The Deer Tribe

I've always thought that the film Mononoke Hime by Hayao Miyazaki had great potential for wargaming, and have been trying to assemble miniatures representing the various characters in the film for quite some time. This entry will be the first of three entries covering the Forest Gods.


The main Forest God is the Shishigami(シシ神) or Deer God. There are several large scale statues of the Deer God, but luckily I was able to find one that looks the right size for use with 1/72 figures.


I've included the red elk, Yakul here as well, because it is a member of the deer family. There are a couple of miniatures that can be used as proxies with a little modification. Red elks have appeared in an earlier work by Miyazaki as well.


The Journey of Shuna (シュナの旅) is considered a precursor to Miyazaki's epic Nausicaa, and includes many designs that appear in his later works. I'm surprised that it has not been published in English yet, but then I guess many people would consider it too Old School.


On to the miniatures. The first figure is the Deer God, which I received with a bunch of Studio Ghibli merchandise, mentioned in an entry I posted back in May. It used to be part of a cell phone strap, but since it seemed exactly the right size for 1/72, I cut it off to use for gaming. The hole that ran through the center was filled in, and painted over.


The next two miniatures will serve as the basis for my red elk conversions. The first figure is a Gemsbok from the Ral Partha Veldt Animals set (31-032). The body is about the right size for what I want, but the neck seems a bit short, and the horns are different. The next miniature is a Psychotic Goat Llama (Chariot S20X1) from Magister Militum. This miniatures comes with tack, so is not as useful as the Gemsbok. It's legs are also too short, though this can be remedied. The best part of the Goat Llama however are the horns, which look spot on for red elk horns.