Wednesday, June 19, 2024

Scanian Progress

I've been making steady progress on the 6mm Scanian War "diversion"...while I've temporarily abandoned all of the other partially completed projects (Thirty Years War, Fenian Invasion and Big Battle Raven Feast). 

I've been focusing on Swedish infantry and I can report I have five infantry units complete, I will wait to complete the remaining Swedish foot when I get some figures with karpus and matchlock. 

A review of the Hoglund book indicates these colorful little canaries are the Sodermanlands Regiment. One of my favorite so far they are very bright.



The fellows in grey coats and yellow cuffs are the Vastgotadals regiment. I think they look rather sharp in this color combination. 





Next up are some Swedish artillery wearing grey with blue trim and wearing karpus. I left the gun carriages in natural wood because I saw some 28mm League of Augsburg artillery painted up in this manner. If you are going to copy someone, copy someone good!






Here is a group picture of the completed Swedish bases. If you read my previous post post on this project, you may be wondering where the Swedish cavalry unit wandered off to...the answer is that I am in the process of rebasing them. 













I thought they were a bit too sparsely populated (as seen above) on the base so I decided to cram 2 more figures on the base. Only problem is that I only had one spare painted figure. They are a work in progress as you can see below. 


Next up was my initial first into the Danish army. I went with a cavalry unit. Apparently some of the Danish cavalry wore pot helmets so I used this opportunity to paint up some of those sculpts. I gave them buff coats and blackened cuirass but apparently these (cuirass) weren't all that common with Danish horse. I think one unit may have worn them so this inaccuracy won't really bother me.




I like the red of the uniform trim. I think the color pops. Next up will be some more cavalry (maybe Danish horse in hats and the green-coated Fynske infantry Regiment).  I placed a rather large order with Baccus for my trip to Scotland and my visit to the Claymore Convention in Edinburgh.



























 

Saturday, June 1, 2024

Yet more Catholic League Reinforcements

Despite my 6mm Scanian War diversion, I continue to grind away on my 10mm Thirty Years War armies. As previously mentioned, my armies are based on those present at the battle of Fleurus so all of my Catholic infantry are in large tercio field squares. 

To allow my armies to fight other battles of the Bohemian campaigns, I needed some Catholic League infantry in smaller units. My plan was to add 5 regiments from for the Catholics and paint them up as Bavarians and other German cities. I opted for dark red and cornflower blue as dominant colors. With three of the five complete, I like the look this far. Once the Catholic League units are done, I will paint up some more cavalry, artillery and baggage and add one all-shot Protestant unit then call the project done! 

Here is a blue regiment with a flag indicating they are either from Bavaria or Cologne. I suspect Catholic League armies used blue sashes but for my armies all Catholics wear red and all Protestants wear blue. 

The next unit is in dark red and their front rank of shot are getting ready to deliver a volley of lead. The flag is a yellow cross on a dark red field. 



 

6mm Scanian War

A few years back, I was really tempted by Baccus' 6mm Sun King/Scanian War range. To satisfy that temptation I purchased a few starter armies and then they just sat in a box waiting until the came to forefront of my painting queue. 

Recently I've been playing Liber Militum Tercios for the Thirty Years War in 10mm and recently I played a game of Tercios with my buddy Alex using his 15mm By Fire and Sword figures for the period of The Deluge wars. The idea popped into my mind to paint up my 6mm Scanian War stuff for Tercios. This would allow me to put my units on big bases (which I love) and give me the opportunity to revisit 6mm (which I also love). 

The plan is to collect and paint small armies for the Danes and Swedes and also armies if Poland-Lithuania, Russia and Ottomans. These armies can cover anything from the Deluge to Scanian Wars. I managed to paint up my first three Swedish infantry units and here they are.

First up is a unit in red/white and with the karpus headwear. Using the excellent Lars Eric Hoglund book on Swedish army of the Scanian War as a reference, this unit was painted up to represent the Skane-Blekinge regiment. After I painted them up, I realized the Baccus flag sheet doesn't have their flag so I had to use another unit's colonel flag. I presume the Skane-Blekinge Colonel's flag was similar to this one. 

Next up is the Halsinge regiment in their grey and green scheme. At this point I should mention the unit bases are 65mm x 35mm which allows me to fit 6 strips of shot, 2 strips of pike and a command stand to the base. 

The final unit was supposed to be Vastmanlands but I realized that the Baccus flag sheet doesn't have this unit. Since the command strips in hat have two flag bearers, I couldn't just steal someone else's Colonel's flag so I referred to the Hoglund book and learned that the Dalregiment wore a similar blue/red uniform and hat previously so I used their flags instead. 

When I ordered the armies from Baccus, all of the figures had firelocks. I wish that I had ordered matchlocks instead. I prefer the slightly bulkier look of the figures and it would be more appropriate if I'm using them for the earlier Deluge conflict. I plan to visit the Baccus booth at Claymore so I will be purchasing quite a few more figures then...

UPDATE: I managed to finish the first Swedish cavalry unit. Not sure which unit they are. According to Hoglund, most didn't have uniforms other than a buff coat. I have decided to match the saddle blankets and and rolls to the colors of the standards and give them all buff coats. Anyway here they are:










I gave the impression of a blackened cuirass for these guys as you can see in this rear image. 


I'm reasonably happy with the results. Looking forward to painting more.