From Millsy: 18th Century Commanders (50 Points)

Now that I've cleared a bunch of riff-raff off the table I can start on some decent sized chunks of stuff for ongoing projects. First up is some new recruits for the Grand Duchy of Saxe-Coburn und Bucholz, my imaginary 18th century nation state.

These are all 28mm Front Rank Miniatures from their Austrian Seven Years War line. I absolutely love painting them as they have wonderful, clear detail and a combination of character and semi-static pose that's perfect for 18th century gaming.

One of the things I really enjoy about our Imaginations project is that there are absolutely no rules when it comes to uniforms. You are only limited by what you mind can conjure up and for me that means at least in some cases the more eye-watering the colour combination the better!

These stout fellow will do service as brigade or battery commanders on the table when Evan and I next face off. Given the amount of buttons, lace and other decoration they're an inefficient way to earn 50 points but I really enjoyed them and that's the main thing.

Cheers,
Millsy

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Efficency be damned, miniatures like these demand to be painted, displayed and enjoyed! Lovely work, Millsy. I'm not crazy about Front Rank for Napoleonics (my hang up with their well-fed sculpts), but they absolutely sing for Lace-Wars, and these don't disappoint. I'm particularly taken with the mounted officer in yellow with blue facings. Gorgeous colour combo there. 

Question: What rules are you using for your Imagination campaigns? 

50 Points it is. Nicely done, sir!

From StephenS - Knights Hospitaller and Priest (53 Points)

I present 8 early crusader foot troops and a fired-up priest! These miniatures are all from Gripping Beast and will take the field as part of my Milites Christi war-band for SAGA. Eventually I hope to have enough extra troops that I can field them to play Lion Rampant as well.

I have painted them up in the colours of the Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem, or Knights Hospitaller. I chose this order as I fell in love with the pictures of these guys in the SAGA rule book. I think it is such a striking scheme, if perhaps a tad impractical in the desert heat. They are obviously early crusaders, and would have served from after the fall of Jerusalem in 1099. The order changed colours in 1259 and started wearing red with a white cross, but my guys won't be getting the new issue uniform any time soon!

The shields were hand-painted as you can easily tell! It is quite difficult coming up with different ways to paint a cross on a shield, so a lot of my guys just have the large cross across the whole shield, as I think it looks best.

The miniatures were a treat to paint up, especially the priest. I actually started another box of these warriors in 2015, but due to my hobby butterfly tendencies (and the Painting Challenge), their brother-in-arms have been finished first.

Have a great 2017 everyone!

Cheers,

Steve

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That is some gorgeous brush-work Steve!  The hand-painted shields look ace and I agree with you, the priest is the star of the show (awesome work on the face). I'm starting these chaps for a later period and your efforts are acting as a wonderful inspiration.

53 Points for your efforts. (I've added a few extra points for your shields.) 

Great work!

Minions, Postings, Theme Entries and the Challenge Cut

Happy New Year All!

I hope you're all nursing through your hangovers because you should be preparing for the March of the Minions!

The Minions

Starting tomorrow we will start our regular scheduled submissions. As reminder, this year's Minions are:  

Minion	Duties
MilesR	Monday / Spreadsheet Walla
AlanD & PaulOG	Tuesdays
ByronM	Wednesdays
DavidB	Thursdays
PhilH & Sylvain	Fridays
Millsy	Duels Walla
Curt	Saturday / Theme Rounds

 

Submission Roster/Schedule

Again, please refer to the participant roster below to find your submission day, your Minion and your stated points target. Remember, you can submit your entries at any time but they will only be uploaded to the blog on your submission day.

Monday (Miles)

AdamC	1,500
AlexS	1,500
BrettM	1,000
ClintB	850
DaveD	2,500
EdwinK	500
JamesB	1,000
JohnSe	500
LeeH	500
MartinC	2,500
NickJ	500
PeterM	1,000
RayR	500
RodF	500
SidneyR	1,000
TamsinP	2,600
The Tribe of Bromley	500

Tuesday (AlanD & PaulOG)

AledC	500
AnthonyOM	500
Barks	1,000
BenF	400
BrendonW	750
ChristianH	700
EvanH	300
GregB	1,000
IsobelS	750
JameL	750
JohnS	500
MelS	750
PhilipK	500
ReillyOG	100
RosieD	200
RusselG	400
SeanM	400

Wednesday (ByronM)

AlexD	200
BillA	500
ChristopherS	500
DavidL	750
GuyB	400
IannickM	550
JasperO	400
JohnM	400
JuanM	500
KyleC	1,000
MichaelD	500
PaulS	750
RichardP	1,500
RossM	250
ScottM	750
StephenS	750
TeemuL	750

Thursday (DavidB)

AaronH	1,000
BenitoM	500
EthanM	1,500
IainW	500
JamesM	500
JezT	400
JimH	400
JonathanO	1,000
MarkW	750
MatsE	400
MichaelP	500
PeterD	800
RobertH	200
SamuliS	1,000
SimonM	500
StephenSe	523
TodR	400

Friday (PhilH & Sylvain)

AndrewB	300
ChristopherSm	500
EricM	2,500
GrahameH	1,000
IanW	750
JamesonP	400
KeithS	1,000
KenR	750
MartinN	600
MattT	400
MikeA	500
ReneA	750
RobH	500
SanderS	1,500
StefanK	500
SteveM	1,000
VictorK	500

Saturday (Curt)

AlanD	2,000
ByronM	1,000
DavidB	1,750
JamieM	1,000
MarkG	500
MichaelA	1,000
MilesR	2,000
Millsy	1,500
PaulOG	850
PhilH	200
SteveB	500
SylvainR	800
TomF	500
ValeryN	500

Please note: The Challenge usually has a crush of entries at the start and finish so, I will be responsible for adjudicating the first few weeks and the last days of the Challenge (December 20th to January 2nd and March 18th to 20th). Note: Those days will be 'free-fire' periods where you can post as much as you like on whatever day you want.

Posting Style Guide

This was a great suggestion from Tamsin (Thanks Ms. P!). 

Here is a suggested 'style guide' for your submissions:

1) The title of your post should include: Submission Day (i.e. 'For Monday'), Your Name, Title of Submission, and indication that it is ready for submission.

2) The body of your post should include a summary of the figures in the entry, scale(s), numbers of figures, any scratchbuilding, half-figures or prone figures etc.

3) Text in Helvetica, images scaled to 800 pixels across the top and set to 'Large' in the post. Please do not create your post in a word processing program and paste into the blog template - it 'poisons' the formatting and makes it difficult to edit.

Theme Rounds

For the Fortnight Bonus Theme Rounds you can submit your post in one of two ways:

1) Simply write up your submission as usual in the Challenge Blog. In the title mark it clearly as for a Theme round. Please don't peek at others' submissions as they should be a surprise. I will then copy them over to the Theme page when the day arrives.

2) You can send your submission to me as an email. I will then copy them into the Theme page. This is a bit more fiddly for me but I understand if people want to make sure their submission is kept under wraps until the Big Reveal.

Again, for the Theme rounds please give us a nice description of your entry, scale, figures used, etc.

The Challenge Cut

For those who have not made a submission yet I remind you that the deadline for the Challenge Cut is 11:59pm, January 20th. Those without a submission by that time will be removed from the roster and no submissions will be accepted after that date. No negotiations. This is a Hard Deadline.

Okay, there it is! I have a few entries to post today, but tomorrow we start with Miles our Monday Minion and Spreadsheet Walla!