15mm Chinese - Update

Rebased T'ang Chinese Militia

Having completed my T'ang Chinese back in June 2019 I thought that I had nothing more to do with the army. Upon reflection I decided that I didn't like the uniformed look that the Chinese Militia blocks had.

see blog entries

https://drewjarman.blogspot.com/2019/01/late-tang-chinese-part-7.html

and

https://drewjarman.blogspot.com/2018/12/late-tang-chinese-part-5.html

for the original units. I decided that I will rebase them and took half of the completed elements to mix up the colours to give them that irregular peasant look. I still have another 24 bases to mix up but for now they can wait.

Thats all to blog for now 

This brings the painting tally so far for 2022 to

240 foot [72 elements]

9 Feature Pieces [9 elements]

24 Rebased elements

Serbian Gusars and Three Kingdoms Chinese Light Horse

Serbian Gusars

The Serbian Empire created an entirely new class of light cavalry, they termed them Gusars which has become to be known as Hussars. These castings come from Alternative Armies and come from the Medus range. They are casting code https://www.alternative-armies.com/collections/15mm-medieval-medus-range/products/huc1-serbian-hussar and come in two parts, the horses are all the same pose but the riders come in two slightly different poses which allows for a small amount of variety. I obtained 24 of them in a random EBay bulk purchase and was not sure of the range or description until this week. The figures are now quite old sculpt wise and are quite slightly built compared to some of the more chunkier ranges out there. 

They do paint up quite well given their age.

Last up are four elements of very old Mikes Models Chinese Light Horse. They were originally armed with Halberds but most of them were broken so I repaired them so they are now armed with plain spears. Putting them on new bases has made them quite serviceable given their age.

All the bases are finished off in my now standard basing style.

This now brings the 15mm painting tally from 1st January to 30th August 2021 to:

523 foot, 13 artillery & 4 war drums [150 elements]

212 cavalry [73 elements]

12 Bamboo & Paper Lions [8 elements]

3 elephants [3 elements]

Plus I have rebased

32 elements of Pikes

28 elements of Archers

10 elements of Psiloi

8 elements of Horde

3 elements of misc foot

54 mounted elements

15mm Chinese - Finally Completed

15mm Chinese Completed - Part 24 Yuan Artillery 

With this blog entry I can honestly say I have finally completed the Chinese Army project I started in May 2020. It seemed like it would never end & only started because in 2019 I had a Late T'ang Army & ended up buying two other Heinz Chinese Armies from EBay from the same seller. This allowed me to create a Chinese collection spanning from the Three Kingdoms, Northern & Southern, Sui, T'ang, Sung & Yuan Dynasties covering 220 AD to 1368 AD.

I still need to paint up some more Mongol & the Khitan Liao allies for some of the dynasties but to all intents I have completed the Chinese parts. The Yuan were early adopters of Black Powder Artillery but they were very small pieces compared to the later Ming guns which is why I decided to use 10mm scale guns instead of later era pieces. 

10mm Kallistra H-7008 Bombards & Essex CHN20 Chin Chinese Artillerymen

10mm Kallistra H-7007 Field Guns & Essex CHN20 Chin Chinese Artillerymen

Chariot HDC6 Han Chinese Archers good for N&S Dynasty Archers on new bases

Leftover N&S Dynasty Archers rebased as Psiloi

Essex SUA8 Sung Chinese Archers on new bases

Essex SUA8 Sung Chinese Archers on new bases

Unknowm Code Essex "Chinese" Archers on new bases

This now brings the painting tally for 1st January to 20th May 2021 to:

205 foot, 8 artillery & 4 war drums [67 elements]

154 cavalry [49 elements]

12 Bamboo & Paper Lions [8 elements]

3 elephants [3 elements]

Plus I have rebased

32 elements of Pikes

28 elements of Archers

8 elements of Psiloi

50 mounted elements

15mm Chinese - Penultimate Entry

15mm Chinese - Part 23 Mounted Infantry [III]

Todays offering is the penultimate entry for my Chinese Army project. Its the last of the Mounted Infantry from Outpost Wargames Services Sui & T'ang Chinese Range. They are Code STC8 Mounted Crossbowmen. I had already painted up two elements as Reg Cv [O] but these are the balance of ten bases to act as Mounted Infantry Crossbowmen. Mounted Infantry appear in a few lists and these are done generically enough to work in the armies I have built. I can use the two other bases to make up a total of twelve bases if needed.

Outpost STC8 Mounted Crossbowmen

Last up because I hate having left over wasted figures I have a few Legio Heroica Mongol cavalry. The figures were incomplete so I had to add shields and lances from my spares box but they will slot in nicely with the Mongol units I already have to use in the Yuan Chinese army. They were a pain to assemble despite being very nice castings.

Legio Heroica MON08 Cavalry

Legio Heroica MON09 Horse Archers

This means I have now virtually completed my Chinese armies. I just have to do four Black Powder Artillery bases for the very end of the Yuan Chinese army date range and base up some leftover but already painted infantry. There are still some Khitan Liao and Mongol Cavalry to be done for allied contingents but it will be good to finally come to the end of this huge project.

I already have a new army project in mind but I might take a break before starting this one to concentrate on completing some other outstanding tasks.

Painting update

This now brings the painting tally for 1st January to 15th May 2021 to:

185 infantry & 4 war drums [63 elements]

154 cavalry [49 elements]

12 Bamboo & Paper Lions [8 elements]

3 elephants [3 elements]

Plus I have rebased

32 elements of Pikes

4 elements of Psiloi

50 mounted elements

15mm Chinese - Part 22 Mounted Infantry

15mm Chinese - Part 22 Mounted Infantry [II]

This weeks offering is more mounted infantry. The castings are part of the Grumpy's Range available from Eureka of Australia. They were part of a bulk purchase of unpainted figures from Ken Bell off EBay last year. It took me a while to ID the castings because Ken got them as a job lot from someone else from EBay! They were described as Mongol Chinese which wasn't much help. The casting code is CHIC01 Chinese Peasant Cavalry with Halberd. There are three poses and from looking at the website they originally had a tall thin plume on the top of the Coolie Hats as they are also sold as part of the Grumpy Ming Range using a casting code share. The figures are well posed and given their age still very nice castings with minimal flash or degradation of the moulds. Since I need lots of castings for mounted infantry in my Chinese armies they will be perfect to use as these or as low quality cavalry elements.

It took me a week to do them from start to finish which isnt bad considering my painting speed and level of detail I am currently applying.

Grumpy Code CHIC02 Chinese Peasant Cavalry with Spear

I now have 6 Mongol cavalry to do followed up by 30 mounted Crossbowmen. I still need to purchase some more artillery crew and some 10mm scale guns from Kallista to use as the Yuan Reg Art [I] elements at the end of the list. I am using 10mm scale guns because the design of the pieces is correct for the army and the scale more suited to the smaller artillery pieces that started to emerge in the beginning of the Black Powder era. I also have a Tribal Khitan allied contingent to paint for the Tang. I might also buy a Khitan-Liao contingent for the Northern Han option in this list.