Part X of the Repainting my 3rd Edition Wood Elf Force- Elven Lords

While I haven't blogged about it lately, I have been diligently working on my 3rd Edition Wood Elf force since Spring. So much so that even though I'm going to post about a single unit today, my Elven Lords cavalry unit- it's actually not the only one complete.

In order, I have finished the following which will be in the next blog entry(ies)?

• Beastmasters (just the animals and I had to get creative, those guys go for $$$).
• Another treeman
• Wizards, 1 on foot and 2 mounted. 
• 2nd Wardancer unit of 10
• Army Standard Bearer
• Bears Monstrous Host
• A Shape Changer- a Werebear
• Another unit of 20 archers!
• Baggage! Only three elves, but I need to find more "elf villager" types anyways.

In short, my Wood Elf army is pretty much complete outside of some Falconer ideas which I may or may not get to and a unit of eight Glade Runners (scouts) made from left over minis from Archer units. Along with that I need to get the actual beast master elves as well for the beastmaster units. If I had to add up the points off the top of my head, its at least 5,000, especially with the dragon. Not bad for a force that started as allies for my Empire army and was maybe around 800 points back then.

But onward to the meat of the post, the Elven Lords which gives this blurb from the Warhammer Armies book:
The Lords of Elven communities and their noble retainers ride magnificent warhorses into battle. Wood elves favor roan and dappled horses, plaiting their mains and ornamenting their bridles with hair-plumes and jewels. 


Like Mike McVey in White Dwarf with his Elven Lord unit featured in White Dwarf #141 I didn't want to have too uniform of an appearance, but I didnt vary them as much as he did. Because of this and the fact that I wanted the flexibility to field them as Wood Riders if I so chose I kept them uniform to the rest of the army. In my imagining of them I take it to be perhaps a single Elven Lord with his retainers, nine in number rather than 10 individual lords.

I decided to keep the horses rustic looking, but uniform with their manes and tails. I didnt want to go all gray as to me this seems more like High Elf steeds so I went with more brown horses. Green and white for the bridles with minor variations on the white patterns. Their bases continue with the autumnal turf to convey middle of the woods late in the year feel that the rest of the army has.

Now some notes on the composition of the unit itself:

• The champion of the unit: I've disliked the mini since I bought it (around 1990) as I recall. Not sure why, but I think something in the pose struck me as odd. Finally, however he came together with a paint job I liked this time around.
• The back row of the unit is of special note after a single purchase off eBay I was able to round out the unit, but they were not cheap. I had never seen the rider with the mask attached to the helm before and it struck me as odd.
• The elf in the front rank with the bow spent a number of years atop a cockatrice for my 4th/5th edition High Elf Army. I debated swapping him out but left him. If I can find some musical instrument "rammage" it will go to him.
• Several of the elves served as Dragonkin mounted on various dragons for my 3rd Edition High Elf Army when it functioned as a purely dragon force. Real quick- if you wanted, a High Elf player could field an entire army of nothing but dragons... more on that in a post at a later point. Fortunately I kept all the metal horses.
• The standard bearer I got off of a eBay seller who I do business with quite often. Sometimes pricey, but always reliable. The mini was in rough shape and gobs of paint which I stripped down, primed, painted. The flag itself is inspired from Dark Ages England and I tried to convey an Anglo-Saxon type feel to it while staying with the colors and scheme of the army.

One thing of note is white spiral pattern on the shields... for some reason on these guys it it was a bit wavier then on the other units. Not sure why. I was also short a few shields so I had to use some later edition ones...

Despite all this the unit came out fairly well and are a nice fit for the elites of the army. They did take a bit longer than I expected however.

Next up, as I mentioned and possibly a line on some minis that can stand in for Falconers but that's low on the priority list.. ok so if you ask, I'm looking for Bob Olley Half Elves from the Ironclaw line in the late 1980s. They are not cheap however when they come up on eBay and the half elf with the spear can't be used for the Falconer unit itself.

The next post on the Wood Elf force me be a "catch-all" as i mentioned above encompassing teh last units as well as my thoughts on the army, what went well and what I would change with hindsight.