A wargamer’s journal….
 |
I have finished the light company for my first Spencer Smith regiment (note the green border on the tricornes). The officer (gold border on the tricorne) is at the right front of the column. | |
 |
I did go back and do more blacklining on the regimental commander. You can see the difference in the two pictures here – before is to the left, after to the right. |  |
Now I only have the Grenadier company to finish and the regiment can be posted to Neutralia.
Since I have the Keuhankans painted, I need to have someone for them to attack to start the 1st Neutralian War! I picked up a 4 company regiment of Spencer Smith figures several months ago and have been working on them company by company in between other projects. I have yet to name the regiment so if anyone has any snazzy suggestions, please send them my way.
Here twelve members of the company are in the “Painting Formation”. I mounted these on popsicle sticks with super glue and then used Reaper’s MSP* Brush-On Primer to lay down the base. Devotees of Young’s book will notice that I am short a few figures for a full strength company. Four are actually painted as are the officer, drummer and NCO!
The NCOs for the line companies and light company are shown to the left. I know they are NCOs because I painted chevrons on their right sleeves. I am using a red border for the tricorne to denote the line company figures and a green border for the lights. These are still shiny as I have only applied the GW ‘Ardcoat and not sprayed them with Dullcote as of yet.
I painted the regimental commander and a couple of officers as a “proof” of the uniform and to see if I could make these understated figures look good on the wargame table. The NCOs show the black lining I used and the mounted officer shows how they look sans lining. I plan on going back and adding the lining to the commander because I like the way it looks. It takes about 10 minutes a figure to add this but the effort is worth it as it shows up well at a distance. The flag is a paper printout of some I got off of the Warflag Yahoo Group, I believe (this is a fairly big group with 1300+ members). I sprayed the figure with Dullcote so the flag colors (printed with an inkjet) would not run.
*Master Series Paints
In the book Setting Up a Wargames Campaign by Tony Bath, there is a system for generating characters with personality. I took the liberty of modifying it slightly and putting it up on my site. Go to this page:
If you don’t like the first one, hit the “Refresh” button on your browser and it will automatically generate another. If you have any suggestions for it, let me know!
The night became quiet again as the fires began to burn low. The screaming of the tortured captives had subsided and the last of the combats between captives for the entertainment of the assembled tribal leaders had ended. As the chiefs began to talk quietly amongst themselves, Hakkaluggee, war chief of the Keuhankans strode into the light provided by the biggest fires. A hush fell over the leaders as they gave their full attention to Hakkaluggee.
Scanning their faces, Hakkaluggee stood straighter and began -
In thoughts from the visions of the night, when deep sleep had fallen upon me, fear came upon me and trembling, which made all my bones shiver! Then a spirit passed before my face causing the hair of my head to stand up! The spirit stood still, but I could not discern the form thereof and it was silent as the grave.
Then I heard a voice saying “Are the teeth of the young lions broken? Why have you not cast out the invaders from your lands and sacred places? How long must the spirit of your ancestors be in pain!”
Angry murmurs arose from the onlookers, and hands reached for tomahawks and knives at this insult to the dignity of the gathering.
“Hold thy peace,” Hakkaluggee shouted, “and I shall share with thee what the spirit said to teach me!”
“Free this land,” the spirit said, “and thou shalt know that thy people shall be great as the grass of the earth. We know that the heathen have driven thy brethren far from you – we have pity upon you for the hard hand of the Enemy toucheth you – but you must rise up against this foe!”
“Brothers! Did not our fathers deal with the heathen? Did not our gods bring evil upon us and upon our peoples for treating with them? We should contend with them, curse them, and smite them… pluck off their hair and make them swear by their false god to abandon our lands! I swear to you here, now, that I will cleanse these lands of all strangers, every one!”
The chiefs began to sound their war crys, but Hakkaluggee stilled them once more. “Now hear from our ally, Double-Scalp!”
Chevalier Hubert de la Pâté Feuilletée then stepped from the shadows where he had been watching. Flinging off his cloak, he stood before them in the full dress uniform of a Freedonian officer. “Hear diligently my declaration, for this is written in the King’s name, and sealed with His ring that no man may reverse it!” He then pulled a scroll from his coat and began to read from the list of promises of guns, powder, and munitions his King would supply. Finishing quickly, he thrust the scroll into the air with a flourish that once again brought Hakkaluggee forward.
“Tonight we send runners to all the peoples of this land, carrying the bloody tomahawk to declare our intent! They shall fly over trails and back roads, through woods and across rivers, bringing the challenge to destroy, to kill, and to punish all of the invaders! Let none stand idly while we go to war!”
The chiefs could remain silent no more and they broke out with their war cries, brandishing their weapons and calling for the blood of their enemies. Pâté Feuilletée walked slowly back over to stand beside his superior on the liaison mission, Comte de Legerdemain. Legedemain turned to smile at his subordinate and mutter sotto voce, “Most excellent work tonight, Hubert. We have these savages right where we want them, eating from the palms of our hands!” Double-Scalp returned the smile as he once again enfolded himself in his cloak.
And in the dark of the night, the war drums began to beat….
Brent Nosworthy has a nice article about the AdG in the Seven Years War Association Journal (Winter 2003 issue – available from MagWeb)and says the following:
A January 1st 1744 ordinance authorized Simon Claude, Chevalier de Grassin, a captain in the Picardie regiment, to raise a corps of light troops. These would become to known as the Arquebusiers de Grassin. This grant was in return for the distinguished action and zeal Monsieur Grassin had shown as a “partisan” in the Bohemian and Bavarian campaigns.
Formed at Metz, the corps was 1200 men strong, containing 900 fantassins (a contemporary term for “infantryman”) and 300 cavaliers (cavalrymen). The cadre of this corps was provided on January 30th through the amalgamation of the compagnie franches de fusiliers de Dulimont, de Vandal, de Bayel, & de Bidache as well as the compagnies franches de dragons de Rhomberg and Bidache.
The same issue has a nice section on the flags of the AdG, although I was a bit surprised to find that light infantry carried a flag.
The fine folks at Eureka Miniatures produced a nice selection of the AdG for their 100 Club recently and I was able to take advantage of the deal to build up a light battalion of around 24 figures for OSW gaming. I think the figures are *very* nice – highly detailed, proportioned well, and available in a number of poses. My only complaint was that the mold lines on some of the figures were visible which is surprising for new molds. These lines came off quite easily, however, and so it is not a bad problem.
The photos below are something of an experiment. I used Liquitex Black Gesso for priming and then took the pictures, hoping the detail would show up better. My first pictures were fairly disastrous as I did not have the camera settings adjusted properly and came up with what looked like silhouettes of the miniatures. I then adjusted the settings for a spot metering on the figure itself and this captured the detail. (Clicking on the image will bring up an 800 by 600 image.)
    |
    |
      |
I have been thinking a lot about the concept of small wars as a result of my wanting to start my campaign off with a territorial dispute in the island of Neutralia. Using what little I know of the French and Indian War I came up with these as possible scenarios (one of which I stole from the Duchy of Alzheim).
I put together how a possible narrative campaign could look:
I am relatively new to this whole blogging thing, so I have been catching up on what’s out there and enjoying getting caught up. I came across this post as I was exploring how to use Google Reader -
Saxe-Bearstein: Initiative in “Tricorne Wars” (opens in a new window)
I like the way he has handled it here for a couple of reasons. First, it gives you a way to decide on who goes first in an alternate move system but can be readily adopted for a simultaneous system as well. Second, I think the concept of inertia is a good one. Sometimes good tactical commanders are unwilling to change plans. When I was teaching at USMA (history dept, 1984-7 and 93-6) I had a boss who had been part of a study on military leaders. The conclusion they came to was that successful battlefield leaders did not have to be bright and quick on their feet. The most important characteristic they shared was being able to visualize where they wanted to go and not being distracted by (or immobilized by) what could go wrong. Third, all of the above then ties into a command radius for each character. Combined with the characteristics in Tony Bath’s Setting Up a Wargames Campaign, this can give a lot of flavor to a series of battles! Good thoughts, Jeff!
I am in the process of deciding on color schemes for a couple of the other regiments I want to field. The first is a Ruritanian regiment known as “The Canaries” – shamelessly lifted from the Swiss battalion in Napoleon ‘s service in the early 1800s (the Neufchatel battalion – but I changed the facing colors).These are RSM figures and I have the regiment on hand right now, just awaiting uniform issue.
The next regiment will also be RSM figures but will be a mercenary regiment from Toorkee. The two figures on the left are from the Janissaries and the right figure is a Bosnian/Albanian figure.
The Janissaries will form the officer ranks and grenadier company and the Bosnians the line companies. Just for a laugh, I might use the Royal Guard with bow figure for the light infantry company! Comments on the proposed scheme are solicited as well as the figure choice for the Toorks.
Leading the Keuhankian depradations (or advising them on the ins and outs) are two nefarious Freedonian officers:
The Comte de Legerdemain and his second, Chevalier Hubert de la Pâté Feuilletée (known as Double-Scalp due to his very bad wig).
Legerdemain also functions as Regimental commander in the service of his monarch. (The regiment is yet to be named but will be known appropriately as “The Greys.” This is one of the first Front Rank miniatures I have painted. (Available in the US from the Miniature Service Center.)The proportions on this one are very nice and it was, quite frankly a joy to paint. The base is a sample from Litko Aero. It was the proper size and although I had considered pill shaped bases for my cavalry, I will probably use these for my commanders and personality figures. Since the bases are Warmaster size magnetic bottoms are readily available.
Pâté Feuilletée (Flaky Pastry) is also a Front Rank figure and is actually the one I painted first! He is mounted on a Litko thin plywood base with one of their magnetic bases attached. I’ll comment on these in a separate post. I decided to go with the circular bases as the Old Glory Indians I had were not standing up well and the 3/4 inch round base fit the Old School Wargame motif better than the square ones. I used Liquitex Gel layered over the base and then painted it black, drybrushing the base with Vermin Fur and Vomit Brown by GW. The Static Grass is from Zeiterdies. I would have had a picture of the Chevalier but my camera battery thought that taking three pictures was enough and dumped the remainder of the charge. When it has finished charging up, I will take more pictures, particularly of the Keuhankans I have painted (over 30!)
Thanks to Bill Protz and Michael Lonie for the suggested names or permission to shamelessly appropriate them from their existing armies!
I managed to pick up some older bags of Old Glory Indians, specifically, packs FIW-01 (Natives Advancing with muskets) and FIW-02 (Natives Advancing with clubs and hatchets) off of Bartertown. I had been looking at Conquest Miniatures Woodland Indians but the Old Glory bags came along at the right price! The miniatures were painted with the goal of being used individually on the battlefield with rules based on those from CHARGE by Young and Lawford.Here are some rough pictures of samples of the miniatures. I have not finished the basing yet as I will be putting them on 3/4 inch magnetized bases from Litko (and they haven’t arrived yet… won’t arrive when I expected them to, either, as they sent them First Class Mail instead of Priority Mail as I had paid for.) 
(I am still trying to get comfortable with integrating pictures into WordPress. I increased the vertical and horizontal space around the photos and they show up nicely in the rough draft of the message but not in the published version!)
The miniatures are the usual Old Glory fare. There are multiple poses in each bag providing for a lot of personality in each unit. On the other hand, there are a number of contortionists in each unit as some of the poses are… unique. The pewter seems to be of a softer sort than RSM or Foundry or GW uses. Several of the muskets came bent in a 180 degree bend back towards the figure as a result of the “toss ‘em in the bag” form of packaging. None were broken, surprisingly, but some of them show the results of poor maintenance. I would buy these figures again, especially now that Old Glory is offering their Old Glory Army memberships. They are a good match to Spencer Smith and RSM figures but are noticeably more slender than Front Rank.
First up is the infamous leader of the Keuhankan tribe – Chief Hakkaloogee. Here we see him celebrating another victory with the traditional Oak Ridge battlecry of “Oompapamaumau” … Note the trophy coat he wears in celebration of his victories over the mainlanders.
I hate doing close up photos of my miniatures because they show up every little fault. Here I can see where I got some of the Chestnut wash I used on the flesh into areas it wasn’t supposed to go. My approach here was to use Tanned Flesh by GW and then wash it with Chestnut ink to make it a bit redder and darker. The rest of the figure was washed with Kel’s Magic Sauce – a product that has black ink, something to break up the surface tension, and some other fancy chemicals (like H2O)!
Two of his faithful warriors are up next.
I was not as happy with these guys when I finished with them as I had hoped. In the final stages of a miniature that will be handled quite a bit, I usually coat with GW’s Hardcoat and spray with Dullcote. This time, however, I tried a tip I picked up off of the MiniPainting group and used Glass and Tile Medium (a craft paint item one can get from Walmart). Although it definitely dulled the paint down, it also took some of it off in places, making the figure look rushed and rough. So, back to the old tried and true methods of painting them up.
I’m pleased with my progress on these as I have completed 32 since the start of the month. That’s a bit over half way through. When I finish them up, I will enter them in the Painting contest run informally by the Army Painting Group on Yahoo. This is an informal contest where every month you put up some of what you have done in the month and list members vote on which project is “numero uno.” There is no prize but you do get bragging rights!
Bad Behavior has blocked 1 access attempts in the last 7 days.
