From Millsy: Back in Black... More 28mm Arabs (90 points)

G'day All,

Apparently a week off from painting black was enough and I'm back with more Arabs. This time it's another ten infantry (Gripping Beast with Fireforge Games upgrades), two cavalry (again Gripping Beast with Fireforge Games upgrades) and the last four miniatures from the Reaper Miniatures Legends of the Sands box set.

A mate pointed out if you are doing Mutatawwi'a for SAGA you are better off leaning hard into either mounted or foot troops so I added another unit to the foot collection. Simple enough to assemble, paint and base, and although they are different style minis they mix well enough with the upgrades.

The two mounted miniatures upgrade one of my earlier units to five miniatures, plus add a mounted warlord for SAGA that'll do nicely until I either buy something fancier or just stop caring this isn't a fancier figure and forget all about it.

Finally, there's four more cracking character Reaper sculpts... two rather flexible ladies (I mean they are limber, NOT from a morals POV!), a wizardy vizier type and his lovely apprentice. The latter two will also do very nicely for Frostgrave which is a nice unexpected bonus.

Points wise...

• 14 x 28mm infantry = 70 points
• 2  x 28mm cavalry = 20 points

Total: 90 points

Next up, yet more Kruleboyz. Thanks for looking!

Artist: Adani & Wolf

Album: The Irresistible Dust on the Floor

Artist: Overcoats

Album: The Fight

Artist: The Mission UK

Album: Carved in Sand

Cheers,

Millsy

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Wonderful work on these black-clad Mutatawwi'a. The little punch of colour really adds the chef's kiss to these guys, especially the shields on the mounted fellas. Your stuff really makes me want to get back to my Siege of Malta project. Inspiring stuff! I also really like your 'local colour' with the Reaper models. The vizier and the red-robed dancer are my personal faves. Well done Mr. Mills!

- Curt & Huck

From Millsy: 28mm Arab Horsey Boys (160 points)

G'day All,

I'm back for a third time with another lot of 28mm Arabs for my SAGA / Oathmark project. This time it's fourteen cavalry, kitbashed from the Gripping Beast Arab Heavy Cavalry and Fireforge Games Black Guard / Berber Infantry kits.

As mentioned previously the Gripping Beast Arab Heavy Cavalry horses were a real PITA with the neck joints being very poorly aligned. Despite my best efforts to fill and hide the issues I am still unhappy with them. They'll do I guess, if I squint and kinda look at them out of the corner of my eye...

The riders on the other hand, I am very happy with. The banner bearers were all upgraded to give them longer poles and flags made from heavy art paper to match the infantry. I've also swapped all the heads (which required some careful shaving), the arms (which were an easy like-for-like swap) and some of the shields.

I'll need one more to fill out three units of five so will try and pick up a sprue at CANCON on the weekend. The amazing KerryT also sent me a care package of 10 camelry and another 5 cavalry which he'd 3D printed so I hope to have those painted sometime soon as well. 

Scoring:

14 x 28mm cavalry = 140 points

1 x cheeky "money for jam" bonus for the Seventh Circle: Violence = 20 points

Total = 160 points

Artist: Agnes Obel

Album: Citizens of Glass

Artist: The Offspring

Album: Americana

Artist: Massive Attack

Album: Mezzanine

Thanks for looking!

Cheers,
Millsy

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Hi Millsy

Great musical selections .. I'm particularly keen on  Massive Attack and Mezzanine is classic :)

Well, these 'horsey boys' look super, I really like your customization of the banners and the head/arm swaps. To my (very) untrained eye, the horses themselves look  great.  Can't wait to see all the Arabs in a group shot!

140 points for the figures and 20 for the Location bonus points

Looking forward to your next post

- Sarah

From Millsy: More 28mm Arabs (60 points)

G'day All,

It's been an odd couple of weeks with a lot of stop-start stuff going on. Back to work after a month off meant the backlog was bigger than normal, and then there was commission work to knock off also taking up free time.

That meant I started but didn't finish several things. This was compounded by having real issues with a box of Gripping Beast Arab Heavy Cavalry which were really poorly made. I think the die is getting old and tired as it's the only thing that would explain the amount of flash, misfits and gaps in this kit. I've built several before and never had so much trouble with it.

First world problems aside, today I present...

Reaper Miniatures - Legends of the Sands

The Reaper Miniatures' Legends of the Sands box set is something I bought a looong time ago with this project in mind and its great to finally be getting some paint on the minis. In total there are 12 in the set and I've painted 2/3 of them for this submission.

Leading my force on foot is Sultan Suleimillsy the Ambivalent, who judging by the rather camp nature of the sculpt has more interest in things artistic than militaristic. At least he has nice threads. Stylin!

Each to their own as they say and he has plenty of well oiled muscle to do the rough stuff on his behalf, plus an evil wizard/vizier type for the ad hoc genie summoning and general magical misbehaviour.

Finally, there's a "hashashin" assassin who does the dirty work behind closed doors and stands for the Ninth Circle: Treachery bonus.

Total: 8 x 28mm minis + bonus = 60 points.

Artist: The Presets
Album: Apocalyso

Artist: Lichtmond

Album: The Journey

Artist: Sunlounger

Album: Armada Collected: Roger Shah presents...

Thanks everyone for looking and Sarah for minioning my stuff!

Cheers,

Millsy

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Hi Millsy .. or rather Suliemillsy :)

I am unfamiliar with your musical selections, but I will definitly fall down that rabbit hole tomorrow!

These Arabs are great, the colours super vibrant, especially the purple and that floral pattern has a certain whimsy which is appealing.

I can envision these characters in many game settings, from pulp to historical.

 Using the Hashashin to reach the 9th circle Treachery bonus is a great interpretation. 

Another 60 points to your score, Well done Sir!

Sarah 

From Millsy: 28mm Arab Infantry (341 points)

G'day All!

Happy New Year to everyone. I hope you've been well and had a great break over Christmas!

I've used my break to plough through a fair chunk of a new project - an Arab force for SAGA and Oathmark. These are primarily Fireforge Games Black Guard and Berber Infantry kits, with the ogres by Shieldwolf Miniatures.  For SAGA I'll be fielding them as Mutatawii'a (minus the ogres) and for Oathmark as standard humans plus allies.

From a total of 60 human miniatures I have 2 x 10 man units of archers, 2 x 10 man units of swordsmen and 1 x 20 man unit of spearmen. For SAGA I'll drop a couple of men from each unit and use as warriors, or divide in two for hearth guards. For Oathmark they'll be fielded as is.

The Black Guard look is amazing and I've wanted a force of them for a long time (here's the lust angle). I've tried to keep the colour palette really tight and highlighted them hard to give them a bold look. 

The ogres are resin miniatures are an absolute joy to assemble and paint. Really clean sculpts with loads of weapon options and the price is great to boot. Sheildwolf Miniatures are highly recommended! There's a definite "similar to but legally distinguishable from" Warhammer Ogor Martribes vibe but I'm fine with that.

The nearly 40 shields took nearly 2 hours alone to paint with all the fine lines in multiple layers for a scuffed look. Happy with the outcome but it did try my patience towards the end. I've used Gripping Beast shields for the non spear units here as I'm not a fan of the Fireforge Games round ones.

Still haven't decided on the banners. I'm tempted to leave them blank to reinforce the starkness but they would look neat with some script on them. For now that's a Future Millsy problem.

One of the things that attracted me to the Fireforge Games kit is the bamboo spears. With the large shields it's a really iconic look and I love it.

And finally some glamour shots of the command stands...

Now do the math please Millsy...

60 x 28mm infantry = 300 points

3 x 40mm infantry = 21 points

Dante's Divine Comedy - Second Circle: Lust = 20 points

Total: 341 points

There are camel and horse cavalry coming later in the Challenge along with a pile of characters from Reaper Miniatures amongst others. For now this is a solid chunk of points to kick me off and I can switch to something else for a while. Thanks for looking!

Artist: Portishead

Album: Dummy, Roseland NYC Live

Artist: Schiller

Album: Illuminate

Artist: Faithless

Album: Forever Faithless (Greatest Hits)

Artist: Thievery Corporation

Album: Saudade

Cheers,

Millsy

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Hello Millsy!

Great musical selections. I think I'll listen to some Thievery Corp too!

Wow, thats quite the variety of minis .. and awesome work on the shields ... I'm sure such detail was frustrating but worth the results. I like the pops of colour .. turquoise, purples, blues and reds on the infantry - really effective!

341points for you!

- Sarah

From PeteF: Moor Medieval Arabs for SAGA (85 points)

 

One of the reasons I'm way behind the pace is that most of what I've ended up painting is not uniform - rather than easy repeatable brushwork on Minifigs French line infantry I've ended up contributing to smaller, more skirmishy war bands.

These are the last of my Mutataww'ia for SAGA Age of Crusades - just came in under the wire for my SAGA group's game this Sunday. I painted the first four Mutataww'ia on camels two challenges ago - progress has been slow until now.

Here are four hearthguard mounted on horses, four hearthguard on foot and a Warlord on foot. In the future I might expand my options with more camel riders and a warlord on a camel. 

Together with the original camel riders, archers from earlier this month and spear warriors this makes up a full 6 point warband for SAGA. Now that this one is done I'm trying to decide whether to do some some crusading knights, go back and finish my Age of Vikings Normans, or start a new warband in a new SAGA Universe (the Footsore Romano Britons are calling to me for Age of Invasions and Victrix Numidians would look great for Age of Hannibal). So many choices so little time. So much squirrelage.

For SAGA I magnetize the minis' bases - and glue a metal sheet (cut from dollar store baking pans) in these handy carriers - a three layered carrier has space for all the minis, dice and tokens.

All these figures are from Gripping Beast - and they've been great fun to paint. I love the variety of weapons, armour, poses and shields - it makes for a nice warband. I tried to pull it together with a few basic colours. The shield designs were inspired by/borrowed from ones you can get decals for - I wonder if there are any other sources for medieval arab shields - googling doesn't turn up that much.

No squirrel point for Moor SAGA Arabs. Here's the points breakdown:

4x28mm Cav = 40 points

5x28mm Foot = 25 points

+20 points for Arakis - desert planet = 85 points TOTAL

Squirrel +0 (total 6)

Skulz +0 (total 1)

I am always a big fan of Medieval Arabs Pete, and this is bunch with a lot of colour and movement.  There is a trade off with the uniforms vs variety of dress, I find it works to alternate between them from time to time to keep the brain limber.  Love the basing too.