Wrapping up the Indians

Tonight I finished my first figures of the new year.  The remaining 22 Indian figures are done.  I'm going to be moving on to the RAFM Martian askaris.  These are nice, if very tall, figures.  They were the first of the post-Bob Murch sculpts for the range and a worthy addition.  It would be great if there. 

The Old Glory figures are pretty simple and generic.  Nice sculpts and cleanly molded.  There are three different turban types, though none of them are super.  I wish the rifles had bayonets.  Anyway, I put them in khaki with some color distinctions to tell the difference.  I have the unit with red turbans inspired by pictures of Madras infantry in the 1890's.  I gave one unit a green turban tassle and green cuffs, inspired by an Osprey plate.  The last is a group with the tall turban/fez which I colored blue with blue turban tassle-simply out of my imagination.  These were fun and fairly quick to paint.  I especially liked painting the distinctive officers.  Two of them come out of the RAFM Victorian Adventurers pack.  The other is a Parroom Station officer.

I really like the Martian colonial figures.  There are two different figures plus a Martian NCO.  I've painted them up in rifle green for the Parhoon Rifles.  Still a ways to go on them. The officer is a colonial artillery officer by Old Glory.  He'll be in red trousers with red facings.  Color, ya gotta love color.

I have a second unit of the askaris, but am short a couple of figures.  This, of course, prompted my first miniature order of the year--two more askaris and ten sword wielding Martians to serve as tribesmen types.  Probably my last figures for this genre for a while.  I still have more Space 1889 figures to paint, but I'll continue to whittle away at them in 2011.

RAFM Figures Arrive: So What?

Hey my first order of the year arrived in the mail today. They are RAFM Space 1889 minis I bought in December for the sale. Why is this important at all? I've declared the new frugality this year, and I'm anxious to see if I have more self control than a starving man locked in a pizza parlor.

I've started working out, and trying to watch what I eat, and I'm hoping this can be part of a larger picture of self-control. It's January 12th-so far so good

Getting back into the swing

I'm back from Ellensburg at last. I got home Saturday evening, celebrated my birthday on Sunday, had to chase around for school most of the day yesterday, so this is the first time I've been able to devote much thought to gaming. I am playing in an Ironclads game on Saturday, and those are always fun.

On Monday I was able to drag out my painting, and have begun working on sixteen crossbowmen. We don't often think of the English as having a lot of these, but their Gascon allies did not have the tradition of the longbow. So, these four stands of guys represent a portion of the Gascon element in the Black Prince's army during the Poitiers campaign. Should be finished with these in the next day or so.

I just finished reading Richard Barber's biography of the Black Prince, a title that didn't fall into use until at least he 16th century. Though a bit textbookish, I learned a lot about him. I also ordered Barber's collection of sources about Prince Edward's campaigns, and hope to have David Green's 2005 book on Poitiers soon. So much that we don't know about this battle, it's hard to know how to represent both armies.

I received a stipend for my supervisor's work at J-Camp. I invested part of it in the RAFM sale. Their Space 1889 figures are 40% off, which makes some of the later Martian figures affordable at $1.75 each. I ordered 55 figures and a medieval organ gun to use as a sweeper. These will be militia in the rebellious city of Shastaphsh from the Frank Chadwick world. They'll be a nice break from medievals.