Saga Vikings

Well, I've finally cracked and got myself a SAGA army, of course of Vikings. They ended up being painted quite quickly, and for those of you who have not been following my Facebook Page, here's the progress

The Saga Viking warband...early stage preparation as I finally get back to painting and playing...black undercoat sprayed on, using 2p coins and some Renedra bases I got in an army pack from Gripping Beast. This was taken August 20th. And why do Renedra bases cost more than 2p each ... ?

24th August - All the metal bits, and a first "colour" - in this case Coat d'arms Linen. This might be quicker than I expect... The figures are a mix of Gripping Beast and Wargames Foundry

25th August - Always interesting how much figures can change from this block painting stage to when they get inked later on.

25th August - Gloss poly varnish on the shields, in preparation for some Little Big Men transfers tomorrow - bit of bronze and gold on the jewellery, brown for the backs of shields and wooden spears and they'll be ready for Army Painter..

25th August - Ready for the shield transfers in the morning... Then the Army Painter magic by lunchtime...!

26th August - All glossed up with Army Painter (not the shields with stickers on them - they get clear poly varnish as a topcoat), and then outside to dry .. it's a nice warm day so maybe spraying matt varnish later ? The shield designs are from the LBMS "GB (Large)" and "Foundry, Artizan & BTD" ranges and really make a huge difference to the quality of the figures

26th August, almost all done.... A good weekends work.. all based with builders sand, awaiting some grass and the like on the bases.

I may add some more photos once they are totally done and on the table

It's been a while - so, some Perry Knights!

After somewhat of a hiatus I've finally gotten round to adding some more content to this site. Nothing too onerous (for me) but here are a load of photos of 28mm multi-part plastic Perry Mounted Men at Arms, which I will be using as C15/C16 Gendarmes in FoG Renaissance armies.

I was wildly impressed with these models - a phenomenal amount of thought had clearly gone into designing each sprue to have huge variations in how you could equip and assemble the horses and riders to allow you to do a variety of troop types from each sprue

The horse barding included was sufficient to do every single horse in the pack of 12

There were just 2 riders who were unarmoured and which add a bit of colour to the formation

Everything was painted in a black spray undercoat, and a drybrush of Gunmetal, with some Gold highlights to bring them up a little

Army Painter Dark Tone gave them a blackened look after the drybrushing

 Very simple Gold details really makes them look more upscale than just plain silvered metal

Ready to rumble - hopefully I will only see them from this angle when they get on table!

Thoughts on Salute 2013

I went along to Salute at the weekend, and was very impressed. The massive numbers of attendees alone would tend to refute any idea that the hobby is struggling or that the internet is taking away from trade shows!

Warlords do a very good job of putting on an event which has a very short set-up time and cannot really afford to put in many of the creature comforts of "proper" events held in a space like ExCeL - for example, carpet would be nice, but would probably add more than 50% to the cost of hall rental, and hence admissions, and a second day of opening would double the costs and also the costs to exhibitors of staying down at the show.

A few people on TMP have whinged about ExCeL, however it is the only place in London with space and availability to host a show of that size, and those who complain about the catering are missing the point - the range and selection of catering is far better than any other equivalent venue, as long as you are prepared to walk along the central boulevard at ExCeL to find the outlet that suits you. Salute also benefits from the presence of the Marathon alongside in this respect, as all the catering outlets are open - this might not be the case if Salute were the only event in the venue that weekend.

My impressions of the exhibitors was that;

•  Historical, and especially 28mm historical skirmish gaming seems to be having a bit of a renaissance at the moment,
• Vendors are selling, and gamers are keener to give a try to "one box" solution games where you can get everything you need (rules, figures etc) from one supplier for sub £100 - of course you end up buying more!
• The market for resin-cast buildings and scenery is shrinking rapidly as the number of laser-cut pre-painted MDF ones explodes. I felt quite sorry for some of the resin scenery exhibitors as their stands looked deserted.
• Osprey will soon publish every rulebook in the market,
• Plastics are a now given, to the point of almost a default for some new ranges, and the debats has moved onto whether pre-paint is now starting to be a serious option,  
• Figure design is really moving onwards and upwards - again like the resin/MDF split some of the companies I once considered "old stalwarts" like Essex Miniatures looked out of place and their stand wasn;t that busy - they may end up being the Hinchcliffe of 15mm without more pzazz injected into the lines and display cases,
• I have no idea what Foundry are up to right now - for all the talk of a new era of product, branding and marketing they had a rather confusing and low key presence,
• Traders take note - having a banner to advertise your stand location is a must - there is almost no other directional signage at the show other than the catalogue, and with no reference points it was sometimes hard to see where you were even with the plan in front of you,
• The Bring and Buy was such a scrum that I didn't even consider going near it. I know the B&B is a staple of wargamiong shows, and makes money, but whether a show like Salute still really benefits from having a downmarket melee in one the corner it is something I'd question - using the space for more traders might now be the sensible option,
• Turn up at 11am, not 10am - the show is still open for another 6 hours, and it avoids the queues !

I only spent around £50 all in all, but that was mostly because I didn't want to buy anything - I think the £50 went out of my wallet through a form of wargaming osmosis which seems to afflict me at many shows...

   

28mm Renaissance Manufacturer Directory

The latest manufacturer directory on Madaxeman.com is for 28mm Renaissance manufacturers.

I've loosely defined "Renaissance" as C15 to the beginnings of the Marlburian era, and rolled in Samurai and Central Americans too so it should cover most people's definitions, although I have left out the non-Ottoman "Arabs" as they can tend to morph across Ancients ranges (which is maybe another project for another rainy day ..or three).

I'm sure there are some manufacturers I've missed so please let me know if you spot them.

The page has the usual voting buttons on it so you can rate the individual manufacturers, as well as descriptions of what ranges they carry and links to their websites. If I've got something wrong please let me know and I'll fix it!

28mm TYW Warfare at Central London

A handful of photos of a 28mm game against Don "Not The Don" Avis on Thursday evening this week. My chaps are a parliamentarian army, fighting here against the dastardly French.

Parliamentarian armoured Carbine horse close in on the French guns. Bold, but effective !

The Parliamentarian infantry were waiting between two fields as the better quality French advanced towards them. The Parliament forces are almost all Warlord Games figures

The two lines of troops close to shooting distances.

The Parliamentarian attack on the right starts to break down.... and so did my ability to remember to take more photos unfortunately.

Oh Wallenstein, what a big ...... you've got!

Big Boys Toys in action at a 25/8mm FoG:R Competition, Wallenstein 2011 - see Thirty Years War Germans actually do quite well indeed.

All the rest of the photos...

The Warlord Games 28mm TYW project is now done and dusted. The final set of photos are here. I now am the proud owner of  the following units:

• 24 Cuirassiers
• 48 Other Horse
• 12 Mounted Harquebusiers
• 20 Croat Light Horse
• 72 Spanish Tercio Foot
• 156 "German" Pike and Shotte
• 4 Regimental Guns (Falconets)
• 4 Medium and Heavy Guns
• 8 Bases of Dragoons
• 4 Generals
• 1 Baggage Camp

(Just a tiny degree of "project creep" there then....)

Lots more Dullcote-ed TYW Pictures

The Testors Dullcote arrived in the post today, allowing me to matt finish my TYW figures. Here are the results ....

28mm Plastic Frenzy !!

Doh! I've finally succumbed and bought some 28mm Plastics. I've been fighting the urge for a while, but they are now so cheap (30p a figure??) and there are enough ranges to allow you to morph them into different armies (Auxilia + Vikings = Sub Roman Brits anyone?). Have a look here at what's for sale on eBay UK or look here for US listings. The Warlord Games ECW stuff is available to see here