A Few More 40mm and Others

I am keeping busy with extra figures for different projects but trying to harness the butterfly a little towards the 40mm project.

Winter afternoons mean the lights not so great so bare with the pictures please .

I have been trying to get a few Mongolian Horse finished for Sternburgs forces, the left figure is Copplestone on a Plastic Wargames Atlantic horse, the other two are Gripping beast Muslim Crusades cavalry with appropriate heads and modern weapons, the middle figure having a Mauser pistol and rifle across his back. Both of their horses are 3D prints from Ebay.

A couple more 40mm Spanish for the latest regiment in red facings. Starting to feel like I have broken the back of this one now with 27 of 40 painted.

Lastly a ash and Sabre British gun and Crew in 40mm. I have a second of these to do which I may try to get completed next as it closes the gap between my French and much smaller Allied forces.

Slightly better lighting today with a few more to share, the Spanish officer is Battlehonours 3d printed at 36mm which seems to be the nearest match for Perry 40mm figures, as the musketeer is, not quite as characterful as Perrys but a nice addition to mix in. The Foundry Hun on a Copplestone horse will be an addition to my 1920's Mongols with the rifle on his back supplementing his bow.

Then we have some based and finished figures.

The Polish MG crew are Woodbine Designs from Gripping Beast, take some just over half way on this next Polish regiment.

This base of Red Cavalry adds another base to a new unit with a Copplestone on the left and STP on the right mixing together quite nicely.

This is my first 40mm Mounted British Officer and is another Battlehonours 3D figure and I think looks very nice indeed.

And my latest 40mm Spanish these take the red faced battalion to 24 figures, still small but big enough to go on table if needed. I will be adding a Grenadier company to this regiment so watch out for that. The hidden drummer is 3d printed Piano Wargames Hessian with a metal Spanish head, the rest are all Perry's.

Hopefully as few more to share soon.

Take it easy and thanks for stopping by.

Back to Mexico and Spain mainly

With Partizan done I can take a break from 1920 and have a re-visit to Ol Mexico and other projects. Plenty still to paint for the wider Russian Civil War projects so will back to them soon.

I wanted a unit of the Imperial lancers in green jackets, there is a picture of them in the Osprey, but of course nobody does them.

However they are wearing simple uniforms, stable jackets and boot trousers so there are plenty of troops I can use if I am prepared to do a little surgery on the heads

This British Intervention force lancer from Perrys is ideal.

The advice I had with heads was to twist them off with plyers rather than cutting them off, this worked great and the pin vice added a small hole for the numb of the head.

I had already picked up a  couple of packs of ACW havelock heads which are ideal from Steve Barbers range.

The end result is spot on.

First bunch of new figures and I still of course have the odd figure to finish off for RCW.

Here is the conservative Mexican green lancer painted up. the quality of photo is not great but I am happy with the outcome.

Five more of these to paint and I will decide if thats enough for a tiny unit.

40mm Spanish Perry miniature. aiming to get a good 16 over the line fairly quickly.

I have quite a few Mongolian cavalry for Ungern Sternberg and the extended Russian Civil War, this chap makes in roads into a new company, another Copplestoen casting.

Copplestone red cavalryman, that 2 of the next unit of 8 done.

In other news I have a few bits and pieces coming off the workbench, still a little shiny here as they need another layer of Matt varnish.

Finishing off bits I had planned to do for Partizan, this Red Cossack will sit in a box until I can get around to the rets of his Sotnia. STP casting from Russia.

Polish MG for my partially completed regiment of Hallers Blue Army. Woodbine Miniatures.

This Battlehonours 3d figure is printed at 40mm, they have very full range for Peninsular so a good way to fill all the gaps left by Perrys. This is an officer of the 88th Connaught Rangers.

This guys will all go to fill the ranks of my third Spanish Regiment with red facings. With far more French than Allies, important I get stuck into the Spanish and British troops.

Thats it for now, some decent progress.

Thanks for stopping by.

40mm Peninsular Painting Update

Re-basing the French and Cavalry got me inspired to crack back into the 40mm Lead Mountain.

My French currently outnumber the Allies significantly, with 7 battalions to 1 British and 2 Spanish. Clearly this needs to be my focus. Whilst most of the French are in 32's and the Spanish in 40's my British unit only has 24 so first thing was to boost them.

I am however keeping up to my next Spanish regiment. I am happy to have it uniformed in more of a ragged uniform than a full uniform , a very campaigny look, lots of waistcoats and civilian kit but the larger number of troops mainly in uniform. Here are two of the same figure believe it or not in waistcoat from Perrys supported by a Piano miniatures Hessian with head swap which fits quite nicely.

I had these two Frenchies part painted so finishing them off, Paris Municipal Guard, Perrys figures.

Then seven British line, same figure different heads and trouser colours. These, along with another figure, will bring my British up to 32.

Cracking on mainly with more Spanish and the odd Spanish Municipal Guard Fusilier.

So whilst I have plenty of French I have started the PMG Fusiliers so I will get the odd one completed to keep this growing until I make a few bases up. For now not painting pompoms so I pick the troops for particular bases/companies when I have a load finished. Both Perrys of course.

I may have added too many in the red cap, but as a white faced red unit they should mix in reasonably well. Just enough variation in these figures for them to each look a bit unique.

Keeping up the theme of Spanish 40mm, here is a bunch more mainly Perry's.

These first three are French in sleeved waistcoats and their equipment will do equally well as Spanish so two have Spanish Bicornes and will mix in with my next Spanish regiment.

This next is a 3d printed Piano Wargames Hessian with the head not printed and replaced with a Spanish bonnet de police. I think it came out quite nice.

And three more Spanish in coatees, this will take me to 20 so 4 more and I can base them up and use them as a small battalion until I have some more done.

And a couple of British Light Dragoons, these are the Perry figures as they come, the rest of the troop will need some conversions for variety.

Once based up these will bring me a bit closer to trying some new rules for smaller battles/larger skirmishes.

Thanks for stopping by.

Re-Based 40mm Napoleonics

You might remember I picked up some painted 40mm French Infantry from Ebay a while back. With some help from Steve Shann I have rebased them after a bit of a refresh to bring them more in line with my own figures (Not much bit of highlights on flesh and a brighter blue highlight mainly).

I also took the opportunity to re-base my cavalry from single bases which were a pain to store and move and always got damaged. So having just finished these off I thought why not get a few snaps for you.

British Light Dragoons, all Perry's but with some simple conversions to arms and a head swap.

These two mounted officers are both Ebay purchases rebased and touched up. The left is Sash and Sabre the right is a 3d printed Piano Wargames.

Two lots of Sash and Sabres Voltiguers.

This lot with a Perry Officer and a Perry Voltiguer on the far right.

I also put the Light Dragoon commander on a larger base, again makes him less prone to damage and looks nicer I think. An NCO rather than an Officer, as I paint more I am looking at 3d printed officers for these figures.

He's a Perry trooper with hands swapped mounted on a AWI Front Rank horse which came out quite nice.

Then there are the 40mm French I bought, these had a fabulous paint job, I did though add my own touches to these guys, a highlight to the blue to make them brighter and extra layer of pale flesh highlighting the face. Other than that its mainly just a rebase. Battalion one.

Battalion two essentially the same process and outcome.

Battalion three in white. A slightly smaller unit, the white had yellowed with age somewhat so required a layer of highlight to bring it back out, again though the starting point was excellent so not a huge ammount of work.

Lastly a re-base for my French Hussars very much the same as the British Light Dragoons.

Much happier with these on larger bases, As you may have guessed this is now a little out of hand for Skirmish gaming and I am actively reviewing how we step it up to battalion level. Lots more to paint so a couple of brigades a side with artillery and cavalry support eventually.

Megalomania at its finest.

No more to base or re-base now so it will be on with painting fresh units, I really need to focus on British and Spanish, the French have essentially 7 battalions ready, with only 1 British and 2 Spanish to face them.

Watch this space I guess.

A Larger Sharp Practice Game AAR

We returned to Sharp Practice this week with the 40mm Peninsular collection.

I decided I wanted quite different forces and push the size of the units to see how it impacted the game. Quite a lot it turns out.

For our game Chris Charlton commanded two formations of 32 Spanish infantry each with 3 level 1 commanders to allow the unit to be broken up. He also had a Spanish heavy field gun and a troop of British Light Dragoons.

Steve meanwhile had a formation of 40 Hessians with 2 level 1 and 1 level 2 commanders plus 4 six man skirmish units each with a level 1 commander.

So 72 Spanish and 64 French.

The French/Hessian deployment point was next to the Villa in their own half of the table whilst the Spanish deployment point was on their own table edge. Each side needed to capture and hold the villa.

I also allowed 2 of the French skirmish units to deploy already on table to allow them to get into to position and have half a chance against the artillery.

I already had in my mind how this would play out, the British cavalry flanking left forcing the French to hive units off to keep them at bay, the Hessians occupying the Villa to use its walls as cover from the gun, the skirmishers nuibbling away at the advancing Spanish.

Probably not surprisingly none of that happened as the players had their own ideas.

First move the Hessians occupy a position between the villa and the woods to the right flank of the villa, two units of French skirmishers started to deploy into the Villa grounds, the other two to ruined walls either side.

The British Dragoons meanwhile deployed to their right flank and the gun to the open Spanish left flank with the infantry marching straight up the middle one formation behind the other.

As the French Voltiguers get into position behind the walls and ruins the French are almost deployed and a quick shot from the left flank unit empties a Light Dragoon saddle.

The Spanish are still sorting themselves out and slowly moving forward.

The Light Dragoons however get two sets of cards back to back and charge the Voltiguers.

The French stand firm and with the cover of the wall have almost as many dice in combat as the Cavalry.

The net result is the French lose just one Voltiguer and the Light Dragoons have two troopers dragged from their saddles, losing the melee they are forced to retreat.

The Spanish have got going, Chris sacrificing a cohesive line in order to just get forward.

The Light Dragoons take more casualties from skirmisher fire as they try to rally and eventually, down to three troopers from eight, they break.

Things may however be about to change as the Spanish heavy gun is deployed and made ready. Its first shot into the Voltiguers ont he French right wipes the unit out to a man

The Spanish are now at long range and the Hessians unleash a first volley supported by skirmishers and they are now inflicting casualties.

The Irish regiment responds with a volley of its own and the Green faced regiment passes through to fire its own volley.

At this point we start to see why such large units do less well in gaming terms as the casualties are spread over the formation and nobody seems to take enough hits for anything to happen for quite some time.

The game has devolved into an attritional firefight, the Spanish gun joins the slaughter but with the walls blocking visibility is not inflicting huge casualties on the Hessians.

40 Hessians and 18 skirmishers however are taking a toll on the front unit of Spanish, as the night closes there is an hour of play left but the outcome is not really in doubt and we declare a French/Hessian victory.

Its been great to get so many of the lovely 40mm figures on table and try a different game out. It does however highlight  a need for somethign different for larger games.

Lots of fun and thanks for bearing with me Chris and Steve.

Thanks for stopping by.