AWI: Maryland Battalion 1776

A bump in the painting roster due to a delay in painting supplies, has brought forward the completion of next continental battalion, the Maryland Battalion circa 1776.


The inspiration for this unit came from the cover and double-page plate in the Osprey Campaign title - New York 1776, which depicts the 'Maryland 400' battalion charging at Gowanus. The BP Supplement supports this, describing them in 1776 as 'hunting shirts died tan' with officers 'red coats faced buff'.


The figures are well proportioned and detailed, and are from the Accurate 7201 American Militia/IMEX 511 George Washington's Army set. While not exactly dressed in hunting 'shirts', they look to be dressed in hunting 'coats' - close enough I say.


One out of the three boxes I bought had figures as per the IMEX listing, the other two had figures as per the Accurate listing, the drummer is a spare one from the Italeri 6060 set.


All have been mounted on 3mm bases as opposed to card, as - like their Accurate/IMEX counterparts - they are about a head shorter than figures from other manufacturers of this period.


The battalion is a large BP unit that can be reduced back to standard, producing an additional command stand also. It is said that Lord Stirling (Maj. Gen. Alexander) personally lead the battalion in the action at Gowanus, hence the inclusion of the mounted officer (from the Revell 2572 set).


This completes the line units for the Maryland/Virginia brigade and next up is the raft of light infantry and dragoons I've prepped while waiting for detail brushes, to complete the New England and Maryland/Virginia BP brigades.

Blood Bowl: Balls!

Having had an excellent introduction game of the recently re-released Blood Bowl from Games Workshop - thanks Simon!, using none other than a painted Chaos team I picked up for less than $20, years ago, I got a little enthusiastic about it.

It was a fun game that had several layers of game play and was a typically excellent GW specialist game.

Noticing the 'embryonic state' of the plastic parts of the sets we were using and knowing Simon is busy with babies... with the thought of the further games he'd be arranging for us, I offered to paint his balls...

... after the giggling and semi-awkward silence had settled down, I got to work.

First up some Orc balls I think... I did't realise Orcs had balls...


I went for two standard 'dirty-look' Orc balls made out of leather and a hume-skinned ball for a bit of fun.


Next some of Simon's Skaven balls... I think that's warp fire? Luckily I found I actually had five shades of the appropriate green paint! But it did pose the question...


... if I have a Skaven ball in one hand and a Skaven ball in another hand, what do I have?


A rather large Skaven... ah thank you and goodnight.

AWI: 3rd Continental Artillery Crew

A few more auxiliary troops for the Continentals in the form of some crew to man a couple of the cannons painted previously.

Have again taken the uniform from what's listed in the BP Rebellion supplement, for this organisation of artillery: black coats, red facings and lining, buff shortclothes.


The supplement summarises that Massachusetts raised the 3rd Continental Artillery circa 1779, so these guys have been included in the New England brigade.


The figures are from the IMEX 555 British Artillery set. Why? Because this set was originally produced in 1/32 scale as American artillery. For some reason IMEX swapped their sets around when producing 1/72 versions of them. After hours upon hours of reviewing contemporary pictures of these guys, I agreed with the PSR reviews and will swap the two sets back - not that you can really tell at this scale :)


Unfortunately the plastic is quite brittle and the sponge guy lost his sponge along the way, and is now holding what is commonly referred to as a 'stick' - I'll convert something at some stage to replace it. Apart from that the figures are well detailed and easy to paint.

American gunner sights down the barrel - is it any wonder I'm single I ask myself?

But with the average finish of these guys comes the realisation that, while a good workman never blames his tools, my detail brushes are well used - and I think have come into contact with superglue :o - I'm out of white undercoat, and have been scraping the bottom of my Citadel White Scar for the last week.

Lancer miniatures' and Revell plastic gun.

Its time for a supply run to my local Games Workshop!

AWI: 2nd Continental Dragoons

The first auxiliary troops for this period have come off the painting table, a small BP unit of the 2nd Continental Dragoons.

These guys have come from the Revell 02573 Austrian Dragoons set and I've done some head conversions using the heads from spare light infantry out of the A Call To Arms 65 British Infantry 1775 set.


The uniform reference this time began out of the Rebellion! BP supplement but was finalised on the Baccus website, hence the helmet conversions - which I admit was a last minute decision. I've gone for Bay horses - standard and buckskin - and a single gray for the commander.


Not my best effort and had to spend a lot of time on painting some of the white details on as the moulding from 1992 - when the set was first produced - was not the greatest.


The 1775 flag is off the net (after the following search on Google images "awi 2nd continental dragoons flag") and after a quick confirmation from the Historical Flags of Our Ancestors website to make sure it was correct... wish I'd scrolled down as there is a flag for this unit for the later part of the war, no matter.


Next up - will the fun never stop!? - an artillery crew.

AWI: 3rd Virginia Regiment

And another one down, and another one down, and another one bites the dust... next line unit done for the Americans. This time its the 3rd Virginia unit circa 1780ish, pale blue coats with blue facings, white lining and shortclothes. No references for musicians so decided on taking a break from reversed coats.


Continuing on with territorial based brigades for gaming  BP Rebellion!, this unit will take its place alongside the Virginia State Infantry and Lee's Legion infantry in a Maryland/Virginia brigade.


The Italeri 6060 box continues to produce great results, although these are the same figures as per the 4th Mass unit completed last week, including the hat and standard bearer conversions - the comments for which can be seen in the 4th Mass post.


The 3rd Virginia flag is from the Historical Flags of Our Ancestors site and a little oversized but nonetheless the first (guaranteed) 100% accurate flag for this American army - "...the 3rd Virginia colors were one of four captured by the British. In 2006, the four regimental flags... sold at Sotheby's auction for over $5,000,000."


Close up of command, no reversed coats and yes that is a beaver on the flag...


Right, a bit of a break from line units and onto the auxiliary units for the New England brigade, then I feel the need to do a large Maryland battalion in hunting shirts, then the auxilaries for that brigade, then back on to the British... it never ends... to try and produce enough units for a small BP game by June :)

AWI: 2nd New Hampshire Regiment

Continuing on with the sprint to get stuff painted while waiting to hear back about contracts, just off the painting table at a record day turn around, the 2nd New Hampshire regiment for Black Powder Rebellion!

Using the supplement as a reference again, it lists this regiment as wearing pale blue coats with white turnbacks, red facings, and buff short clothes. Hmmm... also lists the musicians as white coats faced blue... errr... bugger! No matter, I just did that paint scheme for the muesos of the 4th Mass and I like the red coats, and there's plenty of variation on the net for the musicians of this regiment in any case.


The muskets on this musketeer figure are molded separately and have to be glued on. The hand holding the musket has a spike which fits well into the body of the figure, so no hassles there whatsoever. Sourced the regiment's 'blue flag' from warflag.com and put on a slightly converted musketeer - just chopped the musket off and replaced with flag.


This 6060 kit from Italeri is continuing to turn up trumps with well proportioned troops that paint up well, despite the general issues with the set.


This unit will take its place in the New England brigade along side the 4th Mass, Rhode Island State and Sherburne's battalions, and is the last line unit for the brigade.


Will finish the 3rd Virginia next for another brigade, as its already prepped, then on to some auxiliary troops for this brigade.


Finished line of the New England Brigade.

AWI: 4th Massachusetts

Next Continental unit for BP off the painting table, this time its the 4th Mass and from the Rebellion! supplement for BP, we find that these (like several other units in the war) generally wore blue coats with white facings, turnbacks, and shortclothes.

These are the first hat conversions of the figure with his hat flying off in the wind, from the Italeri 6060 American Infantry set. Didn't take as long as I thought it would to do them.

Above hat conversions: before, during, after. Step 1: slice hat off following the line of the hat, where it sat on the head. Step 2: slice a new line across the head so that hat will sit just above the eyes. Step 3: superglue - the hats super-glued back on with no problems.

As I'm not a fan of moulded flags or painting them, I've also converted the standard bearer from the set, carving off the moulded standard and supplied another flag.

Standard bearer figure after cutting off flag.

Note, no detail on the back of the standard bearer after taking to it with a knife, to be covered by Warflag flag.

I also recently had a bit of a re-think about what units to paint as, although I was making good progress for this era, I hadn't produced enough of the right units to produce any BP brigades. So came up with the idea of late-war themed brigades based on the territorial listings in the BP supplement.


So these guys will take their place along side Rhode Island and Sherburne's battalion for a New England themed brigade.


Again I grabbed the 1777 flag from Warflag.com to match the uniform listing of 1777-1783 and - now the period theme is set - will probably use this flag as default when there's no historical reference for an American unit's standard.

Close up of the command, including converted standard bearer.

So with a few more Continental units already prepped, after they're done it will be time to start on some of the auxiliary units to try and complete two brigades for each side. But once again this Italeri set certainly produces great looking figures once they're painted up.

Seleucid: The Last Pikemen

A bit of time for painting recently after finally receiving several contract offers (yes - hopefully I won't have to sell myself for medical experiments!) and I I know I should have cracked on with the AWI stuff, but after the recent Seleucid Showcase I came over all nostalgic.

I went trolling through the box of remaining 15mm ancients and realised I had two pike blocks prepped and ready to go, and a handful of others left. Given TTS/QRF don't have listings for these guys in their Frei Korps range any longer and that these are probably the last Frei Korps pikemen left unpainted on the planet... ney, in the universe, I just had to finish them.

Original paint scheme from 20 years ago - 'red' team.

I decided to do at least one unit that was different from the others so chose the Antigonid/Later Macedonian Leukaspides (white shields) and some Chalkaspides (brazen shields - not bronze of course, as the Greek word for bronze meant blue - QI).

Leukaspides (white shields) and Chalkaspides (brazen shields), configured for WAB/FoG.

Realising that the total number of elements in my existing phalanx was already divisible/set for DBA (2 ranks deep), L'Art De La Guerre (3 ranks deep), and WAB/FoG (4 ranks deep), and that this was the end, my beautiful friend, for new phalanx elements, I decided to do a pike command element for WAB/ADLG/FoG as well as 9 pike elements.

3 rank configuration for the likelihood of playing L'Art De La Guerre (ADLG).

Pike Command 

A command element for ADLG, FoG, or WAB.

Never actually made a command element with FK standards before. I sliced the bendy lead poles off of the standards and replaced it with piano wire. The Macedonian star ain't the best but the sheaf of wheat came out well.

Leukaspides 



As I have a 20mm Carthegenian army with all spearmen having white shields, I avoided doing the Lukaspides, but glad I finally caved as makes for another easily identifiable unit on the field.

Chalkaspides 



Had a wonderfully nestolgic time mixing up the rose, lavender, and yellows.

All the pikemen have been done in five lots: first back in the 90s, then a repaint in 2000(ish) for DBM, more circa 2006 for WAB, again in 2013 for FoG, and now finishing off in 2017 for the sake of nostalgia itself.

I remember each block took me ages back in 2000, now with improvement to paints and more techniques and experience, all these guys only took about 6 hours.

Facing Off
Also I decided to prep the figures as they would be 'out of the bag' and was warmed and heartened to realise that, if you model the pikes as per the angle of the figures themselves, they are at such an angle so as to not interfere with opposition forces on the table - well done Frei Korps sculptors!

Facing off against light troops with no problems.


Facing off against other pike/spearmen, still with no problems but some jostling to get the pikes to interpenetrate.


Facing off against cavalry, still no problem.


Facing off against Xystophoroi, still no problems on the table.

Well that's it for my 15mm Macedonian/Successor pikemen, finally after 20 years and 136 figures later - done.