Saturday 3 March 2018

The Scottish Project

Ah, the heady delights of a new project! This week the last bits and pieces arrived so I can now begin work on [drumroll...] The Scottish Project! That's right, a new year and a new project. Not to say that the 55 Days at Peking project or the Warhammer Fantasy Empire project and going to be neglected, just um... "sharing my attention" with my new baby.

Like a certain play be Shakespeare I cannot speak it's name. Actually that's complete bollocks, but it was a good opening so what the hell. Anyway, my new project begins today - recreating the Battle of Auldearn in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms in 10mm and using Simon Miller's forthcoming For King and Parliament rules.

The whole box and (quite literally) dice. Everything I need to get cracking

Miniatures

Fortunately for me Pendraken Miniatures have a comprehensive and quite lovely range in 10mm which fulfills all my needs to cover both sides of the conflict. I'm starting, as any loyal subject of the King would, with Montrose and his forces.

One of the benefits of 10mm is cost and I was able to source all the miniatures and most of the flags required for under A$130 including shipping. Last night I spent an enjoyable hour or so divvying everything up into units.


Orders of Battle

With Simon's help and plenty of reading I've assembled an order of battle for both sides. The units involved won't change much from here although the unit stats might get tweaked a little over time once I've seen how things play out on the table top.


The Covenanters are numerically superior but inferior in quality and short on commanders, meaning the additional units will be less effective overall and harder to manoeuvre as well.


Basing Arrangement

One of the strengths of For King and Parliament is the lack of off-table record keeping and I've stretched that to the max in how I'm basing and recording data.

Units will sit on a single 90mm x 50mm base, with miniatures occupying the front 2/3 of the base and the rear 1/3 reserved for unit name and dice holders for recording experience/hits, ammunition and dash (if cavalry). The right-hand (7mm) dice holder will contain the hits dice, green for "raw", yellow for "seasoned" and blue for "experienced". The one or two left-hand dice holders will contain the ammo and dash dice.




Basing Style

I want a really atmospheric highland feel for the bases so I'm going over-the-top on tufts and bushes. This is the look I'm going for...

Photo credit "Must See Scotland - Flowers of Scotland"
https://must-see-scotland.com/flowers-of-scotland/

Martin from Tajima1 very kindly did a custom order for me (in record time no less!) and created heather tufts in a matched purple colour using his "moss mix" tufts as a base. Combined with the same moss mix tufts I should be able to get a close approximation of the dense highland ground cover above.



And that's about where I'm at right now. Time to kick on and actually paint something!

Cheers,
Millsy

18 comments :

  1. Look forward to seeing more. Like the idea for the bases

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  2. Ah we do like seeing new projects . 10mm certainly makes them viable . Look forward to seeing things progress

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  3. An interesting new project Millsy. For the basing it might be worth adding a few gorse bushes and some bracken if you can find suitable tufts.

    You might find some more useful information for gaming the battle at the Project Auldearn blog/website

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    1. Thanks Tamsin. I've been a big fan of their work for years as it happens. half the inspiration for this project came form hours spent ogling their gorgeous work!

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  4. Pendraken do some great figures and ranges but I've not taken the plunge on another size, though the fantasy do look very tempting.

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  5. Wow, looking forward to this one!

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  6. Sounds like a neat project. I'm definitely interested in the FK&P rules. Pendraken make great figures and I have several of their ranges. Looking forward to watching this project.

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  7. Yes, I agree, will be great project!
    regards

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  8. This looks like it will be fun- massed troops with colourful basing!

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  9. I look forward to seeing tartan in 10mm!
    ; )

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  10. Looking good Millsy! You'll need some heather for the table, too, I suppose.

    For A$130 I could barely buy an unpainted unit. :-) Some of my units (painted) cost in the £300 range...

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  11. Sounds like a plan. Nice tufts too!

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  12. Oh this sounds fun, I've got my covenanters done, I'd really like to paint my Montrose army, it's just a lot of tartan though! Looking forward to your take on them in 10mm
    Best Iain

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  13. Good project to do. As another recent initiate to 10mm ECW, I can understand your eager anticipation!

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