Topic: Konrad's State Troops

[Konrad von Richtmark]

edit: This thread evolved to be about state troop painting and building in general, while starting off as being about converting spearmen. Thread subject was changed accordingly.

edit2: I've now set up an Imgur account to re-upload stuff that went down with Photobucket stopping being free. I uploaded all the finished stuff, but not every little intermediate step that I'd originally posted.

I just decided I want another unit of 30-something spearmen. Now I need to find out how to do it. 6th edition spearmen are unfortunately unipose, so while I might mix in a bunch of those, I'd rather not use them for the whole unit. 7th edition Empire close combat infantry, I don't like those at all, I want my guys to have puff-and-slash clothes. Also other, less diplomatic things about how those models look.

I took stock of my inventory, I have an abundance of bitz from the 6e swordsmen/halberdiers box, that'll get me proper arms and torsos. I apparently have 30 7e spear points that could be stuck on appropriate shafts, if I can find something. I have 16 7e pairs of arms holding a spear/halberd shaft, plus another 10 that can be cannibalized from an aborted project. I have 11 loose 6e spear bitz.

I'm thinking I should mainly do it by cutting off the arms from the 7e spear shaft bitz, leaving just the shaft and the hands. Then, they're in pretty much the same shape as the 6e spear bitz, and I can build the rest of the body largely from 6e swordsman bitz.

That would actually be sufficient for 27 spearmen, and with 3 guys being the command group, that'd be all I need. However, I'd still have 7e 14 spear points left, so I wouldn't have to make it that easy. Is there any other suitable bit that could be turned into a spear by sticking that spear point on it? I would, in particular, for the sake of variety, like to make a few spearmen hold their spears one-handed overarm style.

Any ideas?

[Midaski]

I have spearmen made from the 6th Edition Soldiers of the Empire halberds with the blades trimmed off, leaving a point.

[JAK]

Never sure which edition of WFB is which and their corresponding figures but I’ve had success in making spears from plastic rod bought from a hobby shop sold for model railways.

The rod I use is about a 1/16” diameter, but does come in other sizes, and has a metal wire as its core. Making a spear is easy, cut a piece of plastic off the wire, drill a hole in the spear head and glue wire in hole. The hard bit is getting the hole in the centre and then getting point straight and not at an angle. Cut the weapons off the figures hands which shows you where to drill a hole through hand and position spear as required.

A solid spear is less likely to brake, particularly if held by figure in one hand, and not having a glued hand/arm joint will make them less susceptible to battle damage.

The spears in this unit were all done this way, as was the standard.

[Konrad von Richtmark]

I have spearmen made from the 6th Edition Soldiers of the Empire halberds with the blades trimmed off, leaving a point.

I thought about that too, or rather, sticking the 7e spear points on the shafts in the place where the halberd head is supposed to go. You wouldn't happen to have pictures of the result? I was thinking that there's an issue in those shafts being too short, and held in too much of a choppy pose.

[Warlord]

If you need more spear heads, i could send you some.

[Midaski]

There is the guy in the front row, with a trimmed down halberd arm from the Militia sprue.



Not sure if I have any pics of the other sort of conversion - I'll check

[Konrad von Richtmark]

That's the militia halberd, so not exactly what you were talking about, but thanks. I had thought of the same, good to see how it works in practice. It's a proper length alright, but the point is rather long and thick. Maybe I'll just cut it off just under the bland and put the 7e spear point on it. That photo though, third rank, second guy from the left, is that a high elf spear? Now I'm embarrassed that I didn't think of that, I should actually have a few of those laying around.

Warlord, thanks for the offer, I'll have to see what I need. Are we talking 7e spearheads, or 6e spear bits? I don't suppose you'd have spares of the 6e swordsman shields? I was thinking of using those, but I'm coming a bit short of my needs. Is there anything in particular you'd be interested in? I have all sorts, and for the moment, I actually remember pretty well what I have, having recently done a grand sorting.

[Naitsabes]

7th edition halberd/spear shafts work well for a 'rest/march' pose on older models, just cut at the right wrist and shave off the left arm+hand.

for example on the right here:


or on the right, based on an old handgunner (you'd probably want to adjust the angle so that your version somewhat obeys the laws of physics)

[Gneisenau]

6th ed halberdiers work well as spearmen, especially if you are willing to drill out the hands and use copper rods for shafts. You can even use the swordsmen arms then; IIRC, Graf von Carroburg did exactly that, and maybe warhammerlord_soth (check out his Reikland blog). You can use the swords for tips - they are a bit on the large side, but not much.

There are four different halberd arm pairs. In my opinion, three of them work for spearmen. One has the weapon lowered; makes for a good thrusting but you have to stick him to the sides or front. Two have the weapon half-raised with the right hand at the base; these are fine. The only one that doesn't really work, at least not for pikemen, is the one with the reverse grip (left hand at the base), because it makes the weapon point in a different direction.

Hope this helps. If not, I might be able to find some pics, but the models are unpainted.

[Konrad von Richtmark]

I made some first prototypes, photographed with a crappy mobile phone camera in not-so-good optical conditions:


Midaski, good call on the 6e halberdier arms! I didn't do quite what you said, as you can see, but I found out that by sticking the 7e spearhead on the shaft, the resulting spear gets a satisfactory total length, slightly longer than the unipose 6e spearman spears. Bottom left and bottom middle were both done like that. Top middle does what Naitsabes suggests. Top right was inspired by Zygmunt, though I had to carve up the waist of that model a bit to get the spear in like that. Top left and bottom right use high elf spear arms that happened to have the hand in the right position, with the rest of the arm cut away, and the spear tip cut down to match the others better (heck, those high elf spearheads are almost the size of swords). I think those two turned out okay but not great, so I'm not sure if I will do more using that technique. Top left was a bitch to get the arms and hands to match.

I renamed this thread now to be about my spearman converting ventures, though feel free to continue contributing ideas 

[Konrad von Richtmark]

Ah, apparently it isn't possible to rename a thread, even though the subject line shows up as editable. If possible, can a mod change the name of this thread to "Konrad's spearman conversions - brainstorming and progress pics"

[Konrad von Richtmark]

Thanks for the advice, Gneisenau, though I have found out much of that already by now, as you can maybe see, part on my own and part thanks to Midaski. Myself, I have yet to even get into the art of drilling holes and making my own polearm shafts, though that's a skill I should probably learn at some point too.

I concluded as much about what the 6e halberdier arms do. It's a bit peculiar that three out of four hold it in a grip meant for thrusting and only one for chopping. While that's arguably historical, Warhammer halbers are anything but and solely chopping weapons, otherwise they'd have spear-like stats. Besides, those 6e halberds look very short for being two-handed thrusting weapons. Weirdness. I have no idea what I'll do if I one day decide to actually make myself some halberdiers.

[Naitsabes]

Ah, apparently it isn't possible to rename a thread, even though the subject line shows up as editable. If possible, can a mod change the name of this thread to "Konrad's spearman conversions - brainstorming and progress pics"

you need to edit the title in your FIRST POST of this thread. arcane and mystical is the way of the forum.

good set of conversions, the bottom right is a bit too cool for school but the rest look like they mean business.

[Konrad von Richtmark]

I tried editing the first post, and while it did let me write in the subject field, nothing changed even though I saved the post.

About the guy on the bottom right, what do you mean? Too exaggerated an action-pose? He's meant to make a rapid forward thrust.

[Konrad von Richtmark]

Some final late night converting:



The one on the left is largely more of the same, and I suspect, how the majority of the models of the unit will be. The two others are slightly gimmicky ones, looking to make overarm attacks of opportunity over the shoulders of the guys in front of them. The spears of these two are dark spearelf banner poles (those come at a ratio of one bit per four spearelves, so they're massively overabundant). To get the right overarm grip, I cut off the spearelf arm, leaving only the hand, and moved the spearhead to the other end of the pole. The spearhead itself was conveniently shaped so that by cutting at the right place, I got a spearhead of about the same size and shape as the other ones.

I'm now thinking I should make one more action pose, another guy making a rapid, extended one-hand thrust. Only this one should make a low thrust, aiming at enemy legs. I'm thinking he should partly crouch, and partly aim the thrust slightly downward. I can use another elf spear bit to get the spear extended out, along with the right hand grip and turn of the wrist. On how to get the guy to crouch (or maybe kneel or even bend just the front knee), though, I'm out of ideas and would appreciate some.

[Naitsabes]

About the guy on the bottom right, what do you mean? Too exaggerated an action-pose? He's meant to make a rapid forward thrust.

essentially yes. He looks to me like he is trying to gingerly open a cookie jar over a sleeping ogre. But, I don't know how to fight with spears much less how to fight orcs and dragons with them. sounds like you put a lot of thought into the posing so just keep going.

there is a kneeling archer in the new box. but, they don't really match the regular state troops

[Midaski]

I've changed the title - there is a blip since Saturday's server change, and it appears some permissions aren't working for certain member groups.

Are you logged in permanently? - It may be that you need to log out and log back in again, as that has solved another similar problem..

[Zygmund]

Feels like the old times having this kind of threads, with these figures. 

Not sure if you actually need any more ideas, but here are the different Spearmen coversions, kitbashes and alternations I've made:

6th ed Spearmen with slightly altered pose:


Two 6th and one 7th ed Handgunners into Spearmen:


Militia-based Spearmen:


7th ed State Troops with 5th ed Halberd arms with 7th ed spear tips:


Kitbashed Command:


Most probably you can see which exact parts I've used.

Great project! 

-Z

[Konrad von Richtmark]

Thank you for those Zygmunt, those contain a number of ideas I hadn't had yet, or had but somehow rejected as unfeasible.

The militia spearman with the bottle gives me an idea. Last swordsman unit I made, I got a touch of village idiocy and decided to make it look a bit suffering. Arrows are incoming and have hit a number of shields in the unit. One guy in the 3rd rank is in the process of falling over from multiple hits. In the rear rank, there's a few injured or dying or otherwise straggling.

I now got another idea. My longer-term plan is to have two units of swordsmen and two of spearmen, all 30 strong. One unit of each kind uses the  shields with the eagle emblems from the 6e swordsman box, the other two the Maltese crosses. I could use stragglers as versatile backup models that could beef up either kind of unit if I want to go over 30. So if I use the bottle to make a drunk soldier who has conveniently lost his weapon, he could fit right in into either kind of unit, as long as the shield matches.

[Drakenhof]

Hi Konrad,

Last year I did a few conversions regarding similar problems, in that case I wanted to make more halberdiers with no original halberds.

As you can see on these pics, the most of right arms come from the 6th ed. State Troops sprue, which contains halberdier and swordmen arms. Most of my costum ones come from swordsmen. There are also left arms that I made from the halberd ones, that come without a hand. I cut left hands of another arms (I don't remember exactly which ones now, but it might be the state troops or the militia sprue), I drilled them and I put it on the paperclip at the same time that right hand.

Hope it gives you more ideas!

[Konrad von Richtmark]

Thanks Drakenhof, I appreciate it. Most of those are marginally useful for me since walking spearmen would rest their spears on the right shoulder, with the left arm carrying the shield. Those that hold the halberd in the right hand vertically touching the ground, i.e. 2nd and 3rd from the left, those would work just as well as spearmen. I might do a few such for the back ranks.

[Konrad von Richtmark]

This evening saw the completion of four more conversions:


The top left is just another back ranker, though made from a 6e unipose front ranker. The top right is nothing special, just combining a 7e body with 6e halberdier arms and a 7e spearhead. The bottom left is a repurposed 6e unipose handgunner much like Zygmunt's. The spear is from one of the 6e unipose back ranker spearmen, but the hands on that spear were too close, so I had to use a different bit for the right arm and cut off the spear shaft and glue it on top of the replaced hand. The bottom right was a bit trickier to do, note the combination of 7e torso, 6e halberdier arms and 6e spearman spear. There's nothing inherent in those bitz that make them fit, so to make it work, I had to fiddle quite a bit, spill significant amounts of superglue, and use blu-tack to create test solutions.

That's 13 guys built. 14 left plus a command group and there it is 

[Konrad von Richtmark]

Another three done:


Left one is nothing special, just a back rank uniposer with head and spear swapped. Middle one is the one I said I'd make, a guy making a low thrust at an enemy's legs. He'll probably go in the second rank, poking at an enemy front-ranker from there. The one on the right is the unit champion, what's not seen here is that the left arm isn't the usual left arm going with that greatsword, but the left halberd arm of the 6e pair with the raised chopping grip.

Standard, musician and 12 troopers left to go. I think next up is to make the whole command group, then start basing them. I've held off on doing that until now since I want to make sure the unit ranks up properly, with all the action-pose models sticking outside their own base. Now I'm starting to have enough models so that I can do it. The standard and musician probably won't be anything special, out of uniformity with my other regiments I'll use the standard and the drum from the 6e command sprue.

[Konrad von Richtmark]

Geedubs, oh geedubs, why canst thou not keep old plastics in production? 6e was a real treasure trove, and while 7e was largely disappointing, what wonders can be done by merging the two!

[Naitsabes]

For most of us it took a few years but, it sounds like you are fast-tracking through the five stages of grief. See you at 'acceptance'