#drúadan

I got violently side-tracked while painting Uruk-Hai today, wondering what models to paint for Drúadan. Obviously, you can't use the official GW models, because not only are they out of print, they're incredibly not good, even from the often questionable standards of Middle Earth racial politics. I did poke around various historicals, wondering if using Zulus or another south African nation would work, with an implicit reference to Tolkien's very early childhood. At least part of the problem is that none of them used blowpipes, which the original text sort of vaguely alludes at with 'pointed darts and arrows'. But then it was the problem of the MESBG version not having bows. So then I poked around Etsy, and in the flood of not-really-deniable proxies, I found these models from The Printing Goes Ever On.

I think these models are a nice mix of non-European features, book accuracy, and excellent gear. Look at that axe: it's a stone axe, but it absolutely is not orcish craft; care has been lavished on its design. The Drúadan don't have the same material culture as the Rohirrim or the Gondorians, but they're not crude.

From there, I started looking at the rest of the set, trying to figure out how I could manage to make it work for the Paths of the Drúadan Legendary Legion. There are only three spears and one blowgun in the set, though, so while I could just order those, that would make for a very repetitive warband, since it's Ghân-Buri-Ghân and 15 warriors. And Ghân-Buri-Ghân wouldn't be using his listed equipment. And I really liked the drummer, so I wanted to use that mini. It was just a quick comparison of the Uruk-Hai Drummer and the Uruk-Hai Scout... And then it got out of hand.