Ottoman 18th Century Army - New Units

[OB]

Very good to see this.  My next project is a Tatar/ Ottoman force for With Talon and Claw.

[AdamPHayes]

Very good to see this.  My next project is a Tatar/ Ottoman force for With Talon and Claw.

I have read that the Tatar cavalry was the best light horsemen of the period, so that should make a very effective combination.

[OB]

Yes they should be fun.

[AdamPHayes]

No face to face gaming in 2020 so I had no excuse but to crack on with painting the Ottoman army... I matched up a couple of likely looking guns with the gunners I got from Brigade Games a few years back. 18th C. Ottoman artillery had moved on from the giant bombards that were associated with their successful sieges of previous centuries and were not dissimilar to European models. I did want a bit of battlefield clutter on the bases which required deeper sections if I wasn't going to make the frontage of each gun too dominant. I actually ended up with each gun having 3 base depths to accommodate all the figures, draught animals and clutter but I haven't quite finished the rearmost ones.







In Beneath the Lilly Banners these are fielded as separate guns representing a pair of guns(?) and in Piquet: Cartouche they are fielded as a 2 model battery. The extra depth to the bases will make me consider carefully where I position the artillery and how it is supported. I'm not expecting it to ever move once deployed!

[DintheDin]

Majestic cavalry flags and well painted riders and horses!
But I think the artillery is stealing the show! Lovely! Congrats!

[Moriarty]

Have you looked at the Hinchliffe line? Loads of Ottoman suitable metals.

[AdamPHayes]

Have you looked at the Hinchliffe line? Loads of Ottoman suitable metals.

Yes, there's some nice models in there. I have some of the horse archers amongst my border militia.

[AdamPHayes]

I can't remember when I decided that Wallachians and Moravians were needed for my Ottoman force. Possibly the very moment I saw an illustration in an Osprey that looked like an easy conversion from the Gripping Beast plastic Arab cavalry. Whatever the order of events I subsequently discovered that although generally despised by Ottoman commanders, the Moldavians and Wallachians were mustered for quite a few campaigns and can also be rebellious subjects fighting on the Russian side.

The conversion consisted of just tall vaguely cylindrical hats from Greenstuff or Procreate putty. I also added pistol holders to the horses from Warlords ECW cavalry and one rider got an ECW arm firing one of their pistols. The majority of the riders were given bows and scimitars to befit their outmoded irregular status. I also tried to create a couple of vaguely eastern boyar style helmets. Not terrifically successful, so I hid one under the arm of a cavalryman who apparently likes the wind in his hair (although he has no hair to speak of...) 



Bigger pic here

The standard was a Web  find of an earlier Moldavian banner that I liked the look of. It has the advantage of not being sycophantically Turkish, so will work for rebel contingents too. In game terms these are probably low quality light cavalry. They were often lumped together with the Tartars although wont be as capable.

I have enough of the figures to make another 8 of these. If I run out of other cavalry to paint, or need to bulk out the Russian army on the Pruth River, I may do another unit with different hats and  call them Wallachians.

[AdamPHayes]

I have been trying ("very trying" many would say) to do some generals  (Pashas?) as I go along, rather than rushing them the night before the first game with the army as is traditional...

The most recent ones come from Warfare Miniatures' nice command figures sets, with an interloper from Brigade Games. This is my Janissary "brigade general". Most of my Janissary units are in scruffy campaign clobber, so this stand will make it clear who they are. If you don't spot the silly hats, then the giant ceremonial spoon is a dead giveaway...






This pair below are actually Perry Miniatures from their Sudan range, Armoured Egyptian cavalry. The style of helmet and mail is close enough to right for 180 years earlier. I gave both riders baggy trousers and adjusted their straight sabres into curved scimitars. The bossman's saddle cloth is an experiment with using nailart transfers as interesting fabric patterns.







I have some more Warfare officers and some from Old Glory, TAG and Caliver who will all get in on the action for the next couple of command stands.

[DintheDin]

Very interesting conversions, lovely paintjobs!

[Grumpy Gnome]

Great work! Clever idea with the nail decal.

[AdamPHayes]

Great work! Clever idea with the nail decal.

It is a brilliant idea. Obviously copied from someone else! (RogerC maybe?) The real trick is finding decals without unicorns on...

[AdamPHayes]

Finished and based a unit (2 BLB squadrons) of Timarli Sipahi, figures by Warfare Miniature.



Excellent miniatures, very dynamic and easy to paint (no really!) The riders all have long firearms to attach to their backs which locate nicely with a lug to a small - in the cavalryman. I had read that there was resistance by Ottoman cavalry to firearms but this may be a Western misapprehension.

These join my other 4 squadrons which are my own castings on Warlord plastic horses.



There is no real information about uniforms for this period; not in the regular/guard Kapikulu units and certainly not for the provincial Sipahi cavalry like these. This allows me to choose a mix of schemes, some units in similar colours some in a complete mix. This will work okay for the successor cavalry to the Sipahi once they pretty much disappear in the mid 1700s.



For the Vienna to Great Northern War period I am going to rate Sipahi as relatively competent. Maybe not as dangerous as previous times (and described as "useless against regular European troops".) However they are still great individual horsemen and relatively keen. No armour at this time and probably no use for the mundane tasks such as picket duty and scouting but there are lots of other cavalry who can carry these out in an Ottoman force.

In Beneath the Lily Banners rules these will be Drilled Blade Horse with lances. In Piquet: Cartouche rules they will be Regular Medium Cavalry with lances or maybe Trained Militia.

[DintheDin]

Warfare Miniatures are lovely! An impressive lot! Keep them coming!

[AdamPHayes]

Balancing up my Ottoman force required some infantry units be painted. The recent arrival of command figures from Warfare Miniatures (thanks Barry) allowed me to complete a command stand for the Bosniaks I already had. These types of soldiers, raised for a short term period during a campaign, usually had Ottoman Turk officers. I chose a figure with a swanky fur-trimmed coat worn over his shoulders and a circular breast plate. The officer figure was done with richer colours but the others on the command stand kept to the duller limited palette used on the rest of the unit.



The new unit is an Orta of Azabs. These are the militia that was maintained in all the border regions of the Ottoman Empire. The quality of Azabs varied greatly depending on where they were. The better quality end of the spectrum were expected to go on campaign with the main field army although ideally they would free up regular troops from garrison duties.



The figures for this unit are almost all conversions. I took my inspiration from the Bruno Mugnai book on the Ottoman army which has an illustration of a European Azab on one of the colour plates. Most of the figures are Warfare Miniatures Tufeckci musketeers. Always hated these (they were a freebie too, I am SO ungrateful!) Everyone seems to produce Tufeckci based on early 17th Century Azabs. My conversions are to remove all the stupid feathers from their hats and add a simple wrap or turban to most of them. All of the figures also got a longer kaftan and/or baggy trousers.

The officer is a conversion of a Brigade Games artillerist and the musician based on a Brigade Nizam-i-Cedit figure. The flag bearer is a Caliver/Minifigs model. He is a mountain of a man 6'2" to scale but then that is the sort of chap I would choose to look after the standard! The flag was another found online based on one for an Ottoman province on the Danube.



These two units epitomise the colour and variety possible in an Ottoman army of this period. I plan on completing another unit of Bosniaks and then doing some Albanians and Arnauts. The aim is to field about 50% of the infantry as non-Kapikulu types.

There are more pictures on my blog (here)