Wolseley’s Enniskillen Regiment

Here is the second squadron of Wolseley's Horse Regiment...

The ensign is a conversion of one of the troopers. I cut off the sword from his right hand and drilled it for the flag staff. Then I used some modeling putty to re-sculpt part of the hand where I trimmed away the hilt guard and add a sash and feather. The bow on the hip is probably anachronistic but there are some sketches by Mark Allen that show officers with sashes worn in this manner and I thought it looked cool! The pic on the left is at a crude stage but somehow I neglected to take another photo of the finished sculpt... oh, well. I am just starting to attempt more ambitious conversions and am even trying my hand at complete sculpts. I will of course post my efforts...

The squadrons look great ranked up, but my quick and easy photo set-up doesn't allow me to fit both squadrons in the shot! I'll have to arrange some 'action' shots on terrain sometime soon, but that requires a more complex arrangement with studio lighting, etc. and I wanted to get these guys on the blog.

On the painting table next are the Nassau-Saarbrucken-Ottweiler battalion, a unit of converged Dutch grenadiers, Schomberg's Huguenot Horse regiment, and King Billy Himself. After that three Huguenot foot battalions, some artillery, and a few brigade officers and my Williamite army will be finished (for now).

A Tale of One Gamer - Part Six

This month's 40k painting has brought me to 1500-points...

The addition of the Space Marine Librarian gives me psychic support that my force has been lacking so far and it's never bad to have an extra character. The Command Squad adds extra support for my Space Marine Captain and helps keep from being so easily targeted. Finally, I like to field lots of Troops in my army for those all important objective grabs so I painted up a second Tactical Squad. My army is up to 46 models which is very respectable for Space Marines!

I've decided to target my armies for 1850-points for now which seems to be a fairly popular tournament point total... not that I'll be taking part in such events, but the logic behind the total is to allow a good variety of stuff while still finishing battles in a reasonable amount of time, which suits me perfectly. For November expect to see my Red Scorpions gain reinforcements in the form of a couple of Heavy Support choices! Back to Tyranids for October...

Cuirassiers

My partner, Barry Hilton, has gone crackers! The next wave of horse is on the way from Warfare Miniatures and 'wave' barely captures what's coming. There are nearly 60 new cuirassiers that will be available soon. You will be able to order armored troopers with full cuirass or breast plates only, both over and under their coats. There are also models with English or German style helmets, hats, tricorns, or bareheaded. Most have the option to be modeled with sword or pistol. Finally there are a variety of officers, standard bearers, and musicians. If that's not enough, all of these models may be ordered on standing horses or galloping horses!

You can lots more samples in the LoA Gallery and they will soon be available in the shop!

The Hobbit

I discovered The Hobbit and LotR before RPGs and wargaming...  The Lord of the Rings films are some of my favorite movies of all time and I am really looking forward to the Hobbit!

Brandenburg

Just added the finishing touches on my next battalion - a German regiment in Dutch service raised and command by William III's cousin, Prince Albrecht of Brandenburg.

The model on the left is another conversion. The original model came from the artillery crew packs and had a spyglass in his left hand. I removed the glass and added the sword. I also added the eye patch with a tiny blob of green stuff to lend a more sinister air to this officer.

Next up Nassau-Saarbrucker-Ottweiler... very similar to the above unit, but with darker grey coats and red facings. The officers will again be in blue and red.

Wolseley’s Enniskillen Regiment

Finally finished my first squadron of horse! These are some of the best Warfare models so far.

The second squadron is underway...

Dutch Garde te Voet (Blue Guard)

Here is my second battalion of the Garde te Voet. Although there were three battalions at the Battle of the Boyne, I think I'm only going to paint two for my collection (for now).

I now have a very concrete plan for my Williamite collection...

DUTCH
Garde te Voet (2 battalions)
Brandenburg
Nassau-Saarbrucken-Ottweiler
converged grenadiers

ENGLISH/IRISH
Hanmer
Wolseley's Horse (2 squadrons)

HUGUENOT
De la Meloniere
Caillemotte
Cambon
Schomberg's Horse (2 squadrons)

DANISH
Garden til Fods
Zealand
Jutland
Funen
Donop's Horse (1 squadron)
Juel's Horse (1 squadron)

ARTILLERY
4 battalion guns
2 field guns

This will give me most of the front line foot units at the Boyne and the most often mentioned units of horse from accounts I've read - a very respectable force of twelve battalions of foot and six squadrons of horse. Note that the number of squadrons for horse is Beneath the Lily Banner units, not historical organization. Those units listed as one squadron end up with 4-8 models (which will be 6 on the game table) when historical strengths are rendered at 1:35. Those with 9 models or more were granted two squadron status.

The Brandenburg battalion is up next. I am really hoping to have the Williamites finished by the end of the year so I can start on the army of King James II!

Wolseley’s Enniskillen Regiment 03

The first squadron awaiting the final touches (finishing the base and adding the flag)...

The ensign would probably have had a blue coat, but the unit was beginning to look a bit too colorful! I wanted to keep the red coats dominate. You can see the second squadron assembled in the background (and my second battalion of Dutch Guard, also only lacking finished bases and flags).

Final pics next weekend - I'll have some progress shots of the second regiment of Wolseley's Horse and the start of the Brandenburg regiment of foot. 

Wolseley’s Enniskillen Regiment 02

Further progress on my first Warfare horse unit...

Will have the officers done in a day or two. According to C.A. Sapherson, officers wore blue coats so this will be a very a colorful unit!

Partizan 2 2012

Barry and the lads put on a demo at Partizan 2 last weekend with nearly 700 Warfare Miniatures on the table!

Above is one my favorite units so far (painted and photographed by Barry Hilton), Creagh's Jacobite Foot. There are lots of photos of the action at Partizan 2 and more pics of the new cavalry in the LoA gallery (both sporting lots of my flags)!

More of my efforts coming soon...

Wolseley’s Enniskillen Regiment 01

Progress for today's painting...

I'm going to prime the rest of the squadron (four more models) tonight so I can paint a few more tomorrow (hopefully)!

The chunky stands are  5/8" foamcore to make handling them a little easier.

Rainy Day Primer

Have I mentioned how much I loathe undercoating models with a brush? I can paint an infantry model, highlights and all, in the time it takes me to paint ten infantry models black. Spray paint takes a little experience to get good results and minimize touch ups, but once you master the process it is a huge time saver. I find myself with little enough time to paint these days and I try to spend that time finishing models!

That said, on Friday I received my first regiments of Warfare Miniatures horse in the mail (watch for a detailed review soon). I wasted no time assembling them, but it was RAINING thins morning. Never mind the impossibility of spray painting in the rain, high humidity often produces poor results as well, so even if it stopped soon I didn't want to spray these models. If I wanted to start painting I was going to have to undercoat a few by hand.

I decided to try one of Citadel's new 'Technical Paints' called Imperial Primer. I still haven't had much time to mess around with much of what I got in the Citadel Paint Bundle, so this was my first time using this. The paint is thinner than 'ordinary' Citadel paints, so there is no need to mix it with water to avoid obscuring the details. It also has a high concentration of pigment and adheres well to metal (unlike thinned down acrylics normally do). When it goes on, the paint looks a little streaky, but it dried to an even coat. The results were indistinguishable from a pair of models I had setting nearby that had been undercoated with Chaos Black spray paint - in fact maybe better as the models painted with spray paint appear satin while the those painted with Imperial Primer are matte.

Anyway, I'm off to paint some cavalry (photos and a review soon). If you undercoat models with black primer by hand, give the Citadel Imperial Primer a try.