Forces of Nature

I originally did a version of a nature army in first edition mainly using old Rackham confrontation models - because Mantic did not make any for them.  With the first kickstarter, they released two hero special character models - a druid model and a sylph (Keris & Shaarlyot)- these were based on a couple that had pledged to have figures made of them.  Other than that - nothing.  So I used earth familiars as gnomes, air familiars as sylphs, earth, fire and air elements, hand made forest shamblers, and Keris as a generic druid.

Then the second kickstarter, and second edition.  Gone were the units of gnomes and sylphs.  The all large infantry list worked for a bit, but that was just until the new models came in.  And then of course waiting for me to actually paint them up.  The upcoming demos at Origins managed to give me a deadline so I finally got these finished - and even got in a unit of centaurs that just came out in April (which apparently initially sold out almost immediately, though they quickly restocked).

First up are two troops of Naiad Heartpiercers.  With Ra 4+, Piercing(1) and At 8 these are great little shooting units.  Their range is only 18, so the generally won't be able to shoot the first turn (if you go first)

Troop of Naiad Heartpiercers

The one thing about the new Naiad sculpts that I found interesting was the amount of armor on the models - considering they are fairly fragile at only De 3+.  But I guess it is mainly decorative for the fish folk.  The plastic kit also makes ensnarers, but I did not choose to put any in the list.

Troop of Naiad Heartpiercers

Next is a regiment of salamanders.  I have found lately that I really prefer 4 models to a rank when multibasing.  With these larger brutes (they are actually on 25mm bases) I do not see how they would rank up five to a rank.  If you choose to do that, you will definitely need to rank them as you assemble them to make sure they fit.  They have the option to take 2 handed weapons instead of shields (which may be a bit easier to rank), but since they already have Crushing Strength(1), I felt the stronger defense was better.

Regiment of Salamanders

I picked up a starter nature army in the kickstarter for this - and one reason for multibasing 4 across was so I could have a few extra models.  Since it only came with 20 naiads and 20 salamanders, I used three of the naiads I had left to make the Wyrm Riders.   When we playtested this list, these just always gave me a very difficult time, so I thought they were essential.  I picked up two sets of the Sea Elf Kraken Riders from the Ironwind Metals first kickstarter (and have some how managed to lose the other three squid bodies - though I have all the other pieces - grrrr ).

Ironwind Metals Sea Elf Kraken Riders

Regiment of Naiad Wyrm Riders

Like most gamers, I'm not patient when it comes to new toys.  I wanted to replace my forest shamblers - because they looked like crap - with the new mantic models.  And the starter army came with three!  However it was frustrating to watch as they came out with the elf release - and I had to wait several more months to actually get mine with the army.  I ended up trading three more with my son because I ended up also putting a regiment in my demo elf list (in an effort to balance out the demo armies).  However he took some of the arms - so these all tend to have the same arms.  (He used his in his 1000 pt Nature army that was part of our team at Adepticon - as Hop Elementals!)

Regiment of Forest Shamblers

As I  mentioned above ( and have talked in other posts ) I finally got my centaurs in.  I was going to use them as Bray-Striders - but I did not want to deal with pinning the tiny arms to put together the 2 handed weapons - so they became Bray-Hunters instead.  At least this way the arms did not have to be glued to each other.  It still required a LOT of pinning and some gap filling - but they came out ok.

Centaur Bray-Hunter Troop

I also traded for a Centaur hero - and then thought I would just keep a druid in the list - but with the change to bray-hunters I had to change out my points a little, and gave up the surge on the druid for a fighting centaur hero.  His lance was a bit too thin and fiddly, so the shaft was replaced with some steel rod (and I twisted the body so he was actually facing forward.

Centaur Chief

Lastly is the only non-Mantic unit (full unit) in the army - the earth elementals that are still Rackham Confrontation models.  However these will be replaced with Mantic Earth Elementals as soon as I can get my hands on them.

Earth Elemental Regiment

Because it is all fun and games . . .