Reception Committee

Led by Hornaphernes the Mighty, the Medes stand ready in reserve

Awaiting new arrivals are my 30mm Rose Prestige Medean infantry. A lovely figure and so easy to paint. The next block of 8 is ready to be started. 24 down, 16 to go!

Test Shots

Stadden 30mm British Infantry 1890

 A valiant Toy Soldier marches by. I wonder how this might look with some of the Houston 4.7" on Land Carriage that TVAG are selling. Hm.

Yes, I lost the left arm

And now that I see him, the piping on the tunic needs a tidy up, I forgot the piping on his collar and - ah - shouldn't the cuffs on his tunic be of the "jam pot" variety? Still, I do like the way the jacket, trousers and equipment came up. Checking my Osprey, it looks as though his personal equipment was very accurately done, too.

The View from the Cubby House

I thought I'd drop by and let the world know what is passing over my painting desk at the moment.

First along in the current queue have been some lovely Rose Prestige Medes. Sixteen in all to start forming the core of a Persian army. More on this project as we go on. Pictures to follow.

I have been painting a great deal of US and Vichy armour and softskins of late. Not too sure why, but it has been very enjoyable. I'm looking at the Torch landings - perhaps the Safi scenario from the first Rapid Fire! book.

FT-17s with purely speculative markings!

Airfix M3 Lee with patent saggy tracks.

Two utterly pointless purchases from Tradition - 30mm British Corps of Drums and Grenadiers of the Garde Imperiale led by none other than the Emperor Napoleon I. Heaven knows why, or what I shall do with them, but by golly they do scratch a very persistent itch.

Finally, in closing, I note the passing of Mr Don Featherstone. I won't go into his seminal influence upon the hobby, his often reported kindnesses and generosities. There are better writers than me doing that in a hundred blogs and magazine articles. I would wish though that his final moments were filled with memories of his children playing in the sun on one perfect day.

Out Black Spot!

For the past month or so I've been afflicted by the hobby Black Dog. A strong case of the can't be bothereds. I've been slleping in rather than getting up and painting. Watching a video in the evening instead of assembling placcy bits.

Terrible.

But I think I've broken out. I painted a bakers' dozen of Camel Corps this week. And assembled an Airfix jeep. That's got to count, eh?

But to make sure. To make really sure. To make really really sure I'm taking part in a painting challenge. From the 30th of this month to the 30th Novenmber. 90 days. 90 days to paint... something.

I'm thinking of four Charge!-sized units of foot. What a good opportunity to make use of my old Saxon Army. I think i got about 30 figures into that. So, lets see, about 170 to go. We'll see if I can get through that and perhaps throw in some cavalry and guns too.

Can it be done? Only one way to find out.

Hold On To Your Bounce Sticks

A man and his Stick

Whilst watching an episode of Dexter tonight, I took out a piece of quarter-round beading and manufactured a measuring stick to go with my fast-play Sudan rules "The Quickie and the Flame".

I quite like little devices such as this. They combine the fun of gizmology with a handy reference in the quick of the fight.

Someone needs to lose some weight.

Fife and Drum Kickstarter Project Goes Gangbusters

It's really good to see such a worthy and high-quality project like Jim Purky's AWI Kickstarter getting the support it merits.

While AWI is not really my "thing" I've put my money where my mouth is and bought in.

Buy some of his artillery and train equipments while you're at it. They are designed by one of the best regarded researchers of the 7YW out there, Mr Christian Rogge.

Go Jim.

Sudan Campaign - Move 1 Completed.

If you are so moved, I have finished the first move of my new Sudan Campaign.

The wrap-up may be read here:

http://www.bloodreddesertsands.blogspot.com.au/2013/07/move-1-wrap-up.html

The short version is that after one small battle in Western Sudan and a few small skirmishes in the North the rebellion is somewhat in decline. North Sudan has - for now at least - been pacified. The beseiged garrisons seem to be holding out well enough with plenty of supplies laid in.

Let's see what Move 2 has in store!

Those Blood-Red Desert Sands

I have spent the past few days quietly re-painting the basing on my Sudan collection. It's been built up over the past 8 years or so, and over time as my style and paint stocks have varied, they have taken on a pretty motley appearance.

In working on them, I have decided to undertake a small Sudan campaign.

It's not terribly historical and telescopes the events of the Mahdi Revolt into 20 campaign moves. Still, I hope it reflects some of the flavour of the period.

The campaign system is that Steve Winter published on his old "The Colonial Angle" wesbiste.

I'll be preparing and putting up my materials over the rest of this week and hopefully kick things off this time next week.

If you are at all interested, please come and walk with me over those Blood Red Desert Sands.

A brief diversion

On my front doorstep (which we never use and hence what follows) a few weeks back was a parcel that had come to me from the UK. I opened it and it turned out to be the copy of Duncan Head's "Armies of the Macedonian and Punic Wars". I had ordered it in February and promptly forgotten about it. I am sure it arrived with all despatch and had waitied there patiently for me to notice it.

A pleasant surprise you may say, and indeed it was. Even more surprising was the fact that the snails had deigned merely to nibble lightly upon the envelope before nicking off in search of some lettuce instead.

 Well, I was flicking through it today - these books are extremely flick-friendly, you understand - and what a treat it is. Three-paragraph battle descriptions, sections on the composition and descriptions of the Armies and so on.

Then you come to Ian Heath's illustrations. There are 188 of them.

Fair use, yeah Ian?

I invite you to admire them and then ask yourself why no-one seems (that I can see) to have picked up on their "look" to do a range of 30mm miniatures. The only thing with which I can compare them is the work of the German flat engravers. Such clean lines. Such nice anatomy. Such uncluttered simplicity.

UPDATE - OK there are these from Garrison:

Rose Prestige Greek - buy them in huge quantities, they are gorgeous.

But that's about it so far as I can tell. Someone... anyone.. please!

Weekends' Output

Fifer, Poseur and Spanish Pikeman

Dreadful lighting for photography and thus my apologies.

The collection is building apace. Apart from these, I dug out and renovated a half dozen cavalry. It will be time quite soon to examine the question of basing.

Spanish Lancer

Converted from the Willie mounted Arquebusier that they never seem to supply an arquebus for!

Sword and buckler guy and a few whores and powder monkeys.

From the current 1565 collection, L-R, a sword and buckler man, the baby-eating Bishop af Bath and Wells and Pizzaro.

A few new recruits

Landsknecht Pride Marchers

 Obviously the Herr Obrist has been out shaking the can for the Fähnleins!

Spanish Pike

More on the painting table.

How Much is Enough?

I was home with a nasty head cold yesterday, so after Amy had taken the kids off to creche, I slept most of the morning. Rising at lunchtime (oh, how bohemian of me) I decided to make good use of my time and get some more painting done.

I ran through the next five Landknechts and Spanish then prepped up the next three figures for painting. What fun.

Later in the day I bought a Me 109E-4, one of the lovely new-tooled Airfix kits. No good reason for it - I was just in a Battle of Britain sort of mood.

Looking for a place to start building it on my workbench led me to try to clear things up.

Oh dear.

No room.

And my storage spaces are pretty well fully utilised.

Now, this ghastly situation has resolved* a looming cloud of gloom.

No further major projects?

Perhaps. I could see a time where I'd dabbled with most things that interest me. I have WAS/7YW armies for Europe and North America. I have fair sized WW2 forces for North Africs and Barbarossa (and aren't the new Miniairons T-26s nice?). I have the various incarnations of the Duchy of Alzheims' armies for the 16th, 18th and 19th centuries. There are Warhammer Dwarves, Melniboneans, Pan Tangians, Riders of Rohan, High Elves of the First Age. There are huge numbers of Egyptians (160 and counting) and Mahdists (300?). There are various odds and sods of British Colonials in Home and Foreign Service Dress. There are a few dozen Britains 1914 French. There is a large chest of drawers stuffed with plastic model kits - were I an honest man I would also admit to the plastic tubs stacked in the car port filled with various kits and bits. I forgot the 25mm Tradition ACW collection. You klnow, the one I actually have the odd game with!

There is even a largeish stash of Napoleonic lead for the eventuality that I ever go to the Iberian peninsula.

Do I need to add to all this? Will I ever paint those Xyston galleys? Or the dozen or so Langdon ships that I have in baggies to go with the HMS Agamemnon (74) and the HMS Lydia (26)?

Can it be that I cannot conceive at this time of adding any new projects to this lot? Sure, some projects may gain an extra branch - most likely the 7YW Brits getting some Jacobites to brawl against at Prestonpans - but entirely new growths? I'm starting to wonder.

So there you go - perhaps my Slovaks and Landsknechts are the end of the road for me. Nothing is ever certain in life, and I feel that there are Ancients lurking there somewhere, but I feel that this may yet come to be.

*In the sense of brought into focus.

Test Figures

Alzheimer Landsknecht Officers

 I've spent a little time this weekend painting a few test figures. In the inevitable blue are "die Blauen" of Alzheim. All painting has been done with acrylic colour washes on a white, sprayed-on, undercoat. My main inspirations for this method are Richard Marsh's "wash-and-line" technique and the excellent work of Doug Crowther. Everything old is new again!

Spanish Pike

I took a leaf out of the GW playbook for painting large units of non-uniformed troops so they look fairly unified. I chose red and yellow-ochre as a tip of the hat to the Spanish flag. These are likewise Willie Landsknecht figures, but wearing Pluderhosen.

Comments are always welcome.

Setting a First Milestone

As you may have realised, I like to set myself milestones in assembling a collection.

Ross has kindly put forth the germ of a scenario and considering that I know little enough about the period and what may or may not be plausible I have decided to go with it.

Why not?

So then:

Spanish
General
Company of 8 Arquebusiers
Company of 8 Sword and Bucklermen
24 Pike
Troop of 8 Mounted Arquebusiers

Alzheimers
General
Company of 8 Arquebusiers
24 Pike
Troop of 8 Gens d'Armes
1 Cannon and 6 crew

This talk of Spanish troops leads me to thinking about my "Great Siege" collection such as it is. The figures that went into it would feed this project quite nicely and vice versa. Plenty of whores and powder monkeys there for Stokes, too. Monks, bishops, all the usual lovely clutter.

Costings

So, the next step of the project is costing it all out.

What am I committing to buy here?

Totting things up, I can see I am looking at 160 Landsknechts, 72 cavalry, half a dozen guns and about 20-30 gunners to service them. Then there are the stray command vignettes, assorted whores and powder monkeys, the odd casualty figure and so on; say another 20 or so. Half a dozen artillery pieces.

Costing up the foot figures - there are in the region of  210 figures. Thats GBP315 at GBP1.50 each.  Here though I am in the happy position of already having about 20 in hand already, so that lessens the pain somewhat. 30-odd pounds worth of pain relief, in fact. So lets say about 285 pounds for the Foot.

The cavalry - 24 are Willie "specials" from Tradition of London and will set me back somewhere in the region of GBP90. Hell. Although on the bright side, the first 8 have already been bought and paid for, so another 60 to spend. The remaining 40 will set me back another GBP116.

Lets say another 25 pounds for artillery.

Potentially a few buildings, items of fortification and so on, but some can be drawn from stock and others will not be needed immediately, so that can be put aside for now.

So what are we looking at at this point? If we total it all up we find we are at about GBP486.

Considering I'll be buying all this in dribs and drabs over the next year and a half to two years, I probably won't be getting any postage discounts, so add another 30%. GBP631.80.

Converting this to Australian dollars at todays' prices, we see that the project will come out at something in the order of $1036.01.

This seems like a lot of money and to tell the truth it is - about half a new hot water service. It is also about half of my annual hobby budget, at a guess, especially if I take into account what I spend going up to CanCon for our demo games. Still spread over two years it's not so bad, about a quarter of my annual spend, and amortised over the lifetime of the pleasure I shall get from them the price starts to seem less and less.

Policy Framework Document

Without adding an extra 16 figures per unit at this stage (notwithstanding a permanently open option on doing so in the future...) I think I have an outline for a "Landsknecht Project".

Something like this:

The Good Duke Sigismund von Alzheim
One 80-strong Landsknecht "Regiment". Die Blauen. For hire. Reasonable rates, satisfaction proffered. Mostly. Looting? Well, if pay is sufficiently in arrears.

The not so Good Freiherr von Herkheim
One 80-strong Landsknecht "Regiment". The Black Band of black-hearted knaves.For hire. Reasonable rates, satisfaction proffered. Under the right circumstances. Looting optional.

Ritter von Gaustadt, a man who enjoys a good time (ein geiler Bock* in the common tongue).
One 24-strong Gens d'Armes Regiment. "die Unaussprechlichen". Ahem.

Franz das Kamel.
Master of the Esoteric Order of the Artillery. A captured town's church bells are his, by ancient right.
An amazing medley of gimcrack cannon of all kinds.


*OK, yes, I did just find a German slang glossary online. Happy days.

UPDATE: Since my last go at this post, I've taken another close look at the Willie Catalogue and it seems to me that the ECW Cuirassier might also do as either a Reiter or as a ... Cuirassier - ie, a chap in 3/4 armour with a fully-enclosed helmet. Also, the Spanish Mounted Arquebusier from the Conquistador range has uses both as a mounted arquebusier and  as a light, lance armed cavalryman. A dozen of each type perhaps? Is that another four units of medium and light horse? Hm. Hm. Hm.

Back-of-the-Envelope-Doodling

Landsknechts:

Let's say we build a regiment of 50 of them. Going on Ross's ratios (sounds pretty official, eh?), that's 5 guys with two-handed swords and halberds; 10 with arquebuses and 35 with pikes. Seems a bit - to borrow a word - fecky to me.

What about 60 figures? 6 with two-handers and halberds, a dozen arquebusiers and 42 pikes. That seems a bit better, especially the arquebusiers. But it could be better for our close-quarter specialists.

Moving into danger territory, now. 80 figures. 8 guys with two-handed swords and halberds, 16 arquebusiers and 56 pikemen.

It might look a little like this:

        PPPPPPPP
        PPPPPPPP
        PPPPPPPP
        HSHSHSHS
        PPCCCCPP
        PPCCCCPP
        PPPPPPPP
        PPPPPPPP

AAAAAAAA AAAAAAAA

P=pike, H=halberd, S= two-handed sword, C="command" and A=arquebus.

Even more dangerously, I'm starting to look at figure poses. Common sense would dictate having the pikes more or less in the vertical position. But then I saw this:



Pinched fron the Tradition of London catalogue.

Life can be just so damned cruel, can't it?

Meanwhile, I've a thought bubble that I'll inflict upon you all. If wargamers strive for realism in their games, do fantasy gamers strive towards (whilst admitting that it's a chimera, a will o' the wisp, even) magical realism?

I'll stop bothering you now.

Landsknechts

I've been redeveloping some interest in my Willie Landsknechts.

I painted up a couple of them ages ago and rediscovered them only yesterday. I think I have the enthusiasm to paint some more when the current mini leadpile of Slovaks dries up over the next few days.

Whether this turns into an army or just an itch scratcher, I don't know. I do recall that Phil Olley had an army made from older GW figures which looked very nice and that's probably my primary inspiration. I would think that a couple of "regiments" and some of the David Wilson "Willie" Gens d'Armes would do as a minimum with some converted pikemen as artillerists. There were a couple of nice looking "Renaissance" guns in the Tradition range, too as I recall.

Now, apart from having the appropriate Osprey, I know nothing about them organisationally. Can one of the more learned members point me in the right direction as to what proportions of figures I ought to get? Pikes, arquebuses, halberds and great swords?

A Confusion of Cannon

I am building in fits and starts the Slovak Rapid Brigade from the Rapid Fire! Second Supplement for the Russian Front. Slovak figures and equipment are not all that hard to come by in these times of wargaming plenty, however, the artillery is a bit of a mixed bag.

A mixed bag of Heavy Metal

For the lighter guns, you can go to HaT for the 75mm mountain guns the Slovaks used as infantry guns. Skytrex and Raventhorpe both do a Skoda 100mm field gun; I am informed that the Skytrex is the better option, and looking at the Raventhorpe ones I'm inclined to agree!

Now, curiously, in addition Mr Marsh requires us to have a couple of 105mm guns to fill out the Slovak TO&E. There was in the Raventhorpe catalogue a GV19 Skoda 105mmgun for $12.95. I duly bought it and assembled the cumbersome beast, replacing the thin and too-breakable trunnions and axles with brass wire drilled and glued in place. Undercoat, paint, gingerly dry-brush (all that superglue...) and ink-wash and the jobs a good 'un.

What's going on there though? A 100 and a 105 mm gun in the one unit? What the..? That makes little sense. And the 105 looks markedly more beefy that the 100mm gun.

Now though, I noticed that the Raventhorpe catalogue has been changed to read:

"GV19 Skoda 152 mm gun 12.95"

Ahh, I thought, that's it. Just a typo in the catalogue. And the close relationship between Messers Chadburn and March (prolific designer in his own right) might explain what was going on in the RF! Blue Book.

But no. Online searches found little resembling it. Indeed, the Czech 150mm Howitzer for the period was the vz 37 (also known as the K4). Indeed, most Czech artillery was very modern for the period, so what the heck is it? Not the cumbersome beast that Raventhorpe are selling.

Skoda vz.37

The answer came unexpectedly as I was leafing through the second volume from the Arms and Uniforms series on the Great War last night. I was engaged in a vain search for colour information on German artillery projectiles. Yet serendipity strikes us when we least expct.

Top marks to Fred and Liliane Funcken:

15cm Autocannone M15/16

And to Wikipedia

In Czech service



Prince Charming

Don't you ever, don't you ever

Stop being dandy, showing me you're handsome

Don't you ever, don't you ever

Stop being dandy, showing me you're handsome

Prince Charming! Prince Charming!

Ridicule is nothing to be scared of

Don't you ever, don't you ever

Stop being dandy, showing me you're handsome



Action on the Frontier!

Mise en Scene:

It is 1759. The siege of Fort Niagara has begun. The British have sent our small ranging parties to scout for any French relief forces. They are small companies of Rangers, troops from the New York Regiment and light infantry from the line battalions in the area.

One has blundered into the path of the van of the force of Captain François-Marie Le Marchand de Lignery and is now racing for the relative safety of the lines at La Belle Famille. A large party of militia, Compagnies Franches and Iroquois.

I'll be making the rules up as I go along.

The raiders appear on the table.

 They will move 4+d6" per move. -3" in difficult terrain.

The British Lines - formed regular troops fiore with added effect.

The objective for the British player - reach the British Lines.

The French mass

 The Freench task is to run the raiders down and destroy them before they reach their lines.

 There are a lot of them. The British Light infantry have elected to run down the portage road, whilst the Rangers have entered the woods. As a result they have the Iroquis hot on their heels.

French Regulars are just out of range.

 The pursued elect to keep on running. The Light infantry have widened their lead slightly and are just outside of the musket range of the French regulars. The Iroquis are gaining on the Rangers - indeed, they are within musket range, but having moved, cannot fire. What will the Rangers do? Try to out-run them? The Indians can run as fast as them. The Rangers are better shots, though.

Pincer Movement?

 The Indians win their initiative roll. Their front rank is within short musketry range. They need a 6 to inflict a casualty. Ten dice are rolled. A single six results. A ranger bites the dust whilst his pals scurry along. The Light Bobs roll well and wheel into the fringe of the forest. The Militia and CFdlM start to sweep around toward them.

The Indians suffer three casualties from return fire from the Rangers. The Militia, having moved in conformity with the CFdlM take two of their own from the British Lights.

 The French move up to the limit of long range. The CFdlM take three casualties at the hands of the Light Bobs. The Militia having moved up with them cannot return fire either. Unseen by the camera, the Indians have attempted to charge the Rangers but have just fallen short. The Rangers give a withering close range fire - needing 5s or 6s to kill at lose range they lay 5 of the Red Men low.

Indians bowled over by a volley.

The move started off with the English winning the initiative and electing to fire. Fifteen muskets spoke. Three Indians fell. oh dear me. Because...

The Militia promptly charged into the Light Infantry who had been depleted by very effective fire from the CFdlM.

Ouch!

Ample revenge for being shot up last move.

And so did the Indians likewise charge the Rangers.

Who fared extremely poorly in the ensuing Melee.

By this stage both the British units had fallen below fifty percent of their original strength and I thought it best to draw a merciful veil over the susequent proceedings. More tomorrow.

The All-Highest and his pals

Just a last few inclusions in the painting challenge: Stadden 1871-1914 "Germans". Ha! We know who they really are.

You know, all-Highest, I bet you're taller than even Blucher with that hat.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oh, really?

 And some better pictures of the Hungarian Army.

Like my bedsheet camoflage?

 I've enough to do a battalion for Rapid Fire, now. Finns next.

Strelets Hungarian Infantry

 The Royal Hungarian Army at Stalingrad, figures by Strelets.

 I am loath to do this kind of photography. Flash photography done at night rarely looks terribly good and one has to fiddle the results so much in Photoshop afterwards that I myself doubt how accurate a reflection of reality they are. Nonetheless.

 They were all painted over a white undercoat. The basic colours - the flesh, the uniform colour - went on mostly as washed-on, thin coats of heavily diluted colour which I then ink-washed to pick up the detail. The black items (boots, gunmetal bits, balaclavas) were all painted a mid gray then given a thin wash of black. I find that this technique models the shapes nicely. I stumbled across it whilst painting my Alzheimer/Bavarians and Prussians.

 I used a little selective layering, mostly on the packs and a little dry-brushing to pull up the textures of the fur garments.

These prone infantry have yet to be varnished.

Best thing about these figures for me is the unusual subject and that you more or less get a battalion in a box. 

Thought Bubble

Wouldn't it be great, a really fun project to do this:

Only about 50 figures all up, and I do hear that the RSM French have recently been remastered, too. You'll need a stockade, two buildings a gun and a crew made from a couple of militia men. Maybe a few conversions - the French NCO, the walking officer in the rear, the pointing and loading Brits.

More crappy figures

Slovaks busily collaborating in Fascist aggression

On the topic of ropey-looking castings, I have been painting a few of my old Raventhorpe Slovaks these past few days.

They look pretty unpromising in the bare metal, but respond well to some washed on block colours followed by another wash of Gryphonne Sepia and a little lining-in with a dark brown.

I think the trick with them is that they are quite uncluttered with detail. Where there is some, it is sculpted in quite sharp relief which helps the washes get to where they need to go. The areas that are smooth are very smooth which with a good matt white undercoat also helps the painting along.

Three PS's:

One - I like the two artillerymen playing "Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes in the centre there, don't you?

Two - I painted my 100th and 101st Spencer Smith Franco-Prussian War figures last night. My Painting challenge targets are bang on time for once!

Three - It was Erin's 4th birthday yesterday.



Erin's new scooter. She looks rather pleased with it, doesn't she?



I should have known this would happen!