Wednesday 29 April 2020

Dux Bellorum 6 Last unit of elderly Pagan English

Here is the final unit of pagan English for my Dux Bellorum army.
These  are a mix of a final Black tree design that I found after I'd painted all the rest ,a couple of Ebay purchases and seven figures from the 1970s that were painted in enamels, Ral Partha and Asgard and were regularly used as characters and non player characters in D&D games.
I've given them a wash ,touched up the metal here and there and painted the flesh in my usual elf flesh which I have almost used up,bit worrying as I think GW stopped making it years ago and I haven't found a good substitute yet!





I've painted the shields to match the rest of the army.  They're not  terribly kosher as they're mostly Vikings or Varagnians but it uses up some figures that have spent 40 years sitting in various cardboard boxes in various lofts and finishes an army off!
Oh and I  know I'll have to finish the sabot bases off at some point!
All the best
Iain

Wednesday 22 April 2020

Napoleonic 3 French Dragoons and a bit of damp real life !

These are 12 Perry plastic French dragoons which have taken a long time to complete.  This is the  first Napoleonic post since 2017!
I've just called them done ,they're okay but I'm going to have to adjust my technique a bit to get a nicer finish on future napoleonic cavalry, what I  normally do worked on the line infantry but doesn't quite for cavalry.
They're in the 1812 onwards uniform but I'll be using them for the 1809 campaign as no one else was making plastic French dragoons for the earlier period and the overall silhouette says French dragoons to me!
No flag until after lockdown.  I wasn't going to do flags for the light cavalry, having looked at French cavalry on Chasseur's splendid blog I will follow his example and not give flags to any of the cavalry units in the future, it will only be this unit that has them!
I'll probably also use them against nephew 1s Brits in Spain and nephew 2s Russians, hes painted his Russians and is breathing down my neck so there should be more Napoleonic French, cavalry and infantry down the line.




 More Napoleonic troops in the que but they will be a while, probably more Dux Bellorum up next!

So on Monday evening this happened, all the water from the boiler/central heating system poured out of the light fitting into the living room, in the bottom drawer of the plan chest/ coffee table is where I keep reference books and rules relating to what I'm currently working on. Bit of an impact on productivity and blog visiting!
Drying out some of the reference books.  I've stripped the ceiling luckily I've still got a dehumidifier and I'll redecorate next week, I've isolated the pipes,  so no central heating, no boiler,but that's okay  as I had an electric shower installed under the stairs and it's  nice and warm now ,so we can sit it  out until after lockdown, ah how we've laughed!

All the best Iain 

Wednesday 15 April 2020

Dux Bellorum 5 Pictish skirmishers

Here are some Pict archers for Dux Bellorum ,again almost finished at the end of the challenge, finally done now.  They're a skirmish option in Dux Bellorum, so they'll be in units of four,I  need to come up with a couple more figures, well three more as a spare Pict leader has snucked in as he was finished, he might well get press ganged into a Welsh army in the future.
The figures are primarily Black tree design with additional unknown Ebay types to make up the numbers.




14 x figures not quite enough for four units of four,plus one is going to go off and start another army but I intend to insert some additional Celtic archers from a somewhat later period and hope no one notices ( they'll be in the background, out of focus, it'll be fine!)
I've got some more Dux Bellorum lined up together with various other periods and I really need to get some Romans done! Next up probably wont be hairy psychopaths from the Celtic fringe,probably!
All the best Iain 

Wednesday 8 April 2020

Irish/Flodden Highlanders 2

So continuing on from the Analogue challenge I have 21 Irish or Highlanders for Flodden.  They are a mix of Perry ,Old Glory( which I got off of ebay the seller kindly included extra ones he'd chopped the heads off of I have replaced these with spare Perry plastic Ansar heads)and some old re purposed Ral Partha Vikings. They seemed nearly done on the last day of the challenge but clearly I was well off!
To be fair even though I'm no longer working I've had less painting time than when I do work as I'm seemingly repainting lots of the house before digging for victory in the garden!






There will be some more for this project to add to the ones done in the challenge. 
So not Romans but maybe soon after various other bits and bobs.
The flag carrier is waiting for all this quarantine stuff to blow over and then I will resize and print a flag from Ray's extensive Flodden flag collection over on his excellent Don't throw a 1 ! Blog.
I'm currently working on converting plastic Ansars to kerns and plastic gripping beast plastic Vikings and Perry medieval French infantry to gallowglass, bashed together you get a nice axe, chainmail/padded look with the right helmet.
Until then probably more Picts!

All the best
Iain

Wednesday 1 April 2020

Dux Bellorum 4 a pile of Picts! AHPC post

The aim for this challenge was to produce at least the core of a number of armies for Dux Bellorum (other dark age rule sets are available!) I  have largely succeeded with playable Irish and Saxon forces. Now it's the turn of the Picts in the shape of four units of ordinary warriors.  These are mostly from Black tree design, although they don't seem to be doing them anymore which is a pity as I really like the sculpting style plus a half dozen unknown from Ebay.



















This gives me the core of a  Pictish force and post challenge are the Late Romans and the Romano British, rather more cavalry!


All the best 
Iain