I Name This Ship

Something I had planned on doing from the start with my B&P ships was to give them names. At this point historically any name would have been on the back of the ship but having them at the front looks better to me. With that in mind I found a company online which produces name plates for model trains to order some nameplates from. They took a fair while (3 months or so) to arrive but look rather smart so the wait was worth it. The names came from ships that fought during the Spanish Armada attempted invasion with the Tramontana (a kind of north wind) fighting for the English and El Gato (The Cat) fighting for the Spanish.

I've also completed twelve plastic English reinforcements to help bulk out the Buccaneer force. These are made from the Warlord Games ECW infantry pack. I've not spent ages on them but a quick and simple paint job still looks effective.

The could be fielded as Militia or the more expert Musketeers who at twice the price are the more elite option. The Musketeers also come with more gear that can be added onto them so you could in fact sink 94 points into a twelve man unit as opposed to 52 points for a Militia unit with all the upgrades.

As the box comes with 24 musket armed models I am also painting up an extra 12 Spanish militia types to add to the Spanish army.

Glorious Glosters

Having been close to completing the English Militia for my Buccaneer force last week I was able to finish them off during the week.

I really like the models and the look of the red with yellow trim makes me want to paint up some more so I can see myself adding more militia / regular soldiers in the future.

The next unit I will be working on are the Spanish Hostigadores who are a skirmishing militia unit. Historically they acted as stay behind forces harassing the enemy after the main army had left.

These chaps being all lost at sea won't be much help in crewing the Tartana as she glides across the sea. She is pretty much complete with the masts, rigging and sails added.

At present the spars aren't glue in place so I can swap the sails over but as I found when I was rigging her up it's a real pain in the arse to do so I may well glue them in place and leave her as she is.

Points wise the Tartana when fully equipped will be a bit more than the Bark but not enough to make the match-up unfair.

The Tartana is a fair bit bigger than the Bark but much of that is due to her bowsprit being longer and at a lower angle. As the lanteen rig doesn't allow for a place to fly a flag I used a spare spar from Bark to add one to the rear of the ship.

That's all the boats completed for now and I don't have any immediate plans to add anymore. this means with the terrain also done and dusted I can concentrate on the armies to actually fight with/over all the bits done so far.

Red or Dead

This weeks painting has had a rather red theme about it as I have been working on the Tartana and some English Militia. Having decided to make up some red sails I thought it only fitting that the hull should be red as well, and that has turned out rather nicely over the week.

Now I've got the hull sorted out I can get to work on the masts, sails and cannons to complete the ship. That will probably be another weeks work but with the next Bank Holiday weekend only seven days away I should have the time to complete her.

My other painting job this week has been the English Militia to go in the Buccaneer force. These guys are the cheap filler in the Buccaneer army and would seem to be better in melee than at shooting.

During a quick bit of research I discovered that a fore-runner of the Glorious Glosters was stationed in Newfoundland at around the correct time so that was a flimsy enough excuse to use yellow trim and assume some had gone south for a warmer time.

These are another set of excellent models with plenty of character, my favorite is the chap huffing his cheeks out to blow on his match.

I was also lucky enough to get a KoW game in with Mick after a few weeks break. Once again we played using the scenario cards. These gave Mick the invade scenario whilst I had a combination of loot and capture. This gave me the chance to break out the jungle terrain and check it held together for a game.

In the end the game was pretty quickly decided by the central clash of forces which saw my Herd wipe out the majority of the Basilean army.

Despite some late heroics by Gnaeus who managed to wipe out my Centuar Longmanes with one charge and then a good nerve roll (I'd manage to leave them outside of Inspiring range) Mick didn't have enough forces left by the end of turn 4 to continue.

Next up for the Blood & Plunder painting will be the Spanish Militia / Hostigadores, these are the cheapest unit in the army and whilst poorly equipped do have the Skirmisher rule which helps them keep out of trouble.

Native Militia

First off the bank holiday blocks are the Milicianos Indios who I started last week. The sculpts are really nice with the models looking good even after my painting efforts.

Each B&P pack comes with four sculpts so you do get duplicates in the units but they are far from mono-pose. For the bases you have a choice of either painting them brown and making the most of the wood effect they are cast with or putting some ground cover on them. As I think we will be playing more land battles than sea I went with the same easy basing material I have been using on the terrain.

My plan is to alternate working on a Spanish unit then an English one, so up next will be the English Militia.

I also completed a longboat which is a nice little model (when compared to the other ships) and can be used a cheap way to get your men about in a naval or amphibious battle. You can also buy the canoa which is the widely used native version so I may well end up getting one of those as well at some point.

Ships (and buildings) work out their capacity by base size, simply you can fit as many models in as you can get without the bases overlapping. I was thinking of adding a larger MDF base onto the models as the metal ones are prone to bending but as this would stop me from fitting the full amount of models onto a ship I gave that idea up.

I also took delivery of the straws for mounting the spars and with a dab of superglue now have a simple and effect method for keeping the spars in place whilst being able to quickly swap the sails out.

This will allow the use of the Bark for both B&P and any other game I can fit it into. The blue setup will be perfect for Vanguard Basileans for instance.

The last thing completed this week are some quick barricades made out of the spare palm tree models I got to make the forests.

These have been attached to the base with a Polyfila & paint mix and then finished off with more of the basing mix.

Cover looks to be very important in B&P as without it you don't get your full ranged save throw so could easily be shot off the table.