HeroQuest: Group picture

This is the very last post for the HeroQuest project: the mandatory group photo!

With this post I am closing up the last of the goals for the year.

So far, I have painted 117 miniatures this year and with still a few months to go I hope to reach some of the stretch goals, let's see about that. I am looking forward to start 2021 with around 30 miniatures only in the to-do. For the first time since 2014, my stockpile of unpainted miniatures is below 100 and will not grow more until the end of the year.

Overall painting HeroQuest was a blast. Not too many details on them, but lots of character. I made some poor decisions along the way like with the Chaos Warriors and the furniture, but hey it is done now and my daughter loves it.

I hope you like the group pictures!

Painted in 2020

HeroQuest: Furniture

And here are the last pieces I needed to paint for HeroQuest, the furniture!

They are not as sexy as the heroes but definitively very interesting to paint. I loved applying different textures and techniques to them.

My only concern is that I did not check the browns I was using against the reference with the right light, and I ended up with a darker shade of brown. I used chocolate brown and I should have chosen red brown. Anyway, it is done now and I am not planning on repainting it.

For the tomb I made a similar mistake, I chose bluish grey instead of pale one, but that one was not due to the light, I simply forgot about the reference.

As for the doors, I thought hard about them. I was not sure whether to paint them or leave them with plastic grey, which is what I did in the end. If some day I decide to paint them, I will try to do them like this, which is amazing! But there are so many doors that I am not sure if I have the necessary willpower.

This is the first time -ever- that I paint any furniture or scenery, and I have to say that it was nice for a change.

In any case, they are all done now and I can close up the project, I will do that in the last post as a recap.

Painted in 2020

HeroQuest: Barbarian

And here is the last hero of the game and the all time fan favourite! The Barbarian!

Carrying an absurdly long two handed great-sword and tiny amount of clothes, he is the closest you can get to Conan without infringing IP, I guess.

Painting him was quite nice, I did apply several subtle highlights on the skin that of course nobody can appreciate with the photo I made, but oh well I know they are there.

The important thing is that the project is almost over, only the furniture to go!

Painted in 2020

HeroQuest: Wizard

And here is the first human hero I have painted, the Wizard!

I have followed the weird colour scheme shown in the art, purple, red, blue, yellow... I mean, how was this chosen? What colour you want to wear? ALL!

In any case, the overall look of the mini is nice and it fits the fantasy style so I can't complain.

Just one hero to go!

Painted in 2020 

HeroQuest: Elf

Here is the second hero, the Elf!

For those out there familiar with the miniature, you will notice he is holding a slightly different sword. The reason is that long time ago, some kid (my wife!) step on it and managed to bend it in such a way that a repair was no longer possible. Therefore, I cut it and attached a new one. I did not have a longsword, only a short one, but the overall effect is ok, although perhaps a bit too broad.

For the colour scheme, I have chosen the classic yellow/red following the art. Overall I am quite happy with the result, although the photo is quite bad.

Please pay attention to the nice Easter egg, in the Spanish edition of HeroQuest, the Elf was wrongly translated as "El Troll" (The Troll) which is just hilarious. You can see that in the picture below.

Painted in 2020

HeroQuest: Dwarf

This is the first hero that I paint for the game. And in fact it is not one but two! For some reason, I had buried in my bits box a HeroQuest Dwarf. Which is funny because I never owned a copy of HeroQuest when I was a kid. Who knows how I managed to get it.

The nice thing about owning two is that I can now have two in my party!

In any case, I have painted it following the art shown on the rulebook. Which is pretty much what you would imagine a Fantasy Dwarf would look like.

Painted in 2020

HeroQuest: Gargoyle

And here it is, the final dungeon monster!

To be very honest, I was not sure how to paint it.

I had several options on my head:

• First option, paint it as a stone monster.
• Second option, paint it is a flesh monster.
• Other option was to buy another Gargoyle and paint one as a stone statue and the other one as a flesh monster.
• And lastly, I thought about painting it in the middle of a conversion from stone to flesh, in a similar manner like many Tau Kill Teams have been painted.

In the end, I have chosen option one. Mainly because the other option I liked, which is painting it while converting would look too fancy for the style I am using for the board game. In any case, I want to try and paint that effect sometime. It just looks too cool.

As inspiration, I have tried to paint it like this one. Check the article, it has the paint recipe as well as a full explanation as to why it is really a stone statue, including pictures.

As I wanted to try that terracotta colour rather than the usual grey, I need to test out several paint combinations to see how well would it work. Luckily, a couple of old monopose goblins came to the rescue!
Here you can see my first attempt, with the colours used for it.

Not too bad, but too pale in fact.

Second attempt, with a much more reduced colour palette.

In the comparison picture, you can see that the one on the right looks better.
And lastly, here are the colours I end up using.

1. Base coat with brown
2. Sponged with flat grey
3. Sparingly dry-brushed with Orange and generously dry-brushed with pale grey
4. Tiny highlights with Bone

For the sword, I used my usual recipe for old gold and for the whip I used the same technique as seen in the other article. I really liked the whip with a spotty gradient to simulate heated metal. My only regret is that I applied to much white to it but hey, I learned how to do it so I can now replicate it hopefully better in the future!

Now that all the bad guys are painted, let's go for the heroes!

Painted in 2020

HeroQuest: Chaos Sorcerer

With the Sorcerer I can close up the chapter on Chaos for HeroQuest.

Nothing special to mention about this chap. I was tempted to paint him as Skeletor, but in end I decided to go for a classic blue scheme that would match the troops.

Next up I will tackle the Gargoyle!

Painted in 2020

HeroQuest: Chaos Warriors

Here we have the Chaos Warriors.

Very simple paint scheme for these guys. I was not sure if I should go for using different colours on the armour or not, but in the end, I chose to paint them in metal and just give them a tiny bit of colour on the mace at the tip of the horns. Why? Because they look cool like that.

The box comes with four warriors but you can see five in the picture.
The reason is that somehow one from the 1994 Dungeon of Doom for Talisman found its way into my bits box. I really don't know how that happened as I never owned that game.

In any case, I decided to paint it as well. Unfortunately, it had several thick layers of enamel that I could not remove, therefore, I painted on top of them. This is why many details have disappeared. But from a distance it is difficult to notice.

Painted in 2020

HeroQuest: Zombies

The last two Undead of the set.

Pale green for the skin with a strong dark wash to give it deep shadows and putrid feel. Clothes painted with blue and purple pants because if you are painting a green human figure, you need to give it purple pants if you can!

Here is a family picture of all the undead.

Painted in 2020

HeroQuest: Mummies

The next two Undead join the ranks of painted HeroQuest figures!

Even faster to paint than the skeletons. Basecoat white, sepia wash and highlight with bone and white. Cold blue for the skin with a tiny highlight.

Painted in 2020

HeroQuest: Skeletons

Here are the first of the Undead that I have painted for HeroQuest.
They have been very easy and fast to paint.
Basecoat white, sepia wash for the bones, highlight of bone. Brown for the wood and boltgun for metal. A bit of extreme weathering on the blade ... and done!

And with these four skeletons, I have breached the 100 miniatures painted mark for the year! Yay!

Painted in 2020

HeroQuest: Fimir

The last three Greenskins, the Fimir.

Very simple colour scheme, gold and green.

Here is a family picture of all the little green guys.

Painted in 2020.

HeroQuest: Goblins

For today I have another round of Greenskins, the goblins.
The recipe is the same as with the Orcs, but with brighter colours.

Painted in 2020.

HeroQuest: Orcs

Here are the first painted figures from the HeroQuest set, the Orcs!

They are the first monopose Orcs I have painted since the late 90s... back when I had a Fantasy Orcs & Goblins Army. I have to say, I did not miss painting these :)

In any case, I have followed a straight-forward recipe.

Straps and boots in browns.

Classic Green Goblin and Green Wash for skin.

Boltgun metal and bronze for metals.

The only thing worth mentioning is the base, as I did a bit of freehand there to give some texture as it is otherwise just a chunk of flat plastic. I played with a few different options until I found the combination I liked. It is basically grey with a few thin layers of dark washes and light grey for the individual bricks. 

Let's continue now with the rest of the Greenskins.

Painted in 2020

Classic HeroQuest

And after completing the third milestone, here comes the fourth and last for the year!

A Classic HeroQuest boxed set!

After having painted the Silver Tower box, I am really looking forward to this one with much more sober, leaner and simple figures.

The box was kept at my wife's place, inside a wardrobe, for many, many years, just waiting until somebody would take it, fix all the broken pieces and give it a paint job. And 2020 is the year for that!

Some of the figures were broken as it seems some kid back in the day stepped on them :)
I needed to repair some axes, swords and broken bits. Unfortunately, there were a couple that I could not really repair as they got too much glue back in the day and it was all over the figure. I hope that it cannot be seen after painting them.

I will not try to overkill it, but to make it look nice on the table, after all, I expect to play with my kids rather sooner than later, so better not to spend too much time on it!

Looking for inspiration on the web, I found this little gem. I can't believe that the miniatures shown there are the same monopose plastic figures that I have... such great details.