With my foray into the 17th Century European wars continuing, I decided I needed to armour-up and get a couple of full-blown cuirassier units.

You don’t really need them for the English Civil War - a full suit of armour being a bit too expensive for most people so a rarity on the ECW battlefield - but I think I can probably justify having them available to early 17th Century European armies.

As most of my ECW collection is Peter Pig, I decided to stick with them for the cuirassiers. At this stage of the 17th Century, heavy cavalry like this would have fought in the “Dutch” or “trotter” style: trotting up into pistol range and letting loose a volley or two before advancing steadily into contact.

Usually I would use Contrast paints on the horses, but as I wanted to drybrush the armour on the riders I undercoated in Matt Black and then painted their steeds with basecoat-highlight-wash as I used to do before speed paints came along.

On reflection, it was probably the wrong choice. I should have undercoated in Grey Seer as usual, painted the horses with Contrast paints, then painted the riders with a second matt black undercoat before drybrushing.

The way I used was certainly expedient - I completed the two units in two days - but I’m not very happy with the horses. The truth is that Contrast paints have their weaknesses, but they are really good for painting 15mm horses.

Anyway, they are done now: two units of cuirassier cavalry to trample over the fields of 17th Century Europe!