A Pre-Slotta Dwarf

After last week’s foray into mapmaking and creative writing, and several weeks’ worth of Knightmare Miniatures, this week I’m going back to the basics of this blog: an old pre-slotta Citadel dwarf thief.



When I say old, I really mean old. She’s pictured third from the right on the bottom row of a White Dwarf flyer (WD44) from 1983, making her slightly older than me. I don’t remember the pre-slotta era – most of my nostalgia when it comes to Games Workshop is for the period from about 1987 to 1993 or so, although I do have a soft spot for the 90s aesthetic too. So I bought this stealthy dwarf thief recently, intending to use her in a larger scenic base. I’m not sure why I decided to keep her separate in the end – it’s a fairly pretty crude miniature (especially around the hands, eyes, and mouth) and I definitely don’t have masses of spare time for art projects at the moment. Perhaps it was the simplicity of the sculpt that attracted me.

A few of my Dark Sword miniatures have integral bases (the elf ranger in this earlier post, for example), but I thought she’d benefit from a standard 20mm square slotta-free base, to raise her up and create space for some foliage. For the painting, I chose a similar colour scheme to two previous, similar miniatures – including one of the first from when I re-started painting two years ago. A grey-blue robe, off-white fabrics, and leathery brown material, with red accents, including a purse that was supposed to look like a spotted handkerchief, suggested some sort of itinerant, unglamorous life. I’m not sure if that really worked. Her headgear faintly (and unintentionally) resemble a keffiyeh, although that definitely doesn’t stand up to any scrutiny.

I can’t say that this is one of my favourite miniatures, but I’ve rather enjoyed painting a handful of dwarf adventurers in the last couple of years. There will be many more to come – at least by my standards – in the following weeks.