Sixteen 17th century musketeers finally completed.

You'll need to scroll down to see the lot. First for the Blue Regiment;

 And now the Green one;

These are all from Bicorne Miniatures and they match perfectly in terms of size with the growing range from Bloody Miniatures. Below you can see these two groups augmented to form two units of 12 figures by mixing them with some Bloody Miniatures figures;

I see the Blue regiment as being some kind of "elite" unit, maybe the lifeguard of a general or maybe the guards of a major town or city. The Green (and Brown) regiment is clearly a lesser formation, maybe a trained band, a regiment raised by a local landowner or a unit of militia. They have a much less uniform appearance but as we all know appearances can be deceptive. They could equally be experienced and battle-hardened mercenaries.

I've been working away on these for ages, but I kept putting them to one side to work on other things and, finally they are finished and I am really happy with how they have turned out. I think that they are of a reasonable gaming table standard and easily pass the "how do they look from a metre away test".

Anyway, I am now one step closer to have a small force for The Pikeman's Lament or some other Pike and Shot period set of rules. I have three units of Bicorne pikemen to work on now.

These three groups complete my Spanish Guerrilla force

 Here are the remaining 18 figures, in three groups of six;

They are a mixture of Front Rank and North Star (from their Muskets and Tomahawks Napoleonic range). They look considerably less "military" that the first two groups, so they can represent civilians who have taken up arms and become guerrilleros rather than regulars who have joined the Little War against Napoleon.

So, I have now five skirmishing groups and four leaders to form a core force for Sharp Practice, but I intend to add in two groups of skirmishing 95th Rifles to create a bigger force of around 85pts. I'm thinking of it as being a deliberately "literary" force, based on the kind of units found in Bernard Cornwell's classic Peninsular War Sharpe books.

First two groups of Spanish Guerrillas

These two groups of six are all 28mm Perry Miniatures;

They are a mixture of two different Perry sets. One is scruffy-looking infantry in a mix of uniforms and civilian clothes and the other is infantry with British-supplied equipment and Spanish uniforms. I deliberately avoided any real uniformity in uniform colours, because I wanted them to look like stragglers or deserters from a variety of regiments. I'll admit to being pretty happy with how they have turned out.

I have three more groups of six to varnish and I'll photograph them tomorrow and post them up.

Keeping the Spanish theme going...........

Here is the start of my next Sharp Practice project; Napoleonic Spanish Guerrillas.

I have started with four leaders. From left to right they are from Bad Squiddo, North Star, Front Rank and Perry Miniatures. What I like here is the huge variety of different styles of the figures, giving me an opportunity to paint them all differently. The Perry figure on the right is an actual Spanish infantry officer, but the guerrilla bands included members from all over the place, including from the Spanish armies.

I now have to think of suitable names for each of them.

I am currently working on 30 guerrilla figures, which will give me five groups of six to fit in with Sharp Practice rules. The first two groups are nearly finished and they are also Perry Spanish fusilier figures, all wearing a mixture of uniforms and civilian clothing. The others three groups will be a mixture of North Star and Front Rank and have a far more non-military appearance. 

Spanish Unit For The Silver Bayonet

I haven't posted anything for over three weeks, but I have been busy, mostly working on Napoleonic Spanish types. First up, is my Spanish unit for The Silver Bayonet, a set of rules for Gothic Horror during the Napoleonic Wars. There are eight figures in total.

These four above are the more "regular" troops, an Artilleryman, an Officer, an Infantryman and a Sapper. Below are four "irregular" types, a Guerrilla, a Veteran Hunter, a Champion of the Faith and a Swordsman. All these eight labels have specific meanings within the rules.

The figures are from the official range of figures produced by North Star and I have to say that they are excellent sculpts with lots of character and nice details. I decided when painting them that I wasn't going to get too bothered over making them specific to any particular Spanish units of the period. After all, it is basically a fantasy game, although some of these could be used in historical Peninsular War games, probably as characters or specialists for Sharp Practice, although they are quite chunky and on the large size compared with Perry figures, for example.

Anyway, I now finally have a force to use for games of The Silver Bayonet. I'll have to find time to paint up the French and British sets at some point.

A break from the 17th century; more 15mm Soviet armour from Zvezda

I've been feeling the need to paint something different, so here are four WW2 Soviet AFVs.

So, above are two T-34/76 tanks. I already have one of these but I need two more for a game that is being arranged for some point in the future. The gun on the left-hand tank looks a bit droopy, but I've straightened it up a bit. To be honest, it looks OK in real life, so maybe it is an optical illusion? 

Next, something I bought in case I get around to playing some Barbarossa period games, a BT-5.

Generally outclassed by German tanks and anti-tank guns, the BT-5 was very common in the early war period, and remained in production until sometime around the end of 1941. Equipped with a 45mm M32 20K gun, it was able to penetrate the armour of the PzKPFW III Ausf. D, E, F, and G variants at a range of up to 1000m, although it was more effective at shorter ranges. It was at a huge disadvantage defensively because it was only lightly armoured and could even be vulnerable to the German PzKpfw II's 2cm KwK 30 cannon at relatively short ranges. During 1941, the BT-5 and the BT-7 were gradually replaced by the vastly superior T-34/76.

Finally, here is the SU-85, a tank destroyer designed in 1943 to use the chassis of the T-34 but armed with an 85 mm D-5T gun to provide better armour-piercing capabilities against the German Tiger and Panther tanks. Originally intended for use in the T-34/85 tank, the D-5T was replaced as the T-34/85's main gun by the ZiS-S-53 in early 1944 until the end of the war. Production of the SU-85 was ended in mid-1944 as the T-34/85 became more widely available. Around 2500 SU-85s were produced.

I like these simple Zvezda kits because you can buy them singly, they have very few parts and you can get them made, undercoated and painted pretty quickly. Without a great deal of effort, you can turn out decent-looking tanks that easily pass the 1 metre away visual test.

Oh No! Not more Bloody Miniatures!

Well, yes it is, actually and it is the last eight from sets Three and Four. Scroll down to see them all.

These six are from three different sets but I've painted them with a common palette so that they could be a group of Commanded Shot from a single regiment. I really like the red, blue and yellow combination, although I know that contrast colour cuffs might be somewhat anachronistic.

Next are two more figures painted in a similar colour scheme.

The chap on the left is another figure from the Looters set (as is the drinking figure in the first photo) and the other is from the Parliament Men set, but I've given him a more flamboyant uniform than your average sober Puritan gentleman. He will be the leader of a 12-man unit of musketeers, currently being painted.

So, that is the end of the first four sets of these excellent miniatures. I ordered sets Five and Six a week or so ago, and they are now in the queue waiting to be prepped.

In the meanwhile, I have 24 musketeers nearing completion and 36 pikemen primed ready to be painted.

I've also prepped and undercoated 34 Spanish 28mm Napoleonic guerillas and leaders for a Sharp Practice project and the eight figures from the Silver Bayonet Spanish set, some of whom might also be useful for SP.