Bohemian Mercenary Foot Crossbowmen Reg Bw X/I in DBMM

Bohemian Mercenaries for the Med Germans

With the publication of the DBMM revised 2nd Edition army lists last September we were all surprised to see that Phil Barker had introduced a new troop combination in two lists. These are Bohemian Mercenary Foot Crossbowmen Reg Bw X/I double based elements for use in the Medieval German and Hussite lists. In the latest version of DBMM v2.1 rules this is an illegal troop combination as it is in DBM. WRG and Phil have not yet responded to confirm if this is a mistake or explain how this new troop combo is supposed to work in DBMM. They are actually very attractive looking troops for the later 1400's and since I have a pile of left over spare figures in Project Lead Mountain I decided to create sufficient elements to use in the Med German list.

The front rank are Roundway castings. http://naismithandroundway.co.uk/product/clipeati-heavy-infantry/ I filed off the shields as far as possible and glued a mix of now discontinued Corvus Belli Pavises to the fronts. The rear ranks are Minifigs which despite having the figure code 67X are actually the 1st Generation Renaissance figures which were remastered some years ago so are no longer available. Dave Ryan may well reintroduce them into the range having obtained a single pack of castings at some time in the future under a different code. UPDATE they are now available as Code 967X [06/03/17]

Due to there being no common consensus on how to operate these figures within the rules I adopted a different ploy when I based up the figures [more on this below]. Each Pavise is decorated with an historic coat of arms from Bohemia. I created twelve elements to be used as six double bases. 

Due to my needing more Regular crossbowmen I decided that I would mount the elements singly and use masking tape to temporarily join them together when needed. This means I have eight elements of Reg Bw O to use at any time and another eight elements of Reg Bw X when I need them and saves me from painting up single elements of duplicate figures when removing shooting casualties.

Project Lead Mountain 21st January 2017

Project Lead Mountain Update 21/01/17

As part of the ongoing update to my figure collection I am refreshing and rebasing some older figures that I have because their basing style was so old fashioned it ruined the figures. It also allows me to retouch and improve the figures I painted many years ago to a higher standard.

As I rationalise my collection parts of it are ending up on EBay to hopefully find a new home and get some use. I often paint up figures and only ever use them once or twice and then paint up new figures that I like even more which means the older figures never get any use.

This instalment from PLM only contains refurbished and rebased figures.

The first batch are twelve Foot Crossbowmen with Pavise on their backs. They are Tin Soldier MA10 Castings http://tinsoldieruk.com/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=186_206 I have repainted the Pavise with various Italian Cities Coat of Armes making them suitable for most Condotta or later armies or for use as Mercenaries in many other European armies. They are surplus to requirements and will be going onto EBay in due course.

These are Roundway castings but I am unsure of the figure code. I painted them up as generic mercenaries or Civic Militia many years ago. Putting them on new bases has made all the difference and they will sit in reserve for when I need more than the normal number of crossbowmen.

I think these are Essex Miniatures but I cannot be sire as there was no code on them. I obtained them many years ago in a Bring and Buy and they started life as two elements of Reg Bw O. Since I needed a four more Psiloi Crossbowmen I unbased them, repainted their leggings to match and made them into four element of Reg Ps O on new bases.

Ancient Spanish Ally Contingent Finally Finished

Last of the Spanish Finally Done

Project Lead Mountain rumbles on and I have finally completed another small part of it. Back in 2015 I blogged about completing my Spanish Ally Contingent to use with my Polybian Romans http://drewjarman.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/15mm-dbm-spanish-allied-contingent-misc.html

I still had 32 castings left over to enable me to field all three types of allies depending on what I though was suitable. They are new Essex Castings MPA109 which were resculpted a few years ago. http://www.essexminiatures.co.uk/collections/15mm-ancient-macedonian-punic-wars/products/mpa109 This meant that I had been left with not being able to get the older castings that I wanted so purchased 4 packs of the new one not realising they had changed. They are very nice sculpts and were very crisp and had very little flash.

I didn't want them to be particular distinctive as that meant that I would not be able to swop them around depending on the Spanish tribe I was fielding. I ended up making eight elements of Irr Ax S and four elements of Irr Ps S with the spare eight figures left over.

Eastern Franks in DBM

Eastern Franks - Filling Out The Missing Elements

As part of Project Lead Mountain I am finally starting to finish off the missing bits of lots of armies I have including morphing armies into other lists. I have a Norman army which I first used under DBM v1.1 and gets a run out once in a while. It can double up for Eastern Franks of course. The DBMM list includes a 4th Irr Sub-general which represents the contingent Edward the Confessor supplied on 1049 AD. I have already painted up his contingent see my blog entry http://drewjarman.blogspot.co.uk/2016/12/project-lead-mountain-bit-and-pieces.html for some pictures. 

The list requires that for every element of Irr Bd S I take I must take an element of Irr Bts S. So I cast around for suitable boat models and found that Navwar make a Saxon ship in 1/1200th scale Code AGS22. Since they are very small I ordered four packs [2 per pack] and mounted 2 models to a base. The paint job is very basic but they do the job quite well.

I still have 24 elements of Donningtons sword armed Milites to paint for the Swabian Irr Kn I that form a large part of this army.

Bohemian Pavise Protected Crossbowmen

Bohemian Mercenary Crossbowmen

Back in September 2015 I needed to make up some Regular Bw O Pavise protected crossbowmen at short notice. Rather than spend ages doing them I took some already painted crossbowmen that were based up as Irr Bw O and decided to refresh and rebase them and put plain painted Pavise in front of them as a quick fix. I blogged the result back then. They were only ever going to be a stop gap fix. I have now managed to paint their Pavises properly according to a large design sheet I found of Bohemian shield designs. The figures are Essex Miniatures and the Pavise are from Tin Soldier. I am very pleased with the final effect and am glad I bothered to make the effort to do them after 16 months. This means I will now need to start selling off more figures as I decide what to keep.

How they originally looked.