British and French recruits

First off, the doctor for the French unit, as previewed in the WIP post.

British and French Marines. The Royal Marine was actually a figure I first made for my deserter bandit idea, but that was improved (see earlier post), but I really liked the pose, so lost the deserter head, cleaned up his whites and converted a RM top hat from a spare Perry shako head, due to his deserter background he has a random side bag and his pack is from the Victrix Highlanders I have. It’s been a while but I think the arms are Victrix Highlander as well on a Perry body. The French Marine is from the Perry Elite French sprue, which has the fancier hats, although those plumes like to snap. 

British and French Grenadiers. Pretty much straight from the sprue.

 

Investigation markers

Made a couple more investigation markers, just as the bits were to hand. The new ones are a couple of wolf heads on stakes (the heads were originally from the Gabriel Hounds bodies), a GW notice board (sans skulls) and a leg from a Perry sprue.

 

Another abandoned cannon

Another cannon that came free with the AWI crew I used for the bandit deserters, so broken up and overgrown again to give some scatter terrain.

 

A French Unit

 No fluff for these yet, but painted the French unit.

The officer is from a Victrix sprue with a Perry head. Sadly the Victrix sprue isn’t brilliant, but this figure was fine.

A Supernatural Investigator, the first variation from the building a squad from a sprue, another figure from the Perry Royal Navy Landing Party. I figured he had a student of the Revolution look about him.

A pioneer, straight from the Perry sprue. Nothing sophisticated here.

A dragoon for a light cavalryman, from Perry and separate from the build WIP post. The Perry dismounted dragoon is a lovely figure so I had to try for a cavalry unit. This is the second horse I’ve ever painted (well third including the folk horror Oss), the first was a mounted Elf hero for a friend’s WHFB army in the very late eighties, so I was probably overdue. Lovely figures and definitely tempted to do more.

A guardsman, this is another difference to the build WIP post, the original was from the Victrix sprue but as I progressed I went off it and went back to the Perry sprue, which just confirms that you can get a decent squad from a single sprue.

And a couple of infantrymen, again nothing exciting, straight from the Perry sprue.

I have a doctor and a vivandiere that will give an option for the remaining ten requisition points.

Black Dogs

The last items on the bestiary for the core rule book are Black Dogs. I did one a couple of years back for my folk horror project, but needed two for the Silver Bayonet. I wasn’t going to attempt to match the conversion work I did then, so needed two more. I had these 3D printed Wargs, and they will do for now. I’m not really sold on them, but they’ll do.

Some scatter terrain…

 After acquiring the ACW cannon crew, I have a cannon or two going, so figured a bit of scatter terrain would be in order… a spiked and long since abandoned cannon, perhaps the rate that nature reclaimed it isn’t entirely natural.

 

Vampire Bat

Vampire Bat for the Silver Bayonet, he’s a big bugger on a 40mm base, bigger than I expected from Etsy, but we should now realise I don’t always learn when it comes to 3D prints. Lovely model though.

 

Cult Followers

More bandits, this lot as deserters who have turned to unspeakable cult worship. The first two are normal plastic infantry with jackets and pack straps scraped back and a greenstuff shirt and rear straps added. Too laborious for the whole dozen needed, so I found the Perry ACW crew and drafted them in for the rest. Hoods from the Frostgrave Cultist sprue.

 

Deserters

Some deserters to proxy as bandits in the Silver Bayonet. I wanted an out of uniform look, so need shirtsleeves and waistcoats. These came from the Perry ACW cannon crew with arms and heads from various Napoleonic bits I’m accumulating, with sleeves cut down to remove cuffs and shoulder dressing.

 

Silver Bayonet Cultist

A cultist for the Silver Bayonet, a Crooked Dice villain with a head swap as he had a very neat haircut and I wanted him to fit in more with my bandits/deserters/cultists. He also had a accident with his dagger so one was drafted in from a GW ghost body that I hadn’t used when I did my sheet ghosts.

 

French unit for Silver Bayonet

Unemployment gives me a lot of time on my hands, so time to dig through the sprues and start the long planned French unit.

Using the sprues I have, I can do basic types like (back row) infantry (x2) and sapper from Perry, guardsman from Victrix with a lift to his shins and posture corrected with a Perry head. Front row is the officer from a Victrix sprue with a Perry head and a doctor and investigator from Perry sprues. I also have a light cavalry man still on the sprue and plans for a vivandiere, but I’ll have to either buy one or use the Becky Sharpe from Black Pyramid Games.

The investigator is one I’m not happy with I have to say, but it’ll do for now.

The sprues used were:

French Infantry Command 1807-14 FN250/260 from Perry

French Battalion FN250 from Perry 

And a French in Great Coats sprue with no ID from Victrix.

All said and done I could have cobbled a guardsman and an officer very easily from the Perry command sprue. I just fancied distinguishing them a bit more. Plus the coat allowed the guardsman’s height to be altered very easily (not that the Victrix are short, I wanted the guardsman to be big). 

But two sprues would be more than enough for a starter unit. Just the command sprue would be enough if you didn’t want more dynamic infantry poses, as they all appear to be shouldered muskets.

And double duty for Angel’s demon

 Not much more to say, in the interest of budget, going to use my Blood On Satans Claw demon for the demon in Silver Bayonet until I get a new job and find something as suitable.

A rescue werewolf

 So, when I started this Silver Bayonet project, I severely miscalculated how many figures of some types I’d need (see Troll for the hilarity of that). Anyway, when I ordered the three werewolves I wanted, I was sent some misprints and poorly cured figures. These were replaced by the Etsy seller, but sat in a ziplock waiting for I didn’t know what. It turns out of course I needed four werewolves, but rather than order a fourth, I dug out the dodgy prints, picked a decent top and bottom and got cutting and gluing. Some greenstuff britches hide the join, although his tail is a bit manky, but he’ll do for the rare occasion that all four are needed.

A living scarecrow

A living scarecrow for the Silver Bayonet, Mr Mangle from Crooked Dice. Both much to say really, I wanted a sackcloth look to bulk of it, and think I’ve managed to differentiate the straw stuffing just enough. I did the tied knot at the leg as a red ribbon just to add a bit of colour.

Troll!

So I originally liked this model for my hobgoblins, as shown in earlier posts. But only ordered one before I realised I needed two. Ordering his twin led to some errors on my part and these were left to sit in the lead pile, which is more plastic and resin these days.

Anyhoo… as I’m trying to get my Silver Bayonet bestiary filled out, these larger versions have been shifted up to get some paint to see action as trolls. The club on the second one didn’t look right at that scale, so I converted it to an uprooted tree that works well at that scale with my actual scenery trees.

The original hobgoblin for scale:

Mistakes were made in the ordering…

Vampires of great age…

A couple of ancient vampires for Silver Bayonet.

First off, a board game piece I got off eBay, I forget the game. Obviously based on Francis Ford Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula, I didn’t notice until I was painting the face that mini was lacking a defined nose. Rather than add a greenstuff nose midpaint, I remembered my folklore and painted it as a missing nose and open nostrils, as suspected vampires would be buried face down so the nose would rot first and prevent them walking unnoticed amongst the living.

And a lovely mini from Statuesque Miniatures (sadly no longer on their website) of an alien Egyptian god with definite fangs. I forget which novel I read had the origins of vampires going back to Ancient Egypt (I think it was part of the Supping With Panthers series), but this fits perfectly. The figure has some wonderful delicately sculpted hieroglyphics on his chest, thigh, forearms and spine - and they were a bugger to make pop, I was really happy with the strange skin tone, but had real difficulty making the glyphs stand out. The spine especially just wouldn’t pop and after too many attempts, I realised I was loosing the detail. I could try and strip the whole mini or just admit a lost cause and filled what remained of the spine glyphs with liquid g/s. Annoying, but it worked better than the crappy painted glyphs I’d inflicted on it.

They are both tall miniatures, the alien god because he’s an alien god and old man Oldman because he’s a 32mm game piece. The towering alien god works as is of course, and in my head I imagine Vlad hovering slightly as he does his dark bidding.