Saturday 7 May 2011

Some more new figures and thoughts...

Been touching up and  rebasing some Irregular 42mm British Colonials I got off Ebay at a reasonable price . Overwhelmed by actually seeing some painted figures that I was interested in , I went ahead and bought them and then thought - 'what am I going to use them for?'. They didn't fit in with my other 'Balkan' figures and the idea of starting another period in 42mm didn't make sense . When I first bought the Irregular 42mm figures I was not sure where I was heading , I liked the figures for their 'toy soldier' looks and the period of history in the Balkans is interesting , the only problem was that everybody was starting to wear khaki uniforms ! - boring ! . I looked further into it and found that in the 1890s-1900s armies for these nations where still using the older brighter uniforms - if only the Balkans War  had happened 10 to 15 years earlier !. The rot had set in - I decided to use the earlier uniforms and when I miss-ordered some cavalry and got the wrong figures (Greek cavalry -should be in Khaki) I decided to make up a Hussar type uniform -'The Hussars of Excellance' were born (see earlier posts) . By now the madness had set in , I have always admired other bloggers who have their own'Imaginations', so I decided to do my own, set in the  1890s Balkans area . Having spent about 40 years painting 'proper' wargame armies this was refreshingly different and the figures painted in a 'toy soldier' style are soon done . I was mulling over what rules to use when a wargaming colleague 'A' introduced me to 'Funny Little Wars' - "have a look at these - they are weird - you will like them !"  he said  . So here we are about 6 months into the project several £s poorer ( Irregular are several £s richer !) and quite a lot of figures painted , lots of games played and fun for all the family - well me anyway . I'm busy tweaking the rules a bit - the originals were to be played in the garden ( the weather ,hens , cats and not wanting to alarm the neighbours prevent this) - more of this in the future. Oh and the British colonial troops are the first unit of the British Intervention Field Force (Overseas). BIFFO ! Oh dear think I need to lie down!.

6 comments:

  1. Mosstrooper,

    Your experience sounds very similar to my own, although I have opted for 54mm figures for my FLW army ... although I am still hankering after a 42mm army (or armies!) as a follow up for home use.

    All the best,

    Bob

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  2. I fear I am of a similar mnd to Bob in this case and am trying to resist 42mm ... although they are indeed most tempting. I suspect my Elastolin figures of that size I had as a boy have something to do with my enthusiam for the scale too .
    Alan

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  3. The danger is that once you start painting and using them you start casting around for other periods to use them in,ECW is tenpting me at the moment - MUST resist !.

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  4. Be careful of lying down. I find it generates yet more mad schemes. Mad but marvelous!

    Now try not to think about Turks! Especially the irregular volunteer sorts in turbans......
    -Ross

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  5. Glad to see the redcoats have arrived.

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  6. Hoping to expand the british force sometime in the future - got some gunners done - but lots to do !.

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