Kings of War Slow Grow Challenge Episode 5: Painting Progress

A Quick PSA Before We Begin

Before we dive into this week’s hobby updates, a quick announcement.

Ross is taking a short break from the Slow Grow Challenge, and with good reason! He’s been working extremely hard preparing the DreadBall All Stars Kickstarter, which launches next week.

For anyone who hasn’t been following along in recent weeks, DreadBall All Stars is Mantic's upcoming standalone sci-fi sports game, in which players command all-star teams in explosive head-to-head matches. It’s a fantastically fun out-of-the-box experience, packed with awesome new miniatures, and the rules design has been headed up by none other than Jervis Johnson – the man who invented the fantasy sports game genre!

If you’re playing the long game with the Kings of War slow grow, but fancy a fast and frenetic change of pace from time to time, it’s well worth checking out! The Kickstarter is going live on Tuesday 17^th March, and we’ll have tons of new information and content dropping for it in the coming days.

With that said, let’s see how the rest of the challengers are getting on this week.

Alex – The Reformed Perfectionist (Trident Realms)

Things are still a little chaotic in the wake of my house move, but I’ve managed to dig out my paints, brushes and miniatures from amongst the many boxes. Hurray!

Following on from that, I got all of my Naiads and Riverguard primed, and I’ve officially started painting my Trident Realm army. It feels great to finally get some colour on the first models.

When I start a new army project, I always like to paint a couple of test miniatures first. I usually have a colour scheme in mind beforehand, but you never really know how it will look until you see it on the model.

There’s also a slightly philosophical reason for this approach. Painting is my relaxation time, and when I sit down at the hobby desk I like to get into a bit of a flow state – focusing purely on the physical act of painting. I don’t particularly enjoy making lots of decisions mid-session about which paints to use or which colour needs to go where on which miniature. By doing a couple of test models first, I can work all of that out in advance and establish a clear step-by-step process. Once that’s done, I can relax and just enjoy the painting. Happy times!

This week’s test models are one Naiad and one Riverguard. In the pictures here they’ve had their basecoats and a wash, but they haven’t had highlights yet, so they’re not quite finished. That said, I’m really happy with how they’re shaping up so far.

The end of next week marks the milestone for stage one of the challenge. Will I get my Champions Company finished in time? I’ll certainly give it my best shot this weekend. Even if I don’t quite get everything over the line, I’m confident I’ll be able to catch up over the next few weeks now that the house move is behind me and I’m settling into my new living space.

Dan – The Lore-Led General (Xirkaali)

It's been a busy week but I was determined to get something done!

In keeping with the Invasion and Stand at Callenspire storylines, I decided on a jungle-style basing scheme for my army. The bases were painted with Fur Brown from The Army Painter, which I also allowed to coat the lower parts of the models to create that impression of sticky jungle mud – the kind you might see on a Malaysian rally stage!

This was then stippled with brighter green paint and finished with some Summer Undergrowth lichen and a scattering of Brown Battleground basing material, both also from The Army Painter. The base edges were finished in plain black to keep things neat.

Next week I’ll be moving on to picking out some more details on the models and tidying up what’s already been painted.

Tobias – The Hobby Dynamo (Xirkaali)

I’m basically finished with stage one!

Or at least, I thought I was finished until Alex came along, looked at my miniatures and asked: “These are looking great. But aren’t you going to put any tufts on the regiment bases?” D’oh!

It turns out I’d somehow overlooked that step. Cut me some slack please everyone, these things happen sometimes! :)

Of course, I had already added tufts to the base of my Witch Hunter, and was really happy with how they looked, so it was always my intention to add them to the two regiments as well.

So technically I’m not quite finished yet. I’m still very happy with the progress, though! With a full week left before the stage one deadline, I’ve got plenty of time to add those final touches and check if there are any other small details I want to tidy up.

Either way, the first 500 points are looking comfortably on track.

Approaching the Stage One Milestone

We’re now closing in on the end of Stage One of the Slow Grow Challenge.

Our two Xirkaali generals are looking well on track to have their first 500 points painted in time for the milestone next week.

Meanwhile, our two Champions Company challengers have both had to deal with some fairly significant real-life interruptions during this first stage – Alex with a house move from Germany to the UK, and Ross with the demands of his role as Mantic’s Head of Crowdfunding.

Both will be doing their best to push their armies forward over the coming weeks, but there’s a good chance they won’t quite make the milestone date next week. No problem – the Slow Grow Challenge is meant to be a marathon, not a sprint, and the important thing is sticking with the project over the long run.

We’ll check back in next week to see how everyone’s getting on as the first stage reaches its conclusion.