The Halloween season is about more than just scares. Here in Seattle, the approach of Halloween means the end of nice weather and a months-long descent into "the gray," a series of cloudy, rainy, dreary days often strung together 40 or 50 at a time. It's not the dreariness that gets you, or the dampness. It's the monotony of it all. The same day, every day, for days and days and days and days (can you tell I just got back from a vacation?). But Halloween is around the corner to break up the gloom, and it does so with both tricks AND treats.
This week, I'm focusing on a couple of the "treats" in the upcoming Shattered Star set of Pathfinder Battles prepainted miniatures due to hit stores and subscribers in January. And since it's gray outside, I thought I'd stick to a "gray" theme.
Specifically, I'm talking about the Gray Maidens.
The Gray Maidens first appeared during the Curse of the Crimson Throne Adventure Path, our second-ever Pathfinder campaign. Stationed in the Varisian city of Korvosa, the Gray Maidens were the personal bodyguard of Queen Ileosa, and became heavily embroiled in the chaos and machinations that fueled that campaign.
When the Shattered Star Adventure Path set out to revisit Varisia, we knew we wanted to include the Gray Maidens from the start. We liked their design enough that we put it on the back cover of the Pathfinder RPG Core Rulebook, after all, so it was only a matter of time before we'd revisit them in an Adventure Path.
And make prepainted miniatures of them, of course.
The figure pictured above is the rank-and-file Gray Maiden. She works perfectly in concert with the Shattered Star or Curse of the Crimson Throne campaigns, and we've put her at the uncommon rarity so it's relatively easy to build up a bunch of them. Not playing either of those Pathfinder Adventure Paths? Not to worry, this figure is cool enough to work for any female warrior in full plate, including a player character.
Speaking of character, we've had good luck so far including multiple types of the same "troop" in previous Pathfinder Battles sets, and the Shattered Star set is no exception. A squad of Gray Maidens needs leadership, so the set also includes the Gray Maiden Commander.
Pictured above is Oriana, leader of the Gray Maiden contingent encountered in the second Shattered Star adventure, "Curse of the Lady's Light". She's got some nasty scars on her face and a real chip on her shoulder, and your player characters are going to love hating her.
And what better way to focus that hate than a gorgeous prepainted figure placed right in the middle of your gaming table?
The Gray Maidens are coming your way in January, complete with the rest of the Shattered Star set. We're thrilled with the way these figures came out, and I continue to be extremely excited about the level of quality WizKids has put into this set.
But I've got days and days of gray Seattle skies ahead of me, and things are bound to get a bit gloomier between now and Halloween.
In fact, I think the horror around here is about to get downright cosmic.
Return here in seven days for unknowable horrors from the edge of the cosmos that man was never meant to experience (but which will look GREAT on your gaming table!).
Trick or treat!
Erik Mona
Publisher
