Pandemic Projects: Finally some ECW progress!

Unlike most people, I have been very unproductive during the COVID 19 pandemic.  I use games and events to motivate myself, and since none have been happening, I have found myself lacking in motivation. It also doesn't help that I have very little unfinished from Most of my projects,  ECW and Napoleonic being the outliers.

about 2 weeks ago, I was really eager to paint but I didn't have much left of my ImagiNations, and I was not really feeling up to painting AWI.  I remembered that I have a pretty decent pile of Plastic Warlord ECW figures kicking around, and decided that I would at least pull them out and  take a look.  A day later I had decided on a new basing(and only slightly different) for the Infantry and I had primed Lord Say and Sele's regiment and begin painting.  I also decided that i would like to use Beneath the Lilly Banners 3rd ed to play my Civil war games.  Although the rules are meant for 1670-1720ish, I use them with one or 2 house rules for my Imaginations. The rules have everything I think you would need to play games 30 years earlier as well.

Before this, I had the Cuirassier unit, Lord Brooke's regiment(in purple) the Saker, and  Lord Essex character figures painted, as well as 2/3rds of  the Dragoons.  In the last 2 weeks, I have painted 4 Dragoons, all of Lord Saye and Sele's regiment(40 figures) and the 12 figure unit of cavalry(Essex's horse regiment, also frequently called Sir Philip Stapleton's regiment.

All the ECW figures I currently have painted.

40 figures of Lord Brooke's Regiment

40 figures of Lord Saye & Sele's Regiment of foot.

Lord Essex's or Sir Philip Stapleton's Regiment

Sir William Balfour's Lifeguard Regiment

Dragoons

Sir Henry Fairfax, Saker with master gunner,
and Lord Essex

the regiment split us as I intend to field them
in BtLB3

Lord brooks is based on 40x40mm bases, 4 figures to a base.  I decided to change to 45x60mm bases for the musketeers, 6 to a base, and 45x80mm bases for the pike and command, 8 to a base.  this works out far better if I decide to use a system that doesn't require huge units(which I am), so I can put 2 bases of 6 musketeers together with a base of 8 pike and have a standard 3 base unit in Beneath the Lilly Banners 3rd ed. i had the bases sitting around from all the Perry napoleonics. they use 60x45mm for cavalry, and 40x45 for infantry. I glue 2 40x45mm together to get the 40x85mm, and reinforce it with strategic figure placement and the magnetic sheeting i use for storage on the bottom. they come out surprisingly sturdy.

The cavalry basing stays exactly the same, except each unit of 12 becomes 2 squadrons of 6 figures in BtLB3.

I have enough figures to make 2 more units of 12 cavalry, 2 more units of 40 infantry, and enough firelock storm Party figures to make 5 stands of 6.  that will double what is painted right now.  When using Beneath the Lilly Banners 3rd ed, that all doubles to 8 pike and shotte infantry  units, and 10 cavalry units.  Plus I have a unit of 12 dismounted dragoons waiting to be based. 

Making a Terrain Mat

Since I moved to Edmonton last fall, I haven't done much Historical gaming.  Part of this is the group that is here, but part of it was also a combination of my looking to do something different.  However, my favourite period is Napoleonics, and I like big games.  I had the table space but  I did not have a larege enough game mat to  play a big Napoleonic game.

I set out to make myself a 12x5' game mat to host big napoleonics on.  my biggest hurdle was getting the scenic grass i wanted.  I Picked up a shaker of Scenic Express EX881 Summer Grass blend  "flock and Turf"  last spring while i was at Cold Wars .  the stuff is a mixture of coarseness's   of flock and turf  but the green is a nice bright green like the original GW Static grass.   it's really nice looking. 

the problem with scenic Express Products is they are not distributed in Canada, nor does scenic express apparently ship here either.  while searching the internet i found a website called Model Train Stuff  which sells scenic express Products.   I ordered 4 "Eco"bags of 48oz grass.  their estimated shipping time was 2+ weeks, but it arrived in less then 10 days!  The service was good, they let me know when it shipped and provided a tracking number.  I'll definitely consider buying stuff from them again.

anyway, I also bought myself a new Phone, which i used to take the pics of the mat making process. but before I began I wanted to test it's usefulness at taking pictures of miniatures, so i stepped over to my display case and took a single shot of my small ECW collection, and this was the result (of one try only). I was quite satisfied.

The earl of Essex and company. all Warlord Games figures.

anyway, on to hte mat making.  I decided to go with a process i have raed about of several blogs and post on The Miniatures Page.  you take a peice of cloth (in this case a Canvas Dropcloth form home Depot) and coat it with a combination of Acrylic Caulk with latex, Latex paint, and some sand.  then before it dries you cover it in teh flock/grass and pat it down.

Here is a lsit of everything i used:

4x48 oz  Scenic Express "Flock and Turf" Summer Grass Blend (plus shaker I had around, $60)
12x 300ml DAP Alex caulk( a contractor pack, $25)
1x 1 gallon of CIL flat brown paint( $30)
1x Everbilt 12x9' canvas Dropcloth($36)
1x 5 gallon orange Home Depot Bucket.($4)
4x handfuls of concrete sand
1x random piece of plastic from  window blinds i found in the back room(to stir, Free)


Total cost in Materials was $155 CDN.

I did not include the sand because i didn't use much (4 handfuls?)  and it's from a 10KG bag of concrete sand i bought like 8 years ago for another project.  but a bag of the sand will run you about 10-15 bucks.

I doubt you could by a 12x5 mat for that price.

Matierials

first i laid out the dropcloth on my table, and cut it down to a little over 5 feet wide.  the Cloth is actually  about 3 inches short of 12 feet.

Cloth laid out and cut to size

Next I grabbed my caulking Gun and squeezed all 12 caulking tubes into the bucket.

Empty caulking tubes(right) and their former contents(left)

I then added a little less tehn half a gallon of the Brown paint and started Mixing.  I added 4 hand fulls of sand, one at a time, after teh caulking and paint ad been thoroughly mixed.

Mixed caulking, paint and sand.

Using a pair of Latex Gloves, i  spread the mixture over the dropcloth by hand. if you put it on too thin you see the texture of the canvas.  but it doesn't need to be really thick either. the dropcloth had some seams in it is i made it thicker around those to help hid them.

Mat partially grassed.

I then began sprinkling the grass on the mat by hand.  I didn't want full coverage, but at the same time i don't want a lot of the caulk and sand to show through, since it won't be dry brushed or have any depth. but you still want some showing through.

the Mat fully grassed

the total time from laying out the cloth to finishing the grassing was about 2.5 hours.

I'm pretty pleased with the results so-far.  The mat is still drying as i write this, so I'll post again when the mat is dry and i can get some closeups of the final result.

On a Whim....

While I was at Hotlead this year, i picked up a few things, including a  Victrix British light battalion conversion pack(a rare find in person these days, since victrix metal line was sold to brigade) and a warlord ECW cannon & specialist pack.

when exams started , on a whim, i sat down and apinted the cannon team with the  gunner specialist from the specialist pack.   I had decided to paint something different after the relative monotony of the Peninsular  Napoleonics.  despite a total lack of opponents I still intend, at some point int the future, to finish my ECW army.

This really is a nice piece, an the addition of the specialist aiming the gun really  makes it that much nicer. the Warlord ECW  line really is their best offerings.  the sculpting is head and shoulders above that of the Napoleonics they've been releasing.


Next is a set of Perry Plastic Carabiniers I painted 2 weeks ago. this is part of my friend Derek's French army. you'll be seeing more of Derek's French as I paint it over the summer.

These were quite nice to paint(as perry miniatures often are). I'll be doing a regiment of these when I eventually do my own French contingent.


and finally is a random photo of my peninsular war British rushing to defensive positions  at el matadaro 

 I had taken some pictures close in on my new fur mat when I set it up for the first time. I got bored 2 weeks ago, and grabbed one of the pics and photoshopped in a background. this is the result.

Stay tuned for more...

back from my trip.

I got back from Edmonton Alberta yesterday, where I was visiting my sister and nephews.  We drove out west, and camped along the way.  We were out there for 2 weeks, and in transit for about 6 days(there and back). 

I took a bunch of figures to assemble(but not paint, I decided to take a break). I did this because I was staying with my sister, and she lives in the country about 40 minutes northwest of Edmonton, and I do not drive.

I took with me 16 perry dismounted Dragoons, 16 Perry Hussars, 24 Warlord ECW cavalry, 120 Warlord Pike & Shotte Infantry, and 30 firelocks.  As you can see i only got about 1/3rd of the pike & shotte infantry done, and and 60% of the Firelock units.  Still, not bad considering i spent most of my time with my nephews, and on the weekends with my sister. My Nephews are 5 years 1.5 years old, so they are a handful.


We visited Fort Edmonton Park while I was out there. Fort Edmonton was a Northwest Mounted Police outpost that has been restored to it's 1848-era state.  I would have taken pics, but my I'm cursed with a habit of forgetting my Camera.

While I♦ was out there the Edmonton Wargamers Group happened to have a meeting, so i decided to see what  EWG Meetings and meeting place were like.  These seem like a good group of guys.  They meet the 1st and 3rd tuesdays of each month, at a clubhouse.  The club hose was nicer then MIGS, but they lacked the extensive storage space MIGS has, and their terrain collection was not as good as I'm getting used to. again, I'd take pictures, but my camera cruse had struck again.

All in all it was a good trip.  Now that I'm back I'll begin posting again

Lord Brookes Regiment of Foote

I'm just about to head off to the Club for (hopefully) a night of gaming.  I just finished the latest Stands of Lord Brooke's Musketeers and thought i would post some pics.

32 figures strong at this point. Over the weekend I plan to finish the last 8 musketeers and bring the regiment up to it's final strength of 40 figures.

More ECW

After finishing the remainder of the FIW collection I have on-hand, I decided I wanted to switch modes for a bit. I decided to try painting up some of the Warlord Pike & Shotte plastic Pikemen and Command i have laying around.

I decided to paint them up as Lord Brooke's Regiment for 2 reasons. The main uniform colour is purple, and the standard happens to be on the Parliamentarian Flag sheet included with my Pike & Shotte Battalia Box.  I find that the heavy paper that Warlord Games prints their flag sheets on is too heavy for for the bending that i do with my standards. It does not bend smoothly and the surface can actually begin to crease and crack under the pressure. so I scanned the sheet at 600 DPI .  I chose 600DPI so that i can print it off much larger then the original without sacrificing  too much detail.

This regiment will be roughly 5 times the size it is now(40 Figures) when it is finished. there will be 8 more pike, as well as 24 muskets  after this one is done the next unit i intend to paint will be Lord Seye & Sele's  regiment.  I'm aiming to have 4 pike & shotte foot regiments, 2 cavalry regiments(12 figures each), 1 Dragoon regiment(12 foot & 12 Mounted), 2 firelock regiments(12 & 18 figures) and 1 artillery piece for my parliamentarian army..  If by the time i finish that, i don't have an opponent, I'll likely do a royalist contingent of roughly the same size.

I'm also looking for a good set of rules to use for ECW. I know Warlord is releasing an ECW supplement for Black Powder at some point, but no news on when yet. I've played 1644, and wasn't overly impressed, especially with the morale being completely divorced from casualties.  I am Curious to see what For God, King and Country by the Canadian Wargamers Group is like.  I've played Habitants & Highlanders as well as Rocket's Red Glare and enjoyed them.  If anyone has a copy of  For God, King and Country they would part with, Let me know.

ECW Dragoons

Since mid march I've been trying to talk other gamers at the club(MIGS) into doing 28mm English Civil War. Warlord Games has a wonderful Pike & Shotte line of 28mm plastics that will do very nicely. Even better, they are quite cheap.

I started in early April by picking up a box of Warlord Games Dragoons from Bayshore Hobbies.  the box comes with 12 metal riders, 12 plastic horses, and 12 dismounted dragoon plus plastic bases(50x50 for the cav, 40x40 for the infantry). I got them on sale for $39.95 CDN, but the regular price is $44.95CDN.  I Quite like these figures. I have only painted up 2/3rds of the mounted and 1/3rd of the dismounted figures so far, as a teaser to show of the figures, and get others into the period. Since no one else ihas bought into it yet., I feel no rush to complete these.

The only niggle I have with them has nothing to do with the figures. The cavalry base sprue comes with enough 50x50 mm bases to do all the mounted figures, but the infantry base sprues only have 2 40x40mm bases, 2 20x40mm bases, 2 20x60mm bases, and a load of individual bases. I don't know about everyone else, but i like to have all my units on the same size bases.  I do not need tons of individual bases. As I understand it, these base sprues were designed by Renedra, not Warlord, so it is really not their fault.  luckily, this is only a minor problem, since bases are easily bought or made elsewhere. it also helped that last weekend Derek Watson came down to MIGS with a bag of 40x40mm aluminum bases, to give away, that happen to be exactly the same as the Warlord bases. so now i have no shortage for them.

That being said, I have already purchased a Battalia box from Bayshore for 74.95. The Battalia box contains 80 pike & shot infantry, 24 cavalry,  and 10 firelock musketeers. This is a great starter for anyone thinking about getting into the period. I actually got 11 firelocks in my box.  If anyone has an extra firelock musketeer they'd be willing to part with, let me know. I'd like to round out the unit to 12.