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Miniatures Adventure => Pikes, Muskets and Flouncy Shirts => Topic started by: TheBlackCrane on August 10, 2020, 09:51:17 PM
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I've been trying to work out options for 28mm Border Reivers, basically to match up which ranges match with each other and which don't and so on, plus what some ranges have become.
I've read some threads on here but which are from 5, 6 years ago, and a variety of blog posts and suchlike, which have some size comparisons and photos, but I wanted to try and work out a definitive up to date list of what options are available:
So:
Wargames Foundry:
Elizabethan Range
Swashbucklers Range
- Do they match size-wise?
Monolith became Graven Images became Timeline/Hoka Hey?
Vendel are now sold by Thistle and Rose in the US?
TAG do Elizabethans which include packs labelled as Borderers
Colonel Bill's Border Reiver Range
Reiver Castings (Northumbrian painting services)
Any others I'm missing?
I think that the Foundry Swashbucklers match up quite well with Timeline/Hoka Hey, but I don't know about the specific Elizabethan range.
Anyone know how TAG match up with any other manufacturer?
Likewise the old Vendel range which I recall I liked the look of, but unsure how they match up?
If you have any comparison pictures please do add them to this thread too if you can/don't mind; would be good to get everything in one place.
Thanks for any help!
Rob
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Note that Reiver Castings are the old Outpost miniatures.
They are the only ones I have, so can't offer comparisons. 26-27mm toe to eye, medium heft; will generally mix well til you get to ranges that really should be labelled 30-32mm.
Oh, and bonus answer to an unasked question:
Things From The Basement has recently released some lovely laser-cut cottages and a bastle house. I'm in the midst of prepping mine for painting and assembly now. The cottages come with laser-cut teddy bear fur for the thatched roofs!
https://www.thingsfromthebasement.com/store/c46/Border_Reivers_-_The_Greit_Cursing.html
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The Foundry Elizabethans were sculpted by one of the Perrys and the swashbucklers were by, iirc, Mike Owen and are much bigger
Monolith sold the Graven Images range which then went to Hoka Hey - they're lovely but limited especially as there is/was only one horse pose
The old Vendel and Col. Bill's range match as they used the same sculptor
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I worked on an Elizabethan/Marian project at the beginning of lockdown. I'll get some pics for you tomorrow. There are some on my blog.
Foundry Elizabethans are small but well sculpted. Their Swashbucklers are bigger and match Casting Rooms Elizabethans, which have some good and some not so good sculpts.
Colonel Bill is Vendel/ Thistle and Rose and they are about the same size as the swashbucklers. However these are losing some definition and the poses can be a wee bit wooden.
Hoka Hey have the old Graven Images Reivers which are very very nice, but a little bigger and chunkier than the aforementioned ranges. They also do a range of elizabethans which I think came from pendraken. A different style of sculpting from the excellent Reivers - I'd give the Elizabethans a miss.
I don't have any TAG figures.
Swashbucklers/Casting room/Vendel/Graven and TAG should all match , perhaps not in the same unit, but certainly in the same army.
If I were doing a Border Reivers force I'd go with the Graven/Hoka Hey figures.
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The originally Vendel Border Reivers are now owned-sold by the Thistle & Rose guys in the U.S.. Great guys. If you go to their F'book page and contact them you can order the figures. They are casting as ordered rather than keepng loads of stock on-hand... https://www.facebook.com/TandRMiniatures/
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The Foundry Elizabethans were sculpted by the Perrys for Citadel Miniatures and were marketed by Citadel as Wars of Religion figures. The figures were designed to be 25mm and so are much smaller than the Swashbucklers.
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Warlord WOR, Foundry Swashbuckler, TAG Dutch, Colonel Bills/ D'Arlo (base removed?), Monolith/Timeline (base removed), Thistle and Rose/Vendel, Outpost
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L to R: Casting Room miniatures Elizabethan, TAG German, TAG Early Swede (on booster?), TAG Dutch, TAG Tudor, GW Estalian (on booster), Colonel Bills/D''Arlo (removed from base)
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L to R: Redoubt, Old Glory War of Religon (base significantly thinned), TAG Dutch, Thistle and Rose/Vendel, Foundry Swashbuckler, Old Glory WoR (base thinned), Redoubt
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L to R: TAG, Warlord, Reiver, Redoubt, Timeline/Monolith
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L to R: TAG, Vendel, Reiver, Foundry, Timeline/Monolith
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From the left: Vendel (Thistle and Rose), Eureka, Eureka, The Assault Group Dutch, Foundry Swashbuckler
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Height differences between different sub-ranges in The Assault Group 's Renissance range - these figures are from the Dutch, German, Stuart English snd Swedish* ranges...
*Figures in the Early Swedish/Finnish packs vary between this chappy (the smallest) and an average height about that of the Germans.
The Germans, Tudors (and most of the Swedes) will fit with the Sea Beggars neatly if popped onto a booster - the Stuarts not so much.
Left to Right: Dutch, Dutch, German, Stuart English and Early Swedish.
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Interesting question. My experience with this (admittedly around 12 years ago) is shown below!
As it happens, I started my ECW collection accidentally by first buying selected Bicorne / Renegade / TAG cavalry is burgonets and cabassets to use as 'late period' border reivers - basically because I didn't like any of the other figures available at the time ::)
(https://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/0/577_09_05_08_10_05_19_2.JPG)
(https://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/0/577_09_05_08_9_56_29_3.jpg)
I later expanded my 'Late Elizabethan' / border reiver collection to to include figures from the Foundry Sea Dogs range (excellent - some of the best character figures anywhere, ever IMHO)...
(https://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/4/577_25_12_09_6_08_42_0.jpg)
(https://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/0/577_11_05_08_11_37_51_2.jpg)
... The Vendel border reivers by Colin Patten, erstwhile Gripping Beast putty-Lord (great historical accuracy / period flavour, but proper squat little wargaming munchkins with flat faces, and rather stiffly posed)...
(https://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/0/577_11_05_08_11_46_04_0.JPG)
...Old Glory Wars of religion types (Frankly terrible - these were the only 10 halfway usable figures I could get out of a bag of 30 castings)...
(https://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/0/577_11_05_08_11_46_06_1.JPG)
...And a few of the Copplestone-sculpted 'El Dorado' figures - lovely figures, but about 100 years too early, and slightly taller than the rest.
(https://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/0/577_11_05_08_11_46_08_2.JPG)
I would say the Foundry Sea Dogs (apart from a few of the larger characters), the Vendel and Old Glory figures all fitted together pretty well size-wise.
I repeatedly considered the Graven Images border reiver figures (which have since had a couple of changes of ownership / rebrands), but they are a/ much larger than regular 28mm figures, and b/ have a very distinctive, slightly cartoony style that (IMHO) doesn't fit at all well with anything else out there.
Probably the best figures for the period / setting are the 40mm Perry figures, but a/ it's a small range and b/ they are 40mm - so lovely, but not much use other than for genuinely very small scale skirmishes of half a dozen figures a side.
If I was going into border reivers now, I would unhesitatingly go for the TAG border revier figures that sit within within the Tudor English range - this offers a sizeable range of different miniatures, that look excellent, and (based on all the other TAG figures I own) will scale in pretty well with the Foundry swashbucklers.
In fact, I still might!
Another resurrection project looms lol
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Thanks all, really helpful. I am going to purloin some other comparison pictures from elsewhere on the web and stick them here too, but for my purposes my well go down the TAG/Foundry Swashbuckler route
(Although, having seen Captain Blood's figures, it kind of makes me give up in despair! lol)
Next thing of course will be habitual search for rules, but I'm going to paint first and thing about that afterwards. Want to come up with a good campaign system, kitting out individual characters type of thing.
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I'm not sure how well these will fit, but as nobody else has mentioned them, I believe that Eureka does a range of Early Colonial Portuguese that cover the late-15th to mid-16th Century.
https://www.eurekaminuk.com/collections/colonial-portuguese-16th-century
If nothing else, might be useful for "shabbily dressed" infantry/dismounted types.
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I have the Eureka figures too. They fit in very well with the Foundry Sea Dogs and Swashbucklers range.
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There are a few GW Estalian miniatures that could pass as reivers, maybe also some Perry ECW such as these:
https://www.perry-miniatures.com/product_info.php?cPath=23_40_46&products_id=2462&osCsid=u7qtrrs85fbs7dlv4mf5seike2
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For my Elizabethan Ireland project I have mixed Hoka Hey, Foundry Swashbucklers and TAG for the English. I have been careful not to mix the Hoka Hey and TAG together as they dont mix but both mix OK with Foundry (which are excellent) link to some images on the blog below.
https://gapagnw.blogspot.com/2019/07/more-elizabethans-off-workbench.html
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/48232123586_f572f5f85c_b.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2gu7eXG)IMG_20190708_150452 (https://flic.kr/p/2gu7eXG) by Roger Castle (https://www.flickr.com/photos/152172226@N06/), on Flickr
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Loved all the Borders minis in this thread and thought I'd weigh in with a recommendation for Robert Low's two new novels on the Border Wars of Henry VIII.
A Dish of Spurs and sequel Burning the Water are cracking tales of the conflicts and describe forces fighting.
Low is a favourite author, such so that I took a character in these novels as my Nom de plume!
Thanks for sharing!
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Batty is a brilliantly concieved character, I love those books.
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Looking forward to when the two Low books are readily available in US (at this point, they ship from UK, and are a bit pricey for paperbacks).
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Personally I think its some of his best work. I have all his books, the Lion Rampant books have some brilliant characters for me these Batty Coalhouse books are another level.
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Is it safe to assume that the Casting Room Elizabethans are similar in height and heft to the Foundry Seadogs?'
https://www.castingroomminiatures.com/collections/collection-2
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Is it safe to assume that the Casting Room Elizabethans are similar in height and heft to the Foundry Seadogs?'
https://www.castingroomminiatures.com/collections/collection-2
Yes, many (although not all of them) are Frankenstein creations concocted from adaptations to Mike Owen's original Sea Dogs sculpts, so they should come up at the same size and heft.
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Yes, many (although not all of them) are Frankenstein creations concocted from adaptations to Mike Owen's original Sea Dogs sculpts, so they should come up at the same size and heft.
That;s good considering the original line has no command sets and no cavalry. Isn't it?
Have you also handled the Redoubt Renaissance Irish and Borderers?
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Have you also handled the Redoubt Renaissance Irish and Borderers?
No, I haven't. Not aware of those at all TBH.
I do now have the whole set of TAG mounted borderers by Nick Collier though, and they are top notch.
Thats good considering the orogional line has no command sets and no cavalry. Isnt it?
I'd have said the original Sea Dogs line was full of command figures - there are loads of different officer / character type figures in there.
As they were conceived as swashbuckling Elizabethan sea dogs, the absence of cavalry in the original range seems understandable.
As far as Foundry's one-time practice of lifting sculpts from their back catalogue, and reworking them to provide different variants and entirely 'new' figures, I'm sure this is strictly legal insofar as they bought and paid for the original sculpts from the original artists. Whether it's entirely ethical is a slightly different question. Fairly sure the original sculptors involved would say not, but I suppose it depends on whether you regard sculpting of wargames figures as the output of an artist of sorts, or merely a product which happens to have been made by hand. Which might inform one's view of whether it's okay to take a piece of someone's work (even someone you've paid for that work), and mess about with it / get someone else to add to it. But probably best not to get into that one ;)
Of more importance is whether the end product is up to scratch or not. In the case of Foundry's practice of issuing such cut-and-shut models under the Casting Room Miniatures banner, the results are variable. The range of Zulus freely adapted from Copplestone's Darkest Africa by some lesser hand, are for the most part rather good. The extra packs added to the Sea Dogs range using parts of Mike Owen's original sculpts are, IMHO, a lot more variable. A few of the figures work well. Quite a lot of them just look slightly off to me. I think you can (almost literally in some cases) see the joins. But as ever, you pay your money and take your choice.
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Richard: interesting what you say about Foundry. I'm not aware that they've ever attempted to re-work any of their old Perry ranges, which is interesting. I wonder whether that's for legal reasons?
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No figures to see but border rieivers was one of the 3 ranges that Flags of War were going to be doing now the jacobites are winding up.
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Have you also handled the Redoubt Renaissance Irish and Borderers?
I bought a few of these and really didnt like them, some of their other Rennaisace are lovely and I pinched a couple to use as demi-lancers, the Irish light hors torso is actually quite nice and the horse is best Irish horse I have seen, the heads are just awful though so I did head swaps for the half dozen I picked up. I will be adding some dark age Irish horse probably from Footsore.
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The new Border Reivers book by Robert Lowe mentioned above is out now, just got mine.
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The new Border Reivers book by Robert Lowe mentioned above is out now, just got mine.
An excellent read too! Got me going on to a Moss troopers project using Perry’s,so obviously very late for this period.
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I received mine too. A few other things to read first, and then will get down to reading it.
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Started reading A Dish of Spurs, which is full of wonderful period detail. Is it just me, or is this a 16th Century True Grit ??
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Theres more than a nod to True Grit for sure.
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The Robert Carey novels by PF Chisholm are also a rattling good read. A mix of mystery/detective work and straight action, but certainly I think has good period flavour and lots of ideas for scenarios too. The books are mostly in omnibuses of 2-3 books (omnibi?) - the first of which is called Guns in the North. Recommended.
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Completely agree, some nice ideas for scenaiors in there and a really lovely read.
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Already got out my copy of En Garde and working up various of the characters from A Dish of Spurs. A wonderful read rich with period detail.
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I really enjoyed A Dish of Spurs and have just got my copy of Guns in the North. Just like all my projects this one is growing and growing, if you want some different buildings you could check out Fogou Models they are well cast and characterful.
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I've been trying to identify sources for suitable buildings in resin, but every search I do ends up swamped with mdf, oh and Grand Manner (but I like to do my own painting). What do Fougou have?
Anyone got any suggestions for suitable resin buildings in general? How do Hovels match up to 28mm (as compared to 25mm)?
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I've been trying to identify sources for suitable buildings in resin, but every search I do ends up swamped with mdf, oh and Grand Manner (but I like to do my own painting). What do Fougou have?
Anyone got any suggestions for suitable resin buildings in general? How do Hovels match up to 28mm (as compared to 25mm)?
There is a list of resin building makers at the top of the Medieval Adventures forum you might find useful
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Personally I think the Hudson and Allen buildings from Vatican Enterprises are perfect, I have a bunch of them for this period and they are great.
http://www.wargamescenics.com/
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50746656128_89ba418b8b_w.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2kjiST3)cot (https://flic.kr/p/2kjiST3) by Roger Castle (https://www.flickr.com/photos/152172226@N06/), on Flickr
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/48898955546_c8ca82b9a7_w.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2hv2VSs)house (https://flic.kr/p/2hv2VSs) by Roger Castle (https://www.flickr.com/photos/152172226@N06/), on Flickr
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I thought I would add to this topic as it was helpful in choosing miniature ranges for my Border Reiver project. Here are two Foundry Swashbucklers and a TAG tudor ( Percy) between them. Not totally mismatched, but TAG range is more petite. I won't be mixing ranges in the same unit but I will be using TAG for the cavalry ( with dismouted options).
[url=https://ibb.co/NrSrR5P](https://i.ibb.co/JqQqZV4/percy.jpg) (http://<a href="https://ibb.co/NrSrR5P"><img src="https://i.ibb.co/JqQqZV4/percy.jpg" alt="percy" border="0"></a>[url=http://)http://]]<a href="https://ibb.co/NrSrR5P"><img src="https://i.ibb.co/JqQqZV4/percy.jpg" alt="percy" border="0"></a>[url][/url]
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What about Flags of War miniatures, they are probably the best Reivers on the market.
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Personally I think the Hudson and Allen buildings from Vatican Enterprises are perfect, I have a bunch of them for this period and they are great.
http://www.wargamescenics.com/
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50746656128_89ba418b8b_w.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2kjiST3)cot (https://flic.kr/p/2kjiST3) by Roger Castle (https://www.flickr.com/photos/152172226@N06/), on Flickr
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/48898955546_c8ca82b9a7_w.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2hv2VSs)house (https://flic.kr/p/2hv2VSs) by Roger Castle (https://www.flickr.com/photos/152172226@N06/), on Flickr
Two beautiful buildings there Roger
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Lots of good information in this thread many thanks for all the comparison pics. Very timely for me- I am not interested in Border Reivers per se but rather in early 80 Years War Dutch. I have been looking at these very ranges not knowing how they compared till now.
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Cheers Vodkafan they come out well.
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What about Flags of War miniatures, they are probably the best Reivers on the market.
They scale well with the Wargames Atlantic conquistadors, which is useful if you need to bulk out the miniature range ( we play using Donnybrook with about 30 minis per side). TAG also work well alongside Flags of War.
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Eureka's Portuguese Conquistadors work out well too - a touch smaller and more slender, but basing can even that out.