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Miniatures Adventure => Colonial Adventures => Topic started by: randwulf on March 23, 2018, 12:52:57 AM

Title: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game - added paint / basing test
Post by: randwulf on March 23, 2018, 12:52:57 AM

I have a set of British from Artizan Designs and would like to get a set of Afghans for opponents.

What other miniature ranges do people recommend? Also does anyone have some list variations that they have tried for this period using MWWBK? How compatible are the different ranges? I also have not based anything yet and would like to keep the basing uniform. Are there some good examples of palette / tuft combinations that work well?

Cheers,
Kev

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: S J Donovan on March 23, 2018, 01:38:29 AM

Tiger miniatures has a range of 2nd Afghan war miniatures including cavalry and Afghan highlanders.

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: Mad Guru on March 23, 2018, 04:23:23 AM

These are bountiful times for gaming and ghe Second Afghan War in particular and NWF in general!

You are probably familiar with Artizan's own Afghan figures, but in addition to Tiger Miniatures mentioned above, you can also get excellent Afghan tribal and regular army forces from:

Perry Miniatures at this LINK - https://www.perry-miniatures.com/index.php?cPath=23_96 (https://www.perry-miniatures.com/index.php?cPath=23_96)

Wargames Foundry at this LINK - https://www.wargamesfoundry.com/collections/the-north-west-frontier-1880-1908 (https://www.wargamesfoundry.com/collections/the-north-west-frontier-1880-1908)

The Foundry range above was also sculpted by the Perrys, so the figures, though slightly smaller than the newer Perry Miniatures, have a similar style.

RE: Terraining figure bases, here's a LINK to a post on my blog with some info on my approach.  It's pretty simple and doesn't use tufts, but might be of some use:

http://maiwandday.blogspot.com/2012/11/rocky-terrain.html (http://maiwandday.blogspot.com/2012/11/rocky-terrain.html)

(http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-y0vRiWsa61A/UKXfhD8369I/AAAAAAAAFo4/g4h9g46Jd64/s1600/IMG_0204.jpg)

(http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-V3uY2f-Cpug/UKX7kCc46NI/AAAAAAAAF7Q/UNBkhivMKDo/s1600/IMG_0109.JPG)

(http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-TKJf_IfMNCY/UKX8K0S8_TI/AAAAAAAAF7o/HNDGHjRjt8k/s1600/IMG_0126.JPG)

EDIT: I agree with Will Bailie about Old Glory, their NWF Tribesmen are amongst their very best figures and I have several units of them which serve very well alongside my Foundry and Perry Afghans!

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: Will Bailie on March 23, 2018, 04:38:07 AM

My Afghan tribesmen include figures from Artizan Designs, Old Glory and Castaway Arts. I'm very happy with all three suppliers and mix the figures in the same units.  I'm currently adding some Perry Miniatures to their number.

For price and quality, Old Glory is a good start.

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: TWD on March 23, 2018, 06:19:26 AM

I too would recommend the Old Glory, Artizan and Perry models.
All mix well together and paint up nicely.

The Tiger miniature are cheap. That is their sole attraction. In my view you get what you pay for in this case.
 The OG ones are only a bit more expensive and an order of magnitude nicer.

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: randwulf on March 23, 2018, 07:35:49 AM

I hadn't seen the Old Glory miniatures before. You certainly get a lot of bang for your buck.

For MWWBK you need 16 figs per unit, so 2 packs of tribesmen would give you 60 figs, close to 4 units. The command pack looks a bit large to flesh out the units.

To add some command which do you think is better?
https://www.artizandesigns.com/prod.php?prod=1946 (https://www.artizandesigns.com/prod.php?prod=1946) or
https://www.perry-miniatures.com/product_info.php?products_id=3460 (https://www.perry-miniatures.com/product_info.php?products_id=3460) or
https://www.wargamesfoundry.com/collections/1st-afghan-war-1838-42/products/ind201-warrior-command (https://www.wargamesfoundry.com/collections/1st-afghan-war-1838-42/products/ind201-warrior-command)

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: Plynkes on March 23, 2018, 08:30:47 AM

So I take it you are looking for hill tribesmen rather than the Afghan regular army itself? I say that because you mention using 16 figures per unit, which is what you use for melee-oriented spear or sword infantry.

In TMWWBK the bulk of your tribesmen are probably better represented with irregular infantry rather than tribal infantry (which would be 12 figures per unit rather than 16). They were famed for their long-range sniping from the high ground, with massed charges like the Zulu or Ansar's usually being reserved for once the enemy was on his last legs. Perhaps have one or two tribal infantry units to represent religious fanatics or brave warriors who like to get in close once the enemy have been softened up.

In fact, I think the sample Pathan army in the book has something like 3 irregular units and two tribal.  There is also an Afghan regular army list if that floats your boat.

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: randwulf on March 23, 2018, 11:55:13 AM

I am trying to be economical in both figures and cost. This will be a 2nd army that I will buy and paint up to try to tempt an opponent to give a game a go.

So  ... based on the MWWBK Parthan List:

num	type	figs	pts	ptsTot	figTot			figs	pack	figTot
3	Irregular Infantry	12	4	12	36	Old Glory	Pathan Tribesmen with Muskets and Jezails	30	1	30	6 fig short
2	Tribal Infantry	16	3	6	32	Old Glory	Pathan Tribesmen Charging with Swords	30	1	30	2 fig short
2	Tribal Cavalry	10	3	6	20	Old Glory	Pathan Tribesmen Mounted on Ponies	10	2	20
						Artizan Designs	Afghan Irregular Command	4	1	4	Command
						Artizan Designs	Afghan Irregular Swordsmen II	4	1	4	Command

Dees this look Ok? What might be some good optional units?

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: Will Bailie on March 23, 2018, 03:06:02 PM

I will temper my praise for OG Pathans by noting that the mounted figures are not as nice as the foot. (i.e., they are rather ugly)

I'd replace at least one of the tribal cavalry with more shooters.  Cavalry in TMWWBK is vulnerable to shooting.  It is harder for them to take advantage of cover.  They hit hard in melee, and will cause damage, but usually end up very depleted so even though they might win the fight, they will be so worn down that you won't be able to use them again (compared to infantry who can keep on shooting even if their numbers are reduced).

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: randwulf on March 24, 2018, 01:25:15 AM

Updating the list with a few options. This should allow a variety of units to be taken with appropiate +/- adjustments to field a 24pt army.

num	type	figs	figTot			figs	pack	figTot
4	Irregular Infantry	12	48	Old Glory	Pathan Tribesmen with Muskets and Jezails	30	1	30	48
				Perry	Afghan tribesmen skirmishing with jezails	6	1	6
				Perry	Afghan tribesmen skirmishing with Enfields and Brown Besses	6	1	6
				Perry	Afghan Tribal Command	6	1	6
1	Tribal Infantry	16	16	Artizan Designs	Afghan Irregular Command	4	1	4	16
				Artizan Designs	Afghan Irregular Swordsmen	4	2	8
				Artizan Designs	Afghan Irregular Swordsmen II	4	1	4
1	Tribal Cavalry	10	10	Perry	Afghan tribal cavalry command	3	2	3	12
				Perry	Afghan tribal cavalry, sword and shield	3	1	3
				Perry	Afghan tribal cavalry, sword/pistol	3	1	3
1	Crewed Weapon	4	4	Perry	Afghan tribesmen with mountain gun	4	1	4	4

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: guitarheroandy on March 26, 2018, 09:42:08 AM

I was a play tester for TMWWBK and have put on several convention games with it as well as playing regularly at my club, almost all games being NW Frontier.

We do the following with our Pathans:

1. No cavalry. In the hills, the tribes didn't use them. On the Afghan plains, absolutely, but our games are all set in the 1897 Pathan rebellion, so no cavalry.

2. Most Pathan riflemen (Irregular Foot) are downgraded to 'poor shots' (hit on a 6) to represent the lower rate of fire of tribal warriors compared to Anglo-Indian troops. To represent their uncanny sniping ability, we make them some of them 'Snipers' where the enemy leader is killed on any double, not just double 1! We also have at least one unit that isn't downgraded. We field a mix of 'obsolete rifle' and 'musket' warriors in our forces to represent the mix of weaponry. (All our Anglo Indians get 'modern rifle' and British units get 'sharpshooter' to represent the greater rate of fire of the Lee Metford magazine rifle).

3. We field all our Irregular Foot as having 'Born to the Hills' meaning that they can run about over rough terrain as they like AND we give them 'Fieldcraft' so they can go to ground.

4. We field some units of Tribal Foot as swordsmen, which even in 1897 is right. All swordsmen gain the Fanatics rule, so have no short range shooting (most Pathan swordsmen had no short range missile weapon) but become Fierce so hit on 4+ in melee. At least one unit per 24pt force is upgraded to be Ghazi fanatics.They gain 'Veteran' and have 'move' and 'attack' as free actions. This makes them very interesting to play with!

5. No artillery. Most Pathan tribes didn't use any. Again, on the Afghan plains in earlier wars, this may differ.

Our typical convention Pathan force is:

1 x Sharpshooters (obs. rifle, snipers)
3 x Riflemen (obs. rifle downgraded shooting)
1 x Jezzails (musket downgraded shooting)
2 x Swordsmen
2 x Ghazi Fanatics

We can always upgrade more units to 'snipers' if the situation warrants it.

The Anglo-Indian force opposing it:

1 x British infantry ('sharpshooter')
1 x Sikh infantry (Fierce)
1 x Guides infantry
1 x Gurkha infantry
1 x Maxim gun
1 x mountain artillery (we usually give the unit 'the gentleman has a bottle' trait to reduce its effectiveness, especially if the Maxim is also being fielded)
1 x Bengal Lancers

We find that all of these tweaks give us a very 'theatre-specific' feel to the games and everyone who has played our convention games or club-night games has loved them. We play multi-player with 50+ points per side usually too (although we don't really count points, to be honest. We just try to play well-designed scenarios of our own making! We're on about 50-50 victories too, suggesting balance in the scenarios!

Feel free to borrow any of those ideas or not as the mood takes you. :)

Oh, by the way - almost all my Pathans are Old Glory. They are cheap as chips and paint up really well!

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: randwulf on March 27, 2018, 07:18:00 AM

That's a lot to think about. Just reading the rules does not give you the insight needed to see how a game runs. This input is much appreciated. I think I will get a stack of OG afghans and get painting.

Then all I need to do is find is an opponent. Most in the area that I am in, Tokyo, seem to play 40K or Bolt Action.

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: Will Bailie on March 27, 2018, 08:38:36 AM

If you can field both sides, then it will be easier to find players.  And of course there's Mr Babbage!

Thanks, Guitar Hero Andy for the comments, I'll be certainly reviewing them before my next game!

Cheers

Will

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: LordSpode1879 on March 31, 2018, 05:54:22 PM

Apologies for hijacking this thread but I'm looking for recommendations for Ghazi fanatics? Would generic sword-armed figures be ok with a suitable paint-job?

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: guitarheroandy on March 31, 2018, 08:59:51 PM

Quote from: LordSpode1879 on March 31, 2018, 05:54:22 PM

Apologies for hijacking this thread but I'm looking for recommendations for Ghazi fanatics? Would generic sword-armed figures be ok with a suitable paint-job?

I use Old Glory sword armed/sword and buckler-armed Pathans for mine, but I painted them in purely white clothing, simply to help discriminate between them and the ordinary swordsmen units for whom I included some blue (Afridi-style) clothing or coloured turbans, and used models wearing poshteens... 

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: sjwalker51 on March 31, 2018, 09:36:00 PM

Don’t think they’ve been mentioned yet, Studio Miniatures do some very nice Afghan tribesmen that match well with Artizan, Perrys etc.

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: randwulf on April 01, 2018, 12:30:10 AM

I am starting to paint my brits and will order some afghan troops shortly. Do you want to share your painted afghans or NWF British?

I also have some Artizan Punjabi Infantry and officers but I cannot find any painted examples. In particular I would like to see NWF0122 - Punjabi Officers.

Trouser wise are people going Khaki or blue? Also should the puttees be khaki, blue or blue grey? How variable can the British uniforms be?

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: randwulf on April 01, 2018, 01:29:50 AM

Test figure for British.

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game
Post by: randwulf on April 01, 2018, 01:30:58 AM

Also Danny, Peachy and Billy Fish

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game - added paint / basing test
Post by: Harry Faversham on April 01, 2018, 02:57:18 AM

Great stuff, very impressive, old chap.

 :-*

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game - added paint / basing test
Post by: Eric the Shed on April 01, 2018, 10:03:16 AM

Thanks for all the manaufacturers guys - saved me a load of time

My colonial project is heading into Afghanistan this spring :D

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game - added paint / basing test
Post by: Mad Guru on April 01, 2018, 11:16:13 AM

RE: Ghazis, I second Guitar Andy's approach, using predominantly WHITE for their clothing and turbans.  In addition to sword & dahl shield armed tribesmen, I also have 3 x 20-figure basic units of Ghazis from Wargames Foundry Darkest Africa Baluchi Swordsmen, discarding the few in each pack with "Arabian" bare heads and using the vast majority dressed in "Indian" style, wearing turbans and beards.

Here's some pics of them in action over the years:

(http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2G-sS2x7HK8/TXH8zgksayI/AAAAAAAABJU/Zk9NbBsRVBM/s1600/IMG_7224.JPG)

(http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4ZTGV8bLAGI/VrKDlSLI8DI/AAAAAAAAPVQ/yeU9CUtHJB8/s1600/IMG_5743.JPG)

(http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zQJZshGDxas/Tw_Xa1j-fUI/AAAAAAAADJI/-SGyOPxqLfg/s1600/MaiwandGame_331.jpg)

(http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-UaWIZUIcxSM/Tw_ayTrILwI/AAAAAAAADMU/t-SBJ5Mjb7E/s1600/MaiwandGame_314.jpg)

(http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-yWkSedHgs6E/VfkapBj0arI/AAAAAAAANDc/Az-5-io2Z-Y/s1600/photo%2B1.JPG)

RE: Trouser color for "Punjabi" regiments... during the Second Afghan War there is no all-encompassing answer, at least in the nit-picky historically accurate sense.  Khaki is usually right, but as with British line units, during this transitional period, some Bombay, Madras, and Bengal regiments wore blue or more rarely red or green trousers.

Unless you want to paint up a very specific unit, khaki definitely works well.  Those Indian regiments that wore non-khaki pants mostly wore dark blue, such as 45th Bengal Native Infantry/Rattray's Sikhs, and 1st Bombay Grenadiers.

There were actually something like 18 different "Punjab" Infantry regiments which served in Afghanistan during the war.  Some were Sikh regiments, so they wouldn't work with the Artizan "Punjabi" figures, but many of them were not.  Off the top of my head I don't know if any of them are known to have worn non-khaki trousers. If you have a particular regiment in mind a Google search may be able to help.  Also if you post the name/number of a particular Punjab regiment here I can check my reference books and try to find an answer re: trouser color.  But if you just want nice looking generic Punjabi infantry, I would suggest khaki as the first choice, or if you'd like a spot more of color, then dark blue.

Title: Re: Afghan miniatures for a MWWBK 2nd Afghan War Game - added paint / basing test
Post by: LordSpode1879 on April 01, 2018, 10:09:38 PM

That is recommendation enough for me  :)