'Fellowship' from PaulSS: Richard de Vere the 11th Earl of Oxford

I don't think that the theme of fellowship is better summed up in literature than by William Shakespeare in Henry V:

This day is called the feast of Crispian: 

He that outlives this day, and comes safe home, 

Will stand a tip-toe when the day is named, 

And rouse him at the name of Crispian. 

He that shall live this day, and see old age, 

Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours, 

And say 'To-morrow is Saint Crispian:' 

Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars. 

And say 'These wounds I had on Crispin's day.' 

Old men forget: yet all shall be forgot, 

But he'll remember with advantages 

What feats he did that day: then shall our names. 

Familiar in his mouth as household words 

Harry the king, Bedford and Exeter, 

Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester, 

Be in their flowing cups freshly remember'd. 

This story shall the good man teach his son; 

And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by, 

From this day to the ending of the world, 

But we in it shall be remember'd; 

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers; 

For he to-day that sheds his blood with me 

Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile, 

This day shall gentle his condition: 

And gentlemen in England now a-bed 

Shall think themselves accursed they were not here, 

And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks 

That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.

Richard de Vere the 11th Earl of Oxford was commander of the English rear-guard at Agincourt and one of those 'happy few'.

The figures are all from the Perry plastics range, mainly the 'English Army' set, but Oxfords sword arm is from the 'Agincourt Knights' set.

I made a simple sabot command stand as a test piece, 50mm MDF circle made up with DAS clay to 'socket' the bases. Not that happy with the result but it shall suffice, maybe another custom order to Warbases is needed.

'Water Feature' from PaulSS: Tales of the River Bank

I recently received two packs of the Gale Force 9 rivers so when this bonus round came up I thought it would be a great opportunity to get them ready for my battlefield.

When you get them they are pretty bland, the banks are brown with a dry-brush and the water is very blue with a light blue highlight and then gloss varnished, all in all pretty uninspiring.

I started off by washing the water with successive layers of grey, brown and green to get rid of the 'of course rivers are blue' look. In retrospective I think I could have gone even further with this. 

The next step was to add some texture, the original surface of the water was done in a finish of high gloss varnish, which looked OK but was a bit flat. I went to town adding a couple of layers of Liquitex Gloss Gel to add some texture. I left it all to dry over the weekend making sure it was packed away to keep dust off the Liquitex while it cured.

It was now time to make a start on the banks, the kit is delivered with a couple of packs of static grass, but I wanted more texture than that, so started off by sticking on a few chunks of cork bark, lots of tufts, some Woodland Scenics clump foliage then finally adding small patches of static grass with a Noch puffer bottle.

The final step was to build a small bridge. The main components were scrap balsa for the main joists, coffee stirrers for the planking and 1/8" dowel for the rails. The ramps were made of some scrap polystyrene covered in PVA glue and textured with sand and grit. 

I do like how it came out and I now have about six foot of river and a bridge for my games. Not sure how the points shall work for this though, the river would probably be about one and a half 6" cubes and add another half cube for the bridge, 40pts?

And for those of you whose memory was jogged by the title:

'Mercenary' from PaulSS: Routiers

Routiers were mercenary soldiers during the Hundred Years War and this Wikipedia article covers these troops with a good overview.

This group of mercenaries is made up from the new Perry Miniatures Agincourt Mounted Knights 1415-29 set released just a few weeks ago. As I was ordering directly from them I took note that although the box only contains 12 horses there are enough parts for 18 riders so I picked up a couple of extra frames of horses.

As with all the Perry Miniatures plastic sets they are really well done with plenty of options. The rider frame has plenty of men at arms in jupons and tabards etc. but there are also a couple of bodies to allow you to make lighter armed troops in hauberks as I did with the fellow with the blue over yellow shield.

I had planned originally to only get three of these done for the bonus round, but the harsh polar vortex kept me home most evenings this week so I was able to crack on and get the whole unit of siz done.

The variety of components in the set mean that you can have a lot of options on the horse armour, from just a simple chanfron, then adding criniere, peytral right up to mail flanchards (none of these in this batch, but there shall be some in the next).

The only thing not included is any caparisons and I must admit not having to paint heraldry on them is a bonus.

Here are a couple of close-ups, the camera was not doing so well this morning.

'Sport' from PaulSS: English Archery Tournament

I was really stuck on what to do for the sports bonus round, a trawl of the lead pile revealed no inspiration. After a cup of tea and a biscuit I struck on the idea of using some Hundred Years War English archers having an archery tournament for a purse of silver.

The archers were easy enough, I had a couple of dozen assembled already so only needed to paint them.

The target is a 20mm Renedra base that had a circle of paper cut out and stuck on it. The supports are made from a coffee stirrer cut into an A-frame. After it had dried I drilled four holes into it and stuck some brass rod in.

The whole thing was then painted - bit of a mistake here, I should have added the arrows after painting not before! Once painted I cut some flights from paper and stuck them on the arrows sticking out of the target.

There we have it, three English bowmen passing time before catching the boat to Harfleur.

'Reconnaissance' from PaulSS: Sd.kfz. 231 (8-rad)

Reconnaissance 
a preliminary survey to gain information
especially : an exploratory military survey of enemy territory

I was rather at a loose end for what to do for this bonus round, I'm trying to concentrate my focus on the Hundred Years War collection and did not have anything suitable for that, likewise for the American Civil War collection, I could have done a cavalry patrol but did not have any spare figures that would do for what I wanted.

However, buried in the pile of shame was this Sd. Kfz, 231 (8-rad) that I had taken in trade a few years ago. It was much unloved and missing a few bits, for example, I fashioned the 20mm cannon from a spare Perry Miniatures medieval spear and the hatches are clipped from cereal box cardboard.

There was also a tatty base-coat of Panzer Grey so this was cleaned up and re-applied then the whole lot was given a wash with 'Secret Weapon Soft Body Black'. Once that was dried I painted in the panels using Vallejo German Grey, then added a couple of highlights by adding successively more Neutral Grey. The wheels and tools were picked out and then a couple of Balkenkreuz decals added.

The crewman had a 'rush-job' and was stuck in the turret.

This thing is a beast, it's cast in white metal and while doing the decals I put it on the scales - it came in at over 350 grams! There was no way this was not going to get a magnetised base, otherwise put in a box with any other figures the slightest slip would result in carnage. So I grabbed a Warbases 120mm x 60mm and textured it and painted it Field Drab then drybrushed with Iraqi Sand then Pale Sand.

The armoured car was then glued onto the base with copious amounts of superglue and I went to town to muck it all up with a Tamiya weathering kit.

I wondered what to do with the base then remembered that I has some Noch wild-grass foliage, so as my little joke decided that an armoured car the size of a bus should be trying to hide in the long grass.

Schwerer Panzerspähwagen translates as "heavy armoured reconnaissance vehicle" I don't see it as much of a stealth approach!

It's a pretty horrible model, but an hour or so work has taken about a pound of metal out of the lead mountain.