Charlie's Perry Miniatures medieval blog - UPDATE at last! 3rd Feb

[Charlie_]

Thanks everyone! The next batch of five is ready to be primed.

Like the basing too.

Interesting you should mention that, as I really wasn't sure about it on the first couple of figs. It's ever so simple, just two layers of sand, left unpainted (just sealed with PVA with a drop of brown paint in it), followed by patches of static grass. I wanted something quick and easy as I will be basing lots of these guys. But seeing those finished seven, I think it's worked out nicely! I will stick with this technique.

[tomrommel1]

very nice start indeed! And as the captain said the basing is very good

[Charlie_]

Here we go, five more painted. I stuck with neutral colours for all of them except the archer in green and white livery. I'm pleasantly surprised with the dark grey jack on the billmen - I'll do some more like that for sure (I thought I'd screwed it up, it was originally gonna be a lighter grey).

[tomrommel1]

very nice and very fast

[olyreed]

this thread has made me get my  wotr stuff out again, great work

[Charlie_]

very nice and very fast

Well, I've got a whole army to build, and quite a bit of spare time right now, so I'm getting stuck in!!!

Today my order from Wayland Games finally arrived, three weeks and a day after I ordered it. So I now have all six Perry medieval kits, and the conversion potential has hugely increased!

First off I have used the Mercenaries box to build these three.



The two-handed sword chap is a straight build from the Mercenaries command frame.
The one in the middle required a number of cuts... The right arm is from the mercenaries command frame, the hand and weapon shaft is from the light cavalry set, and the weapon head (is it a glaive?) is from the mercenaries kit again. The head is from the mounted men at arms. Having the extra polearm weapon heads in the mercenaries box is going to be very useful for things like this!
The last one uses the sword-hand I chopped off the right arm from the last guy, and arms from the light cavalry set.

I also had another delivery today, from Flags Of War.



I had planned for one of these to go on the standard bearer I have already painted and posted above, but... shock, horror, the flag is too big! Or the flagpole is too small.....
But with all the spare spears and pikes I now have hanging around it is no problem to lengthen flagpoles. I used the spare spear I had chopped in half to make the glaive guy above to lengthen his flagpole. It's now long enough to take the flag! Pictures soon hopefully.



I was worried if I'd be able to get the two pole halves to sit together flush and straight, but it was easier than expected, and anyway the join will be covered by the flag so it doesn't have to look too neat.

[Captain Blood]

Good progress Charile, and interesting builds.

[OSHIROmodels]

Interesting that you've added to the haft rather than replace it completely. I'm assuming you've pinned the, together?

cheers

James

[AdamPHayes]

Interesting that you've added to the haft rather than replace it completely. I'm assuming you've pinned the, together?

cheers

James

Quite brave either way! I just lop off spears and replace them with wire as a matter of course....

[tyrionhalfman]

Great progress and great variety

[janner]

Great progress and great variety

Seconded.

I find plastic banner staves a little too fragile and generally replace them with wire.

[Charlie_]

Actually, I've never actually used wire for spears and banner poles. Perhaps now it is time for me to learn?

I think the standard bearer above can be a test run, to see how he holds up. I'm thinking having the paper banner wrapped and glued around the pole will strengthen it, but we will see.

If anyone could direct me to a good tutorial for replacing plastic spears with wire ones, it would be appreciated!

A pack of these looks very useful.
http://store.warlordgames.com/collections/hail-caesar-armoury/products/80mm-metal-pikes-50

Also on the subject of the banners, has anyone here used Citadel Six? It looks like just what I need, as he does commission work for designing heraldry, which will be perfect for some of the more obscure ASOIAF houses I plan to use, and some houses of my own invention. He provides waterslide transfers to go on brass foil banners, supplied with a wire banner pole as well. I plan to commission him to do me a set of several banners, no transfers for shields or livery jackets required. I emailed him a while ago but have yet to get a reply.

[Charlie_]

So, I've been having fun combining all six kits to make some interesting characters.

First, my thoughts on a couple of the kits.

Foot Knights - This set is obviously fantastic, however I think there are only so many ways you can have a man at arms in full plate armour with a poleaxe before they all start to look the same. You do get a full 38 figures in this one, so I will be in no hurry to assemble them all with poleaxes any time soon. Luckily it means you get 6 of each weapon. Cutting weapon heads off and transplanting them to different sets of arms is a very easy conversion, and I'm going to be doing a lot of this. For example, there is only one warhammer in the set (x6), so wouldn't it be a waste to have the same arms wielding it every time? The head can easily be cut off and put on all sorts of other arms.

Agincourt To Orleans - I'd heard how the figures in this one are slightly taller, and it's definitely true! So much in fact that I really don't think I'll be using the bodies much at all. I put one of the archer bodies together with some bill-wielding arms from the WOTR set, and he towers over all the other billmen. Combined with the archaic clothing and armour, it really makes him stand out. However the arms and extra bits in this set are invaluable! In particular some of the man-at-arms weapons, though frustratingly you only get two of each, so I will have to use them carefully.

Here are some of the new builds I've made I'm really pleased with.

This chap on the left is obviously gonna be some sort of general. The arms are from the mercenaries command sprue, on a foot knight body. The fellow to his right uses the weapon head-swapping I was talking about - the poleaxe is from the WOTR command sprue, but with the warhammer head from the foot knights. He does maybe look like he's grabbing his crotch though... I'd quite like to make a few of these guys in standing poses to act as a bodyguard for the leader, though there are only a few fully armoured bodies to choose from that aren't walking.



And here are three veteran retainers. The first on the left features arms from the WOTR set, but with an axe-head from the foot knights set to make a brutal looking double-handed axe.
The other two both feature spear-arms from the Agincourt To Orleans set, the one in the middle having had the speartip replaced by one of the polearm heads from the WOTR command frame.



That's it for today, building them has distracted me from painting a bit, now that I've at least sampled every set I need to knuckle down and get painting!

[Captain Blood]

Very nice kitbashing. Particularly like the middle chap at the bottom.
As you are no doubt finding, the building of new figures is terribly addictive, and pushes painting backwards 
I know how it feels, trust me 

[Big Martin Back]

Nice conversions. I recently bought another box of the basic infantry, partly to increase my stock of individually based WOTR figures to play Lion Rampant as well as ACOP and partly to try some conversions with the bits from the light cavalry and men at arms boxes.