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Showing posts with label Waterloo 1815. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Waterloo 1815. Show all posts

Saturday, 14 October 2017

Sudan: Ja'liyin Tribesmen



Halfway through the Clear the Desk painting challenge, for your viewing pleasure (not really eye candy, more eye broccoli), some Ja'liyin tribesmen for the Black Powder, Blood on the Nile supplement. These have been made up from multiple 20mm plastic sets as there aren't any of these tribesmen on the market - and have been undercoated and getting caught up in the curtains behind the desk occasionally, for well over a year.



The rank and file are the peltasts/light troops from HaT's 8044 Alexander's Light Infantry (in a previous life, they were actually peltasts painted by Chasseur) and the Numidians from HaT's 8020 Hannibal's Carthaginians - African Infantry set, with the shields shaved off.

The Emir on horseback and the standard bearer are also from HaT, 8249 El Cid Moorish Command, and one Emir on a donkey from Waterloo 1815's 011 Dervish Infantry.



The reference is from Col. Snooks' Go Strong in the Desert, Plate 23 on page 98 and contemporary coloured sketch on page 101. With many more plates from Michael Perry in the book, this is a must have reference for this period and I reckoned seeing how they made the effort to research the tribe, I'd make the effort to individually paint the 24 diamond patches and coloured bands onto the jibhas of these 20mm figures :)

Still, I reckon I know one sure fire thing to remedy the pressing hordes of Ansar, next to which these guys will take their place: some Limbered Royal Artillery from the same period.


Sunday, 3 April 2016

Sudan: Ansar



So here’s the other half of the Ansar (Madhist) force, units of the Black Flag, Blue Flag and Red Flag.

Spearmen

The rank and file are made up of HaT’s Set 8271 Dervish Warriors, another good box set to bulk out the army. 

The commanders from their Set 8247 El Cid Almoravid Heavy Cavalry and even a camel from an Itlaeri set and a rider from Waterloo 1815′s Dervish Warriors. Many of the standard bearers are the unmounted figures from HaT’s Taaishi Camelry (see below)

Making up three Standard BP formations of 30 figures each (mounted count as two).

Jihadiya (Riflemen)

Representing the close rank African Slave Riflemen rather than the skirmishing units armed with firearms.

Again these are from HaT’s Dervish Warrior set with foot commanders drawn from Italeri’s Arab Warriors set (see below), standard bearers from the Waterloo 1815 Dervish Warriors set – with flag conversions, and ye olde Italeri camel with Waterloo 1815 rider again.

Another three Standard BP formations.

Jihadiya (Skirmish Riflemen)

Three of about the ten skirmishing rifle units available to this army  - the rest are painted, just not based. 

These Small BP units play a crucial role in the overall envelopment tactic of the Madhist forces. Staying just within range to continually pop off shots at the British rank and file, hoping for the roll of a 6 to cause disorder, and defending against cavalry from rough ground.

The majority of these skirmish troops are from Italeri’s Set 6055 Arab Warriors (a reissue of the old Esci Muslim Warriors set) and in some instances are pushing the bounds of historic accuracy for this Sudanese army – meh, I don’t care if you don’t. Apart from that, these are good figures to bulk out the skirmishers.
Artillery

The Madhists used to drape their flags on captured artillery peices, or…


… would paint the carriages in bright colours and paint Muslim slogans on the barrels.

So most if not all of the Madhist artillery – and firearms for that matter – were captured British and/or Egyptian pieces. These guns are from a game Age of Imperialism by Eagle Games and are best described as generic looking guns from about the right period. The crew are converted figures from the Italeri set mentioned above.

Taaishi Mounted Skirmishers

These are from HaT’s Set 8250 Taaishi Camelry, a good all round camel rider set. Pretty sure the Taaishi are another group from the Beja tribe. There are some variable poses in this set, one figure in particular has his arm stretched far to the right, hard to place weapons and flags so that they look good. Most of these were a commission painted by mate Spiro, I think I painted 12!

There are two Standard BP units amongst this lot, the rest are Small units. These are the rapid deployment part of the skirmish envelopment tactic, and I arm these with firearms – unlike the Hadendowa skirmish camelry armed only with throwing spears.

Command

HaT Taaishi camels and riders with flag conversions for army and rub levels.

Yet again, Italeri camels with Waterloo 1815 riders, for commanders small brigades.

Flags
All the non-sculpted flags above are all free downloads from Warflag.com.

Sudan: Hadendowa



Time to look at the other side of the conflict for a change with another post of figures, some of which, were painted well over ten years ago by a commission painter.
First up for the Ansar (Madhists) we have a northern Beja tribe, the fierce Hadendowa. Endowed with the title ‘honorary horsemen’ by the British; because of their fast, dynamic, and committed charges – there’s a reason that entire brigades formed squares when crossing exposed terrain, as if expecting to face cavalry.
I’ve themed these guys to Osman Digna’s warriors of the Green Flag, as he was purported to field his forces under the green flag (a division of the Madhist army). He was 2IC of the Madhi and leader of the northern region, who then became Madhi after the original’s death.


These two BP formations are from Hat Industrie’s Set 8271 Dervish Warriors and the unmounted figures from HaT’s Set 8208 Hadendowah Camelry. Commission painted by Fernando Enterprises in Sri Lanka. I’ve had marvelous results from this company for several commissions now, despite a language barrier a few years back, when a commission was sent to an old address by mistake. But I can’t fault the painting standard for the $$ spent at all.

More Hadendowa, another two formations, this time from Waterloo 1815′s Set 011 Dervish Infantry, another commission from years ago from a bloke no longer painting.
Waterloo 1815 should not be overlooked when building 20mm armies. Their figures are well proportioned, accurate and are normally well posed, even if their are very few poses per box (normally 8). They’re a great builder for the main body of an army. Good all round figures.

And from the same Waterloo 1815 set and commission painter, another pair of BP formations for a northern Beja tribe.
These infantry formations are BP Standard Warbands, 30 strong as per the battle scenarios from the main rulebook and Sudan supplement. They’re based a bit odd being 10 bases wide and 3 bases deep, facing, normally, the 12 base wide Brits and their allies. A bit of a compromise around numbers of figures and constraints from previous basing. However, as the rulebook states, these minor variations in frontages pose no problem at all for charging, and working out who is fighting who; and the charging, shooting, and visibility rules calrify anything upon which two gentlemen cannot agree.
On to the mounted Hadendowa arm.


3 Standard formations of skirmishing camelry to get around the squares (one formation is based so it can be separated out into two Small skirmish formations). These are from the  HaT’s Set 8208 Hadendowah Camelry and were a commission painted by a mate Spiro only last year. Awesome job where he spent far too much time and effort for the commission price.

A Small BP formation of skirmishers – oops looks like one of the riders has fallen off his perch! That’s what you get for hiring damned dirty cheap plastic warriors. Where’s the superglue!
Finally the command. Both flag level (army or brigade level in BP) and rub level (small BP brigades).

More Hat camels from the same set, just mounted on command rounds with giant green flags.


Newline Design’s Sudanese Tribesmen II provided with a flag – which are produced by Warflag.com. These flags are free to download and use! So as long as you know the historic measurements of the flags so you can scale them (even MS Word can do this), after a bit of fiddlyness your army can be festooned with historically accurate flags.
Big thumbs up to Ian Croxall for supplying such an invaluable service to wargamers for free.


This is around half of the Madhist army painted and based so far. They look great charging down the wargames’ table in little flying Vs. A bit cheesey but they were said to have charged in great waves of arrowheads. It just so happens that this works well in BP as, even when the leading formation is disordered by British fire, the leaders from the other two units can still see the British line, and so can make one final headlong charge into the Brits.
Every BP game I’ve played with these guys creates a gameplay that is consistent with how I would expect them to have behave in real life. Messers Preistley and Johnson definitely deserve to take a bow for this ruleset!