DRP 3mm 1940 forces for Eisenhower - completed

Four complete divisions in
a shallow A4 Tuff box.

I completed my 3mm armies for Eisenhower. Painting is now getting quite difficult for an old chap like me, so this is probably my first and last 3mm project. I had two main precepts: to make the vehicles and figures 'pop' and to avoid oversize base texturing.

Whereas the aim in real life would be to camouflage men and vehicles and to blend into the background, that would be totally counter-productive for such tiny models. The colour scheme needed to be lighter, contrasting and simpler than in real life. I also wanted to avoid using sand or static grass in a way that would be out of scale with the models.

The bases were intended to be dioramic, so my first step was to arrange and stick the models down. Here I made a mistake. I should have put slivers of card under the vehicles so they were of a height with the infantry and I could then have applied filler between the models to hide the base edges and level everything up. By putting filler only around the infantry, I ended up with a lumpy effect.

I attempted to disguise this problem by adding irregular areas of sand to represent scrub. This was a partial success, but the end result looks more like bramble patches on Wimbledon Common than Belgian fields.

With the models, filler and sand added, I gave everything an overall wet brush of dark brown. I then dry-brushed the vehicles using light versions of the historical base coats with no attempt to add secondary camouflage colours. I block-painted the infantry in 2 or 3 colours, but one would probably have done. This approach was essentially the same as I've used for larger scales that I've based before painting.

On the plus side, I think my decisions to restrict the colours and make the models 'pop', and to avoid out of scale texturing, were correct.

On the minus side, I should have pre-based the vehicles to match the infantry as explained, and then I wouldn't have had to add the scrub. I should also have chosen a less vivid green for the grass and dry-brushed it.

10mm Normans rebased

Taking advantage of a rare opportunity to do some painting etc over the last couple of weeks, I have now just finished reorganising and rebasing the 10mm Normans that I inherited. Actually finishing a project is a big achievement for me these days.

This project involved:

• Soaking the old card bases in water and removing.
• Planning the new units.
• Adding a few additional figures for fun (crossbowmen and peasants with improvised weapons).
• Repainting some mail in silver and some textiles in colour.
• Sticking the figures on my preferred MDF/steel combination bases.
• Texturing the bases with Tetrion filler and a sand/ballast mix.
• Painting the bases.
• Applying 2mm static grass.

Most readers will be familiar with all these techniques and I've covered them all before. However, I will make a few relevant remarks.

Front left: Sergeants. Back left and centre: ordinary cavalry. Right: veteran cavalry.

I like planning units and spent a lot of time doing it. The aim was to optimise use of the figures I had in order to produce two armies. In the end I went with 80mm wide bases to be used on a 100mm grid. This is for To the Strongest! Each base is a unit.

Repainting was fairly impressionistic. I hit the main areas. These are 10mm figures after all. Nobody should notice or care unless they lead very sad lives.

On the new figures, I painted faces but no hands. I might repaint some of the shields to provide more variation and I might add a dark wash to tone down the colours I used on some of the new figures, but I may never get round to it.

Left to right, front to back: Fyrd; Foot Sergeants; Flemish Spearmen, Norman Militia.

The sand was applied to the Tetrion while it was still wet. The best results are achieved by having the Tetrion very wet. But getting the filler between multibased ready-painted figures was awkward.

The bases were initially flood painted with a very dilute wash of household emulsion. The sand soaks it up. They were then dry-brushed with Zamesi Desert and Ushabti Bone.

The static grass was applied with an electric applicator. I'm not entirely convinced this made much difference but it didn't do any harm.

Left: Feudal levies. Front: Crossbows. Back: Bows.

I learnt two lessons from this project:

1. Basing the figures before painting as I did for my 10mm ACW and 6mm TYW armies is a much better approach for multibased figures. In this instance most of the figures were already painted so I wasn't working from scratch. I'm not sure, however, whether I would pre-base 15m or 28mm figures, but I would certainly think about it.
2. Dry-brushing the bases in just two colours was adequate.

The overall approach was based on expending the minimum effort and time, and to rely on the new bases for aesthetic effect. In that it was a resounding success.

Rebasing without tears - DBx basing, steel sabots and magnetic storage

15mm Frankish Warriors in three
ranks, on and off steel sabots.

As a grid game To the Strongest! doesn’t stipulate any particular basing requirements, and as my 15mm Ancients and Medievals are already based for DBx, it's just a question of combining them into larger units. The figures all have magnetic sheet underneath their bases so the obvious solution was to put the DBx elements onto steel sabots. 

Retaining the original bases means they will also remain usable for other rules. I had already gone down this route to some extent in order to play Impetus so I just needed to get more steel bases of various depths.

After some thought and experiment I eventually decided on one sabot per unit and I am now absolutely convinced this was the best choice. If I ever play some other game requiring different basing, I'll just get more sabots of appropriate size.

15mm Late Roman cavalry, Auxilia, Legionaries and lights.

As I usually have to transport my armies on foot, I'm very keen on secure storage, so the sabots (with the figures on them) will in turn be placed into boxes lined with magnetic sheet. I've yet to find out just how well the figures stay on the sabots, but the sabots adhere strongly to the boxes. 

In fact, the attraction is so strong that I've had to put paper ‘ribbons’ under the bases so I can pull the sabots out without scattering the figures. Maybe there’s a slicker solution but this does seem to work.

15mm Feudal Scots with strips of paper to lift them out.
These figures were actually painted by me. The figures in the other photos weren't.

As mentioned above, I used to put magnetic sheet under the bases but it's much less trouble to snip off bits of magnetic tape. The tape is just a little narrower than the DBx base depths, so 12.5 mm for 15mm, 15mm for 20mm and 25mm for 30mm.

I currently get MDF bases and steel sabots from Products for Wargamers, magnetic tape from Magnetic Displays, and magnetic sheet from TinyTinTroops.

Dum vivimus vivamus!

Current reading focus: Late Antiquity

A happy new year to one and all! I can only hope that 2022 will see an end to the epidemic of fear. We need to live, not just be alive, and Covid is just another risk we have to manage rationally. 

As regards wargaming, my new year’s resolution was to make no resolutions. I certainly won't be formulating any grandiose plans and I hesitate even to mention current interests in case of raising expectations...but that's the point of this blog so I will.

My immediate activity is to continue reorganising my 15mm Ancient and Medieval armies in anticipation of playing To the Strongest! and in learning the rules. As ever, my wargaming interests run parallel to historical reading (when I get the time) and I am currently focusing on Late Antiquity.

The combination of 80mm frontages and a 4" grid (which I have chosen for TtS!) works so well for me that it has also set me thinking about rebasing my 25mm Renaissance armies on 80mm wide bases.

I intend to continue work on the 28mm Russian Civil War armies for The Men Who Would Be Kings as these will be easier to complete than many of my other, more colour-complex, 28mm armies.

Other than that I should move myself to finish the 6mm armies for Tilly's Very Bad Day as they are not far from completion.

28mm figures on 80mm bases from the collection of
Norm (Battlefields & Warriors blog). Great dynamism
in posing the figures and a true inspiration. More
pictures here.

I should not of course be starting  anything new but there are some significant historical gaps in my collection and it is hard to resist nice figures. One such gap is the Hundred Years War and the figures which draw me are the 28mm ranges from Claymore Castings and Antediluvian Miniatures. This would be for the Anglo-Scottish Wars (e.g. Otterburn 1388) rather than the Continental theatre.

In recent years I settled on using relatively small numbers of individually based 28mm figures for Rampant skirmish games and smaller scales for multibased mass armies. This project would be multibased 28mm figures, thus breaking what has been a very sensible policy. So, to keep things under control, I am again looking at 80mm wide units for use on a compact table. Quite a few gamers have gone down this path and I am particularly inspired by the Wars of the Roses figures (pictured above) belonging to Norm of the very content-rich Battlefields & Warriors blog. This is just the look I am after.

I have to admit that if using TtS! (which seems likely even though I haven't yet played it), the armies and the game would be little different from using my 15mm Feudal English and Scots. I guess it's all in the aesthetics.

The Pikeman's Lament: My 1671 Spanish and Buccaneer companies

Devoid of the usual May festivities I’m devoting this not-as-merry-as-it-could-be month to work on a range of Rampant armies. My overall minimal aim is to level the bases with filler, and get them all undercoated and base-coated while we wait 18 months for a Coronavirus vaccine or herd immunity.

To kick off, here are my 28mm companies for The Pikeman’s Lament based on the Buccaneer attack on Panama of 1671. The Buccaneers are flintlock-armed veterans, the Spanish firelock-armed militia.

The figures are mainly North Star and Blood and Plunder.

The Spanish (1): Back row: Mounted Captain, Gun and crew, Horse. 
Front row: Lanceros, Pike.

The Spanish (2): Three units of matchlock-armed Shot.

The Spanish (3). Front row: Captain on foot with some extras. Indian scouts as Commanded Shot. 
Back row: Armada de Barlovento (Marines).

 

The English: Four units of flintlock-armed Buccaneers with their Welsh leader, Henry Morgan.

Thirty Years War 6mm progress 5: drybrushing the bases

I had to patch the basic dark brown coat twice as a result of my mistake in using a white gesso undercoat instead of a black one. I am repeating this as a penance and to sear it into my brain for next time. White undercoats are appropriate for figures that are going to be painted with washes but not for block painting.

The next step was to dry-brush the ground, avoiding the figures as far as possible. The recipe - in fact the whole base-before-painting approach - came originally from Nik Harwood and is executed with successive applications of the following Citadel colours: (1) Mournfang Brown (formerly Calthan Brown), (2) Zamesi Desert (formerly Bubonic Brown), and (3) Ushabti Bone (formerly Bleached Bone).

The Mournfang Brown barely shows but it’s probably important in achieving the overall effect. Owing to the closeness of the figures I'm applying the dry brushing only to the outer rim of these figure blocks.

I assume these names mean something in the Games Workshop universe. I was helped in tracing the name changes by this very useful colour chart.

The Zamesi Desert is a strong mustard colour up close but after applying it the bases then look sort of greenish from a distance.

Using four colours just for the ground may seem excessive but the ground is going to be the most important area after the dark brown shadow between the ranks of figures. Lightening the ground makes a major contribution towards lightening the whole figure block.

Finally, the Ushabti Bone lightens the overall effect. The Croat Light Cavalry, the Dragoons (above), the Cannons and the Commanders are looser and require some paint between the figures.

With this amount of dry brushing to do I'm not being particularly careful. I'll be adding patches of 2mm Static Grass later in the process and this will cover any unsightly 'splodges'.

With this stage done I think the bases are already beginning to suggest how economical and effective this ultra-minimal approach is going to be.

Thirty Years War 6mm progress 4: the main colour

An impressive array, but further patching is needed because of the white undercoat and inconsistent mixing and application of the brown paint.

I wet painted the figure blocks (including the bases) with Vallejo Charred Brown. This may be thin paint but it's not supposed to be a wash. Controlling the consistency of the paint is a bit hit and miss. However you mix it, it tends to separate and to dry out.

The brown needs to be solid as it will be the finished colour of at least 50% of the figure blocks. This brown functions as the base colour of the ground, the shadow between the ranks of figures and any and all parts of the figures which I don't subsequently paint with any other colour.

The blocks may be only 60mm x 30mm but given the indentations represented by the figures and the sand on the bases, they have a very large surface area and positively drink paint. Getting 100% coverage is vital. I don't want any white spots in the middle of an area which is supposed to be deep shadow. The blocks therefore have to be touched up in good light.

It was at this point that I realised I should have undercoated in black gesso according to the original ‘recipe’. Had I done so, covering the undercoat completely wouldn’t be so important. As it was it took quite a lot of time to eliminate any white spots and I still have to go over the blocks again as the brown is a bit thin in places. I am currently awaiting a new supply of Charred Brown!

I know some people may think that basing before painting is a little eccentric, but had I painted the figures first I would not have been able to get at the ground between them given the way in which they are so packed together.

Thirty Years War 6mm progress 3: undercoating

Cannon and Commander: a black undercoat
would have been better...

Since my last report I snipped off all the pikes and improved the bases that had gaps in the texturing. I then used a scalpel to scrape off any sand that had got onto the figures.

Having completed the texturing of the bases I glued the guns in place. That wasn't done until this stage because the crew had bases needing to be hidden by the filler but the guns just sit on top.

I then applied a 50% solution of white gesso undercoat entirely covering the figures and bases and touched this up in good light. White on metal is not always easy to see in the middle of a 6mm pike block, but I expect the coverage was at least 95%.

Using white was a mistake. I should have used black gesso. It would have been easier to see against the bare metal and easier to cover in the next stage.

That concluded the preparation stage. The next stage is painting.

Thirty Years War 6mm progress 2: Curse of the bendy pikes

Bendy pikes.

I levelled the bases with Tetrion filler and then textured them with thinned PVA and fine sand. In larger scales I’d have brought this right up and around the feet of the figures to hide the integral figure bases, but for most of these unit bases I was able only to run the filler and sand around the outside border. This means that the figure bases still show on the insides as in the photo of some Swedish Horsemen below. The photo actually makes the gaps look accessible but I think I would have got Tetrion and PVA on the figures if I'd tried to texture in between them.

There’s not much I can do about it, and I’m hoping the gaps will be lost in the deep brown shadows which will which will be be basis of figures, unit base and all.

At this stage I had to think seriously about the pikes. I hate bendy pikes even more than exposed figure bases. Indeed, I’ve even ‘campaigned’ against cast pikes on 6mm (Baccus) and 10mm (Pendraken) figures in favour of separate wire pikes, but it drew little support from other punters. For some time it completely held me back from doing a pike army in 6mm or 10mm, but how could I be right and everyone else wrong? 

All Tetrioned and sanded.

 I had very serious reservations about the thin, fragile pikes on the 6mm Baccus figures but I gave them the benefit of the doubt. Well, I should have trusted my instincts. Despite my best attempts to straighten the pikes and to avoid touching them, the simple process of basing, undercoating and general handling has already proved to me that they are a total disaster. And this is nothing to the bashing they are going to get in use on the table. They are going to end up looking like floppy spaghetti prior to eventually breaking off.

Swedish Horsemen: Untextured gaps to be lost in shadow...

I now realise I have no choice but to snip all the pikes and replace them later. Snipping will be easy but replacing them is going to be fiddly and time-consuming. I'm inclined to snip them now which will give me a little better access to paint the pikemen, even though my painting will be minimal in the extreme and may come as a shock to some readers! I’ll then fit the flags attached to dress pins and finally replace the pikes with brown brush bristles. It can be done as shown here.

The pikes have been niggling me. Having made this decision I am feeling a lot more positive about this project.

Thirty Years War 6mm progress

Swedish pike-and-shot, Swedish horsemen, Detached shot, Cuirassiers,
Dragoons, German pike-and-shot, Croats, Arquebusiers.

I've based all the figures I had for Steven Thomas's Tilly's Very Bad Day. The the photo shows most of them (except for Commanders and Cannons), but it was only about half of what I need. Baccus was closed for renovation so I had to wait a while before placing a third order.

The bases are 60mm x 30mm MDF and steel, and the figures were glued on with PVA which gave me plenty of time to manipulate them into position. PVA is hardly the best glue for metal, but I've found it adequate for small scale figures. The figures are not perfectly aligned. This was deliberate.

Thirty Years War 6mm basing: Commanders, Cannons and Dragoons

Commanders and Cannons

I had originally intended to put three mounted figures on Commander bases but sometimes less is more and I think two figures actually looks better.

Cannons were one of the easiest basing decisions and will be represented by a single Saker and 4 crew. The officer and the figure with the linstock will be positioned behind the cannon and the figures with sponge and cannonball in front.

Dragoons

Dragoons were the most challenging decision. Dragoon bases represent the same number of men as Horse bases, but cramming the same number of figures onto a base just doesn't work.

I think the best way of representing Dragoons is to have a skirmish line at the front, with a horse-holder and horses positioned behind. This would look better if the bases were deeper, but I don't intend to do that so it's a question of doing the best I can in the limited space.

I need 3 units of Dragoons in total and I happen to have one packet of Baccus dismounted Dragoon figures, so I decided to split the packet between them and this just about provides a reasonable look. However, I think the skirmishers would look better with perhaps two or three more figures so I'll just have to get some more.

Thirty Years War 6mm basing: Horse and Light Horse

Original plan for Horse

Original plan for Light Horse

These photos show my original plans for Horse and Croat Light Horse. The top one shows 24 mounted figures which is in the correct ratio to the 48 figures I'm using on Pike+shot bases. The bottom one shows 16 Light Horse.

I had second thoughts about these ideas. I didn't think it was really necessary to use 24 figures for Horse, and I also felt that the Light Horse base looked a little overcrowded. I also thought it would be useful to use (subtly) different numbers to indicate Arquebusiers, Cuirassiers or Swedish Horseman. So I'm now planning to use 20 figures for Arquebusiers,  18 for Cuirassiers, 16 for Swedish Horsemen and 12 or 14 for Croats.

The Croats are acually  'Unarmoured Cavalry' (GNP08) from Baccus's Great Northern War Polish range. I understand that TYW Croats had a proportion of lancers but most would be pistol-armed so most of the spears need to be snipped.

Thirty Years War 6mm basing: Non-Swedish Pike+shot and Commanded Shot

German and Spanish Pike+shot

The non-Swedish Pike+shot units include Imperialist, Catholic League, Spanish and other German Foot fighting against the Swedes as well as Germans allied to the Swedes, but not regiments of German origin under Swedish command which I'm treating as Swedes!

These are going to have the same overall numbers as a Swedish Pike+shot unit, but I'm giving them a higher proportion of pikemen. The proportion isn't necessarily historically accurate but there are only so many ways to juggle 48 figures. It's all about giving an impression.

The front rank will be armoured pikemen and the shot will have a number of helmeted figures. This will make them look a little more armoured than the Swedes.

Commanded Shot

The Commanded Shot bases represent the same number of men as a Pike+shot units but I thought that 48 Musketeers would look a bit boring so I decided to use three ranks of Musketeers with four command figures at the back. It's useful with these small scale figures to provide some visual clues to distinguish unit types at a distance. Swedish Shot will include figures in Monmouth caps.

Thirty Years War 6mm basing: Swedish Pike+shot

A test base of Swedish Pike+shot sitting temporarily
on Blu-Tac. Command strip forms second row of
the pikes.

I've been looking forward to receiving my first orders of Baccus 6mm figures for the Tilly's Very Bad Day Thirty Years War project, not least because I wanted to see how many figures I'd actually end up putting on a 60mm x 30mm base.

But firstly let me say that the Baccus figures are very nice and remarkably well detailed for their scale. I'm no fan of cast pikes, however, and hope that enough layers of paint and varnish will provide a little protection for them against floppy spaghetti syndrome.

First up to consider, and most importantly, were the Pike+shot units. As my friend Ian pointed out, it's good to have the pikes looking really solid and I can't see that being achieved without having them at least four deep and roughly square. (There's enough room to have five ranks but that would probably an unnecessary extravagance.)

A slightly more aerial view. For the Swedes, some figures
in Monmouth caps will be mixed in.

Historically ensigns were placed somewhere behind the front ranks. With four ranks of figures, I can have the command strip with the ensigns as the second rank.

There isn't enough room to have any supernumeries standing outside the ranks. In theory these could look good, but I think you would need vastly more figures in rank to prevent the extra figures from over-balancing them.

Thirty Years War: Provisional 6mm basing plans for Tilly's Very Bad Day

Suggested unit basing for 15mm etc in Tilly's Very Bad Day

In Tilly's Very Bad Day each base represents a brigade. When I was going to do this project in 2mm I had intended to model different infantry formations, even though they all count the same under the rules. Now I'm doing this in 6mm, I'll just create generic basing designs and apply them to all armies.

Rules author Steven Thomas is an enthusiast for Impetus-inspired 'Big Bases' and I completely share his tastes. Steven's Thirty Years War armies are 15mm and his infantry are mounted 12 up in two ranks on 80mm x 40mm bases. That's fairly generous in comparison with, say, standard DBX basing and allows plenty of space around a unit to give a dioramic effect.

I’m doing this project using Baccus 6mm figures. The infantry come in 20 mm wide strips of 4 figures. For the pike-and-shot era with pikes flanked by muskets, there's a strong pull to put these figures on 60mm wide bases unless you want to do a lot of extra clipping. I could have gone for 80 mm x 40mm bases but I want to keep the table size reasonably small.

TVBD is measured in half-basewidths called TUMs. For 60mm wide bases a small table is 3' x 2' and a large one 5' x 3'. Those are very convenient sizes for not having to stretch too much and/or for playing at home. I can erect a 6’ x 4’ table but it’s a lot of trouble. 5’x 3’ is slightly larger than my dining-room table (which is 4’ 5.5” x 2’ 10.5”) but perhaps it will do at a pinch. If not, I’ve long been thinking of constructing a light-weight hardboard playing  surface which can be stored against a wall somewhere and dropped on the table as needed. (It might be made in two sections hinged with gaffer tape.)

Anyway, the bases I will be using are:

Commanders: 30mm rounds.
Cannons: 30mm squares.
Else: 60mm x 30mm rectangles.

Bear in mind that I'm not trying to suggest any faction-specific or period-specific formation. I just need some pike flanked by shot to suggest a pike-and-shot unit. The bases will never be 'realistic': they are purely symbolic - they are game tokens!

Arrangement of figures:

Commanders

3 mounted figures.

Horse

HHHHHHHHH
HHHHHHHHH

Light horse

These are supposed to be the same strength as Horse, but will look better with fewer figures irregularly placed. Exact number to be decided.

Dragoons

These also represent the same strength as Horse but may also look better with fewer figures. They will be depicted skirmishing with horse-holders and horses behind. Exact numbers to be decided.

Pike+shot

SSSS PPPP SSSS
SSSS PPPP SSSS 
SSSS PPPP SSSS 
 
Notwithstanding what I said in the opening paragraph about generic basing designs applied to all armies, I have been wondering whether I should take the opportunity to depict the Imperialists with a higher proportion of pikes. It doesn't affect their status under the rules. It's purely aesthetic. The obvious arrangement would be:

SSS PPPPPP SSS
SSS PPPPPP SSS
SSS PPPPPP SSS

Shot

SSSS SSSS SSSS
SSSS SSSS SSSS
SSSS SSSS SSSS

Cannons

4 crew around a cannon.

I have not shown any officers, ensigns, sargeants or drummers in any of the above diagrams. I do intend to have them but haven't yet decided where to put them.

Thirty Years War: 6mm Paint Plan for Tilly’s Very Bad Day

Some of my 10mm American Civil War figures:
I am basically following the same methodology.

This is a rough and incomplete draft of my plan for painting 6mm Thirty Years War armies for Steven Thomas's Tilly's Very Bad Day. I’ve been creating paint plans privately for years, but I thought it might be interesting to share the experience with readers. It's fairly provisional in its first form but will firm up over time. I will add a little explanatory detail here which I wouldn't necessarily do just for my own benefit.

Once I actually start wielding a paintbrush I'm always very careful to list paints used so I can match them if more models need to be added at a later date. I also mark jobs done so I know where I am and give myself encouragement.

The general approach for this project will be similar to the 'Base before painting' approach that I used on my 10mm ACW armies (see photo above). Last time I found that approach hard-going but it has its advantages:

• Once the preliminary basing, texturing and undercoating is done, the bases can be used on the table in games.
• You begin to gain a very good impression of what the figures are going to look like as you go along. You don’t have to wait till the last part of a process (e.g. a ‘magic dip’) before the figures look right.
• You can balance the colours used on each base.
• The result is effective.
• The method is potentially quick, but you need to be relaxed about the parts you can't reach and the lack of detail. You are basically just painting the outsides and the tops.

The main stages are as follows:

• Base figures.
• Texture bases.
• Undercoat with a wet application of Acrylic chocolate brown.
• 'Pop' figures with light, bright block painting that contrasts sharply with the brown background. If it doesn't stand out it's not worth adding.
• Leave brown in the shadows between ranks and for anything else that can be left brown e.g. legs, muskets, bags etc.
• Detail is minimised – overall impression at a distance is maximised, e.g. Faces will be painted but not hands.

The following section is a detailed painting ‘to-do’ list. Some of the detail below is not quite finished. I'm publishing it as it is. I was thinking of posting this a live document but I decided that would be too awkward.  It’s shown here as a list but my working document will be a Word table and some sections will be placed in parallel.

PRELIMINARIES
Make temporary trays for sorting figures into units. DONE
Decide on basing arrangements. TO BE FINALISED
UHU MDF and steel bases together.
Clip and sort into trays by unit. (Note Imperialist infantry have armoured front rank and some musketeers in helmets. Swedes have some musketeers in Monmouth caps.)
Clean castings if/as necessary.

BASING AND UNDERCOATING
PVA all figures (except cannon) to bases.
Tetrion bases.
PVA fine sand to bases.
Supergell cannon in place.
Undercoat with wet application of acrylic dark chocolate paint.

PAINT LARGE AREAS
Paint horses that are *not* brown.
Paint Imperialist cannon carriages…
Paint Swedish cannon carriages…
Do blackened armour on Imperialist Cuirassiers and Imperialist front-rank pikemen (Dark grey? Gunmetal?)

COAT COLOURS
Using light, bright paints, pick out coats:
Buff coats on Swedish Cavalry.
Swedish coloured infantry  uniforms:
Yellow, Blue etc
Paint Scots in hodden grey (brown) and light blue bonnets.
Remainder of Swedish infantry: pearl-grey.
Paint Swedish Commanded Shot – all pearl-grey or split into three colours/sections.
Paint remainder of Swedish cavalry in random colours...
Paint Imperial Pike+Shot, Shot, Harquebusiers, Dragoons, and Croats in random colours...

DETAIL
Dab faces flesh.
Paint Swedish hats....
Paint Imperialist hats...
Paint Swedish Monmouth caps...
Paint Imperialist pike helmets and shot in helmets as blackened.
Paint some Swedish Horsemen with blackened armour.

FINISHING DETAILS
Paint all pikes light wood.

METALLICS
Bronze cannon barrels.
Silver swords, pike points, burnished armour on remaining Swedish Horsemen.

BASE DECORATION
Static grass, ballast, tufts etc.

FINAL
Spray varnish to fix and protect.
[Ink wash and re-highlight???]
[Very light white feather-brush to lift???]
Add flags.

REFERENCES
Balagan's TYW Imperialist Painting Guide
Balagan's TYW Swedish Painting Guide
Balagan's TYW Spanish Painting Guide

Thirty Years War: Provisional unit plans for Tilly's Very Bad Day

Thirty Years War musketeers

I'm not sure exactly what units I'm going to end up with at this stage but I can make some provisional assumptions. In order to check storage needs at the same time I used CorelDraw to create an A4 grid of 60mm x 30mm rectangles, the size of the bases I will be using.

In each grid division I wrote in a particular type of unit and I was then able to play around with the the numbers and balance.

I know that each army will have one unit of Shot and one unit of Dragoons, 4 Generals and 2 Cannons. The Imperialists will also have a unit of Croats. The rest will be made up of more-or-less equal proportions of Horse and Pike+shot units but I won't know exactly how many until I have sorted the incoming figures and, where appropriate, mixed in additional figures.

All the Swedish cavalry will be Horsemen, whilst the Imperialists will be split between Cuirassiers and Harquebusiers.

The Imperialist Pike+shot will include a front rank of armored pikemen and some musketeers with helmets. The Swedish Pike+shot will include some figures in Monmouth caps.

One Swedish unit will be Scots in hodden grey and bonnets, 7 will have coloured coats and three will be in pearl-grey.

And so, making a best guess I reckon that the armies will look something like this:

Swedes
12 Pike+shot
10 Horsemen
1 Shot
1 Dragoons
4 Generals
2 Cannon

Imperialists
12 Pike+shot
5 Cuirassiers
4 Harquebusiers
1 Croats
1 Shot
1 Dragoons
4 Generals
2 Cannon

Each of these is exactly 30 bases which is bang on target.

Roughly how big were Thirty Years War battles of the Swedish phase?

Battle of Lützen 1632

As I eventually want to use Tilly's Very Bad Day to play historical scenarios, I thought I'd better get a handle on exactly how big the major battles were during the Swedish phase of the Thirty Years War (1630-1635).

This is a ‘quick and dirty’ exercise so I’m happy to grab figures where I can. I started with Steven Thomas's timeline of the war before moving on to Richard Bonney’s The Thirty Years’ War 1618-1648. I also have William Guthrie’s two-volume Battles of the Thirty Years War but that’s rather too detailed for this purpose.

Where I have only crude totals, I’ve converted as if the men were all Pike+shot. The various different labels given to factions may need improvement.

The numbers show (1) Actual men, and in parenthesis (2) Representation at the lowest rate where 1 base = 1000 Pike+shot, 500 Horse or 8 Cannon, and (3) Representation at the highest rate where 1 base = 2000 Pike+shot, 1000 Horse or 16 Cannon. The results have been rounded to whole bases.

It can be seen that the numbers of bases required is reasonable and can be tailored to suit what players have available by changing the conversion rate. The default pick-up game in comparison is set at 15-30 units per army which gives comparable numbers of bases. In other words, if you have armies of 15-30 bases you should be able to play scenarios based on these battles without any problems.

Battle of Werben 1631

Swedes vs Holy Roman Empire/Catholic League

Swedes
16,000 entrenched (16) (8)

Holy Roman Empire
23,000 (23) (12)

First Battle of Breitenfeld 1631

Swedes & Saxons vs Holy Roman Empire/Catholic League

Catholics
21,400 infantry (21) (11)
10,000 cavalry (20) (10)

Swedes
14,842 infantry (15) (7)
8,064 cavalry (16) (8)

Saxons
13,000 infantry (13) (6.5)
5,225 cavalry (10) (5)

Battle of Rain / Battle of the River Lech 1632

Swedes vs Holy Roman Empire/Catholic League

Swedes
40,000 (40) (20)

Holy Roman Empire/Catholic League
25,000 (25) (13)

Battle of Lützen 1632

Swedes vs Holy Roman Empire

Swedes
12,786 infantry (13) (6)
6,210 cavalry (12) (6)
60 cannon (8) (4)

Holy Roman Empire
9,870 infantry (10) (5)
6,900 cavalry (14) (7)
38 cannon (5) (2)
Reinforcements: 2,300 cavalry (5) (2)

Battle of Nördlingen 1634

Holy Roman Empire/Catholic League/Spain vs Swedes/ Heilbronn League

Catholics
23,000 infantry (23) (12)
13,000 cavalry (26) (13)
32 cannon  (4) (2)

Spanish
13,500 infantry (14) (7)
4,500? Cavalry (9) (5)
Reinforcements: 3,000 Catholic cavalry (6) (3)

Protestants
16,300 infantry (16) (8)
9,300 cavalry (19) (9.5)
62 cannon (8) (4)

Battle of Wittstock 1636

Swedes vs Holy Roman Empire & Saxons

Swedes
16,000 (16) (8)

Holy Roman Empire and Saxons
22,000 (22) (11)

Thirty Years War: Additional 6mm figures for Tilly's Very Bad Day

Scottish musketeers.

After some more thought I decided get some additional figures types:

WEC05 - Musketeers, Shoulder, Monmouth cap
I hadn't realised these were also appropriate for TYW Swedes, but Monmouth caps are mentioned in Steven's Thomas's TYW Swedish painting guide.

WEC17 - Horse - Hat
Just an additional pack so I have more Swedes in hats than pots. They'll all be mixed together

WEC 19 (mounted) Dragoons
For Imperialist harquebusiers. I'm not otherwise using this pack. They've got carbines and look like a reasonably good match for later harquebusiers.

WEC31 - Lowland Pikeman, advance
WEC33 - Lowland Musketeers, shoulder
For Scots in Swedish service. This is a very expensive way of filling one base,  but I couldn't resist them and I'll just sell on the surplus (or start a Scots ECW army?.

GNP 8 - Unarmoured cavalry
From the GNW Polish range for Croat and other irregular light horse.

POW02 - Large Church and churchyard
POW03 - Large House
These look fairly Germanic and are for a village feature.

These will probably not be my final purchases as I still need to confirm how many figures I'm actually going to put on the bases and how many bases I might want to field in order to create the largest historical scenarios.

Thirty Years War: Bases for 6mm figures for Tilly's Very Bad Day

Battle of Noerdlingen 1634

My normal practice for basing multiple figure stands is a combination of 2mm MDF and sheet steel. This gives the figures stability in transit when I put them in boxes lined with magnetic sheeting and on the table because of the additional weight. The depth gives you something to pick them up by.

However, I was not keen to use 3mm+ deep bases for figures that were themselves only 6mm high. Because of my firm requirement for steel over MDF, my friend Ian suggested using steel alone but that seemed fraught with difficulties as it is actually very awkward to prize a thin steel sheet from the magnetic plastic without having long nails or damaging the figures.

Printed template for mass-producing storage trays.

Ian suggested that if I inserted a sheet of paper between the surface of the storage boxes and the bottom of the bases, the bases would remain adequately in place but I could use the paper to 'peel and lift' them away when it was time to deploy them.

This worked a treat - thank you, Ian - and I've even started to create little paper trays so that the bases can be lifted out even more easily. Trays made from 80 gsm paper are a little weak and probably won 't last. 160 gsm card interferes with the magnetism. Somewhere in between I expect 100 gsm or 120 gsm paper to provide an optimum trade-off.

This arrangement would save me 2mm of unnecessary, artificial height. But something still tells me that it is a risky idea. Bases 3mm+ deep will give me (and others) something to grab - other than the figures themselves - when moving them around the table. Perhaps I will add the MDF after all!