249 years ago we decided to sever our ties to the past and engage in an experiment in crafting our own system of government. This experiment continues to this day. To my mind it has been tremendously successful despite many stumbles along the way and I look forward the celebrating our 250th next year!
Have a happy Fourth of July everyone!
If you are one of the hardy souls that has been following my blog for any length of time you are aware of one of my biggest anathemas; rebasing. Taking figures off of bases just to attach them to new bases is, to me, a criminal waste of time. Fortunately my gaming group's new favoritestest (yes, that is a newly coined word, and I hold copyright) new rules is Midgard. This set thoughtfully allows the use of minis based for any system and only requires consistency in the basing method. It was a significant factor in the adoption of the rules as almost all of our miniatures were based in compliance with the venerable WRG 6th Edition rules. All we did was group together four bases (arranged two by two) and declare it a Midgard unit. Measuring sticks were then made to correspond with the frontage of the formation and we were off to the races.
There remained but one issue, I had hundreds of figures that were individually based for various skirmish games. Playing with these was problematic because they didn't keep a consistent frontage and were constantly getting knocked down. I had to confess to myself that it had probably been most if a decade since I played skirmish games and was unlikely to return to that any time soon. That moment of reflection out of the way I began cutting bases to glue the minis into proper formations.
A new(ish) release from the prolific stable of Wargames Atlantic is this set mounted sergeants from the early medieval period. I got this set from the good folks at Michigan Toy Soldier, who also have the full Baron's War set which provided the miniatures and the set of rules at an excellent price. As is to be expected from Wargames Atlantic the miniatures are cleanly cast in medium gray plastic. They are detailed and well proportioned with natural poses. The chain mail is well rendered as are the padded gambesons. There are a host of heads wearing a delightful variety of headgear.
The last part of my mass-build of the Wargames Atlantic Sergeants/Peasants sets is this group of spear-armed sergeants. My intent while building them was to get an "alike, but not the same" posing and equipment. To add some variety I used some of the unarmored peasant bodies to reflect poorer soldiers and made the rest using mailed/padded torsos. Once again the huge assortment of weapons and arms holding them made this a simple process. The color scheme is a nod to the year I spent in Cub Scouts (before I was expelled, but that is another story) with strong blues and rich yellows providing a pleasant contrast. The crisp detailing on the minis made painting less of a chore than I had thought it would be, only the sheer number of them slowed me down.
At the bottom of the social and military pyramid were the serfs/peasants. Often forced by circumstances (or their feudal overlord) to take part in the squabbles of their "betters" their main objective was to survive and return to the back-breaking labor of farming. They had little in the way of funds to spend on armaments so often they were armed with modified agricultural tools. Under just the right circumstances they could be effective, but most often they were just there to do the grunt work and buff numbers. The Wargames Atlantic set provides a huge number of options for posing and arming the minis so you are spoiled for choices when building your force.
May turned out to be far busier and decidedly unpredictable than I had imagined. At the beginning of the month I had started assembling the Foot Sergeants and Peasants sets from Wargames Atlantic. This (of course) took me down the rabbit-hole of trying to make each figure an individual, much time was lost combining the two sets. On the upside I can confidently say that they cross-pollinate very well.
After two weeks of squeezing a bit of spare time out here and there I was confronted with almost sixty little gray soldiers and that's when it hit me; I have to paint these guys! Don't get me wrong, these are excellent figures, well detailed, naturally proportioned and cleanly cast. It is just that, as my eyes have aged and arthritis has taken a toll on my hands, painting has gone from a pleasant pastime to a brutal grind. Or maybe it is that I grew up painting Minifigs and Hinchliffe figures....probably a bit of both. All that aside I have finally finished the crossbowmen and archers. You can behold them in all their splendor below.
I'm nearly finished with the spearmen so they should be appearing soon. Perhaps I will find some ancient figures from the 1980's that I can speed-paint my way through.
It is with great sorrow that I must inform you that one of my good friends has passed away. John Hutcherson, known to our group as "The Hutch" (or, more simply, as Hutch) rolled his last dice on the 21st of May.
An avid wargamer and model builder John was particularly fond of naval games and Flames of War. Like most gamers he was an enthusiastic collector of books and minis with a good many projects under way at all times. I first met John at the old Alcove Hobby Shop when it was on Eleven Mile Road. A year or so later I invited to my house for a game and he was a fixture at our weekly games for three decades. More recently he moved to South Lyon which made connecting for games much more difficult but we would still see each other at game cons where his broad smile and hearty handshake were always welcomed.
Rest in peace my friend, and keep rolling sixes!
Further information can be found here Phillips Funeral Home South Lyon
