Topic: Non-Discworld Stuff - It must be early morning.

[GamesPoet]

Looks in line with your other Discworld items, congrats!

[JAK]

Due to the time it was taking my GS work to set on the Tenth Foot I dug these figures out of the 2Do box to keep me occupied.

They were freebie sprue given away by Wargames Illustrated magazine and made by Wargames Factory.

They are well sculpted, but in a style totally different to GW which took a bit of getting used to. Every thing is done to a true scale so no 3” thick straps and I’ll never be able to drill out the rifle bores. The only thing I thought was poor was the hammers on the rifle locks which which seem over large, have little detail and extend over half the barrel – Other than thinning them down a little I’ve left as they are.

 They come with a number of extra parts which you initially think gives you a lot of build options but this is not so.

There are 2 figures in coat with 13 arm options.

There are 3 figures in shirts with 7 arm options.

There are 5 figures in hunting jackets with 19 arm options.

Not an area of history I know much about so I expected the Hunters to have all the long rifles but only 2 of their arms are modelled with these weapons, 2 are with coat sleeves and a 5th with a shirt sleeve. The rest of the weapons are normal sized muskets of which there are 13 modelled with arms and 2 unheld. There are 2 options each for an officer with a sword and a bugler, as either a hunter or a civilian.

There is flash on all parts but its not as obvious as that on GW stuff, however with the fine sculpting you have to be more careful removing it so not to damage the detail. I didn’t think it was small enough that it would be hidden once painted. The head and hats are the worst for offenders. There are no location points for the heads on the bodies so care is needed to get them in the right place and for some reason the joints are designed so that they all end up looking at the ground. The tricorn hats suffer with moulding limitations and look solid rather than a bowl with the sides turned up. A bit of work with a knife and I’m happier with them.

They are built more or less as the manufacturer intended, although 4 hunters now have a long rifle, 2 with hand transplants and the forth I spliced a long barrel onto a musket stock. Not sure where the drum and flag staff came from but it was some historical army of around the correct period.



I built these with the intention of having a play with GW’s Contrast Paints. I’ve had a few of them since their introduction and have used them as washes so this was going to be a chance to actually used them as GW intended.

I’ve not really thought about how they are going to be based, it will just be a display piece and as I’ve had to hide my paints in a cold spot I’ve a few months to think about this.

Time to return to the 2Do box and see if I’ve enough parts to build something worthwhile.

[GamesPoet]

Interetsing to see.  Looks like Amer Rev War figures, maybe for colonial militia or rifle units for the longer guns.

[JAK]

To keep me occupied until the weather gets a little cooler and I can start using my paints again. Some more freebie sprues made by Wargames Factory and given away in Wargames Illustrated magazine over the past year or so.

Like the Americans before they feel different to work on compared to the usual fantasy fodder I work with.

As you can see there are plenty of options on each sprue and each right arm is different, after that I’d be disappointed if I’d bought a Zulu army. They make three different boxes of native warriors types but they all use the same base sprue with the same four bodies with a slight variation of weapons and different headdresses. I had sprues from two different boxes and as the sprues have eight heads I can at least have them from the same unit. There were only 4 different shields between the 2 sprues, I converted 2 of them but still had to use a duplicate one to finish the group.
 


Two faults with the design of the figures.  The moulding of plastic doesn’t allow undercuts so the loincloths look strange on some of the figures. I used a knife to cut and scrape away some of the plastic. The arms attach just above the elbow and they have what is meant to be a cloth arm band to hide and support the join. These arm bands are over thick and badly sculpted in places.



You don’t get much option with the British sprue, just 4 figures, 6 heads and 4 rifles – 2 firing, 1 loading and 1 presenting.



Not sure what I’ll do with them now, probably some sort of a diorama in the future but who knows when.

I’ve also found some Bolt Action sprues (US and German) from same manufacturer and magazine but they’re not from same period/theatre of war so can’t combine them in any historical way. I don’t know the rules either – is 6 men sufficient for a squad in this game?
Otherwise I might just build them for fun (have instructions on how to depict a bazooka being fired) – also Wargames Illustrated is giving another BA sprue away in September, a choice from 4 different armies  - might wait and see if any of these can be combined with what I have.

[GamesPoet]

As with many historical figure sets, it can pay not try to making everything that is wanted from one kit.

Not very familiar with Bolt Action.  I know what it is, but it's not a favorite.  However, 6 figures isn't probably enough for any WW2 skirmish games that I know of.  Most squads historically were in the 8 to 11 starting range, depending on what country and how many hadn't been killed or wounded yet.