Something Arrived & Re-Basing Ensued

Well, Midgard arrived in my mailbox. Along with series the videos put out by the Too Fat Lardies, this new set of rules has really captured my imagination. For the past few years since I built my large fantasy armies I've been wondering what to do with them. They have been re-based a couple of times (from multi-figure bases to singles) and I've never been happy with them. However, I'm doing it all again and I'm really liking the results. Here's the start...

All of my troops are in units of 12. This started because I originally collected them for Dragon Rampant and I just sort of carried on with the 12 figure unit. For this rebasing, I did consider reducing the numbers of figures per unit but I do like the massed ranks of spears. This unit was/is my Royal Guard and was originally made as a 36 figure phalanx. Now it is more like a 3 company regiment. I really like that each base has a tight packed look.

The bases I'm using are pre-made, blank glass/cup coasters that I get from Bunnings (our local BIG hardware chain in Australia). They are 11.2 cm which is just shy of the 12cm recommendation in the Midgard rules. I already have a big bunch of these that I half-heartedly painted and flocked a couple of years back. I trimmed them down so the depth is 7cm. The recommended depth is 6cm but I like the extra bit of play that the extra 1cm gives me. I also allowed me to add a 12mm dice holder at the back of the base.

The dice look less intrusive in the flesh, so to speak, but I might invest in a set that will blend in better.

I have about 18 units all together (of 12 figures) which makes for quite a decent sized army when combined with the horse and other elements. They include several different houses/contingents with distinctive colours and symbols. The largest house is the one below which has three units of spears and three of bow - So that's 72 figures. I decided that I'm going to organise these troops differently and make them spear and bow - Sort of a sparabarra type thing. This type of unit is in the rules and this is a large army so why not add a bit of variety to the mix? They'll be 6 companies strong! 

This spear & bow mix was something I tried to incorporate into the rules I wrote for my own games during The Plague.

At this point in time my Elfin Houses have no names and no history. Maybe I should take the time to create something to give them a bit more depth.

Something else I also have on hand is a large bunch of pre-fab MDF bases. I'm planning on using these for skirmish units and other lighter units with less figures that are more spread out (medium infantry types). These bases are all 12cm x 6cm; some with 6 figure slots and some with 8 slots. I have a lot of them. By doing this I can also keep a significant selection of figures on single bases for use in other games but still use them for large battles.

So I figure I can use these as skirmishers with six figures per base so that one unit of 12 can be used to form two companies of javelineers.

Alternatively, I can also remove a couple of figures and insert a couple of place holders to create 3 skirmishing companies of 4 figures each. I already have a bunch of these little place holders made up and I might actually make a few with dice holders.

And that's it for now. I had a bit of a break for a week because we have my wife's family staying with us which has disrupted our lives a bit. In fact, my wargaming room has become my wife's home office as her original office has become a bedroom.

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P.S. It's going to take me a while to re-base all of my fantasy armies, I have my evil/orcish troops, forest folk, undead, northern riders, evildoer men, some dwarves and fantasy barbarians. I also have a significant Anglo-Saxon army that I intend to use for Midgard. So there's lots of work ahead for me.

Just Horsing Around

Well another week has gone by and I continue to paint and do wargaming stuff for no apparent reason. I can see no potential gaming in my immediate future and I wonder why I keep at it. Not to worry, though... I have to do something to reduce the masses of figures in my possession that are waiting for their share of colourful, acrylic covering.

Over the past week and a bit I've managed to paint up a brigade of 10mm English Horse. This is Palme's Brigade at Blenheim. I must admit that I stole one of the squadrons from another brigade to make up numbers - The regiment with the green flag - The Earl of Plymouth's (4the Horse Regt) which was split up between brigades at the battle. But here they are, reunited in all their 10mm glory! The others are Queen Dowagers Regt (9th Horse) with the blue flag and Lord Cavendish's Regiment (8th Horse) with the yellow flag.

They are a very pretty little brigade and they were very easy to paint. I did the horses using contrast paints, except for the greys, and they came out quite nice. I under coated the figures in black then gave them a good dry brushing with a ghost grey (very pale grey). Then I applied the Contrast Paint - several different shades of brown and a few black. Very fast and effective.

I'm pretty happy with the results and next on the list is a Hesse-Homberg horse brigade which will give the English/Allied army 12 squadrons. (actually, I'm still debating whether to do a Hesse-Kassell brigade: Auroch's Brigade).

Another thing I finished that has been sitting on my paint desk for a while is a train of baggage mules/ponies/horses/donkeys. I was given these a couple of years back by my friend Darryl but I never knew how to tackle them. They were mounted on bases and just sat there for months.

As I was painting the 10mm Horse I decided I'd use these as a test to see if I could use the contrast paints for what they're intended. So that's what I did. Other than the harness and a few other little details these figures are 95% done with contrast paints. I think they came out well and they took very little time to complete once I decided on a painting method. They're not super detailed but they look nice and they can be used in any number of eras. Thank you Darryl.

And that's it for now. I want to do more 10 mm but I might spend this week tackling some of the other half-painted things that have been sitting, patiently on my desk for the past months or years before I get stuck in again. Then again... I may not.

Cheers,

IanKH

Prussian Quick Messenger Service

My Prussians were feeling a bit second rate next to my French. The French had a bunch of pretty looking ADC's but my Prussians had to make do with a handful of individual infantry officers, on foot, pretending to be ADC's. I couldn't find any real Prussian ADC figures (I'm sure there are some out there) so I used a bunch of mounted officers that I already had on hand.

They're a bit of a mix - Three of them are Calpe (I think), two Perry metals and one that I made using leftover parts from a box of Perry plastic Allied Heavy Cavalry. They're a bit rough but they're going to get a lot of handling so there's no need to make them perfect.

These are the Calpe figures. As far as I can tell they're standard infantry battalion commanders but they'll do the job. They have the green collar and cuffs that distinguish them as ADC's and that's good enough for me. Nice figures and easy to paint.

These three are the Perry figures. The one on the left is the plastic kit-bash. I used one of the dragoon horses. I got 3 boxes of Allied cavalry to make two regiments and, as a result I had a few left over figures and horses. I might use one of them to make a cavalry general (even though all the Prussian generals basically wear the same uniform so it doesn't really matter). I have the two metal figures painted up as actual generals/brigadiers but Prussian officer sculpts are limited so I make do with what I can get.

These are for General d'Armee and I'm pretty sure six will be enough for the majority of situations. If I ever need more I'll just place a dice or something else as needed.

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Just as an aside, we've had to make room for visiting relatives so my wife and I had to amalgamate my hobby room and her home office. This means I have limited access to my hobby room during the days she works from home (today being one-such). So I brought my little, el cheapo, Aldi lightbox down and set it up on my desk. It looks bright outside but that was just a momentary break in the clouds. It's a cold, wet, spring day in Melbourne today.

P. S. Listening to The Cramps whilst I work.

One Size Fits All - 10mm Napoleonic's

One Size Fits All was the second record by The Mothers of Invention that I bought some time in 1976 or '77.  How does that fact relate here? I don't know.

I started doing 10mm Wars of the Spanish Succession a couple of years back and thought I might buy some Napoleonic French to see if they are easy paint. I got them prepped them and left them to get dusty. But, now that I'm back to painting and trying to clear things out I decided to try my hand at these tiny guys.

They were certainly quicker to paint than 28mm but not as easy as the WSS / Marlburian figures. Even with a couple of hiccups and a bit of a learning curve, this battalion took about 5 days to complete. I reckon I could do another in about 4 days. They have a little bit of detail in the straps and badges etc, but not too much. I considered doing buttons on their cuffs but I didn't worry about them. The flag is over-sized but I like them that way. I made it myself using Photoshop. In fact I made a whole sheet full of them including the fanions for the 2nd, 3rd and 4th battalions.

They look pretty nice and a few brigades full of these battalions would look very nice on the tabletop. I'm going to do another battalion in a couple of week but first I want to add some more troops to my WSS English (especially some horse). I only have a single brigade at this stage and I need more before I can start gaming with them.

For the sake of comparison here they are next to their 28mm compatriots. I've also added a couple of overhead shots so that you can get an idea of the footprint of the battalion in line and column. Each base is 50mm x 25mm, 2mm MDF.

That's all for this time,

Cheers and thanks for reading.

IanKH

More Prussians ~ Musketeers

This week I've finished the musketeer battalions of the 5th Line Regiment (4th East Prussian). I finished the first battlion a while back and started on the second but put them aside. They they sat around waiting to be finished for about a year or so. Now they're finished.

The figures are the boring Perry plastics. They look okay and they are affordable but they are pretty boring. I'd much prefer an "advance at the port" pose which I think looks better than the marching pose. The flags are from Flags of War. I very rarely purchase flags and prefer to make them myself but this time I bought them (I don't know why). Nice flags though! I bought them some time back.

Now below there's a couple of photo's of the second battalion. I also took a few pics of the first battalion but the light changed in between shots and the pics came out awful. This is a shame because the first battalion is painted better than the 2nd. I once again played with the AI Generative Fill tool on photoshop to add a background to get rid of the window and blinds behind the table.

And that's it for now. I'll get on to the fusilier battalion soon but first up I'm going to try my hand at some 10mm Napoleonic's to see how hard they are to paint, how long they take and how they look as a battalion.

Cheers,

Ian KH

Prussian Jaegers

I've added to my Prussian skirmish line and decided to put all of them out on parade for a photo opportunity. I have quite a decent array of skirmishers (21 bases) with plenty of variety in their uniforms. I also played around with the new AI Generative Fill feature in Photoshop 2024 to block out the wall and window that sits behind my table. Quite an impressive background for a few seconds of work.

I'm currently putting in an effort to finish a Prussian line infantry regiment (the 5th) but I took the time to finish these volunteer jaeger. Like many figures, these troops have been sitting on my painting desk for some time. They were half finished and dusty. They are from Warlords and, in my opinion, they are pretty crappy figures. That's one of the reasons why they gathered dust for so long.

On the other hand here are some more volunteer jaeger in Tyrolean uniform. These figures are Perry and they're very nice. These are from either the Brunswick or Austrian range. When I got them there were no Tyrolean's in the Prussian range so I had to adapt.

Here are some of the other troops in my skirmish line. The guys in black in the centre of the photo below are part of my Lutzow's Freikorps. There are only three bases strong but I can add one or two of the jaeger bases to bring them up to strength. The Freikorps is one of my favourite Prussian formations.

Here's another use of the Photoshop Generative Fill tool. For this one I asked it to generate a background featuring Napoleonic Prussian troops. It came out pretty well.

These two below come from the Perry Prussian infantry boxed set. The top lot are just the basic rifleman figure. All the same pose and pretty boring - But they do the job. The guys below are conversions made from the same rifleman figure. They are Guard Jaeger and they were made by using bits from some Victrix French infantry and the Perry French Dragoon set.

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And last but not least, here's another little chap that has been half painted and gathering dust. He's a Reaper Bones figure that I got a couple of years back. Now he's finished and hanging out with my other fantasy figures. I've named him Otto the Pack Mule.

The Brigadier & The Galactic Patrol

Keeping in the spirit of getting things off my painting desk, I bring you a Prussian general and some space dudes. To be honest, the brigadier is a new purchase but the other figures have been sitting on my desk, collecting dust for over a year (or two) and it's a relief to see them done and ease my guilt. And for that reason they can be first on the bill: 

These figures are Galacteers from Hydra Miniatures. I bought them a long time ago when I was doing a lot of pulp wargaming. I started painting them a long while back but I didn't enjoy it. They look okay now that they're finished, but they were horrible figures to paint in many respects and I don't really like them. Unfortunately I have another squad of five to paint. They've been prepped for a long time so I put them on the desk last night and I'll take my time painting them.

These figures were really difficult to photograph. I think it's becuse the colours I chose are pretty vibrant and the white is very white and it was reflecting into the lens and causing problems. I ended up photographing them in daylight because artificial light made them glare even worse. As a result most of the shading isn't coming through. On the actual figures there is definition and shading on their muscles but it just isn't showing. 

Anyway, that brings us to Herr Brigadier... I needed an extra brigadier for my Lutzow's Freikorp cavalry element. The Freikorps was very difficult to command with only one officer for both the infantry and the cavalry. This figure is from the Perry Prussian Mounted Officer set and I think he really looks the part. As I was adding the final touches to him I thought I should have painted up a hussar officer in the spirit of Von Schill. No worries though. This fine chap will do sterling service, I have no doubts!

And that's this week's update. Not much but even if it's only small steps it means that I'm getting back into painting and slowly getting out of my wargaming funk.

Cheers, and thanks for reading.