"Nobody Tosses a Dwarf!" - Berin

There Beren came from mountains cold,
And lost he wandered under leaves,
And where the Elven-river rolled
He walked alone and sorrowing...

- Song of Beren and Lúthien, J.R.R. Tolkein


Welcome back to another Friday on The Art of Caesura!

We're working our way through "the fellowship" of Zombicide: Green Horde. Last week we looked at Seli - the lithe elf warrior, today we have the stout grumpy dwarf, Gimli...I mean Berin. 

I really enjoy painting these models; they take motifs of fantasy characters and exaggerate them in fun ways. Also, because there is a whole load of them, I feel liberated to work loosely, not getting too bogged down in any element of the process. The miniatures are also so varied so if I get bored of painting humanoid miniatures, I move onto a monster (more on that in upcoming weeks)!

Anyway, today we are working at Berin. For some reason in our games, Berin always gets left behind to man (dwarf) the trebuchet, because of this he racks up tons of XP and invariably ends up being one of our most powerful characters each game. 

I quite like the model for Berin, especially the pose: leaning back giving a blood-curdlingly guttural roar with his weapons held out at his sides in challenge. I also like the wolf pelt on his back, and indeed all of the textures they managed to cram into this little mini: his quilted armour, leather straps fur and hair.

There is one detail though that I'm not really a fan of, and it's quite an important one for a dwarf: his beard (I don't know why I'm speaking in colons today, I'm channeling David Attenborough). I get what they were going for, he has his beard tied up so it doesn't get in the way of his zombie-orc butchering. It's a bit of a different take on a common fantasy dwarf detail. But it's just the positioning, wrapped up in two big balls on the front of his chest. Yeah, they look like breasts. 

I tried to really push the contrast between the fiery beard and more coldly muted clothes to really give some separation, I even tried black-lining between the facial hair and fabric to give some separation, but once you see it, you can't un-see it! 

When I first showed the completed model to my wife, she had the exact same reaction!

The rest of the model, I really do like though. I love his ornate weapons - the carefully crafted warhammer and ax (complete with guilded ram's head) are very dwarven. On the box art they painted his ax as green jade or flint or something, but I felt bringing green into mix made things look a bit busy.

My wife and I are now halfway through the core missions for Zombicide: Green Horde and still thoroughly enjoying it. We just completed a mission where you don't have access to the trebuchet, so Berin had to find new employment as a meat-grinder on the front-lines, a role he equally excelled at. 

I hope you are enjoying having a look at these miniature for Zombicide: Green Horde. Tune in next week for more, right here on The Art of Caesura!


Reading: Hungry Hill - Daphne du Maurier
Gaming: Doom Eternal


Next Week: 

"Well don't you worry, cause this new invention's gonna be the start of a new life for us. I think that's done it. Now, let's give it a try..."