Lead Adventure Forum
Miniatures Adventure => Medieval Adventures => Topic started by: Admiral Benbow on June 27, 2018, 08:54:19 PM
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More than 10 years ago I designed a medieval game for our club THS to be presented at the Crisis show, and at the Tactica a year later if I remember correctly. As we didn't want to game and show the battle of Worringen 1288 as a standard medieval battle between two larger bodies of knights and their retainers, we called it 1286 and did a fictitious skirmish game located more or less around the historic area. All the heraldry was of course historic and I always had in mind to continue that projekt, what I'm doing now and will show here.
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618171701.jpeg)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618171619-340401362.jpeg)
As you see I used more classic 25 mm miniatures at that time, mainly from the Citadel and Foundry ranges and some others, and I was not too determined to use only historically accurate castings. When restarting the project I wanted to do a group of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, allies of Siegfried von Westerburg, the Archbishop of Cologne. A late 13th century central european army of knights would be mainly protected by mail under their surcoats, very few smaller plate pieces at the legs or arms and for the head by the classic great helmet and some early developments to a more conical appearance; definitely no bascinets etc. Horses should be fully barded. This time I would like to be a bit more accurate and started to look around what plastic sets could be used. I decided to use the Fireforge mounted sergeants at arms and the Conquest Medieval Knights sets.
The Fireforge horses have a bad reputation for their heads mainly and I tried some conversions on them:
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618171619-34039605.jpeg)
The two main Fireforge variants. The right one is quite ok and good looking, I didn't change anything. The "grinning" look of the horse heads originates from the fully executed teeth all aroung the mouth, whereas horses have large teeth in the front of their mouth only. So I will leave the side teeth black when painting. The left one had it's front part of the head removed and replaced by a Perry equivalent. No great surgery, parts fitting together wonderfully. As I had removed the original reins, I added new ones (more on that below). The figures have some advantages as well: fully and nicely executed medieval saddles and some good detailing of the barding at the front part of the neck. But only two variants. Hhm, are there any other plastic medieval horses fitting scalewise? Yes, indeed:
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618171619-340382186.jpeg)
A Citadel Bretonnian horse from the 3rd edition Bretonians 1991 I had in my collection for many years. A good looking horse, Perry sculpt, coming in two variants again. But lacking reins at all letting knights on those horses look quite silly. So on my first test model I tried to get a simple solution for adding the typical medieval decorated reins.
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618171619-34037247.jpeg)
This is the simple wire construct on a slightly modified Citadel horse. I used 0,6 mm silver wire, bend it around the neck and into a kind of curb bit and glued the ends into pre-drilled holes at the corners of the mouth. You can see it even better here:
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618171619-340361717.jpeg)
From thin metal foil, I used the lids from tobacco boxes a friend of mine gave me years ago, the decor-pieces for the reins were cut out with scissors, crimped at the upper edge with a needle to get a tiny groove which fits nicely over the pre-glued wire frame. Very easy after some attempts and, in my eyes at least, so much better looking:
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618171334-340351514.jpeg)
And now the best thing: the Citadel horse heads fit to Fireforge bodies excellently, as you can see on the right conversion. As do the Perry horse heads what is well known, but they are not barded. Anyway, for unbarded horses another well suited conversion potential:
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618171334-34034272.jpeg)
The left one with a Perry head and some more horse tack from thin plasticard, and the right one with a head from the Conquest box. I quite like the Conquest horses, but they are too small generally to use them together with Fireforge models, But I liked this one head very much, and using a fair amount of green stuff, I fixed the head to a Fireforge body. I think it looks ok, and with added knight and after painting it should work along the other ones.
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618171133-340291590.jpeg)
When I started my other (late) medieval thread some years ago http://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=41974.0 (http://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=41974.0) I did an extensive conversion of a falling horse with a Perry horse, but never came to a satisfying solution for the falling rider as that has to be a miniature in full plate armour, very difficult to convert in this scale. So now the time had come to use that horse here with a rider from the Fireforge box:
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618171133-340282446.jpeg)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618171133-34027918.jpeg)
Looks authentic enough for me. The bases I use are thin steel bases from 1st Corps giving some heaviness to the leightweight miniatures and tacking to magnetic foil later in my transport box. And that base will get a second rider on it later ... But more on that next time.
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Ooh. This looks like another great project. I am going to follow this with interest.
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:o
This is good and is just going to get better. :)
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Absolutely brilliant conversions Michael :-*
Wonderful work on those horses.
Look forward to seeing these painted :)
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Great work and awesome conversions. I could learn a lot from this. I do use the conquest horses next to the fireforge ones although im slowly just using conquest because I like them better. I raise them a little bit on the base so they stand a little higher and when you do that I feel its difficult to tell if they are smaller. I actually think its mainly the plastic base they stand on that makes the fireforge ones stand a bit higher.
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Lovely work. :-* :-*
Will follow with great interest. :)
Those conversions... :-* :-*
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Superb, I,ll be following this thread. Very interesting to see the head swops on the horses .
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Following this with great interest. Brilliant work so far.
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A splendid restart of a great subject indeed!
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Most excellent 8)
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you should mark this thread with a Not-Safe-For-Work tag
this is pure porn :)
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I am a Fan of your work since the old Zauberzeit-times. So I can say: the older the more valuable you became. Excellent work, fir the Tactica?
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Thank you all for your nice support, so let's go on with some more pictures of the horses with riders.
First a Conquest knight body with Fireforge helmet on a Citadel horse:
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618171334-34032336.jpeg)
And a grim sergeant-at-arms, all FF parts but the flail- and shield-arms from Conquest. Horse head is Perry.
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618171334-340311939.jpeg)
The Duke of Luxembourg himself, again Conquest body and arms. The Conquest knight set is quite disappointing and even inferior to the Fireforge sets, much less compared to the Perry plastic productions. For example, any saddles are sculpted on the body parts, very small and undetailed. I added a small piece of rod to gain some height behind the rider. The shields are very small and have some kind of cushion at the back, making a tight fit to the arms nearly impossible. Horses are generally smallish, have flat heads and some front horse legs are bend forward slightly, looking anatomically quite silly. Not my cup of tea, but some parts are useful at least.
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618171133-34030240.jpeg)
And a couple more pics, all similar constructed as the above:
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618171133-3402666.jpeg)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618170935-340251880.jpeg)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618170935-34024784.jpeg)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618170935-34023811.jpeg)
Two group shots showing all models together:
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618170935-340222440.jpeg)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-270618170935-340211975.jpeg)
On to painting ... :)
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Lovely conversions. :-* :-* :-*
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Excellent Michael. I shall shamelessly steal the idea of adding a plastic card pauldron :)
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Excellent Michael. I shall shamelessly steal the idea of adding a plastic card pauldron :)
They still have been quite common in their simplest form around the turn of the 13th to 14th century, mainly in central Europe and especially in the german territories. And so easy to make. But be aware that the coat-of-arms was again repeated on both pieces, too. That means very tiny lions, eagles or other complicated heraldic signs to be painted onto miniscule areas ... I am just painting the Duke with his red lions rampant on blue/white stripes and decided to just have the stripes on the pauldrons ... :)
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Excellent work
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Just found this!
Truly excellent painting on the heraldry and great conversions - those horse heads really do make improvements to the Fireforge horses and of course your sense of movement is second to none.
Really looking forward to more.
Simon.
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Great project and amazing conversions, the falling knight alone is a true masterpiece! At my club we are working on a scenario settled the same period as yours (Campaldino 1289 using tb line 10mm minis) and i added plastic pauldrons too to my knights to make them more suited for late 13th century. Since theese kind of protections, as those on knees and lower legs, were in leather, maybe decorated, i painted them in plain leather/colours (decorating a 10mm pauldron is far from my painting skills). Do you have other references about this subject?
Looking forward to see your new unit painted. Keep it up!
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great stuff, already one of my favorite posts ;-)
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The Standard Bearer is awesome, I can only guess at the time and work involved. It looks like you,ve used brass wire for the pole , how did you join it to the hand ? Mini Masterpieces all .
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Loving seeing these come together. They are going to be spectacular. ;D
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Do you have other references about this subject?
Thanks for your support! I have almost all Osprey books on medieval subjects and a lot of other books, but what impressed me most in regard to arms and armour of the late 13th /early 14th century was this magazine of the "Medieval Warfare" series by Karwansarai publishers from 2014:
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-050718171448.jpeg)
Between Worringen 1288 and Bannockburn 1314 we have 26 years. In regards to arms and armour development a small timespan, so we can assume that there were a lot of similar things going on and that insights based on newest scientific research can be transferred. Tobias Copwell, an acknowledged expert on medieval arms and armour and curator of arms and armour of the Wallace collection in London has written a great article on "The knights of Bannockburn" including many illustrations and two impressive colour plates showing knights from the highest nobility to depleted ones and their different equipment. I would highly recommend this magazine (around 7,- Euros only) to everyone who is interested in the latest research on this medieval period.
The Standard Bearer is awesome, I can only guess at the time and work involved. It looks like you,ve used brass wire for the pole , how did you join it to the hand ? Mini Masterpieces all .
Thanks Belisarius. I didn't use brass wire but brass pipe of 1,4 mm diameter. So I just cut the plastic lance above the hand, drilled into the lower part, inserted a piece of 0,8 mm copper wire and could then slide and glue the prepared banner pole onto that piece of wire. A little liquid green stuff did the rest.
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Great work Admiral! I'm following this topic with great interest.
And thanks for making me discover this magazine
By the way, I think it is possible to buy a digital version from the publisher's site for half the price more or less.
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Very nice work!
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Awesome! :-* :-* :-*
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Stunning effort will be watching this with anticipation. Love the dead horse with falling knight.
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Fascinating project, love that heraldry on the earlier figures and the new plastic conversions look very tempting.
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Michael,
again another project with sooo much inspiration. Impressive as always. Will follow this with great interest.
Cheers mate!
Alex
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I finished the first paintjobs, some easy colouring to warm up before tackling the Luxembourg heraldry ...
First the nameless falling knight, I will later add a shield and sword after finishing the groundwork:
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-100718195137-342222393.jpeg)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-100718195137-3422184.jpeg)
Next one is Arnold von Nyra, steward of Neersen and follower of Heinrich VI, count of Luxembourg. Simple coat of arms, but the red/yellow combination is always a striking one. He will be attached next to the falling knight on the same base.
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-100718195137-34220723.jpeg)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-100718195136-342192484.jpeg)
I have already started to paint the Count himself, so that's what will come next and perhaps some pics of the above miniatures with finished groundwork.
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Great painting on great conversions. :-* :-*
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Masterly Michael :-*
Wonderful colours.
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absolutely stunning figures!
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Lovely brushwork Michael 8)
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Stunning work :-* :-* :-* :-* :-* :-*
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Hi Admiral
It's could be very interesting for you ;)
http://www3.telus.net/~magmeter/worringen.PDF
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Fantastic stuff 8) 8) 8) 8)
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(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-130718194239-342392239.jpeg)
"Hey Arnold, what the heck does that clattering mean?" "Seems someone's going down, Sire ..." :)
Finished double base with Arnold von Nyra and the falling knight:
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-130718194239-342381912.jpeg)
And then Heinrich VI., Duke of Luxembourg, head of the house of Luxembourg, who died on the battlefield of Worringen as did his brother and his two bastard brothers, so a whole generation of the Luxembourg dynasty was wiped out within a couple of hours ...
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-130718194239-342371605.jpeg)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/34/93-130718194239-34228740.jpeg)
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Damn good. :-* :-* :-*
Keep it coming.
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very nicely done and great freehands.
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Wonderful colours 8)
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Superb stuff 8) 8) 8)
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Outstanding :-*
I must do some more of these... ::)
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Hi Admiral
It's could be very interesting for you ;)
http://www3.telus.net/~magmeter/worringen.PDF
Thanks Byblos, indeed very interesting view and new to me!
Outstanding :-*
I must do some more of these... ::)
Yes, please! Always a great inspiration, Richard.
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Oh yes- that is wonderful sight! Great painting and conversions...
Simon.
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Its wonderful how much passion you put into your hobby!
Absolutely brilliant what you present here.
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Stunning skills on show as usual :-* :-* :-* :-* :-* :-*
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fabulous!! but no doubt this will push my interest into another project i will never finish!
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gorgeous :-*
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Brilliant work Sir. More please :D
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beautiful work... the pose of the falling knight is right on!
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I should visit this part of the forum more often! Brilliant work Michael :-*
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Thank you all and thanks again for your patience! I'm already working on the next two knights, but as I'm always working on a couple of ongoing projects, it might be some more days before seeing some progress here. Depends entirely on my mood what I'd like to paint the other day ... 8)
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This is simply very great modelling skill, you are showing again, Michael - same like moiterei: habe to look more regularly in this part of the forum :-*
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Well, time for an update ...
Between my other projects and real life I managed to finish three more knights for the Luxembourg faction:
Egidius II. von Rodenmacher
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/49/93-171120180121-493241543.jpeg)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/49/93-171120180121-49323302.jpeg)
Dietrich von Reulant
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/49/93-171120180121-493221469.jpeg)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/49/93-171120180013-493212045.jpeg)
Dietrich von Ulmen. Yes, there were very many rhombus to paint. And shade. And highlight. Needed some time ... o_o
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/49/93-171120180012-49320901.jpeg)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/49/93-171120180012-49319596.jpeg)
Dietrich von Ulmen and his supporters
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/49/93-171120180012-49318994.jpeg)
Henry VI of Luxembourg and his gang so far ...
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/49/93-171120180012-493162103.jpeg)
Hope to be faster on the nexr ones. I'll try to.
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Superb 8)
That red and white lozenge pattern is something else :-*
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Those are magnification! :-*
What a wonderful thread!
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Stunning :-* :-* :-* :-* :-* :-*
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Beautiful Michael. Glad to see this project is still alive! :-*
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Truely excellent :o
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outstanding!!!!!!
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Exquisite brush work Micheal, I look forward to the rest of them
Cheers
Matt
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Really enjoying seeing your minis more soon I hope. Keep up the cracking and inspiring work.
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Amazing painting standard, that Dietrich von Ulmen figure in particular - how on earth did you get so many rhomboids so perfectly aligned :o
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I missed these back in November so am very glad the thread has resurfaced.... such impressive paint jobs. They are exquisite. :-*
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Amazing painting standard, that Dietrich von Ulmen figure in particular - how on earth did you get so many rhomboids so perfectly aligned :o
I wondered that too... masterful. Whenever I try something geometric like that it is always a disaster :)
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Lovely,the horses in particular are fab :-*
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Beautiful, the heraldry is outstanding
Brian