From: NoelW - 15mm for a change (320 points)

This week I decided I'd do something different, to give a bit of variety to the painting and the posts. I find having lots of projects on the go keeps me much more motivated than sticking to one single project all the time, although it does mean that every project takes much longer to complete.

In January was lucky enough to buy part of a second hand collection of 15mm figures. Quite a few were painted, many of which I can't really use, but there were also the remnants of an unpainted lead pile, too. Excitingly, they're going to allow me to work on a project I've wanted to do for a while, but didn't think I'd be able to get to, because I'm basically a 28mm gamer yet it would be too expensive to carry out in 28mm. 

I also fancied a rest from lots of 28mm ECW and zulus. So I decided to paint some of the unpainted part of this 15mm collection. Already painted are much of an Indian army and a useful eighteenth century British army. But no sepoys. So that's what I decided to work on. I also fancy the idea of a massive siege, such as Seringapatam, though this would have to be SYW rather than the early Napoleonic period. For such a game I'll need guns, guns, guns. And, luckily this lead pile has quite a few - though, less luckily, not many gunners. 

The figures are all early Minifigs. I've a catalogue dated 1983 which lists them all, though they also seem still to be available from Caliver Books, who cast them to order I think. They may be getting an order from me. 

So that's what I've been doing this week. And here's the first results. 

There are 19 guns, some for the sepoys, some for the fortress. (I'll probably have to make a fortress, too, so that might take a while!) There are more guns to be painted, too, so they might appear next week.

One feature of developing from an existing collection is the need to paint in a similar style to the figures you've bought. In this case, almost all the figures are painted in a relatively simple style, generally a clean, wargaming block-painted approach with no shading or highlighting, and rarely any detail. So there's not much room for sophistication, which is exactly what I needed for most this week, in contrast with the detail I tried to put into my Bonus post. 

As well as the sepoys, there's a battalion of "Tippoo Sahib's Regulars", who would be part of the defending forces against Wellington at Seringapatam. I decided to paint these because they sounded interesting and colourful - red turbans, purple robes, black equipment. These will have to act as generic Indian troops for the SYW for the time being.

I like the idea of Seringapatam and Assaye - which is what these sepoys are intended for - but I don't have an early Napoleonic British in 15mm. Maybe this is an area for future expansion...

For my next post I'll probably return to the ECW, though I'm enjoying the productivity of these very simple 15mm figures, so maybe it's going to be a bit of both. 

There are 4 sepoy battalions of 20 figures, 12 gun crew and 30 of Tippoo Sahib's men, making a total of 122 15mm infantry.

That's 19 * 15mm guns @ 4 pts and 122 infantry at 2 points: total 320 points.

Hoi Noel, that is a nice surprise indeed! What a colourful lot you bring us today and so well  painted as well. I too have a small Wellington in India project (in 1:72) but nothing as nice as these. I do like your Sepoys and the guns are cool too.  320 well deserved points will be awarded this evening!