French Artillery, 10th Co, 6th FA Regt.

It has come as somewhat of a surprise to me to realise that for a blog named after Austerlitz there has been little if any Napoleonic posting going on, what with all the SAGA and SYW stuff. So it's time to fix that. I do paint Napoleonics as well ...

This is a battery I painted up not too long ago. Although the guns are finished, I still have to add on the limbers and train, and the hangers-on. Ever since I saw one of Barry Hilton's batteries for R2E I have been wanting to do the same with mine. I have some suitable figures and I've made a start on painting them up, so I hope in the next month or so they might get done, but with so many other "more important" things needing to be done first I'm not sure I'll be able to sneak them in. The figures are Foundry and are in the old pre-1812 regulations uniform.

The whole battery

The battery from behind

You can see the ruts from the guns running back here, which have filled with water. If only these were in the later uniform they'd be perfect for Waterloo! They are in fact going to be used as  10th Co, 6th FA Regt. for my Waterloo project. I will get round to replacing them eventually, but not until I have every unit I want painted up, wrong uniform or not. 

Gun ready

The howitzer

Looking at the pictures, some of them look a bit chalky. I hope it's just dust, they don't look like that to me "in the flesh". Perhaps it's just my less than stellar photography skills...

Anyway, the next battery will be a foot battery by the Perry brothers. I really wish Victrix would do a French artillery set; I'm sure it would  be a great seller - and I have more than a few more batteries to do for the master plan ...

As usual, comments and criticism welcome.

Wikingas cumað!

OK, so my Anglo-Saxon isn't up to much, but I think that's "The Vikings are coming!" I've finally got around to painting up the first of my Vikings for Saga It should be 2 points worth of Bondi and their Jarl for SAGA, but a single berserker cheekily sneaked in there among them. Most of the figures are Gripping Best plastics, but the Jarl and the pointing horn blower are from Foundry, and I have no idea where the banner bearer and berserker are from - they were part of a lot acquired from Simon of BigRedBat fame. Shield decals are the lovely LBMS ones again, with just one hand-painted shield on the last unidentified metal bod, the one swinging his sword over his shoulder. These were really fast to paint up (for me); again, nothing fancy, just basic colours and the dip. It's so much easier than Naps or SYW ...

The whole mob.

Here is a group shot of the whole lot, against a background of a GB Saxon church that still needs a lot doing to it (of which more anon).  I tried to choose a different palette for the Vikings from the Saxons, a lot more bright colours, some blues, which I had generally avoided, and far fewer browns. It seems to have worked ok.

The Viking Jarl. This is a great figure by Foundry that I picked up off eBay - I also have a mounted version of him that came in the same blister. In some ways I wish I'd spent more time over him, but he needs to blend in with the rest of the figures.

I love the shield design even if I did mess it up a bit overcompensating for the white showing last time. It almost looks like a self-portrait with that helmet!

The Raven Banner. I finally found something sold here in the Czech Republic which uses the old fashioned toothpaste tube material, so I tried out one of the LBMS banners I have. The colours are brilliant, and the foil makes the flag easily manipulable. Just great - I will be buying more.

The baerserk. 

I've just ordered 3 more of these lunatics by Crusader from NorthStar, having discovered that you can order individual models from the blisters from them. I also picked up some Normans so I can make a start on my third SAGA faction.

The shieldwall.

I wouldn't spill their pints!

Again, I think it's the LBMS transfers that really make these figures. They look amazing. Now I just have to paint up some Thralls, a few berserkers and a few more Bondi and I can have my first game of SAGA at home. I've even found someone locally who's willing to give it a try. Life is looking up...