Wednesday 11 January 2017

From StephenS - Knights Hospitaller (41 points)

After a brief diversion with the 'Armour' challenge, I'm back in the 11th and 12th centuries with 4 knights trying to crusade their way through the Middle East.


These are 28 mm miniatures from Gripping Beast and will make a unit of Hearth-guard for the Milites Christi faction in the game SAGA. I built and primed these guys for the last challenge, so it was good to see them finally roll off the assembly line.


I'm not sure how historically accurate the Celtic cross I've clumsily painted on one shield is as a crusading symbol. However, as I've mentioned before, you can only paint a cross so many ways... Besides, maybe some of that famous Irish luck will rub off on my war-band!


These were very straight forward and enjoyable to paint up, despite horses being among my least favourite things to paint. Only 16 more horses to go before this army is finished!

Cheers,

Steve

ByronM: A very nice entry Stephen and for a game I keep hearing great things about.  The horses look really good and I like that you took the time to do extra little bits, like painting the strapping in different colours between the different horses and doing face markings and socks on the horses themselves. What really sells me though is the shields. I know you said they are clumsy, but I like them.  Seeing them a little rough actually works for me as they would have been painted very roughly in real life anyway (I assume), so I like how they look a lot.

41 points (an extra thrown in for painted shields) and best wishes on the rest of your force.

23 comments:

  1. Great models, and even better paint on them! SAGA is a great game, and these guys will be hard to break in it!

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  2. Good looking figures and Saga is an excellent game I can't recommend it highly enough

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  3. Seeing these, and after looking at Saga for a long while, I took the plunge and ordered the rules and some anglo-saxons (I have viking models already) to try and get some more people around here interested in it. Ideally I would love to do the Crusades like you have though, as the models look stunning.

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  4. These are really nice. Well done.

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  5. Oh wow - I actually have the rules for SAGA, just can't figure out of the models, but this looks SO cool - great work.

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    1. We should talk then Greg, I have vikings already here :-) Maybe we can try it sometime sooner than I thought!

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    2. Greg, you're WAAAAY overthinking this. Its a guy in chain mail on a horse with a lance and shield, not rocket science! Order some figs from the Beastie Boys (or the Perry's Crusades range) and give it a go - there's tons of source material out there for inspiration.

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    3. That's what I get from looking at it too Peter. 1 point = 4 elites = 8 normals = 12 peons. How you choose to model each is not all that important (other than some weapon restrictions per faction) from what I can see.

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    4. Oh man - there is TOO much source material, it fries my circuits. Makes the rivet counting in 30k seem straight forward...

      But the best part of this Challenge is submissions like this - you see them and think "I have to try that sh!t"

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  6. Very nice Knights, it's great to see the hand painted shields.

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  7. Nice militant brothers, I think the shields look great, I got saga but never got going and lion rampant came along and saga got shoved to one side, maybe I should try and have a go.
    Best Iain

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  8. Stunning knights indeed, the shields are well worth the extra points, man do you have a steady hand!

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  9. GB make some great figs, and these chaps are no exception. Great work, Steve!

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  10. I'll echo many here in complimenting you on your hand-painted shields. I've painted these same figures for my Normans and I think you've done a great job - I like the overall dark tone you've used for them. Well done, Stephen!

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  11. Nice job Steve - looking forward to seeing them in action at the club! Mounted Hearth-guard - ouch! They'll also work nicely for Lion Rampant and Burn and Loot... :-)

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  12. Well done on these fellows! I know from personal experience that black isn't actually the simplest colour to pull off but you managed very well I'd say.

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  13. They look great Stephen. Those shields are excellent. I know you said they're clumsy, but I really like them and think they are spot on. I think sometimes we gamers/modellers get carried away with aiming for geometrical precision with shield designs when in reality they were probably painted on hurriedly by men who were no great artists using whatever paint was at hand. (This is even more applicable to camo patterns, but that's another thing altogether).

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  14. Great painting, the shields are super. I really like SAGA too so am happy to see more units completed. Some of mine are in my painting queue so I hope I get to them.

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  15. Dark and gritty. A force not to trifle with. I can imagine any of my normal players really enjoying using these on the table top.

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