Thursday 22 August 2013

Preparing the weekend - A war on three fronts...

Once per year our club organises a special coterie event. After we fought a fictional Napoleonic battle for the fortress of Kolberg (see the report here and here) we considered the American revolutionary war for this year. Although we have been preparing the event for months the last week turned rather busy for me. But there were some things I wanted to finish urgently. It turned out to be a war on three fronts...

1st front: British command base:
Possibly I'll lead two brigade on saturday. After having finished the grenadiers and the 74th highlanders it seemed in reach to field one brigade completely of my own miniatures for the first time. But not without an appropriate leader:
For England and King George !
For those three brave soldiers I used a 60mm circular steel base from Precision Wargames Supplies. I like the weight, the precision and the magnetic nature of the material. And in addition the bases are very precisely cut and sold by Ian, a nice and dilligent fellow. It has always been a pleasure to deal with him. Anyway I used some structur paint to cover the base and will paint it in matching brown tones this afternoon. Although I like this snowy look a lot...

2nd front: Black Watch:
My second task was to complete the third unit for my brigade. A standard sized unit of Black Watch highlanders was my choice:
Actually I used the same techniques and colours as for the Scotsmen and grenadiers before. Some parts - especially the skinny parts - darkened more than usual after I applied the Armypainter Quickshade. So they have a rather tanned complexion. A bit unusual for British...
Anyway for this unit I chose the scottish infantry in trousers from Perry miniatures. Although they are really excellent, there are some tiny details which are worked out better in Foundry's AWI range. E. g. the face and facing details are better to my mind.

3rd front: Table tiles:
The scenario will be based on the events of the Penobscott Expedition of 1779 and we'll need a large hill for the scenario which will represent Dyce's Head on Majabigwaduce peninsular. Four board tiles needed, two of them has a club fellow, two from me. One already finished, one to go. This was my level of awareness until last friday and it sounded fair for one week to finish one board tile.
But then during our last preperation meeting Bernhard said: "You know that one of my hill parts is 1m x 0.5m, don't you?" Actually I didn't or at least I didn't remember so I had to prepare 1,5m hill rather than 1m. Another piece to make...

Anyway during last weekend we turned our balcony into an terrain building center and Viktoria and me sawed, glued, sanded and plastered. Rather I worked and she played on the balcony but however Mrs Monty was lucky with her leisure time and I got some modelling work done.
Work in progress...
Well... After three days with less than six hours sleep I'm rather tired but nevertheless confident most of the stuff will be finished this evening. I'll not manage to get the flags done but who cares? I'll do this calmly next week.

10 comments:

  1. That command stand is going to be really nice when you're done. I like that horse!

    I don't know how you guys get so much done so quickly. I'm terribly slow but I don't know how to get faster.

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    1. Ususally I'm rather slow as well. But it's surprising what you might get done between 10pm and 12pm when you get used to five hours sleep per night... ;-)

      Cheers
      Stefan

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  2. Lovely painting, Monty. I agree with Anne that horse is very well done.

    Best wishes

    Giles

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  3. great progress!

    Where would we be without deadlines for "con" games? Most of my major projects only get done because I've made some unreasonable commitment to hold a game at a con without enough time to finish everything. Who knew that gaming was a "thrill-junky" sport?

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  4. Great looking minis, love your work on the white!

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  5. Stirling work Sir, you've made some fabulous progress in such a short time. It promises to be a great game.

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  6. They look very nice and I'm looking forward to seeing them posted on your upcoming game!

    Christopher

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  7. God looking stuff, great progress.

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  8. A brigade of Grenadiers and Highlanders led by a wonderful looking command base, quality.
    Look forward to seeing pictures of your terrain and figures in action.
    Pat.

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