Poles armed with polearms - the Path to Grunwald

[Westfalia Chris]

Well, guess what, I actually managed to paint some stuff! 

As many of you may know, I was never too keen on Medieval wargames, but I got hooked at the beginning of the year when Lt. Hazel told me of his plans to do a Teutonic Order State project for the campaigns of 1409 and 1410. I had attempted to start a Hanseatic League project about 10 years ago, but that fizzled after four figures. This time, I was interested enough to pull through with it.

This conflict between the Teutonic Order and a Polish-Lithuanian alliance arose out of long-running disputes, started off with raids and escalated to numerous Polish towns and castles besieged, ransacked and put to the torch. In retaliation, after an armistice of about half a year, a combined army of Polish, Lithuanian, Russian and Tatar troops invaded the State of the Teutonic Order on the Baltic coast, what was later to become western Prussia. The campaign culminated in the Battle of Grunwald, or Tannenberg, as it is better known in Germany.

Since Lt. Hazel had already opted for the Teutonic Order side (and you may have seen his excellent work in this year's LPL), I opted to go for the Poles and Lithuanians. My initial focus is on Polish knights and infantry, with some Tatar allies for now and maybe some Lithuanians and Russians later on once I sort out the modeling aspects. That said, since we consider using Lion Rampant rules, I've already got 34 points of troops (no upgrades), so it is more of a collection rather than a concise retinue.

I started out using the Kingmaker Hussite War range from 1st Corps and am now adding some suitable, or rather, stylistically-not-too-far-off-the-mark Perry HYW plastics as odds and ends. I'll probably add some siege artillery and a unit of handgunners, but right now the focus was on getting a playable force so we can keep up the Impetus.

Pics, or it didn't happen, though! I'll use the Lion Rampant nomenclature to outline what the units will predominantly be used for.

Six Polish mounted Men-at-Arms. I opted to use a variety of herbs with a common red theme to tie the unit together. Kingmaker miniatures.



Six more Men-at-Arms. Here, I went for a varied look with various heraldic motifs. Obviously, the unit is much less coherent, visually, but it helps keeping the units apart.



Next up, six Mounted Serjeants. These were actually the first mounted figures I painted for the project. I have six more of these, but the casting was rather crude with their horses and I'll have to bring up the motivation to actually get to grips with them.



Last unit of cavalry for now - a bunch of "pseudo-Tatars", i.e. Fireforge Mongols painted a bit more cheerfully to represent some of the 3.000 Tatar allies which formed the right wing at Tannenberg/Grunwald and drew off part of the Teutonic Order force into swampy terrain after a desultory first charge. The figures were chosen for availability since I couldn't find actual Tatar figures for the period. If you have any suggestions, I'll be glad to hear them.



Moving on to the infantry part, here's a bunch of Polish Men-At-Arms. These are Perry plastics, and very nice - my previous experiences with Perry plastics were rather mixed, but the various knights and footsoldiers from the HYW boxes are quite nice and assemble into nice pieces.



Making our way down the ladder, next up is a dozen of Polish foot. As it stands, I'll most likely use them as Foot Serjeants in Lion Rampant, but I'll do some Perry replacements for the poorer-clad figures which will form the nucleus for a unit of Foot Yeomen. These are very obviously from the Kingmaker Hussite range, but they are close enough in style, and I very much like the sculpting, even if they are a bit sedate in their posing.



And finally, a unit of crossbowmen, also Kingmaker. Not much to say about these. I mainly took them on board because they were part of the starter army I purchased and are suitable for the campaign - although the forces involved had surprisingly much cavalry, the infantry apparently included quite a number of missile troops.



That's it for now. As mentioned before, I'm currently preparing some replacement figures for the Foot Serjeants made from Perry French Infantry, and am considering some terrain pieces to go with it. But more on that as the time comes.

Thanks for looking!

[OSHIROmodels]

That's a whole heap of wonderful figures 

cheers

James

[pbjunky1]

 

Well, guess what, I actually managed to paint some stuff!

There are some really nice looking minis in there. You should keep going with this painting lark!

[Svennn]

Great heraldry and depth of colours, altogether wonderful

[von Lucky]

Some very nice painting there.

[Captain Blood]

Well, that is a surprise Christian! Very nicely done. Very well executed heraldry  

[NurgleHH]

Gut gemacht- Well done, Sir!

[Malamute]

Lovely work Chris, knights and such like are always visually appealing and yours have come up a treat.

[Codsticker]

Great looking work. We have played several games of Lion Rampant- lots of fun!

I couldn't find actual Tatar figures for the period. If you have any suggestions, I'll be glad to hear them.

As far as alternatives to the Fireforge Mongols, I always thought that Gripping beasts plastic Light Arab Cavalry (Linky) would supply about 6 Cossak-y/tartar looking models that could be used for several centuries.

[AWu]

Very nice. Great knights!

I am not convinced by Polish foot men at arms - as a little fantasy unit -  but everything looks really good.

To keep Polish theme more historical invest more into cavalry than infantry generally
Infantry was almost absent on Polish side at Grunwald and in the campaign.

[M.P.]

I concur those minis look splendid, esp. cavalry. Will you do some lithuanian cavalry as well?

[Westfalia Chris]

Very nice. Great knights!

I am not convinced by Polish foot men at arms - as a little fantasy unit -  but everything looks really good.

To keep Polish theme more historical invest more into cavalry than infantry generally
Infantry was almost absent on Polish side at Grunwald and in the campaign.

Yes, the infantry is more about the occasional siege. That said, I do not yet know if we will actually do Grunwald proper - and for the more likely smaller skirmishes, I guess some infantry is appropriate. For Grunwald itself, there should be a much higher cavalry ratio, I agree.

Also, we are not yet fully set on Lion Rampant for the rules. We might be using some skirmish rules which allow dismounting (or being dismounted when the horse gets shot), so some foot versions of the mounted knights could come in handy.

I concur those minis look splendid, esp. cavalry. Will you do some lithuanian cavalry as well?

I've been thinking about that as well. I'll have to see what figures to use. I still have six of the Mongol Cavalry which could probably be converted for this purpose (i.e. light cavalry), but I'll have to source some suitable heads first, since these seem to be a key feature with very distinctive hats and helmets.

[AWu]

Infantry is always Ok (even if proportions are sketchy).
I am more worried by those knights with polearms. Ive never read about anything like that.
Generally Polish knights never fought dismounted in the period (it was nothing like Agincourt nor War of the Roses), sieges with actual combat were not that often (even when Marienburg - Teutonic capital finally fell - it was by bribery of unpaid Czech mercenaries and not by assault) so be cautious with them.

Campaign before Grunwald saw some small sieges and ransacking though.
5 July Janusz Brzozogłowy in swift raid ambushed and destroyed Teutonic forces from Schwetz (Świecie) . He was making aggressive actions to mask main advance and thanks to his partisan raids von Plauen was left in Schwertzand did not participate in Grunwald battle to block Brzozogłowy campaign of terror.
7 July saw capture of Bądzyn
12 July there were some clashes near river Drwęca
Castle at Kurzętnik was besieged but siege was lifted day later.
13 July castle at Dąbrówno (Gilgenburg) was captured in combat and burned - actual siege and combat here.

More sieges were during Teutonic strike back in 1411 (for example mentioned Janusz Brzozogłowy was besieged in Tuchola - but city was captured by deceit not combat).

There is a lot to battle outside of Grunwald itself although from the Polish perspective they were almost exclusively cavalry engagements.

PS: You probably should be interested in Road from Grunwald as Battle of Koronowo should be more interesting than Grunwald for skirmish type gaming.

[Westfalia Chris]

Infantry is always Ok (even if proportions are sketchy).
I am more worried by those knights with polearms. Ive never read about anything like that.

To clarify, only the six Men-at-Arms are supposed to be knights, and only one has a two-handed axe - from my reading, war-hammers, maces and axes were popular arms in Eastern Europe at the time. The other infantry are supposed to be retainers of some sorts, and the classification as "Foot Serjeants" is mainly due to the armour most of them are wearing.

Generally Polish knights never fought dismounted in the period (it was nothing like Agincourt nor War of the Roses), sieges with actual combat were not that often (even when Marienburg - Teutonic capital finally fell - it was by bribery of unpaid Czech mercenaries and not by assault) so be cautious with them.

That is indeed a major difference to Western Europe. As said, it's mainly an issue if the figures have to be dismounted, either due to the scenario or getting their horse killed. They are certainly not part of a force for Grunwald proper - the low-class infantry will be guarding the camp and train.

Campaign before Grunwald saw some small sieges and ransacking though.
5 July Janusz Brzozogłowy in swift raid ambushed and destroyed Teutonic forces from Schwetz (Świecie) . He was making aggressive actions to mask main advance and thanks to his partisan raids von Plauen was left in Schwertzand did not participate in Grunwald battle to block Brzozogłowy campaign of terror.
7 July saw capture of Bądzyn
12 July there were some clashes near river Drwęca
Castle at Kurzętnik was besieged but siege was lifted day later.
13 July castle at Dąbrówno (Gilgenburg) was captured in combat and burned - actual siege and combat here.

More sieges were during Teutonic strike back in 1411 (for example mentioned Janusz Brzozogłowy was besieged in Tuchola - but city was captured by deceit not combat).

There is a lot to battle outside of Grunwald itself although from the Polish perspective they were almost exclusively cavalry engagements.

That's what my sources suggest, too, and where we would like to take the campaign - some small raids and all.

PS: You probably should be interested in Road from Grunwald as Battle of Koronowo should be more interesting than Grunwald for skirmish type gaming.

"Path to Grunwald" was more of a catchy title in the first place, and as a counterpart to the "German" part of the project titled "Road to Tannenberg" by Lt. Hazel. It's not supposed to be just limited to that.

[Metternich]

Very nice to see the Polish heraldry.  We are so used to seeing French and English that we forget the rest of Europe !