Tiny tin troglodytes (because I’m 3.64% archaic human, you know)

Back on August 16th, I was innocently minding my own business standing outside Silver King Hobbies in Tacoma waiting for it to open so we could play Saga on our biweekly game day. As I waited, I browsed through the Tribal player community group page on Facebook and saw this:

What could I do? I had to have them. 

I tried to order them on the spot, but there was no Wi-Fi and 5G was being squirrely, so I had to wait to order until I got home. I ordered two of the Clan Jakson mega-sets so I could have opposing forces with all the options.

I can't explain why I'm drawn to them apart from the fact that they're beautiful minis, but also a very obscure niche kind of mini. I'm an obscurantist if nothing else. They're also right in line with my current obsession: Tribal. I'll often see minis I love, but won't act on them because I can't think of anything to do with them. For example, Lucid Eye has produced Neanderthals and Cro-Magnons for several years as part of their Savage Core line of figures. I often looked longingly at them online, but never pulled the trigger (until now, see below). When the figures and rules come into alignment, it's, "Brace yourself, bank account, you're about to be pillaged!"

When the figures arrived from North Star (not without first bouncing around various cities for several days after making landfall in the USA and then getting "stored" in Sumner, WA for three days), I oohed and aahed over them. They were all I hoped they'd be.

There are five packs in all for a total of 25 poses.

The main force that makes up the warrior units are a pack with club-armed figures and a pack with spear-armed figures. The Clan Jakson set comes with two of each pack, enough to make four warrior units for your warband.

The firepower (such as it is) comes from the marksmen pack. These appear to be younger men/boys who would rather throw rocks and javelin-like sticks than get in close. Clan Jakson come with two packs of these, which is enough to provide the maximum allowed two marksmen units in your warband.

The warlord and heroes are provided by a separate pack. All of the heroes stand out from the crowd. There's one pack in the Clan Jakson set, which is enough for your warlord and four heroes.

Finally, there's a really nice pack that doesn't provide troops for your warband, but will come in very handy for playing the game. To keep the cave-fires burning when their men are away, there's a caveman family group pack with women, children, and wee troglodyte bairns.

They're great, but the women look nothing like Raquel Welch in One Million Years B.C. Maybe they represent a time before the fur bikini was invented—or more likely after it became passé because Neanderthals lived between 400,000 and 40,000 years ago, much later than Raquel's time.

They don't look like Wilma and Betty either, but their nonconformity to iconic paragons of paleolithic pulchritude doesn't distract from them at all.

The figures are beautiful with a lot of detail and well-animated poses. They've really put Bobby Jackson on my radar screen. He's best known for the excellent figures he's sculpted for Reaper Bones, so I've not seen a lot of his work before. He made the caveman figures because he's a Tribal player and sculpted his own custom warband because he can.

Painting

I thought a bit about how I'd paint these figures and decided that instead of my now-standard dip method, I'd go with mostly Citadel Contrast Paints and Army Painter Speed Paints. I wanted to get the one-and-done effect of things like the fur, which they all wear in abundance.

Skin - I wasn't sure what color to use for the Neanderthal's skin. Sources vary from saying than Neanderthals were darker skinned and darker haired to others who cite DNA evidence that points to fair skin and red or even blond hair. Not really knowing what I was going to get, I applied Citadel Guilliman Flesh. I'm happy how it turned out. They look pretty earthy, like they haven't washed in 40,000 years.

Furs - I got as many browns and grays as I could find as contrats paints or speed paints. I wanted to avoid a monochrome look for the furs. In a few cases, I did a light drybrush over an application of the contrast paint just to better highlight the raised bits. I'm pretty happy how that turned out.

Leather - there's a lot of exposed leather bits, such as the turned back meaty side of a fur. I was disappointed with the options for leather colors among the contrast and speed paints. As with the furs, Citadel has a color called Snakebite Leather, which goes on pretty dark. I used Army Painter Ancient Honey for some leather bits, but it's pretty yellow and I toned it down with a wash of Army Painter Soft Tone. Otherwise, I used Vallejo and Reaper leather colors that I applied as a wash or highlighted then washed afterwards. Some of the browns I used for the fur colors would work for other leather shades, but I wanted to keep the colors distinct.

Hair - I went with a variety of hair colors, but nothing too far out. I used a lot of auburn/chestnut color with a few darker brown. Several have a Vallejo color called Shrapnel Red, which makes for a nice deep red hair color. I highlighted that with a bit of Orange-Red. Finally, starting with a base of a light tan, I added yellow ochre highlights to get a few blondes in the mix, because they have more fun.

Stone - I imagined at first that I'd try to replicate the varied colors of flint, but settled instead on the Reaper Paint Stonewall Grey, which I applied to all the state-of-the-art weaponry.

Washes - In a few places, I used regular ol' paints, like for the stone bits, but also for the wood bits and the twine bits and the decorative shells and tooth bits. In all those cases, I used Army Painter Soft Tone applied just in the specific areas. I think I might also have used Citadel Agrax Shader (or was it Nuln Oil) at some place. In any case, washes were local and not an overall application to the figures.

Bases

I went with fender washers for the bases. All the warriors and marksmen are on 1" fender washers. The warlord and heroes are on 1 1/4" fender washers so they stand out a bit. I haven't done the family group yet, but I'll likely put them on 1 1/4" bases for the women with children castings and maybe a 1 1/2" base combining the single female figure and the zwei kinder.

I've used fender washers for my Xenos Rampant figures, Vietnam figures, and some ECW skirmish figures, so this basing is nothing new. I like the heft of the metal base (lack of heft is one reason why I never do plastic minis). Because I'm not doing the whole dip routine, I can mount the figure and apply the coarse pumice gel medium for texture before I start painting the mini.

I took my time with the first batch of 20: five spearmen, five clubmen, five marksmen, and five heroes. I gave them a shot of Krylon Matt Finish after painting the figures and before I started on the bases.

The result

I'm happy with how they turned out. I'm not sure if I'll use the contrast/speed paints much on other projects, but I'm glad I'm doing it for these.

I've got 60 more figures to go, but I can probably go faster with them, although I'm not sure I'll do 20-figure batches again. (No, I probably will.)

Newcomers

I mentioned above that I'd often looked longingly at the Lucid Eye Neanderthals. I decided to get some with an eye—a lucid eye—to mixing them in with the Bobby Jackson figures to get an even better mix of poses and such. I wasn't sure if they'd match, but I was surprised to see how well they do.

They don't have as many different poses at the Bobby Jackson figures, but they're all quite nice. There are two packs of warriors with mixed weapons, one hero/warlord type, and a female shaman type.

The hero figure is wee bit larger than the average figure and fearsome. He's definitely on a larger base as another hero or warlord.

I also got a figure that's more fantasy than reality. Give her a fur bikini and she'd be a dead ringer for Raquel.

She's labeled as Vahira the Herd Witch and described as a Neanderthal Cro-Magnon mix. She's as winsome as any full Neanderthal lass moodily wandering the Pleistocene heather pining for her troglodyte Heathcliff.

She's also carrying what looks to be an entirely imaginary stone/flint sword, but that's common with figures from Lucid Eye's Savage Core: Age of Ice range. There's a fantasy element to them that just requires some to wield some kind of swordy thing. I'd be surprised if anything like that stone sword shows up in some paleontologist's dig. I could use her as a person token for the game objectives or as a shaman character. In any case, she's on a 1 1/4" fender washer, so stone sword or no, she isn't going into a warrior unit.

I'm coming a long with these pretty well. They have less little detail bits than the Bobby Jackson figures, so they paint quicker. I'm hoping to have them done by the weekend. Then on to another batch of Bobby Jackson figures.

My ancestors, my inspiration

I noted in the title that I'm 3.64% archaic human. According to Living DNA, I am 1.92% Neanderthal:

And 1.72% Denisovan:

I can feel my knuckles dragging as I type this, but it could also be that I'm a poor typist. In any case, painting cavemen has a special interest for me now that I know I am one. My ethnic background is varied, but limited to the British Isles and Northern Europe. I'm more than twice as much caveman as I am Welsh. Although I've been to Wales, I have no interest in spelunking.