EPIC ECW Marston Moors Collection

[Helge]

Greetings

A while ago I acquired a whole bunch of sprues for Warlord Games' "EPIC" ECW release. In this thread I will gradually turn those into a small collection as a side project to my larger Napoleonics adventure. This will be a slow-pace activity whenever I need a break from painting an eternal stream of Prussian Landwehr...

As with all my projects, the collection will be centred on a single historical battle so that I can work on a real order of battle (and know when to stop!). I had originally planned to do the relatively modest battle of Naseby. Unfortunately, I then procrastinated and Warlord eventually released their Scottish sprues. The Scots - which I inevitably purchases - weren't at Naseby so the project will now be focused on the battle of Marston Moors. Conveniently, this battle saw a collision of royalists, parliamentarian and Scottish covenanter forces so there will be a bit of everything.

Collection Design

I am mostly using the Warlord sprue for this collection, though their cavalry models don't look particularly good. I bought a bunch of 15mm cavalry that I might substitute here and there, but I have 20+ Warlord sprues so they have to go somewhere . Painting will by my usual Contrast Paint approach for mass armies, with bit of rough pre-shading beforehand.

The small bases that Warlord provides for the game look really cramped so I have decided to base everything on 60mm frontage MDF with variable depth. All cavalry and independent foot units will be based on 60mm x 40mm representing around 200 men per base. A deeper base gives more depth to add landscaping and spread out the ranks. For the infantry battalia, I am using depth to indicate unit size, as follows:

 - Small Battalia (<600 men): One 60x40mm base of pike, two flanking 30x40mm bases of musketeers
 - Standard (600-1200): One 60x60mm base of pike, two flanking 60x40mm bases of musketeers
 - Large (1200+): One 60x80mm base of pike, two flanking 60x60mm bases of musketeers

Give the command and control limits of the age, it seems more reasonable that larger regiments would have more depth rather than doubling in frontage the way that Warlord suggests for large formations. This also avoids the weird look of having two parallel command groups in the front...

As with my Napoleonics, I am using round bases for commanders with the size and figure count indicating the level of command:

- Army commanders on 50mm bases with 3 figures
- Wing/contingent commanders on 40mm bases with 2 figures
- Line commanders on 30mm with 1 figure

The Armies
Both armies had the typical wings of cavalry, of approximately equal size, which I will tackle later in the project. In the centre, their composition varied. The Royalists had grouped their multitude of small regiment into 22 "bodies" which appear to have mostly operated in pairs. I am going to represent a single "body" as a standard battalia and a pair of bodies operating under a single command as a large battalia. Opposing them were a combined force of Scottish Covenanters - operating also in paired regiments - and a smaller contingent of Parliamentarian regiments. As with my Napoleonics, I will mark of units in green once I post them here.

The Royalist Army - Prince Rupert of the Rhine

Right Wing of Horse - Lieutenant-General Lord Byron
     First Line - Sergeant-Major General of the Horse Sir John Urry
              Lord Byron's Regiment of Horse (2)
              Sir John Urry's Regiment of Horse (2)
              Col. Marcus Trevor's Regiment of Horse (2)
              Sir William Vaughan's Regiment of Horse (1)
              Col. Samuel Tuke's Regiment of Horse (1)
              Commanded Musketeers
     Second Line - Lord Molyneux
              Prince Rupert's Regiment of Horse (2)
              Lord Molyneux's Regiment of Horse (2)
              Sir Thomas Tyldesley Regiment of Horse (1)
              Thomas Leveson's Regiment of Horse (1)

Centre - Lord Eythin
     Forward Group
              Prince Rupert's Regiment of Foot (L)
              Lord Byron's Regiment of Foot (ST)
              Commanded Musketeers
     First Line - Sergeant-Major General of Foot Henry Tillier
              Henry Warren's Regiment of Foot (ST)
              Sir Thomas Tyldesley Regiment of Foot (L)
              Robert Broughton's Regiment of Foot (L)
              Henry Tillier's Regiment of Foot (L)
              Erneley & Gibon's Regiment of Foot (ST)
     Second Line - Sergeant-Major General Sir Francis Mackworth
              Henry Cheator's Regiment of Foot (L)
              Edward Chisenall's Regiment of Foot (ST)
              Derbyshire Foot (S)
     Newcastle White Coats - General Marquess of Newcastle
              Combined White Coat Regiments (L)
              Combined White Coat Regiments (L)
     Artillery
     Reserve of Horse - Commissary General George Porter
              Prince Rupert's Lifeguard (1)
              Sir William Blakiston's Brigade of Northern Horse (2)
              Sir Edward Widdrington's Brigade of Northern Horse (2)

Left Wing of Horse - General of Horse George, Lord Goring
     First Line - Sir Marmaduke Langdale
              Sir Richard Dacre's Brigade of Northern Horse (4)
              John Frescheville's Regiment of Horse (1)
              Rowland Eyre's Regiment of Horse (1)
              Col. Francis Regiment of Horse (1)
              Commanded Musketeers
     Second Line - Lieutenant-General Sir Charles Lucas
              Sir Charles Lucas' Brigade of Northern Horse (4)
              Commanded Musketeers



The Allied Army - General Alexander Leslie, Earl of Leven

Right Wing of Horse - Lieutenant-General Sir Thomas Fairfax
     Thomas Morgan's Regiment of Dragoons
     First Line
              Lord Fairfax' Regiment of Horse (2)
              Sir Thomas Fairfax' Regiment of Horse (2)
              Charles Fairfax' Regiment of Horse (2)
              Sir Hugh Bethell's Regiment of Horse (2)
              Commanded Musketeers
     Second Line - Sergeant-Major General of the Horse John Lambert
              John Lambert's Regiment of Horse (2)
              Lionel Copley's Regiment of Horse (3)
              Francis Boynton's Regiment of Horse (2)
              Sir Thomas Norcliff's Regiment of Horse (1)
              George Dodding's Regiment of Horse (1)
              Commanded Musketeers
     Third Line - Earl of Eglinton
              Earl of Leven's Regiment of Horse (2)
              Earl of Dalhousie's Regiment of Horse (2)
              Earl of Eglinton's Regiment of Horse (2)

Centre
     First Line - Lieutenant-General of Foot William Baillie
             The Earl of Crawford-Lindsay's Fife Regiment of Foot
             The Midlothian Regiment of Foot (Viscount Maitland)
             The Kyle and Carrick Regiment of Foot (Earl of Cassillis)
             The Nithsdale and Annandale Regiment of Foot (William Douglas of Kilhead)
     Second Line - Sergeant Major General of Foot Sir James Lumsden
             The Loudon-Glasgow Regiment of Foot, also known as The Chancellor's Foot (Earl of Loudon)
             The Earl of Dunfermline's Fife Regiment of Foot (Earl of Dunfermline)
             The Strathearn Regiment of Foot (Lord Coupar)
     Rear Line
             The Stirlingshire Regiment of Foot (Lord Livingstone)
             The Linlithgow and Tweeddale Regiment of Foot (The Master of Yester)
             The Angus Regiment of Foot
             The Minister's Regiment of Foot
             The Levied Regiment
             The Galloway Regiment
             The Teviotdale Regiment
             The East Lothian Regiment
     Detached to Fairfax Contingent
             The Clydesdale Regiment of Foot (Sir Alexander Hamilton)
             The Tweeddale Regiment of Foot (Earl of Buccleugh)
             The Edinburgh Regiment of Foot (Colonel James Rae)
     Fairfax Contingent - General Lord Fairfax
             Lord Fairfax's Regiment of Foot (ST)
             John Bright's Regiment of Foot (ST)
             Combined Northern Foot (ST)
     Manchester's First Line - Sergeant-Major General of the Foot Lawrence Crawford
             Earl of Manchester's Regiment of Foot (L)
             Sergeant-Major General Crawford's Regiment of Foot (ST)
             Sir Miles Hobart's Regiment of Foot (ST)
     Manchester's Second Line - Earl of Manchester
             Edward Montagu's Regiment of Foot (S)
             John Pickering's Regiment of Foot (S)
             Francis Russell's Regiment of Foot (S)
     Artillery - General of the Ordnance Sir Alexander Hamilton

Left Wing of Horse - LG of the Horse Oliver Cromwell
     Col. Hugh Fraser's Dragoons (2)
     First Line
             LG Cromwell's Regiment of Horse (4)
     Second Line - Commissary General Bartholomew Vermuyden
             Earl of Manchester's Regiment of Horse (4)
             Commissary General Bartholomew Vermuyden's Regiment of Horse (2)
             Charles Fleetwood's Regiment of Horse (2)
             Commanded Musketeers
     Third Line - LG of the Horse Sir David Leslie
             LG David Leslie's Regiment of Horse (2)
             Earl of Balcarre's Regiment of Horse (2)
             Lord Kirkcudbright's Regiment of Horse (2)

[Helge]

I am starting with the royalist infantry. First we have Henry Warren's standard regiment which I painted up a while ago as a prototype. Even though a mix of browns is realistic for the period, it doesn't look great at this scale. So for future regiments I will use bold, consistent uniforms which - while historically incorrect - just looks nicer on the tabletop.

[rct75001]

I had to stop myself and check that it was the one and same person as painting that massive 28mm Napoleonics project - you are a glutton for punishment

That first unit looks excellent.  But my goodness it is a lot of units to paint - good luck.

Richard

[Norm]

Marvellous work and plans.

 My Pike & Shotte project is not too far away. I am thinking of 2 basing changes. 1 - Cutting the musket strips in half and basing them in either 3 or 4 ranks on a 30mm frontage (the effect would be to give P&S unit a frontage of 120mm instead of 180mm) and 2 - losing those single figures in the front rank that have their pikes at porte and replacing with a standard pike strip or moving the command strip to the front and just adding a standard strip behind, to maintain the 4 ranks. These will go onto a single 60 x 60 base.

[Calvin59]

Vast project! But it is very interesting and motivates me to continue my parliamentary army. I will follow with great pleasure the evolution of the program. 

[scotty]

Looking good. I did my own Marston Moor game using the Epic figures at the Border Reiver show. For the cavalry, I mixed in figures from Peter Pig, Steel fist and Alternative armies. A good match with the Warlord cavalry

[Hu Rhu]

This is going to be ....EPIC.

Seriously a great start but I don't envy you the painting challenge, even using contrast paints.  Good luck.

[Helge]

Thank you all for the well-wishes. This project will progress slowly in between Napoleonic efforts, but here is hoping that it will get done!

Looking good. I did my own Marston Moor game using the Epic figures at the Border Reiver show. For the cavalry, I mixed in figures from Peter Pig, Steel fist and Alternative armies. A good match with the Warlord cavalry

Wondeful! Are there any photos of this to admire?

Next we have the large regiment of foot of Sir Thomas Tyldesley. They wore red uniforms and I matched green accents to the flag. As a large unit, they have more ranks of pike and musketeers.

[scotty]

A great looking regiment

Wondeful! Are there any photos of this to admire?

Some photos of my game on here https://scottyswargaming.blogspot.com/2024/09/border-reiver-and-game.html