Carthaginians for Swordpoint, Soviets for Bolt Action and Samurai for Test of Honour! A somewhat eclectic selection, but they all have their own fascinations that seem to endlessly lead to one of them rising to the surface, while the other two slip below into the shallows, only to rise again a few day later!
A few weeks ago, I was steaming along painting troops for my Carthaginian Swordpoint army, and just embarking on a thirty-two figure unit of Hannibal's Celtic allies from Victrix Miniatures, with a few of the slightly odd Warlord types thrown in. On the eve of The Other Partizan, I had completed just one base of Celts... At Partizan, I encountered a group of players from a local club, that I didn't know existed, playing a Bolt Action demo game and suddenly there was the motivation to crack on with the box of Soviet infantry I'd bought without having any real plan in mind.
So, is it possible to keep chasing the rabbits and get anywhere? Well, probably not, but as things are, I don't see any alternative.
The Victrix Celtic infantry are absolutely gorgeous and suspending painting to keep up the pace with my Bolt Action Soviets has been a real challenge. As an added bonus, they fit quite nicely along side Warlord's contorted Gallic counterparts. I used Warlord's Celts in their re-branded Germanic Warriors set and a whole unit of them looks pretty peculiar, as most of them are either bent double lunging forward or, squatting in a pose that looks like they are desperately trying to relieve themselves from a bout of severe trapped wind. However, a few of them, scattered in amongst the much more majestic looking Victrix figures, adds a nice touch of height variety and gives a unit a much more dynamic look.
I was just getting the hang of painting stripes and checks with this command stand and was looking forward to developing the technique as the unit progressed. Of course, the LBMS shield transfers are exquisite and really inspire you to do the best painting job you can.
So far, I think I'm managing to focus on one rabbit and have two Soviet squads simultaneously taking centre stage on the painting table, however, I keep looking at the Victrix Celts and the small size of the force you need to play Test of Honour is proving to be a temptation that might just see me veering off after a different bunny!
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| Banzuiin Chobei |
I'm still not exactly sure how I ended up downloading a PDF copy of Test of Honour; I think it was the lure of only having to paint a dozen figures or so to have enough to play a game! Oddly enough, I have several boxes of Wargames Factory samurai tucked away at the back of my cupboard under the painting bench. I bought them with a miniscule bid on e-bay years ago and put them in the cupboard because I couldn't figure out how to put them together! Now that Warlord have taken on the Samurai mantle, you get a sort of instruction sheet which shows how to construct them and I managed to, not only build an Ashigaru spearman, but also paint it in something resembling the proper colours. The rules suggest that your main Samurai figure should be your persona on the tabletop, so I decided to buy the Chobei's Renegades set as Chobei seems to be the character who, physically, most closely resembles yours truly.