know about one) and find some Elven leaders to find out what had been happening since he arrived. The Elf PCs at least should be starting to suspect that somehow he's been asleep for a very long time indeed...

This is the 36th session coming up. We've actually missed two while I was working away at the end of last year, so technically it might be the 34th session actually run, but for accounting purposes it should be Session 36 I think. We started in August 2017 after all, and thus have been running for 3 years now. I'm quite pleased that we have managed to keep it going - but I'm looking forward to it being face-to-face again!