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.

 

 

A bandit leader

I love this Eureka Miniatures figure of the French general Marshal Ney. The cold weather gear is wonderfully bohemian, so combined with the fancy uniform (looted no doubt) he will pass muster as the leader of the band of deserters and bandits (which I need to do).

 

I’m a fickle beast…

 This may be my third choice for hobgoblins for Silver Bayonet. I was going through some 3D prints I’d ordered from Etsy and found these fellas having put them in the (no longer mostly) lead pile. The exposed skulls, extended limbs, protruding horny growths and bones so fits the fluff of corrupted humans I’m annoyed I’d forgotten about them.

They are more suited to 32mm as that is the fantasy standard nowadays and I should have asked them to printed undersized to match historicals, but the spindly otherness works for me.

 

A veteran hunter

A veteran hunter for Silver Bayonet, being the vampire hunting Major Sharpe from Black Pyramid Gamings Regent Z range.

Possessed

A Possessed for The Silver Bayonet, a Madman from the Carnevale range of miniatures. A smidge bigger than a historical Perry Miniatures figure, but with the pose and arms restrained, it’s not really noticeable unless you compare his feet, which would be Sasquatchian in proportions.

The straight jacket was invented in the mid-late 1700’s, so that confirmed my figure choice with attempts to restrain the possessed soul.