Heartbreaker Dark Elves

Step into the Way Back Machine (along with Mr. Peabody), and let’s go back to the last decade of the previous century. There were several massed battle fantasy games available – all competing against Games Workshop’s Warhammer. Heartbreaker Hobbies had a game called Leviathan. They even used some of the same sculptors who had sculpted for Games Workshop and Wargames Foundry. What made these figures appealing to Warhammer players is that they were cheaper than the Games Workshop figures. Of course you couldn’t use them in Warhammer tournaments, but they were good for bulking out armies.

Now let’s follow Mr. Peabody and his boy, Sherman, back into the Way Back Machine and fast forward a few years to 2009. I was just getting back into the hobby when I attended my first MillenniumCon in Austin. I paid for my trip & convention fees as a vendor doing chair massage during the convention. Anyway, during one day of the convention, I found a lot of GW Warhammer Dwarfs for sale. When I first started playing Warhammer with my son, I played Dwarfs, so I bought the lot. However, the next day, the same vendor had a lot of GW Dark Elves, so I blew my budget and bought them.

In the lot of Dark Elves, there were some Heartbreaker Dark Elves sculpted by Tim Prow. There were three different poses, but this pose is the best. Anyway, I finally finished painting the last six models and now have a unit to use in my Warrior Heroes: Warbands games from Two Hour Wargames.

There are two general methods of representing troops in table top miniature games – one is an element approach where several models are based on a single stand to represent an unit, GWs Warmaster and THWs Rally Round the King are examples of this method, – the second method is base each model individually and then group the models together to represent an unit, GWs Warhammer and THWs Warrior Heroes: Warbands use this method.

While Warrior Heroes: Warbands focuses on the fantasy genre, Two Hour Wargames has a companion ruleset, Captains and Kings, which focuses on the historical genre. Both sets of rules are worth purchasing. For the historical player, you’ll find the rules for chariots and elephants in the fantasy set & for the fantasy plater you’ll find the rules for the arquebuse (early musket favored by Dwarfs & Humans) in the historical set. Both sets also feature siege rules and the Great Hall Burning scenario, which evolved into a Dark Ages skirmish game of the same name.

Here is the complete unit of twelve Dark Elf spearmen (11 spearmen & 1 leader). Infantry units in Warbands can vary in size from six to twelve models.

In Addition…

I’ve managed to complete two other fantasy figures, both from Reaper Miniatures. The first is a Reaper Bones plastic rogue, Arran Rabin and the second is from Reaper’s Dark Heaven Legends range – Muriel the Just.

I feel good about getting these models finished. Muriel has been in the lead pile for at least 30 years, the Dark Elves sat in my lead pile for 12 years after sitting in some one else’s lead pile for 15 years and the rogue is from the Bones II Kickstarter which I received in 2015 (so 6 years in the lead pile for him).

Will I ever paint everything in the lead pile? Probably not, but I’m gonna try!