Lionmen

I'd been tempted by Tony Barr's (East Riding Miniatures) fantasy figures for some time, something a tad more unconventional than Humans, Dwarfs, Elves or alien bugs was quite appealing for a change of scene. There was no particluar army list in mind so it was a case of getting a bundle of figures and working it out once I'd seen them. As always with ERM the figures arrived within days of despatch along with some sample 40mm width bases which happened to be handy as I'd just finished painting my Judge Dredd army and they needed some shiny new bases.

The Lionmen come in a variety of poses for the hand weapon troops but the archers and bear riders do not which is a shame as all the figures painted up quite nice and some more variety would be a big bonus (more work for you there Tony!). The archer is a standard pose with the archer shooting and I opted for 4 shooters elements. The handweapons are a variery of axe, sword and hammer in different poses all with shields; thre is also a command pack with a musician, cleric type with religious standard and a chap with a broadword. I decoded to not bother with the cleric and went for 4 blades, 1 being the general. The archers riding bears are depicted using shortbows and facing right, the bears sporting saddle and harness.I decided riders applied here as they seemed more light horse than knights. I also wanted a big hitter so went for a hero, I liked the iea of the hero on a bear but there is no suitable figure. A quick bit of carving with the modelling knife soon had an axe wielder in half and atop the bottom half of a bear rider.

I'd ordered these around June 2003 and started painting in November, finally finishing on the 26th Dec. So from lead pile to painted in 6 months, not too bad. I'd originally planned them for HOTTBAP 2004, but tricksy Richard laid down the gauntlet for that event and honur requires we attend with an arny fitting the theme. Still, I expect the Berkeley Vale gang will look forward to giving them a good kicking.