Orcs / Dusklings for Five Leagues from the Borderlands

 Having finished all the Orcs I intend to paint for my Five Leagues from the Borderlands campaign, I thought I would catalogue them here. The figures are all from the Ral Partha Europe Demonworld range. Most of my 15mm fantasy figures are from the Demonworld ranges although I am adding figures from other ranges, and, indeed, other scales to fit the needs of this campaign.

The Orcs are the major threat in my campaign, so I focused on painting them all first. I now have enough to field any faction from the Duskling list, and some of these will do double duty as unique foes, members of other factions, or could even become party members at some point. I also have in mind the idea that I could run a campaign from the Orc perspective, where the Orcs are defending their homeland from the invading Humans and Elves, but that will have to wait until the current campaign is over.

The basic principle behind my collecting and painting for the current campaign is genericness (is that a word? It is now). I'm not collecting figures for each enemy type. I am collecting figures whose traits fit a bunch of different enemy types. So, this is how the Orcish roster looks.

Unarmoured Orcs

My unarmoured Orcs will fit any army list that requires cannon fodder with no armour and a basic melee weapon. This means they could be brigands, poorer members of a proper army or anything else. Only one entry on the Duskling list requires unarmoured troops, so I do not have many of them, but they can be mixed with other troops as I wish.

Light armoured Orcs

I have opted to use figures with shields for Orcs in light armour. Dusklings in light armour are the most numerous enemy type in the list. I painted the standard bearer and the horn blower on a whim, not because I needed them, and I'm planning to go back and add a design to the banner but have not been inspired yet. Like their unarmoured brethren, they can stand in for a variety of troops from other lists.

Orcs in Partial Armour

I'm counting chain as partial armour in my campaign although some of these could well count as wearing heavier armour if I felt like it. Like all the others, these guys can stand in for a variety of other troop types.

Orc archers

These guys provide the missile support for all of the other Orcs. I don't actually need this many for Five Leagues from the Borderlands but I am sure they will come in handy for other games.

Orc characters, leaders and heroes

I have a few different Orc leaders and heroes. They get fielded when I need leader figures as part of the Orc warband, and will also appear as unique foes, heroes, or other character figures from other enemy tables, as and when I need them.

Orc shamans and wizards

Five Leagues from the Borderlands has Dusklings who hate magic. One of their special traits is that they will pick on your spellcasters even when your warriors are a better target. Generally, this means that my Orc warbands will not feature spellcasters, but it can happen and these guys will then appear. They can also be evil necromancers and other nefarious spellcasting types from other enemy tables.

So, that is the major threat that my party must defeat. These Orcs will also come in for other games I play. They will be Gnolls in my Rangers of Shadow Deep games, and the spellcasters among them can lead warbands into Frostgrave. I also now realise that I have the basics of a Dragon Rampant warband here, so I am going to have to explore that idea more. I do like flexible figures!