Sunday 12 June 2011

The Beginnings of Barbarism




DH-228 Viking swinging Two-handed Sword.

I uncovered this fellow in a box I had hidden.  Ah! treasure of the forgotten times! (the 1980's)

While not the first figure I painted, he's arguably the longest surviving figure in my collection. I had originally painted him up for D&D to portray 'Starek the Destroyer' the viking-esque fighter I played back in the early 80's. I have pretty fond memories of ol' Starek.  Fought a whole tribe of Minotaurs and won, survived the Village of Homlett and was done-in in swamp by a troll or something...

Y'see kids (wheeeze), back the days, we used historical miniatures to act as our player characters and fight the monsters. Heck, most of the orcs we used were Romans with green painted faces. Not that you really needed them, big squares and hex sheets were yet to infest the realm of role playing. But they did look cool on the kitchen table with all our see-through state of the art gem dice.

The figure is a classic from Ral Partha (which I'm sure a discerning few of you knew already) and is one of the (IMHO) signature Tom Meier sculpts of period. Look at the movement implied by his pose and his tunic. Glorious.  Oh, I know, somewhere one of you is saying 'but, but, but, excuse me, Early Medieval Scandinavians did not wear horns on their helmet, nor is there any suggestion that Norse warriors employed a two handed grip on a sword that is clearly 12C at best...'

And y'know, I just want to give you a hug and tell you you're gonna be OK.
Because this is singularly the  
Finest Viking Miniature Ever Made

Ever.

The cool bit is you can still get this guy






3 comments:

  1. Heh... I have a few of those...

    I still have a quite a few of all my original D&D - a few of them with original paint jobs. Some with multiple paint jobs - layered over top of each other so thick that most of the original detail is completely obliterated.

    In recent times I've started stripping paint off those old gems and giving them the paint job they deserve...

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ahhh what a blast from the past - and doesn't Starek exhibit the patina of age ... the scars of a veteran. I particularly love the ripples of his sword blade telling many a story of many dungeon encounters past. The glory days of D&D were the late 70s for me - all the paraphernalia (except a couple of guides) and one module are long lost in the many paths life has taken since then. Pure nostalgia ...

    ReplyDelete
  3. Ah the village of the homlet! That is the inly D&D module I still have--a great setting for a game with intrigue a plenty and a great list of wines at the tavern.

    ReplyDelete