Lead Adventure Forum
Miniatures Adventure => Medieval Adventures => Topic started by: Whitwort Stormbringer on February 28, 2015, 12:42:17 AM
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How did these escape our collective interest for so long?! (based on my rudimentary search skills, apologies if it's been covered)
I'm very much looking forward to this set, particularly for SAGA, as bow-armed levy have been the most difficult unit for me to find in plastic, and I'm trying to keep things pretty cheap.
Discussion on Conquest's forum suggests ~28 models per box (kind of an odd number...), with many head variants to represent different cultures, and compatibility with their Norman sets for conversion possibilities (like the sounds of both of those!).
I realize they're not making minis for one game in particular, so the minis/box is entirely their prerogative, but I do wish they were in a multiple of 12 for building SAGA levy units. Oh well, 4 leftover minis (plus, apparently, plenty of heads) really isn't a problem.
Sounds like they're aiming for a late Fall release.
(http://i35.photobucket.com/albums/d197/Myntokk/image.jpg1_zpsyfdfw0xb.jpg) (http://s35.photobucket.com/user/Myntokk/media/image.jpg1_zpsyfdfw0xb.jpg.html)
(http://i35.photobucket.com/albums/d197/Myntokk/image.jpg2_zpsrku0smlo.jpg) (http://s35.photobucket.com/user/Myntokk/media/image.jpg2_zpsrku0smlo.jpg.html)
(http://i35.photobucket.com/albums/d197/Myntokk/image.jpg3_zpsnri4tdvh.jpg) (http://s35.photobucket.com/user/Myntokk/media/image.jpg3_zpsnri4tdvh.jpg.html)
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Wow... These could be fun :D
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Could be useful. Hadn't noticed these before. The heads look really good. I like those a lot.
The arms and in particular the legs - rather less so :?
Not a great fan of the Conquest Games Normans, I must admit. But there is a definite learning curve with plastic-producing companies, and later sets tend to be noticeably better than first efforts. So fingers crossed that these are an improvement, and I'll reserve judgement until I see them in the flesh. Or plastic.
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There's certainly a gap in the market for some decent plastic dark ages missile troops, so will keep an eye on these. Long time to wait though.
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These are a great welcome indeed. :)
Lots of possibilities with separate heads, plus the converted ones of course. :D
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Dark age archers? Yes please. Thank you sir.
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Could be useful. Hadn't noticed these before. The heads look really good. I like those a lot.
The arms and in particular the legs - rather less so :?
That. I wonder if they could sculpt the short sleeves so they 'hang' a little more, and still provide suitable sockets for the arms.
Still tempting, though.
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Looks promising. I am don't really like the look of the chainmail.
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I think it'd look better if it was tidied up and rotated 90 degrees. I'm far from an expert, but on most real hauberks I've seen the link columns tend to... 'point' left and right rather than up and down.
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Didn't want to be a naysayer, as I quite like the faces, but the arm joins look really rough.
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I think these may be just what I need.
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Thanks for the notice WS. I see from the web site that autumn 2015 is likely. Always on the lookout for suitable archers for my Dacians and Pontics - I think with some suitable head swaps these may work. Hopefully will be compatible with GB Dark Ages heads and arms?
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Hopefully will be compatible with GB Dark Ages heads and arms?
I'd guess they will be compatible in terms of scale, but in keeping with other Conquest sets, the upper sleeves will be attached to the torsos, with shorter arms ("elbows-down") separate, and neck attached to the heads, rather than torsos with integrated necks, as in the GB sets.
So I would suspect the parts will mix just fine, with a little cutting and trimming.
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Those definitely look much better than their Normans which I cannot make myself like.
The chainmail seems to be made with vertical rows instead of horisontal, which seems a bit odd, though?
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they look promising
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Good catch on the chainmail, it's not something I'd have noticed on my own. It won't prevent me from using the models, but now that a few folks mention it, it does look a tad odd.
I have to admit, while bow-armed models interest me, I think the greatest appeal for me is a greater diversity of unarmored Dark Ages infantry in plastic. The GB models have plenty of war gear options, but are extremely lacking in pose variety, while the other Conquest infantry are a little more dynamic, but sorely lacking in options. Hopefully, with these thrown into the mix, there will be plenty of variety and options between the 3 sets.
Didn't want to be a naysayer, as I quite like the faces, but the arm joins look really rough.
Looks to me like they're blue-tacked into place, which is probably part of it.
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I usually dont visit their forum but I just stumbeled on this. Yes please :D
(http://i950.photobucket.com/albums/ad342/Conquest_Games/Medieval%20Archers/Medieval%20Archers%20for%20web_zpsfnrs4i0e.jpg)
"...We have just got back the wonderful box art from our talented artist Andrea Modesti. Here's a sneak preview of it before it gets put onto the actual boxes themselves..."
http://www.conquest-games.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=47873 (http://www.conquest-games.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=47873)
We don't have an exact date yet for their release but we are aiming to have them ready for a Crisis release (beginning of November). We will also put them up for pre-order maybe a few weeks before too and post them out a short while before official release. We should have a few more things to show you in the next month or so.
Mike
It looks like it will be a "Go" for a Crisis 2015 release unless there are any major delays in the rest of the process - we have got to the complex stage where we try to get everything (artwork, painting, printing, advertising etc.) to come to a head on the right day. We will be doing pre-orders on the webstore before then too.
Mike
(http://i950.photobucket.com/albums/ad342/Conquest_Games/Medieval%20Archers/IMG_6532%20copy_zpscjhgq4gn.jpg)
"Here's another teaser for you - a painted 3-Up that will be apearing on the side of the box..."
http://www.conquest-games.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?p=54296#p54296
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Nice! Could use a box of these when they're released.
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Nice box! Yet some anti-shine would do.
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would like a box too
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They look suitably generic enough to match most dark ages armies. I am sure with a few head swaps and maybe some alternative legs they might make excellent additions to my army.
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The one in the first photo's got the look of a garden gnome.
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I would use them for my GoT Stark army
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I am wondering why they have chosen to show models carrying the quiver on the back, as belt quivers were by far the most common (and, practising archery myself, I must add, also the most practical) way to carry arrows.
Also, I am a bit annoyed about the more and more widespread practice of painting up a 3-up model and using it to promote a figure range, as the final 28mm product will almost never quite match the master model detail- and crispness-wise.
These models may end up looking allright, but I'll need to see the final product to judge that, and given the weird mail, and the shoulder 'baldrics' which seem to be without a scabbard (the most widely (by historians/archaeologists) accepted way to carry a sword, at least by vikings), thus making them obsolete, I feel quite a bit reserved towards them. Well, if not too many of them wear the mail, I may yet decide to get a set...
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I visited their forum again to check the status on these.
(http://i950.photobucket.com/albums/ad342/Conquest_Games/Medieval%20Archers/Medieval%20Archers_zpsqvo70ygg.jpg)
Here is the first shot of our new Medieval Archers box content, painted by Toby at Artmaster Studio.
There are only 24 of the miniatures in the shot, you will actually get 28 archers in the box set.
We are almost there for the release of our new Medieval Archers.
We have put up some box sets for pre-order (please note, that any order that contains an Archers box set will not be posted until the Archers are available). These will be sent out as early as we can manage to try to coincide with the Crisis 2015 show.
Our retailers and distributors should be taking pre-orders soon too - talk to your favourite on-seller and order some in if you prefer to buy from them.
The official release date is Monday 9th November. However, they will be up for sale at Crisis 2015 if you can make it there.
Regards,
Mike
http://www.conquest-games.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=47874
Nice to see some progress. :)
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Put in my order, plenty of quite useful looking options.
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Hopefully they'll be at Warfare :)
cheers
James
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Their official release is at Crisis...I saw the first painted copies at SELWG - they looked quite nice in the flesh. They were just sorting out a few details with the sprue. They are also planning to release Andalucian shields and heads which may be of interest.
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From the artwork I was hoping for some Phrygian helmet, but I can see only some odd looking phrygian cap! Am I wrong?
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Any close-ups?
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From the artwork I was hoping for some Phrygian helmet, but I can see only some odd looking phrygian cap! Am I wrong?
Sometimes the difference between a cap and a helmet is the colour of the paint ;)
For the other times possibly a scalpel and about 2mm of green stuff 8)
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:) it is so, indeed.
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I believe the release date was two days ago, did anybody place an order? I hope somebody does an unboxing so that we can have a look at the sprues.
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Hoping I might pick up a box at Warfare at the weekend, as Conquest are allegedly trading there...
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I've recently found out about these figures but i was a bit doubtful of them. But now that I've seen some pics I'll definitely be getting a box.
They'll make a great addition to my SAGA armies as well as doing double service for light infantry skirmishers for Hail Caesar.
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I have ordered a box but not directly from them so I dont know exactly when I might get it Im afraid.
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Picked up a box at Crisis !
Very good looking set nice parts to kit bash
I will start on them on the weekend and post pictures then.
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Good news. Thanks Tom.
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Hoping I might pick up a box at Warfare at the weekend, as Conquest are allegedly trading there...
Wanna go halves ;D
cheers
James
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Good plan! :)
I'll see you there.
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:D
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Picked up a box at Crisis !
Very good looking set nice parts to kit bash
I will start on them on the weekend and post pictures then.
Please, don't forget to make pictures of the sprues! That would be really appreciated :)
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Acquired a Conquest Games Medieval Archer Accessories sprues at Crisis in the Goodie Bag. More pictures can be found at my Wargame News and Terrain, Wargame News blog. http://wargameterrain.blogspot.be/2015/11/conquest-games-new-hard-plastic.html (http://wargameterrain.blogspot.be/2015/11/conquest-games-new-hard-plastic.html)
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It is fairly unbelievable that this company has produced (and is now selling) this product - a product which we all know has a very long development time of several months before getting into final production, and yet they still haven't actually managed to take pictures of the frames to show what's on them... ::)
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And they still have that insane 'mouse-over-popup' in their webstore. *sigh*
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And they still have that insane 'mouse-over-popup' in their webstore. *sigh*
That's all the rage on websites now. I hate it so much. Just let me zoom in with my iPhone! I CAN DO IT!
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As requested, shots of the frames...
Things to note. The box contains 4 frames x 6 archer figures, plus two 'accessory frames' (which are in fact, just the bottom half of the standard frame - the half with all the bow arms), plus one command frame - which is the same as the command frame in the Norman infantry box.
My first impressions are that these are quite a lot like the Fireforge, Gripping Beast and Frostgrave plastics - i.e. soft detail on the clothing and bodies, well done faces. The hands on these are slightly unnatural looking, giving them that slightly Games Workshop-like look that a lot of plastic figures seem to unavoidably have (Perry and Victrix excepted).
The legs all look a bit suspiciously stiff and spindly to me, and unlike all the other plastic figure sets out there, the Conquest figures have shoulders and upper arms moulded onto the body, with only lower arms separate. I don't know why they decided to do it like this, because it not only reduces one's ability to pose the figure how you want it to some extent, but it also cuts down the ease with which you can kitbash them with other sets without resorting to surgery of some sort :?
Not insurmountable, but irritating.
There are some separate knives (which look suspiciously like Bowie knives rather than C11th daggers) and quivers of arrows included, and these are nicely done.
The casting is pretty clean with only faint mould lines and one or two tiny bobbles of spare plastic attached to sword tips etc.
The detail disappears a bit in some places though. The faces, for instance, are very nicely done (although a shame they included a couple of duplicates). The back of the hair is very soft on detail though. Weirdly, on some of the heads though, at the sides of the head (where the back of the hair joins the front of the face), it kind of bleeds into no real detail at all. Just a semi-featureless area of plastic. Which is poor frankly.
Here are the frames:
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/23/577_14_11_15_6_23_52_0.JPG)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/23/577_14_11_15_6_23_52_1.JPG)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/23/577_14_11_15_6_23_53_2.JPG)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/23/577_14_11_15_6_23_53_3.JPG)
This is the 'accessory frame' (as you see, it's just the bottom half of the main frame)
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/23/577_14_11_15_6_23_53_4.JPG)
And the command frame...
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/23/577_14_11_15_6_25_12.JPG)
Now despite my criticisms, my sense is that the bodies will take paint extremely well. So I'll probably just put a few figures together straight from the box, possibly with a little bit of added Green Stuff fur, and maybe some trousers on a couple of them, and they'll serve decently enough for Stark or early Saxon bowmen respectively.
Jimbibbly and I split a box, so for nine quid for 15 odd figures and lots of spare parts, I really can't complain. It's probably worth it for the heads alone, which will appear on many a future mash-up of all denominations. The knives and quivers will certainly come in useful, as will some of the bow arms wearing braces, and even some of the pointing hands etc.
It's really just the legs which look a bit suspect. Maybe I'll just stand mine in long grass ;)
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Thanks -most useful :)
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Thanks for sharing captain Blood, they look very useful, even though they've stuck with the shoulders attached to the bodies and the low neck joint that are unique to this manufacturer.
A shame, as even though different manufacturers have approached neck joins differently, the others all at least attach arms at the shoulder.
I'm guessing the reason for the shoulders being on the body is to stop you being left with a noticeable line down the shoulder, especially with chain mail unless you're fairly skilled with green stuff. It might look good, but it limits your options for easy kitbashing.
Having said that I'll still pick some up as the other available dark age sets lack archers.
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Oh dear... :(
Just spent half an hour trying out all the possible shooting arm combinations, and I can't achieve a remotely realistic looking shooting pose.
The problem is the arm joint. Because all the upper arms turn inwards slightly toward the torso, it's just not possible to achieve a lifelike longbow shooting pose, whereby the bow arm, the bowman's chest and the loosing arm are 'flat' - i.e. in a line.
On these figures, the bow arm is always going to turn inwards, whilst the restriction of the ball-and-socket style joint just above the elbow, means that it's also impossible to raise the loosing arm up to the height it should be. Whoever designed these made a schoolboy error... A bow is not loosed with the hand in the middle of the chest, but with the hand pulled back and right up by the ear.
The only way I can see of achieving it is to chop off the arms at the shoulders and reposition the upper arms to turn them more outwards and / or upwards.
If you're not too fussy and just want the general representation of bowmen on the tabletop for a wargame, I guess these will be fine.
But if you're at all interested in the modelling aspects, and creating reasonably lifelike poses, I'm afraid these aren't going to do the job.
Disappointing :?
Ah well, the heads are good...
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Great review, Captain. Thanks. :)
Unnatural hands: where the knuckles and the fingertips are all lined up in perfectly parallel rows, implying that all the fingers are the same length and the fist is a neat cube?
Bowie knives: an attempt at seaxes? Seems kinda limiting either way.
Attached shouders: aye! I remember they looked a bit square and hunched on the Conquest Norman cavalry. I think their effect on the bow-pose might be enough to make me pass on these, for now. (Schoolboy errors that'd be nonexistant with even the most cursory bit of research [i.e. a glance at google images] seem too common in corners of this hobby) Pity, because the heads do look good. :)
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I vaguely recall that shortbows were drawn to the chest rather than to the ear. Do you suppose that could account for the wonky poses?
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I vaguely recall that shortbows were drawn to the chest rather than to the ear. Do you suppose that could account for the wonky poses?
Possibly. Some of the bows depicted in the kit look more like short bows, others appear to be longbows.
Honestly, I think it's just poor design and execution. The way the arm joints work and the way the figures have been sculpted, make it impossible to achieve realistic bow firing postures.
Here's a comparison picture. One of the Conquest figures - as good as I can get it - alongside a Frostgrave body with Perry HYW arms and head.
Because of the way most modern plastic figures fit together, it's possible to easily adjust the set of the head and arms to create more or less realistic looking poses. As with the Frostgrave/Perry model. The head can be tilted. The arms orientated from the shoulder joint to achieve a natural pose. But because of the way these Conquest figures fit together, for a firing pose at least, it isn't possible. The head sits up, rather than looking along the arrow, the bow arm turns in towards the body, and the loosing arm/hand is way too low - sitting above the solar plexus rather than up by the ear/chin.
The Frostgrave figure with the Perry arms and head looks like a passable representation of a man firing a bow.
The Conquest figure looks like a child's drawing of a man firing a bow.
It's not awful - but it's not right.
(By the way, look at the size of the loosing hand. It's approximately twice the size of the hand holding the bow stave!)
Like I say - for me, at any rate - the execution of many aspects of this set is disappointing :(
Sorry to knock them. It's a much-needed attempt to fill a gap in the market for general purpose plastic early medieval bowmen. And aspects of the set are good. For other poses, it might be fine. But for bow firing poses... They just don't look right. That said, I appreciate I'm a fussy so-and-so. For general wargaming purposes, I'm sure most people won't worry too much about the slightly awkward poses.
(http://leadadventureforum.com/gallery/23/577_15_11_15_10_53_27.JPG)
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I think chopping off the arms at the shoulder and then using the Perry Agincourt arms might be the way to go. I'll have a fumble around tonight and see what happens :)
cheers
James
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I think chopping off the arms at the shoulder and then using the Perry Agincourt arms might be the way to go. I'll have a fumble around tonight and see what happens :)
That should work.
A little GS to hide the gap and you are sorted.
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Well, I shall have to pass on this. Too much else to do to bother with getting a somewhat inferior product to look better. Conquest did it again.
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Richard, thanks for putting the frames pictures.
About the bodies and heads indeed they may give some good possiblities for converting.
The arms are a bit more dificult but i believe with some cuts and the help of green stuff they may end up in some interesting aditions.
Nevertheless and despite the negative parts i think they will end up doing their job.
Definetly a lesson for Conquest to learn on the next plastic set. :)
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Captain Blood, thank you so much for the excellent review! Some features of the set seem to be dissapointing, but for example the faces are great.
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Wooohooo!
This set had gone totally under my radar. Not to say that it hasn't been missed. When I started my Conquest Normans I wondered why they hadn't made any archers but I guess it's just another one man hobby operation adhering to the same reality as the rest of us.
In the mean time I managed to buy some Black Tree Design archers, but heck - who cares! lol
Happy I am.
EDIT:
That webstore is driving me nuts! Every time I scroll over an image it opens in a pop-up window! Is it just me!?
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That webstore is driving me nuts! Every time I scroll over an image it opens in a pop-up window! Is it just me!?
Nope, it's the absolutely worst webstore solution I've ever come across.
And they still have that insane 'mouse-over-popup' in their webstore. *sigh*
That's all the rage on websites now. I hate it so much. Just let me zoom in with my iPhone! I CAN DO IT!
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Shame, but...on sale I suppose the heads and bits could be worth it, and (oddly) you could probably use the bodies to make other non-archer types...scrounging what you can from the box. Thanks for the review and the pictures. I don't need heaps of archers any time soon, but it's nice to know what's on there. I do quite like the heads/faces though.
Sure would be nice to see a plastic manufacturer sell a "extras" sprue. You know? You have two or three boxes in a line of plastics. How about an extras sprue with casualties, additional heads, weapons, banners, shields, etc. Allow you to really go nuts and get characters on the table.
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I'm getting a box for Christmas, so at least I won't be paying for them. I've got plenty of extra bits from other sets to bash about with.