To me the Gondorian imagery reminds me of European armies and such with the plate and disciplined style of warfare (the New Line interpretation anyway). I've been searching for a way to personalise my Gondorians by adding a bit of colour etc. to break up the mass of silver. I've planned to give them all cloaks if I can work out how, but now I'm also pondering adding surcoats to my leaders. For those unfamiliar with the term, basically they're just a cloth garment worn over the armour usually emblazoned with the noble's coat of arms, serving as a means of identification on the battle field when you can't see faces etc. I've also heard that they may have helped shade the armour and stop it heating in the sun.

But anyway, what I'm proposing is to add surcoats to my army 'nobles', probably in the style of Spud's redesigned Gondorians from TLA. My problems are thus. Existing examples of Gondorian surcoats seem to be fairly bland in the traditional Gondorian livery (eg. Pippin's Citadel Guard uniform or even Aragorn's kingly attire still seem fairly plain). Hence I am hesitant about designating something colourful and interesting to my models which might seem at odds with the established image. I plan to base my force in Linhir which I surmise would be an important trade city, thus generating wealth and nobles. What's your take on the colour issue? Is it alright to go bright colours or should I keep to the more traditional, yet boring dark colours (I figure my army will be in a dark blue or something).
Secondly, what warriors could I convert like this? Captain is obvious but I don't know what else? Bodyguards maybe, though they'd have to be in similar livery or something. All I can think of at the moment would be to extend the knight image if I was to use them and give them individual heraldry (seeing as how warhorses would be more likely ridden by the rich).

Sorry if this was the wrong place to put this, please move if it is. Any help or feedback would be appreciated.

Hmm, perhaps you could have a variety of colours, but keep them toned down - e.g. include greens, reds, blues, etc, but keep them either dark or with a greyish hue to them (e.g. a light blue would be something like GW's Shaddow Grey). For bodyguards, perhaps have a quartered design for them in their lord's colours and emblams, while the lords have halved designs?

Rainbow.

Well maybe that's a bit TOO bright but I like it.

You coudl have 1 hero (Say a king) with a deep red one and then have some Citatel gurad with the same only without a special little Familey crest on there cloaks. But you could give them to Captains (Would be standerd an often plain), Kings (More elabirate and mayeb there Family crest, People like Aragorn or Farmir who would have a golden lines one maybe etc.

Alos may i suggest lookign at Fantasty as the Goblin wolf riders have some good cloakcs that fit quike well over the shoulders of most men.

My strongest hero currently (excluding a potential Imrahil) is only a military commander of Linhir's defences so I assume not that much more stature than a captain, and therefore I don't really need to consider kingly schemes as little more than restrictions to how far I can take individual nobles.

I'm thinking about doing something like: https://2img.net/h/i112.photobucket.com/albums/n168/horddemon/surcoat-1.jpg with a halved or quartered scheme and a crest of some sort. The problem is how far you can personalise it, without leaving the whole Gondorian image appearance, seeing as everything seems to have the white tree on it. Or maybe I could keep the tree design on the front of the surcoat but give a personalised crest on the shield?
My other hesitation is keeping the army visually linked. With such a disciplined and structured force, it would look strange with a brightly coloured chap standing in their midst.


@ Jaws - Wolf Riders? Bringing them up on the GW online store I can't really see any cloaks?

They do have cloacks but alas i can't find picture eaither (and can't search as i ahve 5 mins of lunch break left) but here is the box i was on about.
Goblin Wolf Riders

If you go for a quartered scheme Cal, I'd suggest putting the tree in one quarter and a personal emblam in the other. As for cohesion, I'd sugest keeping the design similar, e.g. with a quartered design, have two quarters black with a silver tree and the other two coloured and having the black quarters being the same one on everyone. If you're leaving the standard WoMT minis unconverted, then how about aplying the quartered heraldry to their shields? Or alternatively, use the 'bright' colours as a trim on their tunics.

@ Jaws - You reckon they're a good fit? Those Goblins look small, so even if they do have cloaks they would be wierd proportions for men? I think I'll have to practice the greenstuff skills. Something like the central join of the Rangers, or the pins either side like the Numenoreans or the side join like the Arnorian captain (which looks pretty cool).

@ Dinadan - While I'd love to do a quartered scheme (and probably will), placing the white tree into one quarter would be awful I'd imagine. The freehand would be so fiddly. What I was thinking of was to leave the tree on the centre of the armour (while smoothing the rest into cloth) and using that as the major emblem on the surcoat and then file the tree off the shield and paint his personal emblem there. Alternatively I could give him a standard shield and remove the tree and paint a personal emblem(s) on his surcoat. Something like 3 clams would be simple enough. I could remove the white tree altogether and give him a personalised shield, but then I'm worried about the links to the rest of the Gondorian forces. Though I suppose KoDA don't have the tree anywhere...
As for the standard WoMT, I was just planning to paint them in a 'standing' Gondorian army scheme, as they're likely warriors of all sorts of classes and most of their equipment is probably issued. Could be interesting colouring their garments like they're personal but then you get to the problem of having a lot of individual styles to paint and the force looks less disciplined.

On another note, should I change anything about the tree design on the shield? Just thinking that I could alter it slightly (or substantially) to make it look independent from the forces of Minas Tirith (though keeping it similar has its advantages). The redesigned Gondorians replaced the tree completely with the sun. Other ideas could be a lone tower or some sort of city emblem like the Swiss use.

You could always use a fine pen instead of freehand While the standard warriors' gear will probably be issued, they may also be wearing their own tunics underneath. The 'personal' colour could be tied into social status. For example, with the Warmaster Republican Roman army I'm doing at the moment, all the Roman troops have off white tunics with a different trim to indicate the different parts of the maniple (red for hastatii, green for princips and indigo for Triarii). What I meant by having colours on the regulars, is just a small band around the hem of the tunic, and even then, you wouldn't use a different colour for each one, but could either do similar to my Roman idea, or put on the colour of one of the captains (e.g. split you army into groups of warriors, each with a captain or other hero to represent a minor nobel and his serfs. The serfs would then have a band of colour related to their 'lord's' heraldry to denote that they were his men.

As for loosing cohesion, restrict yourself to a limited pattern. If you were doing Dol Amroth yopu could restric to blue and white and apply it in different ways to each mini. Remember that historically, may armies didn't have a uniform, even professional ones.

Cal585 wrote:

@ Jaws - You reckon they're a good fit? Those Goblins look small, so even if they do have cloaks they would be wierd proportions for men? I think I'll have to practice the greenstuff skills. Something like the central join of the Rangers, or the pins either side like the Numenoreans or the side join like the Arnorian captain (which looks pretty cool).

Well becuase Fantasy is a larger scale to LOTr they work out a just the right size. 1 of the cloaks fits perfectly over my olf Faramir's soulders.

jaws900 wrote:

Well becuase Fantasy is a larger scale to LOTr they work out a just the right size. 1 of the cloaks fits perfectly over my olf Faramir's soulders.

Fair enough. Can't imagine Goblin cloaks being in good shape though... More ragged and worn. I'll wait till I see them first though.


@ Dinadan - Hmm that's an interesting idea, though blue is a harder colour to compliment than white. I did want to add details onto the tunics, so this could be a good idea. Though I was only planning to start this with a small list and only having the single hero. If I need additional captains I might need to rethink that.
I think this is half inspired by Medieval Total War 2, where everyone seems to be dressed int he faction's heraldry by necessity so you can tell who's yours.
Hmm... personal heraldry linked to the captains. Well as a city I'm not so sure about serfs, as they are a standing army who have been recruited and employed, so they would need to be free men to join. But some sort of unit identification could work...

Cal585 wrote:

jaws900 wrote:

Well becuase Fantasy is a larger scale to LOTr they work out a just the right size. 1 of the cloaks fits perfectly over my olf Faramir's soulders.

Fair enough. Can't imagine Goblin cloaks being in good shape though... More ragged and worn. I'll wait till I see them first though.

You could try to sculpt/fix the tears?

Alternatively the Chaos Marauder cloaks are quite small, although I think you only get 1 of them in a box so I guess that's no use. They'd probably have the same worn problem as well though to be honest.

Hmm, I'd have to see them first before I considered them a possibility. I've been wondering about just using tissue or something stiffened with glue to provide something to build the greenstuff up on.