Deli for the Ottomans

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I’m still building my 15mm 17th Century Ottoman army: the Sipahis and Janisseries are done, not it’s just a matter of adding some of the more irregular troops.

About as irregular as you can get, the Deli are technically a light cavalry unit consisting of fanatical warriors and known as The Mad. They would dress themselves and their mounts in animal skins, decorating everything with feathers, fur or hide.

Altough my Sipahis are painted using traditional acrylics, I went back to Contrast paints for these mainly because Contrast really suits the depiction of fur and feathers.

When you get these (mine are from By Fire & Sword, some of the last of the v1 models before the v2 ranges are released hopefully later this year) you get a packet of stiff wire lances which come with a lot of little metal balls.

I puzzled over what these were for before managing to find a picture of the models from the BF&S website that showed them in place: they fit on the lance and rest just on top of the hand holding it as, I suppose, a sort of hilt. Might have been nice to have that on the box somewhere as I almost discarded them in ignorance.

For some reason, I also found the flag and epnnants difficult to do this time. Usually I’m fine with them, but the flag is a second attempt after I ruined the first one, and you can see that some of the pennants suffer from the dreaded “edges don’t match white edges”! They still make the unit really pop though, so worth doing.

The Deli were certainly light cavalry, but you don’t give horsemen a lance and call them fanatic and mad unless you expect them to charge people. As most rules don’t allow lights to charge formed units, I’ve therefore classed the Deli as fanatical formed cavalry, but might have to review my decision in light of the various whinges I have heard about this. I think I might add the option of fielding them as light or standard: people can then make their own minds up!

So just a few light cavalry units to go now, although to tell the truth I have many units of lights in my other armies that would pass as Ottoman lights. They were, after all, largely the same peoples…but it’s just I like a full roster for each of my armies rather than operating some kind of central pool. Any excuse to buy more minis!

Painting Ottomans

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I have about half a 17th Century Ottoman army ready for the tabletop: the infantry bought from a friend, the cavalry painted by Glenbrook Painting Services (recommended).

Half an army is no good to man nor beast, so Time to get started on the other half. First up were some more European Sipahi and, as I had the figures handy, another infantry command base.

As the rest of the cavalry is painted acrylics-on-a-black-undercoat, I followed suit with the two horse units shown above rather than using my beloved Contrast Paints.

This was a bit of a shock to the system, especially with the horses, but they didn’t seem to turn out too badly. The By Fire & Sword figures are above-average castings but one unusual trait is that, with cavalry, the horse provided is plastic versus a metal figure.

This has two effects: firstly a base is a bit top heavy, and secondly the horses are sometimes bent out of shape and can’t easily be straightened. Fortunately not a problem with this batch, although I did have to remeber to be careful when taking them off their painting-bases.

The Janissary command base, on the other hand, uses Essex figures and is done using Contrast Paints. Comparing the two (i.e. command base versus the two cavalry units) shows the difference between the two painting styles. In this case, for this colour scheme, I prefer the Contrast look, although I accept that for some colour schemes nothing beats the layered (base coat, top coat, highlight) acrylic treatment.

Rainy Day Painting

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It’s raining again, and no-one is around, so a trip to the painting table to see what we can find to work on.

First up are a couple of large artillery bases for my 17th Century Ottomans:

I wanted some big guns for the Ottomans and, as you can see, I found them!

The guns themselves are from the English Heritage: a recent trip around Framlington Castle (recommended, even in the rain) gave me access to the gift shop and to said guns. They’re great for a huge artillery pieces and it’s only the wheels that need painting. Add on some Ottoman crewmen from Essex and away you go.

The Ottoman artillery didn’t take very long, so it was what else I could find in the lead mountain to fill the time. With all the news being about the situation in Palestine, it seemed grimly inevitable that my eye eventually fell on a small bag of figures that turned out to be Khurasan’s Egyptian crewed weapons for the Yom Kippur War 1973.

In the packet you get one HMG team, one 81mm PM-41 medium mortar team, and two Malyutka or “Sagger” anti-tank guided missile teams. All nice figures that paint up nicely: the only problem was remembering what combination of paints I’d used for the crews’ uniforms…but fortunately I keep a record of that sort of thing so was able to quickly find the info I needed.

More Epic Scots - the Cavalry and Small Guns

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Having used all the musket-bearing men from the handful of ECW Warlord Epic Scots Covenanter sprues that I had acquired, it was time to see what I could do with the rest of them.

I didn’t want any more pike-only units, so that left some Scots cavalry, Scots lancers, and a few pieces of what I’d call small artillery: frame guns and falconets.

As there weren’t enough cavalry to make up a single decent sized unit of either pistoliers or lancers, I decided to build a small unit of each: the new For King & Parliament Celtic Fringe books have plenty of small cavalry units in them, so these would be ideal.

Now I like the Warlord Epic Scots infantry: the right size (or near as damn it!) to match my 15mm collection, nicely sculpted with plenty of detail, and I found the “strips” approach ideal for massed ranks of musketeers.

The Scots cavalry however are unfortunately another matter: the cavalry on these sprues are badly sculpted to the point where I almost just discarded them and bought replacements from another manufacturer.

Or let me be more specific: the horses are fine, in fact are nicely done, but their riders are terrible.

Both lancers and pistoliers have very poor detail to the body and faces (much less detail than on the infantry) and, worse, each has this blob area of plastic with no detail at all where the front of the figure meets the horse…a poorly detailed coat can be compensated for with a cunning paint job, a blob area of plastic has either to be carved into shape or just ignored.

On top of the above, the lancers carry not lances but (presumably in keeping with the Scottish theme) cabers: enormous logs that have to be painted to show a useable lance or risk being seen as objects of derision.

I forgot to take any pictures of the figures before painting them (well, I didn’t think I would need to) but my fellow blogger from the Keep Your Powder Dry website (excellent site, highly recommended) has posted this one, above, that shows what I mean.

He does, however, go on to say that the figures look good from the side (which I agree with) and that these are an improvement on other Warlord Epic cavalry…which makes me glad I haven’t got any!

Being tight as the proverbial badger’s backside, however, and not wanting to spend any money on alternatives, I persevered, and produced one small unit each of lancers and pistoliers. They’ll “do” at the three foot range, but won’t be featuring in any close-ups!

To end on a positive note, the artillerymen, on the other hand, are great.

They have all the detail of the pike or musketeers strips, but as individuals. They were very easy to paint up, and their falconets (the one on the left in the picture above) and frame guns (the other two) are great.

So a mixed bag from the Warlord Epic Scots Covenanter range. Loving the infantry and artillery, not loving the cavalry.

Painting Epic Scots

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Friend John kindly gave me a couple of those Warlord Epic Scots Covenantor free sprues that came with Wargames Illustrated a few months ago, so it was time to get them painted and onto the table.

First up was a large unit of Commanded Shot. I decided to give them a natty pair of red trousers: not very dour but I fancied a change from Hodden Grey. The command figures came from Eureka: a bit taller than the Epic’s, but then you want some big men in charge!

As before, the epic slugs painted up very easily and were actually quite fun to do. In fact, it took me so little time to finish this lot that I went straight into painting a second batch, this time with more traditionally coloured trews!

The flags, by the way, come from Maverick Models. They are a simple Cross of St Andrew custom printed for me by Steve, the proprietor. The cloth effect makes them very simple to use (much easier than paper flags) and they end up looking very good indeed.

With two large units of Commanded Shot completed in record time, I could spare the effort to use some of the single figures on the sprues to produce three bases of Attached Shot: something to give my artillery a little better chance of survival on the battlefield.

These were obviously just like painting standard 15mm figures…they are nicely posed and I particularly like the chap priming his pan (front left on the right hand base).

Finally, although not Scots, or Epic 15mm scale, I also had a chance to paint up another Spear unit for my 28mm Venetians. These are Perry plastics and, as usual, a slight pain to build compensated for by the variety and realism of the poses that can be generated, and the ease with which they paint up.

Epic Scots Painted Up

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I stopped buying Wargames Illustrated shortly after it turned into the Battlefront catalogue (a pity, as I have every issue of the old style magazine and still dip in and dip out of them on a regular basis) but, when I saw they had a free Warlord Epic ECW Scots sprue as part of the package, thought I’d take the opportunity to (a) give the new-look WI another chance and (b) try out the Warlord Epic Scots.

I hadn’t really interacted with any Warlord Epic figures up to this point: my collection is nearly all 15mm and thought of buying Napoleonics that were slightly but significantly smaller that what I have (the admittedly larger, more like 18mm AB range) didn’t appeal.

In fact, I’d always wondered what on earth Warlord were thinking when they introduced another unique scale into the wargaming world. Why not go 10mm or 15mm rather than something in between? Or were they trying to create a Hobby like GW?

Anyway, reading around, the Epic ECW ranges were supposed to be larger than the Epic Napoleonics, more like 13.5mm, so I was happy to give them a go. I duly bought my copy of WI and settled down to have a read and a look at the free sprue.

First impressions were good. A nice lot of detail on the figures and they certainly seemed a good size. They also looked like they would be quick to paint: no picking up lolly sticks with 3-4 figures on them, just bases of 10 figures a time…plus the fact that a percentage of each figure wouldn’t need to be painted as it was hidden by their neighbour next door.

The 10-figure blocks were a pain in one way, in that they don’t fit with my existing basing system, but I don’t have any Commanded Shot bases for my Scots yet (in fact, the army is positively short of muskets having several Pike Only battalia) so I thought I’d give four “shooter” blocks a go as an oversize Commanded Shot unit.

So, what do I think?

Yes, very nice really.

They were easy to paint: really detailed relief takes Contrast Paint beautifully, and they were as quick to paint as I thought they would be.

I added a command figure from Blue Moon’s 18mm range that towers over them a bit, and a standard bearer from Alternative’s Furiosa range who fits nicely. And a dog just for laughs.

The $64m question, of course, is how they would fit in with my other figures: mostly Peter Pig and Hallmark 15’s.

Well, the photo below shows the Scots and a battalia of English pike and shot side by side for comparison:

The height difference isn’t noticeable at all. In fact I think the Epic figures are 15mm from top of bonnet to foot and that the 13.5mm measurement is to their eyes.

They are obviously a little more densely packed than my usual basing system, but that won’t be a problem providing I’m consistent with deploying any Scottish Commanded Shot like this.

One thing: they are a bit slimmer front-to-back then their metal equivalents, almost on their way to being flats, but I’m going to put this down to a diet of good Scots’ porridge rather than anything else!

The price is also good. The sprue also contains four pike 10-man blocks and a smattering of singles, horsemen, artillerymen etc. Would certainly work out much cheaper than buying everything in metal.

Will I buy more?

Probably not…but only because I have loads of Scots already.

I do need some more Commanded Shot, however, so if anyone would like to donate a sprue they received with WI but don’t want, Comment or PM me at the usual address and I’ll quite happily take it off your hands!

Would I buy Epic if I didn’t have any ECW figures and wanted to get into the period?

Yes, I would.

I’d have a basing system that suited the 10-man blocks (FK&P is a very forgiving rule system basing-wise) and would quite happily have built a large collection of Royalist, Parliamentarian and Scots figures up.

So a big recommended from me, and I will certainly look at the other Epic ranges provided they are also 15mm equivalents.

They look even better from behind: the only direction I will ever see them from of course!

FK&P AAR: Transylvanians vs Muscovites

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Time for another game of the eastern Europe variant of For King & Parliament: my Transylvanians would take on Bevan’s Muscovites.

Transylvanians

Muscovites

This was a cracking game where the action swayed backwards and forwards across the field.

In summary, the Transylvanian elite National Cavalry (the chaps with the yellow and red lance pennants) charged forwards right of centre of the field and swept all before them: smashing enemy units from the field with ease!

On my left flank, however, the mass of Transylvanian light horse were comprehensively butchered by Muscovite heavy cavalry, who steam-roller-ed over them with barely any effort at all.

In the centre, the two sides came together as the actions above were taking place and, unfortunately, my troops got the worst of it and slowly began to give ground.

Honours were even, with both sides hemorrhaging victory medals, until the very last moments of the game, with the Muscovites just taking the win 16:15!

As I said above: a cracking game…with the charge of the Transylvanian elite National Horse being one of those moments that will go down in gaming history!

Here the battle in pictures:

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ECW Infantry Battalia

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Regular visitors will know that I recently bought the new ECW casualty figures from Alternative Army’s Furioso range (and very nice they were too).

Never one to miss an opportunity to buy stuff, at the same time I also ordered enough figures to make up a standard ECW infantry battalia in the way that I configure them for For King & Parliament. Seemed rude not to really!

I hadn’t bought any of the Furioso range before (mainly using Peter Pig and Hallmark via Magister Militum for my ECW collection) so was curious to see how these would fit in.

The first thing to mention is the excellent way in which they were delivered, especially the pikemen. I don’t usually like figures with integral pikes - the pikes always seem to get bent out of shape in transit and then never go back to how they should be - preferring to add my own using rigid wire spears, but these arrived absolutely and beautifully straight, taped to a piece of cardboard to make sure they remained so. Well done to AA!

Secondly, the figures paint up very well indeed. The detail is crisp, and takes Contrast paints very nicely indeed. The pikemen come in breastplate and helm, and it’s nicely sized breastplate that is easy to (after the undercoat) re-paint in black and then highlight with a dull steel colour. Likewise the musketeers: the detail (the apostles, the feathers on some of their hats) highlight clearly and easily. Great stuff.

Finally, their sizing is comparable to the rest of my collection. Yes, the pikes are considerably more solid than the wire spears I’ve used elsewhere, but this is a minor gripe: height-wise they work very well.

So, all in all, I am very impressed with the Furioso pike and shot from Alternative and will doubtless find myself browsing the rest of the range in the very near future! Highly recommended.

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ECW Casualties

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Those who have gamed with me know that I do love a good marker: be it an ammo marker, a pin, shock, wounds…whatever system, I love a good marker!

They’re dead, Jim: you can tell by the SBOBCP’s

Up to recently, however, I’ve shied away from using “dead” or “wounded” casualty figures to mark things such as disorder, believing that it was far better to concentrate my figure production on actual units rather than waste time and money on something that can easily be replaced by a small bit of brightly coloured plastic.

My recent foray into competition gaming has, however, made me think the opposite. I originally went into competitions using my small bits of brightly coloured plastic, but soon realised that these looked out of place opposite the more subtle casualty markers used by my opponents. I looked like a newbie, for God’s sake!

The situation was remedied for my 28mm Romans in my games of To The Strongest, when friend Peter gave me a set of Roman shields mounted on flocked 2p pieces, but my 15mm English Civil War figures for For King & Parliament still suffered from the SBOBCP syndrome.

The Romans are more subtly dead now, jim!

Until now!

I haven’t really used Alternative Armies’ Furioso range for any of my 17th Century collection, preferring to stick to the usual suspects of Peter Pig, Hallmark via Magister Militum, By Fire & Sword (for Eastern Front) and the occasional Essex. No particular reason for this (I buy sci-fi figures from Loud Ninja via their site) just generally not being familiar with the range and choosing to stick with what I know.

I did, however, see an advertisement for some new casualty markers from Alternative, so thought this might be a good time to dip my toe in the Furioso waters. I duly ordered (taking advantage of a 20% off sale and the situation to buy another battalia of ECW infantry as well…but more on them another day) and received a smart little package in return.

Apologies for the quality of the picture (the setting sun on a Grey Seer’d painting tray) but these are rather nice. They come small enough to mount on a 1p piece, as I have done above, and are very easy to paint up: just the right amount of detail to make them pop. There are six different types (three face up and three face down) but, as you can see, you can easily make a variety pack through different painting schemes.

They also do some standing up wounded if that’s your preference.

These get a highly recommended from me, and I can’t wait to get them onto the table.

Cuirassiers Ahoy!

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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!

Winged Hussars!

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With real life being so busy at the moment, I have started augmenting my own painting by buying already-painted miniatures, either second-hand or painted to order.

One of the stands, therefore, that I always try to visit at wargames shows is that of Instant Armies & Veteran Miniatures. They stock literally thousands of second-hand figures across a wide range of periods. They don’t usually have a sign or branding, but they are the chaps who have the 28mm figures on display on top of the wooden draws containing the 15mm figures.

I restrict myself to buying figures at least as good as what I can paint myself, and the good thing about IAAVM is that a lot of their offering, unlike many second-hand figures platforms, is of a very good quality indeed, and at prices that won’t necessarily break the bank.

They were at Warfare on Sunday, allowing me to pick up a very nice unit of 15mm winged hussars for my nascent 17th Century Polish/Lithuanian army. A night in a tray with just the bases under water and they were all ready for re-basing.

Cost-wise, they worked out at around £2.50 a figure, which is a great price considering that the base lead would cost you about £1.40 a figure with a £3-£4 painting cost on top of that.

So thnak you to IAAVM: my Polish/Lithuanians are now one unit closer to completion!

ECW Scots Lancers

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Another lot of figures rescued from the depths of the lead mountain: a unit of Scots Lancers for the English Civil War period.

What I usually find is that I get into a new period or army and fanatically paint enough figures to enable me to get it onto the tabletop as soon as possible.

As I’m doing that, however, I add more units to my core, initial purchase as I think about all the different variants I could play. These, new, purchases generally go to the back of the queue and, as my initial surge wears off, get relegated to the lead mountain as I switch from painting the army to playing with the army. Painting-the-same-uniform-a-million-times fatigue also sets in!

So here is a unit of Covenantor lancers that were initially bought a couple of years ago when I first started putting my ECW Scots together. It was actually a pleasure to paint them. The lancers are 15mm figures from Khurasan, with a Peter Pig command figure. Paints were from the Contrast range, with the horses actually painted in Fyreslayer Flesh!

Time for another game of For King and Parliament…

Some Painting, Some Re-Basing

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Almost unbelievably, I recently actually managed to find time to do some painting!

What with real life being very busy and all the actual gaming I’ve been doing, the painting side of things had slipped, but I had a spare hour or two and thought that I really should get something done…so I did.

These are the Laminids: more 15mm sci-fi from Khurasan. I’m going to add them to the Pelagic Dominate force that I already have: they will fit right in with the other “sea creatures” that that range features.

These are very simply painted with GW Contrast paints: just one coat per colour, so only four paint pots opened. They were, in fact, so easy to paint that next time I order from Khurasan, I shall add another two squads to make a platoon and ask Jon if he can add a command figure to the range.

Sassanids

I’ve also finally got around to re-basing the Sassanid infantry to go with the recent re-basing of the cataphracts, clibanarii, horse archers and elephants.

I almost didn’t bother: I mean, who fields Sassanid infantry anyway? But the figures were there, and would have prayed on my slightly OCD mind as “incomplete”, so re-base them I did.

The latest To The Strongest lists give them as either standard or deep javelinmen, so I split the figures into two units of each:

I was a bit nervous how the deep bases would turn out - I’ve only ever used the double-sized bases to deep elephants before - but, actually, these look just as good…and I had a bolt-shooter set that I could add to one as dressing as well, so all good.

Polish Lithuanians

Finally in this burst of figure production, the painter I use to augment my own efforts sent through the first of the Polish Lithuanians: a unit of Petyhorsy armoured cavalry.

Nice figures and beautifully painted.

One thing, though. By Fire & Sword, the manufacturer, use plastic horses with metal riders. Now I’ve no objection to plastics and have loads, but they seem to be using the soft rather than the hard plastic, which can sometimes lead to the horses, particularly with ‘heavy metal’ riders, not standing up straight.

So bad was this on one of the mounts in the unit above that, despite its proximity to its neighbour, the horse leant to one side to the extent that its rider’s lance was tangled with that of his comrade next door…and nothing I did would make it otherwise. Worse, it made the whole unit look weird.

The solution: a bit of stiff wire (actually the bit cut off a lance to make a spear) as a brace between the two steeds:

The close up makes it look very noticeable in the photo, above, but it isn’t on the tabletop. Job done!

FK&P: Lists for the Eastern Front

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Whilst researching for my English Civil War armies, I came across the blog Tales from a Wargaming Shed. It’s author, Tim, had some rules and army lists for using For King & Parliament to fight pike and shot battles in 17th Century Eastern Europe as opposed to just the UK’s green and pleasant land.

Muscovites versus Cossacks, from a recent game

This, combined with the comprehensive miniatures for the theatre available from Wargamer.pl, inspired me to start a collection of Zaphorogian Cossacks to face friend Bevan’s Polish Lithuanians and then, as my collection expanded to include Muscovites, Transylvanians and others, to build on Tim’s work and the information provided in the By Fire & Sword rules by Wargamer.pl, to create more detailed army lists for For King & Parliament for the theatre.

On this new page on this blog, therefore, you will find pdfs of the army lists I have created so far. These are, I hasten to say again, hugely based on Tim’s work and the information provided in the By Fire & Sword rules by Wargamer.pl. All I have done is build upon their work, adding information taken from other sources (for example, the Steven’s Balagan blog) to put together enough information to get as many different eastern front '“pike and shot” armies as possible on the tabletop. Any mistakes are my own, and I welcome corrections or suggestions (send to admin@vislardica.com).

FK&P: The Eastern Front

More Kudos to Warbases

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I recently bought a whole load of painted figures for use with my Zaphorogian Cossacks: there was a complete Muscovite army, large numbers of Transylvanians, and a smattering of Ottomans as well.

The only problem was that they were all based for the miniatures’ parent rule system By Fire and Sword: so although I wouldn’t have any problems adapting the units to FK&P/Eastern Front version, it did mean that I would be moving figures on lots of bases around the field rather than my usual large element bases.

I did think about re-basing, but the bases that the figures came on were far too well done to be casually destroyed…and re-basing figures is always a tedious and sometimes risky business. I needed another solution.

Step forward Warbases: that excellent company from north of the border who specialise in bases of all sorts. They already supply the custom bases I use for IABSM infantry squads, the larger bases I use for TTS deep units, and the standard movement trays I use for my Vikings, so I investigated what they could do.

I wanted movement trays of two different types (one for foot, one for horse) but with a narrower lip than usual so they wouldn’t end up being too prominent on the battlefield.

One quick e-mail to Warbases describing what I wanted and they were happy to provide. Okay so I had to stick the extra thin lip on myself, but that was hardly a hardship!

Here are the results: multi-based infantry, horse and artillery units now beautifully and conveniently trayed-up and ready for the tabletop. Once again: well done Warbases!

 

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17th Century Swedish Command

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Over the last couple of year’s I’ve built up a sizeable 15mm collection of English Civil War figures. To them I’ve added some Cossacks and am in the process of building a contemporary Polish army as well.

Looking to get more use out of all the above, I realised that I could quite easily use the bulk of my English Civil War collection as Swedish troops for the Thirty Years War. After all, the Swedish troops dressed in “western” styles rather than the “eastern” styles of the native Polish or Cossack infantry: so my “Swedish-style” ECW cavalry could masquerade as Swedish reiters, and the infantry could be fielded as is.

That was a good start, but I didn’t have any idea as to the composition of a Swedish army…but a couple of hours online and with the FK&P rulebook enabled me to put together the following, which I think does the trick nicely.

The main elements of the army would be reiters and either “Swedish” of “German” foot. “Swedish” foot were rarely actually Swedish of course (a lot of Finns and a surprising amount of Scots): the name comes from the way they were fielded in terms of pike/musket ratio following Carl Gustav’s reforms. Likewise, “German” foot were not all German, and the term applies to any foot with a more conventional pike/musket ratio.

I could have gone into more detail and noted that CG’s army were often short of pikemen, so all the infantry were effectively “German” stylee, but that’s probably an unnecessary complication: it’s enough that I can call pike-heavy battalia “Swedish” and standard battalia “German”.

The next question was how to make the army look a bit more Swedish. The solution was actually quite easy: the Swedish Command pack from By Fire & Sword gives you seven different command stands plus flags.

One problem is that the By Fire & Sword models are really difficult to get hold of in the UK: exports from Poland presumably more difficult now due to a mixture of Brexit, COVID and the dramatic increase in postage/transport costs. I manged to get one of the last I could find from Entoyment in Poole.

The models are generally up to the usual high standard of By Fire & Sword except, unfortunately, for a lot of the faces. I don’t know whether it’s the original sculpts or the casting, or even worn out molds, but many of the faces just didn’t have the relief that you’d normally expect. I’m not the best painter in the world, so I reply on clearly defined detail on figures to bring out the, er, detail, including faces. Base colour, a wash then highlight forehead, nose, cheeks and chin only really works if you have a clearly defined forehead, nose, cheeks and chin…otherwise you’re actually painting faces from scratch, well beyond my talents!

This was disappointing, but I still think the By Fire & Sword packs are great: everything you need plus flags.

So that’s a Swedish army created from existing stock and one pack of command figures. I might see if I can do the same with some of the other TYW nations…

Cossack Artillery

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Fanfare please: the last of the Cossacks roll off the production line!

Well, I have one more, unopened packet of Moloitsy, but even if I did want to paint them up, there’s no room in the two Really Useful boxes that I’m using to store the Cossacks in (it’s a bit like a tabor after all!) so who knows where I’d put them. Bored of painting Cossacks now, anyway: with 231 painted since 21st October, I feel I have more than done them justice.

Just working on my tan, Alexy

First up, in the photo above, is a Light Gun base to augment stationary infantry or tabor units. Figures and gun are from By Fire & Sword, and very nice they are too, if a trifle tall.

I do like how the Contrast paint has covered the torso of our sunbather with the ramrod: that’s just one coat of Darkoath Flesh over the grey undercoat. Loving Contrast paints very much!

Next up is a standard artillery base. Not quite such a good photo, though.

You can see that I have had to import some spare Peter Pig artillerymen as the original artillery pack only contained enough gunners for two crew per piece. I’ve painted the Piggy’s contribution in the same green both on the above and the next piece: I’m calling them non-Cossack mercenaries used to train or improve effectiveness!

I do like the pose of the chap in the red trousers on the left: the one with his foot up on the barrel and staring dreamily into space. You can’t quite see it in the pic, but in his other hand, the one by his waist, he’s holding what looks like a piece of paper. I like to think it’s a letter from that special little Cossack lady expressing her love and admiration…but it’s probably a Dear John or a bill!

Finally, here’s a little gallery of the single siege artillery base I’ve painted up.

This artillery set comes with not only it’s own resin gun emplacement, but also with a separate “slide-in” base for the gun and gunners so that you can also use them on their own, behind a tabor for example. Very nifty and much appreciated.

Again, not enough crewmen though, so I’ve added a Piggy mercenary and a couple of spare command figures (the standard bearer and the drummer) to make the scenic base a bit fuller.

So that’s the Cossacks done now (or as done as any wargames project ever can be) and it’s on to the next section of the lead mountain.

No sneak previews, but I think I’ll be moving forward through time to WW2…

Cossack Command

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I’m now just working through the last few bits and pieces for my Zaporogian Cossack army for the (unofficial) eastern European version of For King & Parliament.

Here’s the latest offering, once again showcasing the beautiful banners that come ready provided by the chaps from By Fire & Sword.

Cossack Cavalry

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It’s always nice to see who’s going to be first to get an entry into the new year’s Painting Challenge and, this year, it happens to be me: the extra bank holiday day giving me the chance to both start and finish a couple of units of Cossack cavalry.

These are more from the By Fire & Sword range, and very nice they are too. It was also such a relief to paint a “regular” unit (i.e. one where the figures are all the same) after the five units of Tatars that were my final entries into last year’s Challenge.

And that, of course, is one of the reasons that I have been able to finish them so quickly: less time switching between paints and poses. That and the fact that they have very little in terms of “webbing” or equipment.

Oh, and if anyone is wondering how I got the roan colour on the unit with the purple and yellow banner, it’s using GW Contrast Fireslayer Flesh with a Cygor Brown mane and tail. I think I should have given them white socks as well, but that can easily be fixed the next time I want a roan horse.

Only a few more Cossacks to go now…

More Tatars

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After my brief diversion to the Far East, it’s back to the slightly nearer East with just about the last of the Tatars that I need as allies for my Zaporogian Cossack army. All that’s left on the Tatar section of the painting table are three command figures to use as a General should I want to field them in two brigades rather than one.

These are very nice figures but I’m still not convinced by the plastic horse, metal rider combination: I think it would work better the other way around. I will, however, save my final opinion until after I’ve used them a couple of times: the proof being in the (presumably left-over Xmas) pudding.