A Few More Mythical Earthers

 

Goblin with Spear, Shield and Bow

I added a unit of Goblins to my growing Mythical Earth (ME) army - Miniature Figurines 'not' Middle Earth range from the early 70s. These are the ME56 figure, Goblin with Spear, Shield and Bow. When I collected these as a nipper these were cheerfully dubbed the 'GSSBs'.

I stuck to the same colour palette that I used for the Man Orcs: iron for the metal-work and dark red for shields and straps. As I always do I primed in white, painted the base flesh colour, and then ended up almost repainting the rest of the model black to carry the armour and fill-in behind the shield and arms. Although a little lining with a brush will be done at the end, I mostly rely on the black undercoat for this, cutting in the surrounding colour to leave a neat divide.

ME56 is a funny little figure and you have to wonder whether it originates from the same hand as the rest of the range. The sculpting style is very unusual for Minifigs. The pose is also quite poor from the point of view of moulding and casting - although that is hardly a unique thing with these early Minifigs. The spear is crudely done, a very thick piece of wire which has been flattened and cut into a point without any attempt at shaping the spear-point. 

The armour is modelled to represent either mail or scale, and it's quite hard to tell which. Again, this is not the Minifigs way, which is to engrave the mail as is the case on the Man Orcs and other models in the range as well as all the contemporary ancient and medieval ranges. 

I've been picking these up from ebay and friends have contributed a few too, so it's hardly surprising that there is some variation in the models I have. Although the spear butts are all grounded at the back of the base, some extend over the lip of the base itself, making a longer spear held at a necessarily different angle. Some of my figures have the spear butts clipped - as is the case with this example - which was obviously done by the original owner to neaten them up. 

I have enough usable models to paint up another unit the same size, and a smaller batch of figures that are probably too poorly case to make the effort worthwhile. I think the inferior castings are genuine Minifigs, but I guess it's possible these could be contemporary re-casts - it certainly wouldn't be all that unusual were that the case. The poorer castings have massive fill-in behind the arms and shield where the mould halves haven't properly closed. I can't bring myself to paint those. The good news is that ME 56 has been re-issued as part of the Miniature Figurines Classic Fantasy range. I've not seen the new castings but hopefully they'll be up to scratch. 

The GSSB was a popular model in the day, not least because it was a reasonably potent tabletop proposition with a combination of weapons that offered ranged and close-combat abilities otherwise unavailable to the servants of the Dark Lord. 

I've also painted up a couple of sample figures: the Dunland Spearman ME21 and True Orc with Sword and Shield ME45. 

ME 21 Dunland Spearman

Here we have the Dunland Spearman - a standard hairy barbarian type albeit with a man-bag slung at his waist. This is a very typical Minifigs spear pose - as seen on the PB Hoplite for example. I've painted this in the same colours as the unit of axemen I already have. 

ME 45 True Orc with
Sword and Shield

And here is the True Orc. Not sure I fancy his chances much with that flimsy looking shield and complete lack of armour. Same anatomy as the True Orc Archer I already have as part of the army, and altogether a pleasing little model in the Minifigs style. The trouble with this chap, and also with his stablemate ME24 True Orc Swordsman, is that the combination of weapons and protection was especially poor in terms of the contemporary rules that we all used - effectively condemning him into the realm of 'D class medium infantry'... and we all know what happened to them. 

Mythical Earth Revisited

 

The Mythical Earth army takes shape

As some may have come to appreciate, I am a bit of a fan of the Miniature Figurines Mythical Earth (ME) range. This is a range that came out in the mid-70s and was the first proper range of fantasy figures available in the UK. The models are 'true' 25mm and entirely compatible with Minifigs historical ranges of the time. I've been collecting these for a while and have managed to amass quite a bit of original metal via e-bay and thanks to the kind donations of friends. I've been a little reluctant to show work in progress until I had a reasonable force ready - let's say something approximating the sort of tabletop army that might have graced a battlefield in the 70s!

As schoolboys my friends and I collected and gamed with this range when it was brand new - and for some reason I drew the 'bad guys' straw when it came to choosing forces. My gaming buddies sensibly went for the Gondorians and allies, or the dwarfs and elves. At the time I was never able to afford to build up the large sized units that the game suggested. So, at least in part, I wanted to go back and recreate the army that was in my mind's eye as a teenager. The core of the army is made up of man orcs (six units of twenty apiece), aided and abetted by goblin archers and Dunlendings (one unit of each twenty strong again) and goblin wolf riders (five units of twelve). The whole is led by a winged Nazgul.

The basing is standard contemporary WRG Ancients sizes - finished in plain green - on mount board. I know a few of my fellow 'old school' army builders like to use mdf bases, which are marvelously regular as well as convenient, but I find them rather thick. Maybe I shall regret this decision, because the board does tend to warp, but it's what I've done for all my armies including the historical ones. I mix the green colour up from Warlord 'Green Webbing' and Vallejo 'Flat Yellow': mixing up your base colour is, of course, madness. I rather like it!

Minifigs never made any man orc archers so I decided to have a go at replicating the Minifigs style myself. The result is not a bad approximation of the original and fits in quite nicely. I based the pose on a Roman archer drawing his bow from the 'PB' range. If anyone is interested I'll get a little post together on how I produced the sculpt. So, not an original model from the 70s but I like to think that it's something that might have been had Minifigs decided to expand the range further. 

Although most of the infantry are original metal (aside from my archers) most of the cavalry are new casting from Miniature Figurines, now owned by Caliver books. At the same time as I was buying up old models, the folks at Miniatures Figurines were putting models back into production. This proved a great opportunity to build up my wolf rider horde.

I've managed five units of twelves models, three units of the axe-wielding riders and two carrying swords and bows. The new castings are clean and fairly easy to prep and paint. They are also slightly smaller than the original metal and a little flatter due to being 'remoulds' from production castings, but you'd be hard-pressed to notice unless you were to place them side by side. 

I have a single unit of original models and the casting vary hugely in quality: I imagine because the pieces were cast at different times and the moulds themselves were variously worn. What was or wasn't an acceptable casting obviously varied a bit in the 70s, and I've resorted to a little bit of rebuilding here and there, as well as filling in sinks and pits, and carving out some of the 'clag' from torn and worn moulds. 

I scoured the inter-web for inspiration when it came to the wolf colours. 'Orclord' Richard Hale's collection on The Stuff of Legends website is a great example of what can be done with these and similar vintage figures, and I confess to shamelessly imitating the Mythical earth wolves in Richard's collection as painted by Andrew Taylor. Of course, I had to paint sixty of the beasts so it's production-line painting really, but I think the result passes muster, certainly as massed units. I'm tempted to have a go at a few conversions - maybe some lancers and possibly standard bearers and leaders. 

I'll take a few pictures of the individual units when I get a chance as well.  Hopefully I'll have a few more units ready soon. Not too sure what to tackle next: maybe a unit of goblins with spear, shield and bow. We shall see.