The dawn rose over the Grey Mountains of her homeland as the wafting smell of burning and death clenched her senses and boiled the blood that pulsed through her veins. Everything she had grown up with, all those she loved, her entire life before she was taken by the Dukes of Bretonnia lay destroyed before her. The agony and sadness was second only to the rage that she felt over their tradgedy.
Ramona was born and raised in the fertile lands held by the Duke of Gisoreux in the foothills of the Grey Mountains. Her people were farmers mostly, with few skilled artizans and sminths among them. Despote this, they were self-sustaining, but although they needed to do no trade with other communities in Bretonnia, they did. As such her little community became closely tied with many of the other communities that inhabbited the feethills in the Duchy of Gisoreux.
When she reached her teen years t was found out that she had a certain gift with magics and sorcery, and so she was sent for by The Lady of the Lake, or so she was told. She departed her family and the lands she grew up in with sadness, but at the promise of things better. Unfortunately for her it was torture. She was deemed unfit to serve the Lady throughout the realm as she was found to be too self-determined. And so was kept in the secret catacombs of the Lady's magickers, where they keep all those of magic potential who are taken, and whose magic and life energy are leeched to strengthen the Order of the Enchantress.
There she schemed to escape with no success and not the bravery to attempt it, until she heard of the rebellion. So it was that her people who had lived on their land for ages, were told they must leave since they would not pay taxes to the Duke. Their lands were to be taken by the Duke himself for his pleasure. They refused to give up their lands, and with them many of the communities that dwelt in the foothills of the Grey Mountain leant their support, for they knew that it would be them next. And so her people faught a desperate war of ambush and sabotage against the Duke of Gisoreux and his knights. Ramona's community and their allies became knows as the Hill-landers, and the Duke spread great lies about their vileness within his Duchy and throughout Bretonnia. Despite this peasants from the flatlands and the cities would often refuse to fight the Hill-landers, and many left to join them.
Not more than a month after the rebellion began, the King of Bretonnia, along with the Dukes of Montfort, Bastonne, Parravon, and Quenelles and their armies climbed the hilly pathways of Ramona's people and hunted them down and killed them all. Ramona had escaped her captivity only to find that she was too late to help her people.
From there she vowed to take revenge. She would bring down the Duke of Gisoreux, the King, and all other dukes that had a hand in destroying her people. Her thirst for vengeance lead her to study arcane magics of undeath, leading her to vampirism and immortality so that she may better wage her war against the crown of Bretonnia. Once she was powerful enough, it was to her people's mass grave that she returned and from there she rose them from the dead so that they could gain their own vengeance on their murderers as well... And so, Ramona's Hordes of Death were born!
And that's all the back story, below see the miniatures!
Posted: Feb 3, 2009 - Manufacturer: Games Workshop
My Vampire General Ramona the Vengeance Taker. She is a pretty nice fig, one I bought when I was revitalizing my
undead Warhammer army in the late 90s. If you don't recognize her, originally she was
a Bretonnian damsel or something like that. She makes a great vampire. In the HotT
rule set she could play a hero or a magician.
Posted: Jan 26, 2009 - Manufacturer: Games Workshop, Reaper Miniatures
This was a pleasure to do, and will likely play the role of the general for my HotT army.
The centre fig there is a GW wight something or other.
The two flanking figs are Reaper skeletons, with added helmets and decayed armour.
I really enjoyed doing the scarecrow banner. It is a miniature version of my
Giant Scarecrow Halloween display
and I wanted to do it in miniature for ages! I am very happy with the way it
turned out!
Posted: April 16, 2009 - Manufacturer: Games Workshop
Another element for my Hordes of the Things-Warhammer undead army. The figs on here
represent two generations of GW ghouls... The front rank are earlier than the back,
and they are of two vastly different schools of design. It also clearly shows scale creep. I like them though. I am very
happy with the scheme, especially the skin colour, which is done using the same colours
as the skeletons in this army. Another thing I realized with this one is that I didn't
have to put complimentary colours on each fig; I just painted them all with purple cloaks
and then added the jack-o-lantern (which I sculpted) for compliment. Finally, the weapons on
these figs are left with the original (circa 1998) paint job.
Posted: Feb 3, 2009 - Manufacturer: Games Workshop
The last element required to bring my undead Hordes of the Things army up to the
minimum points requirement. This will play the role of a Hero type element for now.
if I ever paint up more of these, I can eventually use this as a simple mounted
knight element, or a knight general or something like that. These are all old GW
figs, including the undead mounted champion/wight in the middle with the axe. It had
been probably 13 years since I first painted it, and it was nice to get back to it!
Posted: Feb 3, 2009
A shot of the general leading some of her undead!
Posted: Jan 26, 2009 - Manufacturer: Reaper Miniatures
I like the generic skeleton... Just a skeleton with a spear and a blank shield.
These figs are old Reaper skeletons with swords. Replaced the swords with spears
and they painted up very nicely. I really like those big blank shields! Note the added
arrow there. I have a bunch of Bretonnian figs that I plan to paint with green arrows :)
Posted: Jan 26, 2009 - Manufacturer: Reaper Miniatures
Second element of spear for the HotT action. Again, the standard skeleton is really cool,
even if GW doesn't think so ;)
Posted: Jan 6, 2009 - Manufacturer: Games Workshop
One of the old, out of production fell bats from GW. I am not entirely sure why
they re-did these for the new ones, as they are very similar. The jack-o-lantern
on the base I sculpted for another purpose, but decided it was too small. It really
adds a life to this fig thanks to its brightness. I am quite happy with the final outcome
on this fig, especially the wings.
Posted: Jan 6, 2009 - Manufacturer: Games Workshop
This bat is a bit more tame than the previous, but still, such a large bat would
be quite frightening with or without extra-giant fangs. The tombstone is the ever
present tombstone from the zombie box set. As with the other bat, I am happy with this one,
especially the top of the wings.
Posted: Dec 29th, 2008 - Manufacturer: Games Workshop
For the Hordes of the Things (HotT) with Warhammer miniatures project I decided to pull
out the old Skeleton Cavalry figs, which have been out of production and use since 1996 when
warhammer moved from 'Undead', where you could mix vampires and mummies, to the Vampire Counts
and Tomb King armies... Anyway, I decided that these would be skeleton knights, and so based them
up for HotT as knights. They won't work for Warhammer base-wise, but it doesn't really matter since
they're unusable anyway! So, besides all of that, I am very happy with them! I went for the early
medieval knight looks, early crusade sorta thing and it seemed to work pretty well! Over the next couple of weeks
I will take some pictures of the figs the way they looked prior to being repainted for comparison!
Posted: Dec 29th, 2008 - Manufacturer: Reaper Miniatures
This was the first set of undead figs I have done for some time. These
are slightly modified Reaper figs that I used for my old (circa 1996) undead army.
Thanks to a Hordes of the Things (HotT) with Warhammer miniatures project that was started here
dug them out, fixed them up, and repainted them! On a 60mm by 20mm base, these figs will
work for HotT as well as Warhammer if I should so choose! The shields were fun to do; first I painted
them to look brand new, and then I added dirt, rust, and slash marks... It was tough to put that stuff
over the highlighted freehand, but it turned out well in the end. I added a touch of bright orange to
my standard rust scheme, and that worked very well also I think. Overall, I like the medieval look of the figs.
Posted: Dec 29th, 2008 - Manufacturer: Reaper Miniatures
Repainting figs is always a load of fun! These figs sorely needed an update,
as they were painted originally more than ten years ago! These are old Reaper
skeletons (the two on the outside originated as
this one and the one in the middle originated as
this one). The glaives/halberd weapons are actually made
using those plastic-coated large paper-clips for the shafts and plasticard for the blades. They
worked pretty well I think. This stand (based for Hordes of the Things as well as Warhammer) sports my
favourite jack-o-lantern shield so far (the one in the middle).