Wardancer

Hi everyone, having just recently come out of the dark ages and also having somewhat of a Warhammer past, I have the impression that banners or standards seem to be suprisingly seldom. In Warhammer, the army standard is one of the jewels of the entire army. Take this as an extreme example: http://eldathres.de/images/Miniaturengalerie/Hochelfen_Armeestandartentraeger-Vorne.jpg Besides that, every regiment has one standard bearer. In LEGO however, this seems not to be the case. Most armies in the "show your kindoms army"-thread don't have one. It does not seem to be as popular a topic in customizing as for example torso decals. The Kingdoms line does not have any flags bigger than the 2x2. Everyone loves shields and horse bardings with heraldry on it, but big banners do not by far exist for every faction. I have seen a few brickbuilt banners but that limits the detail strongly. Ninjago does an interesting thing in 2260, but that is just 2x4. Is it just my Warhammer past that gives me the impression or do you feel the same? Why is that?

But no one will ever know where I live muhahahaha... *diappears in a cloud of gray smoke* Errr I mean I am aware that this decreases the chance for some children and AFOLS in my home city to get elves. But it took months to get them so there was plenty of chance for these. Also kids seem to prefer Ninjas anyway I am not collecting them for resale, but for modding and customizing which seems legit to me.

Got 7 more elves today from local shops. Now I have 40 which sounds like a decent number, maybe.

When I like a fig, I get selectively addicted. First I went through about 10 shops in my city and in the surrounding villages to get about 20 spartans. Then elves happened and I got about 30 by identifying the dot codes. At first I got a few wrong figs, but soon I had a hit rate of 100%. I went through the same shops every couple of months to see if they had opened new boxes. Currently I think about which cities I could still check for unsearched boxes, but the fuel prizes would kind of raise the price per fig. I could use about 20 more elves for my army and I feel time is running out for getting them at 1,99 Euro... Buying them for 5 at bricklink, no way. Fortunately, this is not likely to happen again... except something very elflike appears. A female would make me freak out. I guess 8 minotaurs will be enough, also 3 statues of liberty and thats it. But who knows...

Also it is advisable to check big stores regularly for reduced sets. At the moment, in Germany, prices for the older sets go down because the new ones were introduced a month ago.

Are you aware of Kingdoms Battle packs? 5 figs for 15 Euro is quite good. But be aware, some are misprinted. I don't know if there is such a a thing as "Ebay Kleinanzeigen" in Holland. It is a branch of ebay which works without fees and auctions. I made a few good deals using this, for example I got the big kingdoms castle for 50 instead of 100 Euro. The problem with kingdoms is: everybody likes them. Everybody knows the prices the sets can fetch. I think it is useful to have a good plan on what to focus. It could be anoying if you collect half a dragon knights army and THEN decide that you like lions better.

I propose to skip Series 5 and go directly to 6. Who needs a chaos dwarf when they can have a minotaur?

I agree with AwesomeStar that none of the shields seems perfect. The brown one looks to elaborate, it would fit a fast fine warrior better than what seems to be a rather brute and crude fighter. The gray squared one looks to big and "institutionalised", as in a roman army or medieval one with very accurate regiments, most likely with spears. It kind of undermines the "barbaric look" of the fig. The gray round one looks ok, but also too big for my taste. What came to my mind were the shields of the spartan, the viking, the upcoming mel-gibson-like "highlander" or any other small round shield. The dark dwarfs shield from series 5 would be perfect in shape, but not in colour. Another, cheaper option could be to use a 2x2 round radar dish with an extra handle inserted, but I do not know in what colours they are available. I did it for my custom wood elf assasin becaus I wanted a really small shield.

My Kingdoms army is not in a good shape at the moment, but I thought maybe some of you might enjoy my idea of a Kingdoms Black Elite Guard. DSC08520 von MWardancer auf Flickr Their leader: DSC08519 von MWardancer auf Flickr Nothing fancy, but I like them. You will of course recognize the spartan parts and the kingdoms parts. The shields are Griffindor shields.

I guess you are right. Not every theme needs runes and ornaments, some are better left a bit simpler.

Hmm, with so many history/fantasy related figs already revealed, chances don't look good that my prayers for a female elf will be answered in series 6. I am kind of happy about the swordsman and the minotaur. The minotaur is a good addition for the magical beasts of the forest part of any army. But I still feel the head piece could be improved colourwise, it looks a bit like a massive brown blob. The new sword is an improvement, but looks a bit simple compared to all the custom ones available. Also, the new brown shield is a welcome addition, but it is less spectatular than the viking shield. More details should be added. The Statue of Libery is of course great, she will make a forest goddess of some sort.

Beautiful. Looks like it can withstand many sieges easily! I checked the other pictures on flickr. Some walls have still room for more details.

Amidalas leg piece reminds me of this piece I am afraid:

I like it! Its very believable and has a beautiful shape. Also, I like the golden curtain and the round roof. It even hosts four minifigs without looking crammed! One thing that struck my eye ist the 2x2 gray tile between horse and carriage, and the gray parts inside the horse. Maybe there could be more continuity in colour if some of that were black or dark blue. I like it! Its very believable and has a beautiful shape. Also, I like the golden curtain and the round roof. It even hosts four minifigs without looking crammed! One thing that struck my eye ist the 2x2 gray tile between horse and carriage, and the gray parts inside the horse. Maybe there could be more continuity in colour if some of that were black or dark blue.

I am not into superheroes, but Poison Ivy will make a wonderful wood nymph, a siren of the forest, luring knights into deadly entanglement. Also, Wonder Woman is hot. I like the hairpiece.

Only 2, the white/red crownies of the contemporary kingdoms series and my growing army of normal and customized wood elves. It is fun to turn the one elf prototype into a whole faction.

I like your MOC! Say, these 1x1 bricks with open studs on all sides that hold the dark green spikey things, are they reddish brown? Bricklink doesn't show any of these in reddish brown, but in your MOC they exist? Or is this a different type of brown?

I like the blond big beard which I can use for an elf wizard.

I like the combination of dark green and regular green you use for the trees a lot. I think you are very good with wood and stone (sounds like a dwarvish compliment). I am currently working on some kind of tree, especially on the question of how to built the forest floor under that tree. Your floor with the gray 1x1 tiles on reddish brown works very well in connecting the mine to the forest optically.

I love the horse blankets you made! Tey look very accurate.

Thanks everyone. I hope to be able to show more wood elf mocs and customs soon, I am working on something I call the Chain of Summoning. Anyone else focussing on elves at the moment?

To many, the mere idea of a wood elf assassin seems absurd, even obscene, in regard to the high standards of elven ethics. However, for some... delicate matters, a secret group of assassins has been founded. These silent, swift warriors answer directly to the queen and to her only. Assassin von MWardancer auf Flickr A better look from above: (please excuse the picture quality, my digicam is broken so I have to use my cellphone) Assassin von MWardancer auf Flickr As I am building a wood elf army, I was experimenting on giving the regular elf some variation. The easy step was to give the standard elf black arms, a black cape under the dark green one and reddish brown hands as gloves. The hood and the shield needed to be painted because they do not come in dark green which of course sucks. I applied Warhammer decals to the hood and shield. Since this is my first custom fig ever, I made about every mistake in the book. Painting is a pain in the behind for me, and so is using waterslide decals. The fig has many small painting irregularities, which I seem to be unable to avoid. The decal on the hood represents the sign of the secret wood elf order to which assassins belong. The decals on the shield are rather dark, which I preferred to match the darker look of the guy in general. One additional feature is the stealth mode: It makes the assassin virtually invisible for the observers eye. Applying secret techniques I do not dare to utter publicly, the assassin seems to transform into a bush. See yourself: Assassin in Stealth Mode von MWardancer auf Flickr The illusion is perfect.

I can't find any of these tubes on bricklink. Is this reddish brown? Are they called "tube"?

I like the shape a lot, also your usage of different shades of gray is very convincing! The high contrast between the blue and black roof parts irritates me somehow, maybe a different shade of blue instead of black could be an idea.

This is so great! Maybe this technique can help me solve my problem with building dryads. How do the tubes hold on the bottom? Are they stuck onto the green flower stems?