Māori warriors by Eureka Miniatures

I have just finished painting this lovely set of Eureka Miniatures‘ 28mm Māori warriors. They are primarily designed for the inter-tribal conflicts, before Europe started to make an impact with the introduction of the musket that asymmetrically changed the face of traditional tribal warfare.

However, these figures should also be able to be used for the earlier parts of the colonial New Zealand Wars of the 1840s, so they’ll bulk up my existing war-parties of figures by Empress Miniatures.

Māori are the indigenous Polynesian people of New Zealand. Māori originated with settlers from East Polynesia, who arrived in New Zealand in several waves of canoe voyages between roughly 1320 and 1350AD.

Conflict between tribes was common, fought with the traditional weapons as depicted on these figures. If you want to know more about the Māori methods of warfare in pre-European days, you could check out an article I wrote in January 2022 for issue Wi409 of Wargames Illustrated.

The Eureka figures are beautifully sculpted. It is evident that they have paid great attention to the way Māori toa (warriors) move, as the posing includes some distinctive stances that are quite unlike those of other warriors around the world.

For example, fifth from left in the above picture (also visible in the picture at the end of this posting) you can see a warrior brandishing his patu (adze), his feet splayed in what appear to be odd directions, replicating the sort of dancing trot with quick restricted strides that Māori warriors used – and still use today in traditional ceremonies.

Note also that some of these figures are poking their tongues out. The gesture of a warrior flicking his tongue in and out like a lizard is a traditional challenge.

One of the warriors is a musician blowing a pūtātara, a type of trumpet with a carved wooden mouthpiece and a bell made from New Zealand’s small native conch shells or triton shells. We used to have a pūtātara at my work, and boy it was hard to get a sound out of it!

The set includes an ariki (chieftain), shown on the right in the above picture. He is wearing an elaborate cloak denoting his rank.

The other warriors are dressed in pirāpaki or pākē kūrure, which were garments of strands made from the leaves of harakeke (flax) with the fibre exposed in some sections to create lines or geometric patterns.

The right rear figure is the other musician included in the set. He is whirling a purerehua (bull-roarer) above his head, which produces a mournful moaning sound.

You can also see how I have based my figures individually, but can put them into sabots to group them. The ferns, by the way, are model railway scenery produced by Noch. They come in a garish green plastic colour, but a coat of paint soon fixed that!

Some of the figures are wearing a rain cloak called a pākē or hieke, essential for the often cold and wet conditions of the New Zealand winter. It was made from raw flax partly scraped and set in close rows on a plaited fibre base.

Another nice thing about the Eureka figures is that they have a range of body types. So you get everyone from tall and muscular to shorter and thicker-set.

The faces, too, are wonderful. When painting these figures, I could almost recognise some of my Māori friends. I am sure I have worked with that bearded fellow on the right!

I didn’t attempt to paint detailed facial moko (tattoos), but merely hinted at them with a green wash on some faces.

These two warriors kneeling in front of a meeting house (a 3D-print from Printable Scenery) are armed with the taiaha, a close-quarters staff weapon used for short, sharp strikes or stabbing thrusts with efficient footwork on the part of the wielder.

The taiaha consists of the rau (striking blade), which is a shaft of oval cross-section; and the upoko (head) with a large arero (tongue) extending out from the mouth in the Māori gesture of defiance, which could also be used to jab the opponent. These taiaha have a tauri (collar) of red feathers.

The taiaha requires skill, speed, and agility, which is why it was only wielded by high-ranking warriors. The specialty of the taiaha was defence. A master wielder could last an entire battle untouched, at the same time killing or disabling many of his attackers.

One of the figures is a little larger than the others, and along with his taiaha he is also carrying a fishing net. I have depicted him as Māui, a demi-god and a trickster in Māori mythology, famous for his exploits, cleverness, superhuman strength and shapeshifting ability.

One story about Māui describes how the sun used to move across the sky far faster than it does today, zipping back and forth so quickly that the day had barely begun before it was over. Māui would watch his family at work and, no matter how hard they tried, it was impossible for them to finish their chores before the sun was gone.

Māui decided he needed to slow down the sun. So he persuaded his brothers to come with him and gather great mountains of flax, weaving it together into long ropes. They then tied these into a great net – big enough to catch the sun.

With the help of his brothers, Māui caught the sun in the net and beat it with his grandmother’s magic jawbone. The sun was so bruised and bloodied by this battering that from that time on it could only limp slowly across the sky, slowing its passage and ensuring each day is now long enough.

I’m sure a net strong enough to catch the sun would be a powerful weapon in a wargame!

I used GW Contrast paints for all of these figures. As I get older, I find I am getting lazier and sloppier in my painting. Certainly these figures don’t bear the close-up inspection that some of my earlier work could happily withstand. But from any distance they still suffice as ‘wargames standard’.

Trying out Valour & Fortitude

A set of new Napoleonic rules? Ingeniously simple rules? Only eight pages (and that includes the front cover and a quick reference sheet!)? Written by wargames legends Jervis Johnson, Alan Perry and Michael Perry? And continuously supported and updated by them? Hmm, intriguing. Oh, and they’re completely free. Wow, how could I resist?!

Yep, Jervis Johnson and the Perry twins released their free downloadable Valour & Fortitude rules late last year. Of course, I snapped them up straight away. But although I have loads of Napoleonic troops, I don’t have a wargames table. So despite enjoying reading through the rules, I couldn’t actually play a game to test how they worked. Until the other day, that is …

My pal Scott Bowman (owner of Kapiti Hobbies) has a very well-equipped wargames room with three tables and an exquisite set of scratch-built terrain tiles. So with a minimum of arm-twisting, I persuaded Scott to host a Valour & Fortitude game at his place. We roped in a few of our gaming friends (thanks Bryan, Richard and Ste!) to help push the lead round the table, and so last Sunday afternoon we were finally ready to test the rules in earnest.

Our game was very loosely set during the Peninsula War. I say loosely as we included some troop types that were never even in Spain. But this was to be a fun game intended mainly to test the rules, not a serious historical reenactment. In any case, our little group’s overall gaming philosophy has never been particularly restricted to only follow historical orders of battle.

Many years ago I scratch-built a series of small Spanish-style buildings, so our test-game’s Peninsular setting also provided me with the opportunity of taking them out of the back of my cupboard and seeing the light of day!

With four players, we settled on a game with just over 200 points a side. This enabled us all to field a couple of brigades each on our 8’x6′ table. I was able to supply all the 28mm troops we needed, which was to be fought between the French and the Anglo-Portuguese. The above photo shows both the forces set up in our staging area (though in the end we had three artillery bases on each side instead of the five shown in the pic).

I’m not going to give you a detailed battle report here. Rather, I just want to sum up how we found these new rules. But if you do want a battle report, along with seeing and hearing how we handled the rules in real-time action, take a look at Scott’s video.

So, were the Valour & Fortitude rules actually ‘ingeniously simple’ as they are described on the cover? Did they work well? Did they give us an enjoyable game that felt right for the period? Did we like these rules enough to use them again? Would we recommend them?

These are all tough questions to ask after just one game. So bear in mind the following thoughts are very much just my first impressions. But first impressions do count!

Is Valour & Fortitude the ‘ingenious simple’ ruleset as it claims to be?

There were indeed aspects that seemed ingenious to us. One of the most obvious was that unlike many ‘you go, I go’ games, in Valour & Fortitude fire comes before movement. For us, this reversal overturned the way we usually thought about our wargames tactics. We had to think carefully about whether our units would fire and make assaults, or hold off their fire so they could manouevre for longer distances and/or make formation changes.

Another ingenious mechanism is that only one unit can take the lead in firing at an enemy unit, with additional dice added for any other units that can support that fire. This simplified the whole firing process, so that rather than individually sorting out each unit’s firing, we could whip through an entire army’s firing phase very quickly and efficiently.

The same ‘lead unit and supports’ mechanism is also used for melees, and once again simplifies what can sometimes be a very convoluted process in other horse and musket rules.

If a unit accrues hits up to its ‘tenacity’ rating, it is regarded as ‘shaken’, and for every further hit over and above that rating it has to undertake a morale test called a Valour test. When a unit becomes shaken or routs, it also causes a ‘setback’ token to be given to their brigade commander.

Once a brigade commander accrues three setback tokens, his whole brigade is regarded as ‘wavering’. Any subsequent setbacks require the wavering brigade to take a so-called Fortitude test, which could result in the whole brigade being shattered.

It is fair to say that the above Valour and Fortitude tests caused us the most initial confusion. They take a bit to get your head round, but once you get the hang of them, these tests again are remarkably ingenious and simple. Though we did decide that we need to work out a better system than we used for marking the hits, shaken units, setbacks and wavering brigades, but without cluttering Scott’s beautiful terrain with too many unsightly markers and tokens.

So, is Valour & Fortitude ‘ingeniously simple’? I would say yes, despite some initial puzzling through some aspects in our first and only game so far. We thought that with another read-through of the rules after this first experience of using them, everything would become clear. Furthermore, there appear to be lots of nuances that will result in more challenging games once we are more familiar with the basics of how the rules work.

Did the rules work well?

I mentioned above that the writers continuously support and update these rules. So by the time we got to test them, they were up to version 1.5. Being an online ruleset and only a few pages long, keeping your copy updated is simply a matter of downloading the latest version. These updates meant that many of the bugs and clarifications that any new set of rules tends to have were likely to be fixed by the time we tried them out.

We found these rules got us into combat quickly, rather than spending the first hour just moving into contact. Firing and melees were also quick and easy. Our game only lasted a few hours, but we got to a clear conclusion with one side the winner – though it was a toss-up right till the end as to which side would win (for the record, it was the Anglo-Portuguese, of which I was one of the commanders!).

The core rules are supplemented by a number of special unit rules and a set of fate cards, which are included in the various army sheets (also supplied free on the Valour & Fortitude website). So strictly speaking, I guess these rules aren’t really just eight pages long as you also need these army sheets – but they are still pretty concise compared to most other rulesets.

I did read a review somewhere that the one-page quick reference sheet that comes with the rules is a little hard to follow, as it merges tables for things you need to know during different phases of a turn. Little Wars TV have therefore produced a more logically sequenced QRS, but it is based on an earlier version of Valour & Fortitude, and is adapted for smaller games. So I further adapted the Little Wars QRS to match version 1.5 of the rules, and it worked fine for us. You can download my revised QRS below.

qrs-1Download

Did these rules give us an enjoyable game that felt right for the period?

Well, we definitely enjoyed ourselves. The rules weren’t as frustrating as sometimes new sets can be. It was relatively simple to look up things if required (though we did comment that even such a short set of rules could do with a short alphabetical index of the main points to help find things quickly in the heat of battle).

As for Napoleonic feel, the narrative that developed as our game progressed seemed quite in keeping with our (admittedly non-expert) understanding of the period.

Did we like these rules enough to use them again?

We all agreed that these were an immensely playable set of Napoleonic rules. We just need another game or two to really get them under our belts, and then they should become almost intuitive to play. So, yes, we will definitely play Valour & Fortitude again.

And would we recommend them? I guess that depends on what sort of player you are. I suspect these rules may be a smidgen too ‘ingeniously simple’ for some of the true grognards amongst us. But if you want a simple and enjoyable set of Napoleonic rules that has the right overall feel, that enable you to play a game from go to whoa within a few hours, and that are well-supported by three designers who have immense street-cred in the wargaming community, give Valour & Fortitude a go.

Anyway, even if after trying out these completely free rules you find they’re not your cup of tea, you’ll never regret how much you had to spend on them!

My painting of two colonial New Zealand Wars gunboats

I know I only posted about my painting of Captain Cook’s ‘Endeavour’ yesterday, but I have got a little behind with my blogging and there is one more painting to report on.

This is a painting of the gunboat ‘Avon’ (which could be regarded as New Zealand’s first steam-powered warship) towing the iron-clad gunboat-barge ‘Midge’. These vessels were part of Waikato River Flotilla that took part in the invasion of the Waikato district of the North Island in 1863-64.

The invasion of the Waikato was the largest and most important campaign of the 19th-century colonial New Zealand Wars. Hostilities took place between the military forces of the colonial government and a federation of Māori tribes known as the Kingitanga Movement. The invasion was aimed at crushing Kingite power (which European settlers saw as a threat to colonial authority) and also at driving Waikato Māori from their territory in readiness for occupation and settlement by European colonists.

The colonial forces were aided by the large flotilla of vessels operating on the Waikato River and its tributaries. The flotilla comprised shallow draught boats, including gunboats and barges for transporting troops and supplies, as the front line moved progressively south.

Before we look at how I went about paining my picture, here’s a quick look at the finished item.

We see the little paddle-steamer ‘Avon’ of 40 tons, 60 feet in length, and drawing 3 feet of water. She had been trading out of Lyttelton before being purchased by the government for conversion into an armoured steamer. Iron plates with loopholes were bolted inside her bulwarks, and the wheel was enclosed with an iron house. A wooden blockhouse-like structure was added later abaft the funnel to provide more protection. ‘Avon’ was armed with a 12-pounder Armstrong in the bows, as well as several rocket tubes.

‘Midge’ was one of four gunboat-barges, each 30 feet to 35 feet in length. They had been open fore-decked cutters in Auckland Harbour. They were armoured with lengths of bar iron, and in the bows of each boat was a gun-platform for a 12-pounder. Troops and supplies were put into these barges, which were towed up the rivers by steamers.

The basis for my painting is a plan view of ‘Avon’ draughted by Harry Duncan in Grant Middlemiss’s excellent book The Waikato River Gunboats.

I have previously built a small model of the ‘Avon’, using a plastic toy as a template. Whilst not completely accurate (for example, the paddle boxes are quite different) it gives a general impression of what she would have looked like.

For the background I decided to base my painting on this moody water-colour of the Waipa River by 19th-century artist Frank Wright. The Waipa was one of the Waikato River’s tributaries used by ‘Avon’ during the campaign. I’ve never visited this area, so it was important to have some reference material to ensure I captured the look and feel of the river.

Before touching any paints, I did a lot of planning with a graphics program on my computer. I photographed my little model, and superimposed it onto the Wright water-colour. I then used the program’s tools to mock up some reflections and smoke, and to add a Māori warrior on the bank. Doing this allowed me to play around with the sizing and placement of the various components until I was completely happy with the composition.

The grid was to help me transfer the finished layout onto my much larger canvas. I simply used charcoal to draw a grid of exactly the same proportions onto my canvas, and then carefully copied the contents of each square. Much easier and more accurate than trying to copy the whole picture at once!

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The above slideshow takes you step-by-step through my painting process, starting with the rough background that I did with a house-painter’s brush, and finishing with the final fully detailed rendition.

So here she is, the gunboat ‘Avon’, complete with captain and crew. For figures I paint a white silhouette first, then colour it in using Games Workshop Contrast paints (I wonder if Games Workshop realise that artists could be a huge untapped market for their model paints!).

And here’s ‘Midge’ with its commander, Midshipman Foljambe. He later went on to become Governor-General of New Zealand. ‘Midge’s’ gun is behind the iron doors at the bow.

Two Māori warriors hide on the bank, waiting for their chance to take some potshots at the gunboats. Volleys from the bank were a constant danger, and in February 1864 Lieutenant William Mitchell was shot and killed as he stood on ‘Avon’s’ paddle box.

Unlike my ‘Endeavour’, a ship that has been painted many times by loads of artists, I suspect this is the only large painting in existence of either ‘Avon’ or ‘Midge’ (though they do appear in smaller size in some contemporary pictures and on the cover of Middlemiss’s book).

I’ve already had a bit of interest in my painting, but I don’t want to sell it. So I am currently investigating how to get art-quality prints produced for sale.

More paintings of ships and planes

I’ve been doing more painting … but painting paintings, not miniatures! Well actually that isn’t quite true, as I have actually been painting miniatures as well, but they’ll be the topic of another posting.

As I develop into the hobby of painting pictures, I’m finding that I am increasingly drawn to ships and planes. I’ve already featured a few of these in earlier postings on this blog.

So let’s look at my latest efforts.

I came across a picture of a sailing ship against a sunset on an old CD cover, and thought that it would make a wonderful subject for a painting. But I also wanted my picture to tell a story.

So this is HMS Herald in 1840, sailing off Kāpiti Island on the west coast of New Zealand. She was taking Major Thomas Bunbury of the 80th Regiment around New Zealand to get as many Māori chiefs as possible to sign a copy of the Treaty of Waitangi (an agreement between the British Crown and Māori).

Off Kāpiti Island the Herald met the canoe of famed chief Te Rauparaha, who came on board and signed the treaty (actually, he signed it twice, because unknown to Bunbury, he had already signed previously!).

I was quite pleased with how the frigate came out, especially the translucence of the sails back-lit by the sunset. Though that sunset is pure artistic licence, as I don’t think the meeting between Bunbury and Te Rauparaha would have occurred in the evening!

I learned one valuable lesson from doing this painting. If you are going to tell a story, make sure the subject of that story is large enough to see. My Māori canoes are so small that some viewers don’t even see them until I point them out!

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Above you can see a slideshow showing the stages of completing this painting.

My next painting is also a scene from New Zealand’s nautical history. It depicts the ships of Dutch explorer Abel Tasman, the war-yacht Heemskerck (right) and the smaller fluyt Zeehaen (left).

In 1642 Tasman was the first European to sight the shores of New Zealand. But he never landed, after a cultural misunderstanding led to four of his sailors in a ship’s boat being killed by Māori.

Painting the ornate stern of the Heemskerck was an enjoyable challenge, in which my experience of painting miniature figures really helped.

I chose to show the Heemskerck with its top-masts cropped off. I feel this makes the picture more dramatic than if I had portrayed the entire ship.

I’ve had lots of compliments about my portrayal of the sea. I was trying to get the effect of the sun glinting on the swells.

I’m also really pleased with how the fat little fluyt Zeehaen came out in the background!

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Above are the stages I went through to paint these two ships.

This painting is based on an old Air New Zealand publicity photo I came across, which I figured would make an unusual painting. I must admit I was as much taken by the wonderful Morris van as with the plane itself!

I am particularly pleased with the metallic effect on the plane’s engines. This was a case of trial and error, and there are many coats of paint under the engines, each one unsuccessful until I came up with final effect.

In researching this painting, I found out more information than anyone could ever need to know about as prosaic a subject as air-stairs! For those interested, these stairs (with their natty Cadillac-style wings) were made by Hastings-Deering.

My wife worked for many years as a cabin crew member for Air New Zealand. Though I hasten to add that she isn’t old enough to have worked on this DC8 in the 1960s!

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Above you can see how the DC8 picture was put together.

Finally, here is a sneak peek at my next painting. Once again, a part of New Zealand’s marine history – Her Majesty’s Bark Endeavour – the ship that Captain James Cook sailed round the coast of New Zealand in 1769.

This is still a work in progress, as the sails and rigging needs lots more work. It is also the largest work I have endeavoured to do so far (see what I did there?!) – at 28 inches across, it is twice the size of my other works.

An unplanned landsknecht army that came from nowhere!

This is kind of weird, as I never planned to build a 16th century landsknecht army. I don’t know much about the period, I have never played any games in this era, and I have no-one particularly interested in building up opponents for this army.

Nevertheless, I now find that I have sort of organically reared a moderately sized landsknecht army.

It all started with one freebie sprue of Warlord Games’ plastic landsknecht pikeman. I painted them up on a whim, and then thought, ‘Why not buy one box just to see what a pike block looks like?’

Then the one pike block grew to two, then three. And when a fellow gamer mentioned a joint club order to Old Glory, I couldn’t resist seeing how a pike block of their more animated metal landsknecht figures would look in comparison to the rather staid poses of the Warlord plastics.

Along the way I realized I also needed some hand-gunners, then some zweihänder (two-handed) swordsmen and halberdiers, a cannon, some generals … and before I knew it, a landsknecht army had grown from no-where!

So for your delectation, here are some pictures of my latest additions to this unplanned army.

I mentioned above that I had been curious to see the animation of the Old Glory landsknechts. I had heard these were one of the better ranges that Old Glory put out, and I must say I was indeed quite impressed when I received them.

Apart from a couple of the officer poses that looked over-animated to my eye, the figures in general looked pretty realistic. And boy did they convey the famous panache of that slashed and be-ribboned landsknecht clothing!

I think I must have dipped my brush into every paint-pot I own to paint these guys, and even then mixed a few additional colours myself. I am really pleased at the resulting spectacular mélange of different hues and tones.

My painting style is pretty impressionistic. So from close-up the figures look a bit messy, but they do really pop when you stand back to normal tabletop height.

I rather like the officer in red in the above picture. The flags were made from images I found on the web.

This wee fifer is one of my favourite of the Old Glory figures. He looks like he has stepped right out of a renaissance-period print. Again, my slap-dash paint style is obvious here (from the GW Contrast paints that I like to use).

Above is the third of the Warlord Games pike blocks I painted. I intended that this regiment might hail from Bavaria, thus the blue and white flags. But to tell the truth I don’t know how realistic this is (as I said, I don’t know much about the period). But it is cool to look at, and that’s all I want!

For those intrigued to know how Warlord Games and Old Glory landsknechts match up, here are a couple of comparison close-ups.

As you can see, the faces of the Warlord figures are very realistic, even with no more than just a single wash of GW Contrast flesh paint. The poses are quite static, but look very natural.

Meanwhile the Old Glory figures have very active poses, and their clothing is much fuller and more flamboyant. I had to drill their hands to take the pikes (which are plastic spears from Fireforge Games). Their faces are not quite so finely sculpted, but still capture the look of the period.

A group of halberdiers, also from Warlord. The right arms are made out of metal, so they were a bugger to attach to the plastic figures. In the end I had to pin them, which was a bit of work. But I am pleased with the result.

These figures are from the same box as the halberdiers, but equipped with the plastic zweihänder swords, so a cinch to glue on compared to the halberds.

And of course I needed some handgunners. These are mainly by Warlord, but there are a couple of Steel Fist Miniatures metal gunner in there as well.

The handgunners look great defending this scratch-built farmhouse.

The cannon is by Steel Fist Miniatures. I like the way the figures are posed pushing the gun into position (though I imagine such a large gun would actually take more than just two men to move!).

Winners of the big hat competition are these two generals, the only mounted figures in my army so far.

I am currently mulling over what type of cavalry I should get. I don’t want to go overboard (famous last words?!), so just one unit. But should they be heavily armoured gens-d’armes, or maybe some lightly armoured pistol-wielding reiters?

An interlude with a Connie and two Airbuses

Whilst taking a brief pause with painting my Landsknechts (I’m waiting for an Old Glory order), I’ve returned to my other hobby of painting pictures with acrylics.

My latest three paintings have all had an aviation theme, though of a civilian nature rather than military.

My late father-in-law was a pilot with a now-defunct airline called Skyways of London. This Lockheed Constellation was one of the aircraft he flew.

The Connie is in my opinion one of the finest looking airliners ever, with its fish-shaped fuselage, triple tail and stalky undercarriage. I copied the basic shape from a photo I found online.

My picture shows the aircraft landing at Manchester Airport, recognisable by its distinctive multi-story control tower visible in the distance.

In the foreground are a trio of enthusiastic plane-spotters! Their bicycles were actually one of the hardest parts of the painting, and even now I’m not sure I’ve got the angled wheels on that left-hand bike correct.

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If you’re interested in how my pictures come together, here is a step-by-step slideshow.

The colour quality changes with some of the pics, as they were taken at different times of the day. But you get to see my method of layering the different components of the painting.

This painting shows an Air New Zealand Airbus on its final approach to Wellington Airport. The passengers will be having a bouncy ride as the aircraft lands in the face of a gusty southerly wind blowing up Evans Bay!

The large fern design on the side of the fuselage was challenging to paint. Air New Zealand’s ‘koru’ logo on the tail, based on the Māori symbol of a new unfurling silver fern frond, was also quite tricky.

The Hollywood-style WELLINGTON sign on the hill is real, with its fly-away design reflecting the city’s nick-name of ‘Windy Wellington’.

My brother-in-law is an avid wind-surfer, so I sought his technical expertise in how the sail should be angled in these wind conditions.

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Again, here is a step-by-step view on how I created the above painting.

And here’s another Air New Zealand Airbus arriving at the gate on a drizzly night.

I worked off plans to depict the front-on view, but it still surprised me how boxy the bottom of a sleek Airbus looks from this angle.

I thought the reflections from the anti-collision light beneath the plane would be difficult to depict, but in the end when you simplify them down, they are basically just dry-brushed orange downward strokes under the wheels, engines and fuselage.

The beam from the white taxi light worked quite well, more-or-less by accident when I haphazardly slashed in a diagonal white streak on the ground. I do have to fix the light source though, as the taxi light should be at the top of the nose wheel strut, not the bottom.

I was quite pleased with the marshaller. I’ve never been good at painting humans, but this simple view from behind came out quite well. His arms may be a little long, but that could be just an optical illusion because of his batons!

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And here is the step-by-step slideshow of how I painted the layers of this picture.

I may have time to do another painting or two before my Old Glory order arrives – and I have some ideas of other interesting subjects to depict. I may even pluck up the courage to try a military painting some time. So keep watching …

A colourful diversion into Landsknechts

This new period caught me more-or-less unawares. Whilst I’ve always liked the renaissance era as such, particularly novels set during this period (especially if they feature Leonardo da Vinci – I can thoroughly recommend ‘The Medici Guns‘!), I never thought I would ever collect a renaissance wargames army.

But my latest painting project has indeed been a renaissance one – Bavarian landsknechts, commanders and a gun – and I plan on adding to this army in the near future.

This new fad actually started two years ago, when on a whim I bought and painted a box of Warlord Games landsknechts. My intention at that stage wasn’t to build an army, but just an interesting one-off painting project to keep me occupied during New Zealand’s first covid lockdown.

I was happy with how they came out (as you can see above). But even then I never gave any thought to expanding my one unit into an army.

I don’t really know what it was that led me two years later to suddenly decide to buy another box of Warlord Games landsknecht pikemen, and then to order a few extra metal landsknechts from Steel Fist Miniatures. Whatever it was, it came hard hard and fast, as I had them all assembled and undercoated tout-suite!

This despite knowing absolutely nothing about the period (other than the afore-mentioned novels, and watching a season of ‘The Borgias’), nor even how a renaissance army should be organised.

And here is the result: the second pike-block in my little army. I chose to give them Bavarian flags to differentiate them from my first block.

I have probably shot myself in the foot for using these figures for gaming in my area. Rather than the 40mm wide bases that come with the Warlord box, and seem to be accepted as the de facto base-size here, I though they should be on 30mm bases to give more of a packed-in appearance. So that’s what I’ve done, games-standard sizing be damned!

However, I am sure that (once I eventually find an opponent) we can fudge a bit to play our respective base-sizes in the same game.

I was especially pleased with how Games Workshop’s Contrast paints worked so easily to replicate those colourful uniforms. Their flesh tone also does a fantastic job on the beautifully sculpted Warlord faces.

The armour was done with basic silver paint, followed by a black ink wash, then a Humbrol gloss varnish followed by a satin varnish – though the gloss varnish was probably an unnecessary step. It has certainly turned out looking like real metal.

I mixed in some Steel Fist Miniatures figures to provide a little more variety. Here you can see a Steel Fist officer drawing his sword on the left, and a drummer on the right. These figures are a smidgen bigger than the Warlord plastics, but as you can see, they fit in OK.

I also got this impressive gun and its crew from Steel Fist Miniatures.

This photo also reveals that whilst my figures look reasonably good from a distance, from close-up you can see my style is very impressionistic! But overall I hope I have achieved the effect of a team of scruffy, gun-powder-coated gunners.

The gun comes with two barrels – this one with the ragged burgundy cross, and one with fleur-de-lis. I have only lightly glued this barrel onto the carriage, so I can interchange it if I want a French-aligned force.

“You call that a hat?! Now THIS is a hat!” The first of these two Steel Fist commanders sports a big hat, the other an even bigger hat!

Here’s my whole landsknecht force so far – two pike blocks, a gun, a handful of arquebusiers, and the two commanders.

I also have a box of Warlord arquebusiers undercoated and ready to paint, so the ‘shotte’ part of this pike-and-shotte army will soon be extended to 36 figures. Keep watching this space!

Painting 40mm figures, and some tugs

After a long hiatus, I’ve finally painted a few more miniatures. They are 40mm metal figures from a New Zealand supplier, Triguard Miniatures, so I feel I am doing my patriotic duty to support them!

On a whim, I bought two sets of these figures to try them out. I chose two of my favourite uniforms of the 18th century. Firstly, the Gardes Françaises.

And secondly, some British grenadiers.

Each pack contains twelve figures, basically two variants of the privates, and one officer.

Here’s the final result of the grenadiers. As you can see, they look pretty good, even just quickly painted with GW Contrast paints, and with no attempt at basing.

There was a small amount of assembly required (heads, arms and swords). I really hate glueing together metal figures, as I always worry how sturdy they will be. Though I did manage to pin their heads on, so at least they shouldn’t come off in a hurry!

To face my grenadiers, here are the Gardes. The complex lace on their uniforms was quite easy to pick out in this scale.

Again, some assembly is required, and I must admit I wasn’t so happy with how some of the head-to-neck joints turned out – some of them look quite gawky!

The muskets also look rather precariously balanced on their shoulders so as to fit around their tricornes. How in the world did 18th century soldiers ever shoulder arms without knocking their hats off!

Here we see the 40mm figures arranged beside a base of 1/56th (roughly 28mm) figures by Crann Tara Miniatures. They are indeed very hefty models!

I don’t know if I will ever actually game with these large figures, but they will look gorgeous in my display case.

I’m actually dithering whether to make them look more like traditional toy soldiers by gloss varnishing them and leaving the bases untextured – something I would never do with my 28mm miniatures.

So why has my figure painting been in a bit of a hiatus, as I mentioned in my opening sentence? Well, its because I have been spending time painting pictures, a new hobby I have taken up in my retirement.

This is the tugboat ‘Natone’ moored at the Wellington docks in the very early 1900s. She was actually skippered by my wife’s great-grandfather. I did a lot of research to find photos of her, and then spoke to several steam-tug enthusiasts to get the colours right. The buildings in the background are still there today, though of course ‘Natone’ has long since gone to that great shipyard in the sky.

One of the enthusiasts I consulted for ‘Natone’ was so impressed with the final pic, he gave me my first ever painting commission. He wanted a picture of the steam-tug ‘Toia’ in Wellington Harbour during the mid-1900s.

I depicted her backing over her prop-wash as she manouevres out of the tug berth. Again, the background is researched to be as authentic as possible.

I’ve also painted a couple of birthday presents. This one was for my wife. It shows, Mount Ruapehu, her tūrangawaewae.

The tūrangawaewae is the Māori concept of tūranga (standing place), waewae (feet), often translated as ‘a place to stand’. Tūrangawaewae are places where we feel especially empowered and connected. My wife has been coming to this mountain for skiing ever since she was a child, so it is a very special place to her.

For my 94-year old mother, I painted her childhood home in the town of Weert, the Netherlands, where she lived until she emigrated to New Zealand in 1953. Her house is the one with the round window in the attic.

The 8th (King’s) Foot joins the Barryat of Lyndonia

After a long gestation, the latest regiment of my imagi-nation, the Barryat of Lyndonia, has finally arrived. The Barryat doesn’t have its own army, but contracts foreign regiments to fight its battles (clever!).

Initially the Barryat’s contracted regiments were all ones that had appeared in the Stanley Kubrik film Barry Lyndon. But as all the main units from the movie have now been used up, the Barryat is now employing random real-life regiments such as this one, the British 8th (King’s) Regiment of Foot.

The real 8th Foot fought at a number of the more famous battles of the mid-18th century, including Dettingen (1743), Fontenoy (1745), Falkirk (1746), Culloden (1746), Rocoux (1746), and Lauffeldt (1747).

The figures are all from the range of superb 1/56th scale metal models produced by Crann Tara Miniatures, which are now owned by Caliver Books in the UK.

In fact, I’ve really got to praise Caliver Books for being able to complete this regiment. You may recall that I previously posted about painting the grenadiers of this regiment, and said I was awaiting the remainder of the figures to be shipped from the UK.

After they still hadn’t showed up by several weeks later, I contacted Caliver Books to check the date they posted the package. I wasn’t angling at getting replacements (truly!), but Dave Ryan immediately replied saying that consignments did occasionally get lost, and that he would resend the missing figures, which he promptly did at no further cost. Now that is excellent service! The 8th Foot and in fact the entire population of the Barryat of Lyndonia salute you, Dave!

The colours (flags) are by Flags of War. This is the first time I have used their paper flags, and I must say I was very impressed with them. The shading and highlighting gives the effect of the light shining through the cloth.

Two hints for using paper flags:

• Firstly, after gluing the two sides together, lightly crunch up the flag from the top corner by the finial down to the diagonally opposite bottom corner – this gives the effect of the weight of the flag dragging it slightly down, which you won’t achieve by just rolling the flag vertically as many people do.
• Secondly, always paint the edges of the flag to match the design, so as the cover up the unsightly white edges of the paper.

The 8th Foot carry two colours:

• King’s colour: Union flag, the centre decorated with the white horse of Hanover on a red field surrounded by a blue garter and surmounted by a gold crown; the motto “NEC ASPERA TERRENT” underneath; the regiment number “VIII” in roman gold numerals in the upper left corner.
• Regimental colour: blue field with its centre decorated with the regimental badge as per the king’s colour. The Union flag in the upper left corner with the regiment number “VIII” in roman gold numerals in its centre. The gold king’s cipher surmounted by a crown in the three other corners.

The drummers of the 8th Foot wore the royal livery of red cloth, lined, faced and lapelled on the breast with blue, and laced with the royal lace (golden braid with two thin purple central stripes).

By using deep bases (60mm) I can put my officers at the front, and the NCOs and drummers behind the line.

The figures were painted almost entirely with GW’s Contrast Paints. I love the way these paints flow, and how they automatically provide some basic shading and highlighting. These figures won’t ever be painting competition winners, but they look fine from normal viewing distance, especially en masse.

Speaking of ‘en masse’, this regiment is big by wargaming standards. There are 54 privates, 3 officers, 3 sergeants and 3 drummers, along with another 8 figures on the command stands, and of course the mounted colonel. A total of 72 figures!

Here’s a picture of how I have organised the regiment, loosely based on the battalions in the old wargaming book Charge! or How to Play Wargames.

The nicest-looking AWI game I have ever played in

My most memorable American War of Independence wargame took place nearly 20 years ago at the Wellington Warlords’ (the wargaming club of New Zealand’s capital city) annual wargaming competition, ‘Call to Arms’.

At the 2002 event, one of the demo games at ‘Call to Arms’ was a refight of the Battle of Guilford Courthouse, put on by three of the Friday Night Fusiliers – Paul Crouch (3rd from left), Steve Sands (far left) and [a very young-looking!] myself (2nd from left).

A few years after this game, Paul moved to Australia and sold all the wonderful troops in these photos. However, I heard from him recently that he has decided to re-do this project, buying up and painting the troops all over again. He has set up the Sons of Liberty blog to follow his progress.

In talking with Paul, he told me he still has hardcopy photos of the original 2002 game. So I suggested he copy the photos so we could look back at what I think was one of the finest AWI wargames ever, even though it took place nearly nearly two decades ago!

The original Battle of Guilford Courthouse took place on 15 March 1781, between General Cornwallis’s 2,200 British troops and the 4,500 Americans under General Greene.

In the above photo, the British redcoats march out of camp on their way to do battle against the Americans. In the foreground are two cannons and some of their Hessian allies.

The figures and the scenery used in this game all belonged to Paul Crouch. In the main, the figures were by Front Rank, but there were also a few Dixons and Foundry figures.

Paul, Steve and myself were all firm “visual” wargamers, rather than “competitive” or “simulation” players. For us, the main thing was the game had to look good – to be a moving diorama, in effect.

A closeup of the British advance. You can almost hear the drums beating and the fifes trilling The British Grenadier! Behind the redcoats is a battalion of Loyalists, wearing green coats and white trimmed hats.

The British flags were by GMB, who made the best flags around. Paul made the Loyalist flags himself. Note how the flags are realistically shaped – too often the effect of such beautiful flags is spoiled by having them standing out straight like boards.

On the left flank of the British advance are some British light troops, some German Jägers, and even a few Indians.

Paul’s bases were beautifully done – each base was like a mini-diorama. And his figure painting was absolutely exquisite. He used a black undercoat technique and acrylic paints.

The British advance steadily across the clearing towards the first fence-line, where a line of Americans can be see waiting. Behind them, way off in the distance, are more troops in front of the Guilford Courthouse.

The base cloth we used really set off the figures well. It was green baize, but had been sprayed with a mixture of colours. Under the baize was an old carpet which had been laid over some pieces of wood, giving the effect of slightly undulating ground.

You can also see this same photo at the top of this posting, but retouched to make it look a little more real.

Nervous American militia await the redcoats behind a typical switchback railing fence.

These are not the steadiest of troops. But if they can get off a good volley or two before they run, they might slow the steady British advance.

Steve Sands was busy for several nights producing much of the fencing used in our battle.

One of the features that really made this game was the fact that all our battalions were big (at a time when 12-figure units were the popular standard). Each unit had at least six bases of around three or four figures each. Anything smaller does not look anywhere near as good.

The British have forced back the militia through a line of trees. The militia stop, rally bravely, and try to hold the next fence-line. A British and Hessian volley rips through the air.

In the foregound is the last line of American defence. But these troops are no mere militia. These are the regular American infantry, the Continentals. They’re made of sterner stuff, and the British might be worn down by the sniping of the militia before they get to Continentals’ line.

A close-up of the British and Hessian volley. We were using a very simple set of rules called Gentleman Johnny’s War, which made calculating the effect of volleys such as this very easy.

You can never have enough trees in a demo game, especially one set in America. Paul had a huge amount of Woodland Scenics trees, which really looked good on the table.

For the sake of the simplicity, it was decided that trees only interrupted visibility, but didn’t hinder troop movements.

One of the British units charges towards the militia.

By sheer coincidence all the figures in this photo are posed perfectly, as if this was a set-up shot. The charging infantry are in a running pose, while those firing are pointing their muskets. Behind the fence, the militia take pot-shots.

No, the militia can’t stand yet another British volley, so they turn tail and they’re off. But, just as in the movie The Patriot, have they done enough to whittle down the British before they come to grips with the waiting Continentals in the foreground?

Our first sight of the magnificent Architectural Heritage model of the Guilford Courthouse itself. This is a miniature of the actual building. If you look very carefully, you’ll even see the judge standing in the doorway, no doubt encouraging the steady Continentals lined against the fences.

Paul always liked to dot his games with little bits of scenery such as the haystacks you can see in the picture. These were for visual appearance only, and didn’t effect play at all. They were simply moved out of the way when troops passed through.

From behind the Continental lines, you can see the last few militia, and way off in the distance a Hessian flag denotes the British advance.

During March in America, there wouldn’t really have been autumn (‘fall’) trees! But the occasional touch of autumn colours in the trees just gave a lift to the table appearance.

The white house in the far background was hand-made by Paul.

The judge looks on as the battle rages between the British and the Continentals. In the end, the British manage to puncture the Continental centre and creep round their left, so the Americans have to yield the field, just as happened in real life.

Note the barricade of barrels in the foreground – another nice scenic touch.

You would think that General Cornwallis must be feeling pretty pleased with himself. However, in real life the battle cost him 532 casualties against the Americans’ 260.

So instead of pursuing his defeated enemy, he retired to the coast. If this game had been part of a campaign, the result might have been pretty much the same.

There is more fun with scenics in the background – an ammunition dump and wagons to bring powder and balls up to the guns.

One of the most asked-about units in the game, but one which never really came into play, was Tarleton’s Legion. This was because the main protagonist in The Patriot was apparently modelled on Tarleton (though one cannot say that the film representation was at all accurate!).

In the real battle the cavalry did get to grips, but in the game the day was won before they even got onto the scene.

So, just as in real-life, a marginal British win. But more importantly for the Friday Night Fusiliers, a win for presenting the sheer beauty of hundreds of exquisitely painted figures marching and fighting across a gorgeously terrained board!

A special thanks to Wayne Stack, a fellow Fusilier, who took all these wonderful photos as part of an assignment for a police photographer’s course he was on at the time! He was enthusiastic when I told him that Paul still had his photos, and readily gave us permission to publish them here.

I hope you have enjoyed looking back at this spectacular game, and that you’ll follow Paul’s progress on his blog as he recreates his exquisite armies.