Painting Challenge Submission #8 - The Dogs of War at last!

The Alcatani Fellowship march forth, accompanied by the beautiful and dangerous Lucrezzia Belladonna. These are all old metal figures from GW's "Dogs of War" range. 

My eighth submission to Curt's Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge was an exciting one (well, for me, at any rate), as it kicked off painting for project which has been "in the works" for quite a while! Here we have the mercenary pikemen of The Alcatani Fellowship accompanied by notorious hireling sorceress Lucrezzia Belladonna. These are all old metal figures from GW's "Dogs of War" figure range for Warhammer Fantasy Battle. These are very, very old figures, more than 20 years old. 

The "Dogs of War" were a faction GW released for their Warhammer Fantasy Battle game, comprised of mercenary units and characters from the region of Tilea in GW's Old World fantasy setting. Sculpted by the amazingly talented Perry twins, the "Dogs of War" were one, in my opinion, of the most creative and most fun factions that GW ever released. GW came out with a wide assortment of Mercenary regiments and characters which could be added on to offer a creative twist to your existing army or could come together on the table as an all-mercenary force. The Dogs of War were the first Warhammer Fantasy army that I ever collected and painted. In fact, I was playing that army at a tournament in Winnipeg when I first met Curt back in 1998/1999.

The classic army book!

Later, I sold that old army and moved on to other things. How foolish of me! But the fond feelings for this old collection never left me, and with the help of, and inspiration from, Dallas, I started to hunt down these old figures on eBay. Not the easiest or most economical endeavor...but by late 2023, I was ready to go! In fact, I thought it would be a primary project for AHPC XIV. But there was just one problem...I moved house mid-Challenge...and so the project was postponed...

But the AHPC is back, and I was careful to put all of my carefully assembled Dogs of War bits aside, ready for this edition of the Painting Challenge...and here we go!

The Alcatani Fellowship

A 24-figure pike block ready for action! Many thanks to Byron for the awesome tray...

A group of farmers who lost their crops and livelihoods (presumably with no Tilean equivalent of the EU's Common Agricultural Policy to help them) and were forced to turn to the mercenary life to earn a living, the Alcatani Fellowship represent the more communal, lower-cost end of Tilea's mercenary service offerings. They are lightly armoured, of middling fighting capabilities and the character leading the unit, Rodrigo Delmonte, is a fairly average fighter. For all that, they have one attribute that sets them apart on the Warhammer Fantasy Battle tabletop...they have pikes!

A view of the ranks...nice variety of poses, but it makes assembling a larger unit a bit tricky as you need to find some specific poses...that was easy in the late 90s, but is trickier on eBay today.

The world of Warhammer Fantasy takes so much inspiration from late Renaissance-era Europe, but the pikes were oddly missing from the figure range. They had been in the rules, but you did not see them on the tabletop. The Empire had halberdiers, swordsmen, spearmen...but no pikes. The Dogs of War changed all that. Many of the initial wave of the "Regiments of Renown" were pikemen, and any Dogs of War army would be built around two or three of these pike-armed regiments. 

This one figure holding his helmet came among the blister packs...I thought it was nice to have one non-conformist in the ranks...they are mercenaries after all...

This was so fun because even very established players had seldom encountered pikes on the table. The rules reflect the effects of the weapon very well, but this would take even established Fantasy players by surprise. The pikes are particularly murderous against cavalry (as you would expect), and so it was always great fun to encounter Brettonian players, with their insufferable and unstoppable knights (which often have special rules compelling them to charge any target they can reach), have their faces fall off as their stupid noblemen charge right at the pike blocks and directly into oblivion. 

A solid core unit for a "Dogs of War" army. 

This solid 24-figure block of Alcatani pikemen is a great basic building block for a mercenary force - modest in their fighting ability, but murder with their pikes. You can try and wear them down with missile fire - and thus sparing other, more dangerous fighting units from that effect - or you can charge right at them...and see how you like eating 24 pikes before you ever get to strike a blow...these fellows will serve as an excellent foundation for my renewed Dogs of War collection. 

Lucrezzia Belladonna

"What a lovely day for a ride..."

All Warhammer Fantasy armies must wield magic in some way in order to be successful, and the mercenary armies of Tilea are no exception. While the rules allowed for you to simply designate any of the (at the time) widely available different human spell-casting figures as a hireling wizard for your mercenary force, the Perrys did sculpt one Tilean-specific figure - the alluring and dangerous Lucrezzia Belladonna. 

Lucrezzian rides at ease...but her magic skills are not to be trifled with. And say, does this drink taste a little funny....?

"The most beautiful woman in all Tilea, and some say even the Old World, is Lucrezzia Belladonna. She is also the most dangerous to know! Lucrezzia is a renowned sorceress and rumored to be an arch-poisoner and mistress of many assassins!" Lucrezzia has been married seven times, as suitors from across Tilea, and even the Old World, are drawn to her, um, significant assets. I think she should do the trick for the "Lust" bonus category - a means whereby AHPC participants can score extra points. 

A super-fun sculpt to paint up!

Lucrezzia is a powerful wizard and fun special character to use as part of a "Dogs of War" army, and I thought it would be great to have her as part of this nostalgia project. This is a tremendous sculpt, with all sorts of great details. I took a fair bit of extra time with this figure in an effort to capture these details...I got some of them, maybe not so much others, but this is a fun, unique miniatures and I'm glad to have Lucrezzia Belladonna in this collection.

That's all for submission number eight! Thanks very much for reading, and please continue to check out the AHPC XV main pages for more submissions!