September Painting



For my game at the Colonial Barracks convention in November, I needed a number of differently armed figures for the troops in the army of the notoriously unstable warlord.  (See http://jacksongamers.blogspot.com/2014/09/send-in-marines-play-test.html for the play test report.)  So I sorted through my mountain of unpainted figures and came up with two units of poorly armed "native" figures to join the ones I was using that were already painted.



The first batch are eleven Foundry Belgian askari in straw hats.  They are counted as being armed with percussion rifled muskets, even though the game is set in the 1930s.  The white lines on the front designate the forward center for facing during the fire sequence of the rules I am using, "The Sword to Adventure" which is a variant of "The Sword and the Flame."

They are joined in one command by nine musket armed tribal warriors, also from Foundry.  Eventually both of these groups will join my Darkest Africa forces.



The second unit is made up of descendants of escaped slaves, called Maroons in the local vernacular because of the reddish-brown color of their skin (This by the way is historically accurate, the maroons being escaped slaves from Jamaican plantations living in the interior hill country.)  These guys are armed with percussion smoothbore muskets but are also decent hand-to-hand fighters.  Their leader is in the red shirt in the center whose name is Daddee John, an ancestor of P'hat Daddee B'wonah, the President for Life of the Republic of Bongolesia (with apologies to Murphy).



This is the other half of the Maroons.  Although they fight for the notoriously unstable warlord, they really don't like him at all and, given the chance, would shot him in the back.  These figures are from Foundry's Pirates range.  They will join my small collection of pirates figures after the convention.

 

While these figures were fun to paint as I could almost let my imagination run away with me on their clothing, the last batch were more of a staid group, being more "armed civilians" for my Very British Civil War forces.

These armed civilians are from the Artizan Design partisan and guerilla lines that Brigade Games carries.  Their clothing also works for 1930s British.  Their leader is in the center and you can tell from his beret and leather jacket that he is a veteran of the Spanish Civil War.  They'll join the other armed civilians I already have.

September was a very productive painting month with 50 figures painted and two buildings made.  I think that I am finally out of my summer painting slump and I hope that the rest of the year will be just as productive. 



More African Natives

My last group of figures that I painted in June have finally had their portraits made.  All of these figures were purchased from Ken H. at Bayou Wars.  They are all Foundry figures from their Darkest Africa line.

The first up is a single formerly Baluchi mercenary who is joining my gang of Ruga-Ruga toughs.  He will free up an more conventionally dressed askari to be a gun bearer for my white hunters.

The last are a group of not-so-heavily-armed Zanazabari slavers.  These seven chaps are armed with muskets instead of the Martinis and Remingtons with which their comrades are armed.  These figures will probably end up being used as guards while the more heavily armed Zanzabaris go out after more captives.

Already primed are the last batch of figures I purchased from Ken -- a 17-figure unit of Baluchi mercenaries armed with matchlock muskets, swords, and shields.  While not having a lot of firepower, these fighters should be awesome in a melee.

Administrators and Warriors

Trying to get a head start on the figures I'll need for my Colonial Barracks convention (link) game in early November, I just finished a few 28mm figures that I have had for a while.

First up are three Colonial administrators:

On the left is the Colonial Governor's secretary, in the center is a missionary, and on the right is the Colonial tax collector.

To assist the "helpless" native village against both the Colonial tax collector and the Zanzabari slavers are a group of traveling warriors, out to right wrongs and protect the innocent, all for a small remuneration, of course!

The warrior in the center with the multi-colored shield is an old Ral Partha figure.  He and the Zulu-style warrior on the far right have been painted for a while.  They are joined by the six Foundry native warriors across the rear of the picture.  Armed with spears and other hand weapons, their courage and fortitude will have to strengthen them as they will be facing modern Western rifles.  But  being a "white hat" has never been easy.

I'll be play-testing my modified Lion and Gazelle scenario on October 15.  Between now and then, I still have some African animals to paint and some more jungle vegetation to construct.

Rangers and Light Infantry

After finally getting my first war band of Woodland Indians painted, I started on some opponents for them. First up were 9 Redoubt French & Indian War rangers.

I painted them wearing the black with blue facings uniform popular with some of the ranger units during the early part of the war. Although Redoubt sculpted them to be Roger's Rangers, these will just be a generic group until I can decide on a name for them.

Although they look very shiny in the pictures, they do have a matte varnish on them that gives them a warm satiny look. The Redoubt poses were very easy to piant.

They should be excellent opponents for the Gallian allied Indians and the Gallian colonial militia and Compagnes Franches de la Marine that I have.

The rangers will be teamed up with a small group of Foundry British light infantry. Now the actual figures are from Foundry's American Revolution line, but in my imagi-nation New World, they will be so uniformed just a little earlier than in the real-world.

These seven stalwart "Light Bobs" are painted as the light infantry of the 5th Foot, early in the conflict before they became corrupted by the radical ideas of those 'Murican bandits.

As with the Redoubt figures, these were very easy to paint, with the details being clearly defined and readily accessible to a paint brush.

I'm also just about finished with the last contingent of this little command, a squad of 4 'Murican loyalist grenadiers (see previous post for a picture of one of the figures primed). I'm basing their uniform on that of the American Revolution Queen's Rangers. Their picture will be posted shotrly.