Friday, 26 March 2021

Some Union progress.

A quick update. By this evening I will have completed 3 Union Regiments, two guns and a mounted general, so with the same number of rebs that's a grand total of 360 infantry plus 4 guns and crews in 2 weeks, not a bad start to the project. One issue will be painting the same sprues over and over again as I take it further. That said Kallistra are indeed a perfect match for these having seen painted units with Kallistra command. I might well place an order for some of their cavalry both mounted and dismounted to ring the changes.

I have cut down all of the hats to kepis on the Union troops, the topper used is identical to the kepi top so they look pretty convincing I think. So far no chopped muskets and all fingers still intact. I decided to go with printed flags from the Warflag site as I wanted them slightly bigger than those supplied and I'm happy with the  results so far. 

The visual impact of 60 figure units is quite pleasing when you stand back at arms length I must say. I'm going to have to come up with some kind of unit identifier as they all look the same! I'm thinking maybe  a neat printed label to the rear of each command base, just the name and maybe paper strength on each and then record losses on a good old fashioned roster sheet to avoid tabletop clutter. I'm going to try the set of rules that Steve-The-Wargamer suggested based on the OHW rules but fleshed out a bit more and see how I get on soon as I get a few more units painted.

Images show state of play as of this morning with just the 3 more strips to cut down the hats, base coat and paint hopefully today. 





14 comments:

  1. Lee, good to see the motivation for these remain high. I have two Kallistra armies and enjoy them. I based them on the bases that come wit the blister, so that is 40 x 20mm. I use two bases for a regiment when using 4” hexes or bigger battles, otherwise I go to three bases for a frontage of 120mm.

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    1. Norm, it looks like Kallistra are going to benefit hugely from the release of the Warlord epic set. There are a lot of complaints about the price point of the future releases, I'm sure you have seen them too and in most cases kallistra are mentioned as an alternative. I will probably buy the Zouaves and iron Brigade sets simply because they match the style of the basic set, but no doubt I'll end up eBaying strips as they contain far more than I would ever need! For everything else it will be Kallistra.

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  2. Wow! You're powering through these Lee, great work.

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    1. Cheers Ian, they do up really quickly thanks to the way they are made in close order strips.

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  3. Ain't that a sight! Lovely.. and let us know of any additions you come up with, those rules of mine are fairly basic!

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    1. Cheers Steve. As for the rules, well they will suit me well these days I think if I am to get my old brain back into wargaming :)

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    1. Thank you Neil, I'm enjoying doing these.

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  5. Hey Lee, I saw that Kalistra match up too. There’s not much in it is there? I gather the new warlord releases in this range are going to be expensive then?!

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    1. JBM, as an example the Zouave box is priced at £40.00 and contains 300 figures, but who on Earth requires 300 Zouaves? It is a fact that the average Civil War soldier was lucky to have ever seen one of those fancy uniforms throughout the entire war.

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  6. They look great Lee. Re identification of units. For my 6mm Napoleonic armies I created bases for the figures and along the back printed strips and colour codes to show which brigade, which corps and any special attributes. To record causalities I used clear plastic strips under the bases and wrote the hits on their with chino graph pencil. Well done.

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    1. Thank you for those suggestions re unit ID. I might try out a couple of things over the weekend :)

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  7. Great job on these epic scale troops! Found your blog on TMP. Thanks for sharing. I also see that we follow some of the same blogs. 😀
    Your really turning out the units now. I love the look of the ACW troops in close line like this. If I already didn’t have hundreds of 18mm ACW troops I’d be all in on these as well.
    Gonna have a lot around you blog now. Now following. 😀

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    1. Hi Stew and thanks for following. THis blog has made so many twists and turns over the 10 years, everything from 6mm Napoleonics to Bolt Action and Flames of War, AWI, ACW! I also do a bit of commission painting for a few friends.

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