That Still Only Counts As One!

First post of 2025.

Surely it needs to be something big.

I mean really big.

REALLY, REALLY BIG!

Oh yeah! That's the way to start off the new year.

A Mumakil, or Oliphaunt, from the Lord of the Rings. A war beast that the men of Harad ride into the Battle of the Pelennor Fields to drive back the charge of the Rohirrim.

It's taken me about a week to do, partly because there's a large model to build and a large surface area to paint, but also because it's a bit of a swine of a model kit.

The first step was assembly which appeared fairly straightforward, which was helpful because the instructions are from the 'vague grainy picture with arrows around it' period of Games Workshop instructions.

Two major problems appeared during this section, first were the four struts supporting the main howdah, which were not numbered, didn't have any defined keying and needed to be slotted in with the howdah above them to ensure they went into the right location. Most of the swearing in the whole build happened at this point.

The second issue were the massive straight join lined down the middle of each leg and across the body and head. This is where the age of this kit showed the most.

And so I took to doing the largest greenstuff application I've ever done on a model.

I don't usually bother with filling gaps as usually paint will cover most issues. However, the lines were so visible that I felt I'd need to do something more definite.

I actually have a surprisingly large amount of greenstuff for someone who doesn't use it and so go on with filling the gaps.

I looked at a few videos before trying this step and one guy had use his knife to cut lines to simulate the Mumak's skin into the greenstuff whilst it was still wet. I'm not sure how successful mine were, but it's better than just a smooth surface.

Looking at the joins now it's painted, I could definitely improve this process, but importantly the joins don't draw the eye, which was my goal, so I'm happy with how I did.

Meanwhile, I started on painting with the base, which is pretty much the equivalent of an entire unit's worth of painting: our dead Rohirrim, two dead Orcs and three dead horses, along with sundry weapons and shields.

I really like the base and decided to go with clumps of grass and flowers rather than using the basing material I usually put on my LotR models because of the level of detail involved, which include horseshoe prints, that I didn't want to cover up.

Next up was the howdah, which was a much simpler affair and done with just four contrast paints, although waiting for each stage to dry was a bit of a pain.

I will say that my top tip if you are going to paint one of these monsters is to keep the base and howdah separate for painting, because otherwise thing will get really awkward.

And finally we got to painting the Oliphaunt itself.

I again mainly used contrast paints, but added some dry brushing of the skin and the tusks to enhance the texture of the skin and deepen the shadows, whilst smoothing out the appearance of the tusks.

I suppose I could have done something to add spikes to the tusks or painted designs to the skin, and I may still do that, but for now my goal was to get it done and on the table.

And so there we have it.

I have to admit that this beast has been one of my white whales of gaming ever since I saw the first model. That's the reason I went for the somewhat frustrating plastic kit (that I had been warned about) rather than exploring 3d printed options.

Given that the scenarios that involve these creatures all included at least two, if and when I get another, I will look at alternatives as this was frustrating at times.

However, I'm really pleased to get it done and it's a great way to start the new year. I now just need to paint a regiment of troops to ride it.

Acquired: 0

Painted: 1

Lead Mountain: 640