Austrian combined grenadier battalions Napoleonic 55

 Two battalions of Victrix Austrian combined grenadiers, fun chaps to paint . I've tried to use the facing colours of the regiments I've painted, primed grey, wet brushed white, brown and black are Liquatex inks to help speed thing up, flag poles are time consuming but worth it I think?  Probably shouldn't have a flag for a combined  unit but it looks good so I'm  keeping  it! Another forty-eight added to my Napoleonic total I've got  more Austrian grenadiers but some of them are Foundry so a bit diminutive but I guess they'll get done eventually, together with Hungarians, grenzers and Hungarian Grenadiers and more Austrian line and of course, lots of cavalry!

This gives me another  48 Napoleonic infantry towards my total, running 235 I'm going to have to get my finger out , difficult as I'm only painting one evening a week ( when I'm home) at best! I'm busily assembling pike and cavalry for the great Italian wars, Napoleonic Hungarians and Grenzers while  still painting Napoleonics, Late Romans and looking hard at the box with Montrose's army in it, oh and cutting off and assembling 100 years war French cavalry and finding time to push the ruined buildings along!

All the best

 Iain 

Ten ruined buildings WIP Terrain 23

 Here are the ten black foamboard ruined buildings that I based on some MDF buildings I  was given  by Des. They have been incrementally finished, first stage is foamboard on hardboard bases with pva and sharp sand, then matchstick sills and cut down coffee stirrers for first floor floorboards.  Next up is bits of plastic brick sheet applied here and there, using up left over offcuts from the ruined factory building to start with and then some ready mixed filler applied where the brick sheet was missing to give the impression of lost render woth a plasterers small tool. Balsa beams, coffee stirrer rafters wire battens and some loose slates as they are fundamentally northern European,  Masonary paint ( which is essentially emulsion and sharp sand on the exposed foam board edges and to give a little texture to the floor. The windows ( which are meant to be European casements as opposed to the  ubiquitous British sash window ) are matchsticks and I tried plastic tile spacers cut down but endedup just doingthem in matchsticks. I will spray paint on plastics and a coat of dark emulsion all over followed by muted colours inside and red for brick , off white for lime mortar and some colour on the render. I also decided to add chimney breasts on both floors and brickwork in the loft area where they wouldn't have been plastered.

Here they are with the roof joists done on most if them and all rendered and the prototype with windows and frame roof battens and some oversized slates that I already had, they will be smaller on the rest!

Mext process, finish roofs on all of them, finish windows and add masonary paint to the exposed foamboard.

So I think I still need to add slates, I cut up some thin card but it's still too thick so I'm going to chop up some Perry boxes as I think they're the right thickness and maybe some chimney pots? Can you spot the French sniper and the historex 54mm furniture I'm going to dress in? Apologies for a WIP post but I'm not painting here in Cardiff ,if I'm home at a weekend and get a couple of hours I could finish a unit up, fingers crossed! 

All the best 

Iain 

A club game of Fortitude and Valour Napoleonics 54

 It was the last game before the summer break at the club the other Sunday, I've missed a load as I was working on the flat and John has been pretty ill but as he was out of hospital and fancied a game I was only too happy to dig out the Austrians and French plus some terrain and head down to the club.

As the Austrians I had one brigade of two line infantry units, two units of cuirassier and a unit of Landwehr on my left and on my right a brigade with two units of line infantry, a unit of Landwehr, some Chevaulegers and an artillery piece. All the Austrian line infantry were in their first  game. Opposing them on the French right wing was an entirely mounted brigade of three units of cuirassiers, a unit of dragoons and a unit of horse artillery. On the French left three units of line infantry a unit of hussars and some foot artillery.  The two built up areas and the hill were objectives. We were a little rusty so went for a straightforward encounter battle, the French got the first go , occupied the built up area on their left, the central hill and advanced their cavalry on their right wing, when it came to the Austrian go I occupied the built up area on my left wing charged my cuirassiers at the intimidating mass of heavy French cavalry, advanced my infantry on the right flank and charged the infantry unit on the hill with my Chevaulegers the cuirassier melee ended in a draw so we would need to carry on, the attack column on the hill lost the melee and because they'd lost to cavalry they routed. In the next French turn after some desultory shooting from them, assault column and occupying built up areas cuts down your dice throws the heavy cavalry battle ended with defeat and retreat for my cuirassiers Shooting continued next go with my troops in line doing rather better than their French counterparts, my cuirassiers were lost my Chevaulegers were running away ,having eliminated the French foot artillery  so it all looked rather bleak. I did manage to destroy another infantry unit with firepower from infantry and artillery  but was then forced to form square in the face of heavy cavalry storm. The French cavalry came on and took out my artillery but I was able to take out first one unit of cavalry  on the last roll of the game which also caused the companion unit to rout. We both occupied a built up area, I'd destroyed one more unit but John's general was sitting on the other objective and while not a unit it would have been churlish to claim a victory that way and I was happy with a relearning draw! The club is quite until September, I'm working in Wales until then anyway which is disrupting my painting although I am preping lots of plastic figures! 

All the best

 Iain