From RobertT: 6mm Swedish Cavalry (45 points)

This post is the reason why I joined this challenge.  My mate Steve and I started playing the Great Northern War using Beneath the Lily Banners supplement "Talon and Claw" with big battalions (72 figures) and big squadrons (12-14 figures).  Which is fine except that Steve says he "can't paint".  So I stepped in and painted both armies in exchange for a hardback copy of the rules.  We were having a grand old time with victories going back and forth, then Baccus released "new improved" Swedes with more dynamic poses and, without any notice, about 200 Swedish cavalry landed on my doormat.

 

Hopefully it is possible to see the size difference between the old sculpts at the front and the new ones at the back.

 

 

To give an idea of how long the new arrivals have been sitting staring at me, I had to brush the cobwebs off the undercoat before I could begin.  And then I decided to paint anything BUT these, adopting the same mindset of someone who leaves all their homework to the last possible minute before going back to school.  I even tidied my room before finally biting the bullet.  Here they are having almost completed the horses.  Once these are done I can get on with my own Saxons, Poles and Cossacks.

 

 

I have completed three squadrons of Swedish cavalry of 14 figures each.  They are based but not textured.  Steve has found some Vallejo texture gloop which he wants to try out, so I have painted the horse bases "generic wargame brown" and left them at that.  Hopefully 42 points is accurate for this state.

 

 

They are in a "typical" Swedish wedge shaped charge which looks right.  

I have a palsy in my right hand which can be quite vexing so I tend to use inks at this scale.  Various browns (Burnt Umber, Sepia and Antelope Brown) with different amount of thinners for the horses and thinned Prussian Blue for the uniforms.  Hence the white undercoat instead of the more traditional black.  To get the yellow facings to stand out, I had to do a quick dab of tan first.  At this scale I am not interested in painting every little detail and the uniform shade might not be 100% accurate.  But they look like Swedes on horses and I can tell which direction they are facing.

When I was painting my Ancient Spanish for Hannibal's army, I used contrast paints instead of ink to get a lot more variety and they came out really well.

To do the hat lace and the gold trim round the flags, I deployed my secret weapon.  Gel pens.  I cannot recommend them enough for this scale and 15mm too.  Store them on their side, not tip down or up as gravity does bad things to them.  I thought they deserved their own photo.

Final shots of today's unit charging one of my Russian battalions.  In this scale the massed ranks really look like a battalion, even though the footprint is the same as 12 15mm figures.

 

 

 

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Sylvain: 6mm is my favorite scale and your nicely done Swedish cavalry reinforces my addition to it. They are so tiny yet so easy to visually "read" as cavalry on the board, even at arms length. Your colors are vibrant and they really look in motion. I will add 3 points for the flags. It has been an honor to be your minion; "à la prochaine".

 

 

From SteveG: Ancient Germanic Cavalry (70 points)

German Cavalry 28mm metal mostly by Warlord Games.   Love the riders.  Chock full of personality.  Sadly their horses are emaciated nags, so I’ve swapped a few out for the excellent plastic “light horses” by Wargames Atlantic.   Much better proportioned and lively looking steeds!

Warlord Rider, Wargames Atlantic horse 

OG Warlord Games 

 Also shown below is a very much inferior plastic old Wargames Factory Germanic Cavalry. To be avoided unless you’re paid to take them  IMHO  😊.    

Wargames Factory

Victrix- slightly modded

Warlord Rider, WA horse

Steve G 
7 x 28mm cavalry = ? 70 points 

From Millsy:

I'm so glad you've joined us this year Steve and that I have the privilege of minioning your posts. I find myself looking for them each Friday when I start processing posts. There's just something about your style that really floats my hobby boat.

Maybe it's your choice of subject matter, or your brushwork, or your amazing basing. Ultimately I think it's a mix of all of them and a bunch of other stuff too.

Good call swapping out some of the horses. Such brave looking warriors deserve a mount of equal robustness.

70 more points added to your tally mate. Can't wait for next week!

Cheers,

Millsy

From TeemuL: 7th Cavalry and old Elementals (35 points)

I had a quite nice week last week, I was healthy, I was not travelling and other hobbies didn't take all the time. So I managed to complete quite a lot of minis, these were supposed to be published on Sunday, but I didn't have time to write the texts.

Here's a group of 7th Cavalry, Black Sheep Miniatures from Warbases. Nice metal minis, varied poses, equipment and clothes, good for skirmish games in Old West. I guess some mounted minis would be nice to have, too, especially for Cavalry.

I painted them following the marketing photos and I'm rather happy with them. Trousers could be lighter blue and jackets darker blue, but there's a difference and they look quite nice - at least when there are no comparisons. I based them like my other Old West minis and dusted the boots and trousers a little bit. I like the yellow scarfs, they are not too bright.

Then something from the previously mentioned second hand bargain box I bought earlier this year and painted the Black Drake from earlier in the Challenge. These are Earth and Fire Elementals from Games Workshop, 1984.

Solid metal minis of course from that era, they even have 25mm round metal bases built in, so I didn't glue any additional bases on them. All in one piece, I like it! C34 is the code for them, stamped on the base and introduced in GW's Spring 1985 Journal.

So the left one is Earth Elemental and is very stony. May be some green moss would have made a nice detail, but I went with a simple approach. But to make it a bit more interesting, I tried to paint "supernatural" eyes to him, glowing blue... The eyes look ok, but I'm not sure do they look glowing. :)

The right one is Fire Elemental. The fiery part worked ok, but the elemental itself is a bit bland? I had a plan to paint him bright white and reflect some of the fire, but white is such a difficult to paint. From the side you can see the lizardy eyes I painted, and it/he/she looks much better from the side or back than from the front.

That's 7 28mm minis in total for 35 points. I have something for the paradise coming up and if I manage to paint something more, I'll combine them all on the final post on Wednesday.

From Millsy:

Lovely brushwork Teemu! I really like the way you have highlighted the face on the Earth Elemental and the blending on the flames/smoke on the Fire Elemental is amazing.

For me the pick of the post is the US Cavalry even so. The blue you have chosen with really pop on the table and the desert themed basing really looks the part.

Great work all round mate and another 35 points for your tally!

Cheers,
Millsy

From KentG: 28mm cavalry (320pts)

Well here we are back again, this time it’s all cavalry 

The funny thing is I had said that after the last challenge 

I wouldn’t be doing much cav well you can see how that plan worked 

Out. There’s three different lots of cav, not sure what I was thinking

All those hand painted shields took way to long especially 

The checkered pattern

These first 12 are Spanish Jinetes by Gripping Beast

Not the most detailed figures but they still really nicely

Next up just because who needs more detailed shield yip me

So here Gallic cavalry by Gripping beast again I actually really enjoyed 

These 

 I had a lot of fun painting these next 8 figures by

Bloody miniatures, the detail on these English Civil war minis

Is so really nice and great to paint

Black is always a fun colour to paint

As most if not all of us know, but I’m 

Really pleased with the result on this chap

No flag on the pole here the new owner of

These figures haven’t made up his mind yet.

So let’s total up for the week 

32 x 28mm cavalry @ 10pts each 320pts 

Which means I’ve hit my target for this challenge 

From Millsy:

A wonderful batch of cavalry Kent, all beautifully painted as ever and with a great mix of coats colours on the horses which adds so much interest and variety. 

My initial though was the shield designs were decals and then I read your copy. These are absolutely brilliant mate, particularly the checks which are an absolute bugger to get right regardless of scale.

This 320 point cavalry bomb blasts you through your original 1,500 point total and we're not even halfway! Please let me know your revised total and I will update the roster accordingly.

Cheers,

Millsy

From LeeH: Don Cossacks and Officer (90 Points)

This week I have a unit of Don Cossacks charging across my desk. It is said that just hearing their cry of “Hurrah” could send entire battalions into retreat. Even Napoleon seemed impressed by these wild undisciplined horsemen, stating “Cossacks are the finest light troops among all that exist. If I had them in my army, I would go through all the world with them."

The Cossacks had a fearsome reputation and formed fast units that could exploit open flanks and harry retreating troops. They were excellent for reconnaissance when they could be bothered to report back on the position of enemy troops rather than chase after them. It was said (mainly by the French) that the easiest way to distract Cossckas was to present them with an unguarded baggage train. This unit is painted as Don Cossacks with a dark blue uniform, red trim, and a broad red stripe down the leg of loose-fitting trousers. They wear various cloaks and many have ill-matching headgear, from tall fur busbies to soft forage-style caps. All bar the officer carries a lance and I can testify to the sharpness of these…they drew blood on several occasions when I let my attention wander while handling them! 

Unlike the regular troops, the officer was cast as a single figure. That said, I decided to assemble all the figures before painting…a practice that doesn’t have universal approval, judging from a very quick search online. I think I prefer this method, and while it makes painting some parts of the model a little more tricky, overall, I found it easier than trying to combine painted figures without destroying the paintwork. 

I’m happy with how these turned out although I think I’ll take a rest before painting more cavalry! 

(Scoring: 9x28mm Mounted =90 Points)

What a fine troop of Cossacks, Lee! As a unit, the effect of all the browns and the blue uniforms is very pleasing to the eye. Beautiful painting. And as always, your basing is very effective, giving these troops a good wintery feel. Well done indeed!

Martijn

From KentG: 28mm ECW Parliamentarian cavalry plus a couple peasants union generals (pts 130)

This week has been an interesting one Covid in the house did end up 

Eating into my time, thought if I isolated in the painting room I could

Spend more time but that doesn’t seem to work in the real world

So the following is a mix of minis

First up 3 28mm Perry union generals

Another couple of 3D printed 28mm figures from 

the peasant set by Wargames Atlantic

This young lady looks like she is thinking

do not mess with me I've had a bad day

either she has stolen a pillow or a bag of wheat

This is the last of the 28mm Warlord games cavalry I have

 except for a couple of figures I might base be themselves 

even though they are a pretty basic sculpt they still look cool

the banner was just copied off the free banners on the Warlord site

One more figure a single cav that was left over

            Points

            2 x 28mm foot 5pts each = 10pts

            9 x 28mm cavalry 10pts each = 90pts 

            3 x 28mm union cav 10 pts each 30pts

                                                          Total 130pts

From Millsy: Boo! Hiss! More horrible regicides! Maybe they'll pick up a dose of COVID and stay home instead of chasing the rightful King around with murderous thoughts in their heads. Very nice brushwork all around here Kent and the basing on the generals really sets them off a treat. I like the way you've set up the grazing horse so it looks like it is snacking on the flowers!