Messing with the Crusades...my small army

[kublai]

thank you for the pics ! your blog is realy cool. the horses are different, do you plan to put them in the same unit ?
Will you include some infantry as well ?

Wonderfull conversions by the way !

[PsychosisPC]

Thanks for the compliments.

I think what I will do is probably convert a few and put them in a separate unit from the Perrys, but it'll probably depend on how they look when I paint them up.

I really do look forward to seeing their infantry, which based on their site it seems that they are coming out pretty soon.

[mrtn]

Nice to see something different from you. As to the scale differences I'd just mash them together. Remember, James Hetfield and Kylie Minogue are the same scale too.

[Crazy Harborc]

In a army, placed on a tabletop, same brand minies in a unit should be fine. On/in the photos IMHO they look close enough to pass a casual eye balling by an opponent.

THAT said....you are the one who will "know and see" every defect, because they are/will be your minies. Do what your gut tells you to do.

[PsychosisPC]

Since the Romans are essentially finished, the last couple of weekends I've been working on the knights. One unit will be Hospitallers, but these are some of the other knights.

Now they are not done, I still need to do a bunch of washes, paint a few of the details and paint all of the shields, so very much still a work in progress, but getting there.


That is a GW High Elf shield, donated by a buddy. At first I was concerned that my sculpted surcoats were not smooth enough, but as I got the paint on them they started to come around. Not as good as the Perry's, but good enough for me. Here's a Perry crusader for comparison.


I'm starting to really get the hang of painting horses. The horse conversions I think turned out better than I can paint.

[PsychosisPC]

And some more of the works in progress.




I'm going to get all of them to about this level, then switch to my Kolinsky Sable brush and finish up all of the detail, then onto all of the washes. Basing will be the last thing done.

[Idle Scholar]

Really nice looking knights there. I know you say WIP but I'd be very happy with those as tabletop quality.

[colhodg]

Nice to see some paint on these guys, having seen your romans very much looking forward to seeing these done.

Are you planning on dirtying the edges of the barding at all? basing first i guess but it would tie the minis to the basing.

[PsychosisPC]

I may. We'll see how the basing looks when I get it done. Haven't decided yet though.

[PsychosisPC]

These are my Hospitallers. I’ve never been crazy about painting black and white, but I knew I wanted to do a Holy Order and this one of my favorite choices. Some of them are my converted Perry Miniatures knights mixed with the Perry’s Holy Order/Hospitaller Knights.

The ones without hoods and sleeve-less surcoats are my conversions, like the knight with the couched lance and standard bearer. The two horses with the caparisons are my conversions with GS and BS.


With the conversions, I was attempting to get Norman early Perry Crusader models out of the First Crusade in the 1090s, into more of the late Second and Third Crusades.

Note some of the kite shields are actually GW High Elves shields from their foot infantry, that made conversion of the shields much easier. And some of the shields were actually converted with green stuff putty. The movement tray I think turned out well. The basing is HO scale railroad ballast, with some gravel, Joefix grass tufts, and GW Staw. I'm happy with the basing, its a bit different from what I normally do.


The banner did not turn out great, but I will fix that at a later date. Its a painted paper banner with some foil in between the layers to keep the bend.

The horses, scared me at first to do them. I'm not someone that has a lot of knowledge about horses, and this is not fantasy, so I used a number of reference photos and attempted to get 3-4 different paint schemes that would work well. Out of everything I think the horses turned out the best, with the exception of the white one in the back.

[Meraklis]

my friend your sculpting and painting skills are very good indeed! I especially admire what you did with the barding on those Perry horses!
How many knight units are you planning to make? Do you have an army list in mind?

looking forward to seeing more from you!

[tancrede]

Very cool work here : good converting work, and really nice painting.
The bases looks especially good and I really like them.

Keep us showing more crusade work (turkopoles or foot sergeants, for example).

[PsychosisPC]

Many thanks guys. Playing WAB 2.0 and loving the game. For my first 1000 points I have two units of knights this one being the Holy Order and another 10 to 12 strong, two units of crossbow men and a small unit of Spearmen. Right now using the El Cid list. Got more to follow.

[kublai]

really cool knights.

will you check out Hail Cesar and Clash of Empires or will you stick with WAB ?

[PsychosisPC]

really cool knights.

will you check out Hail Cesar and Clash of Empires or will you stick with WAB ?

Thanks.

As to Hail Caesar, the answer is absolutely no. I've looked over their rules set and I have their Black Powder ruleset. It does not appeal to me. And please don't get me wrong, I like Warlord Games Miniatures, take a look at my huge Roman army. Around here we also like to play tournaments, not just pick up games. I'll probably play some BP eventually. And I really love the WAB ruleset. To me it is what Fantasy should have been.

CoE does appeal to me, and I've heard nice things about it. Don't know anyone in my area that has it yet. We'll see if it takes hold. Here in the midwest U.S. we have quite a few WAB players. I'm even organizing our first WAB 2.0 Wisconsin tournament, open period and 1500 points, to be held in August.

[Crazy Harborc]

PC.....good luck with your "Cheeseland" tournie.

Around here....WAB2 must be underground. There are hundreds of lifetime, dedicated wargamers in the St. Louis area.....No stores here have WAB2 or any suppliments in stock.

[PsychosisPC]

PC.....good luck with your "Cheeseland" tournie.

Around here....WAB2 must be underground. There are hundreds of lifetime, dedicated wargamers in the St. Louis area.....No stores here have WAB2 or any suppliments in stock.

We have 1/2 of the spots filled up, which if everyone signed up shows, the tourney will be as large as Adepticon's field this past spring. We have no misconceptions about what we are up against, we are a hardcore few. We are happy that it may be half the size of our annual Warhammer Fantasy Tourney. And Napoleonics...its me and ??????....I guess just me.

Historicals are indeed an issue. We have lots of gamers in Wisconsin, but I have yet to go into any gaming store in our state, that carries any historical miniatures, let alone WAB, Hail Caesar, Clash of Empire, anything from Warlord or the Perry's or anyone else Historical for that matter. And having lived on each half the state over the past few years and traveling the state regularly, I've made it too a ton of different stores, border to border to border to lake to lake. Yet we have people playing it regularly. Our local store is strictly GW and Flames of War. Its the way it is.

My question is do the places in St. Louis have anything either?

[Mr. Ultra]

Yea there is. In particular with the horses, I'll do some size comparison photos. Conquest Games appear to be 28mm, the Perry's I would say are bit smaller. The horses for Conquest are wider in the body.

edit: Here's a pic.

2) Perry Norman
3)Conquest Games Norman
4)Gripping Beast Knight
5)modified Conquest Games Norman
6)Perry HYW

I also did a short review of the plastic Conquest Games kit on my blog at the following link:
http://psychosispc-themadhouseworksh...n-knights.html
There are more pictures and scale comparisons on my blog at the above link.

That's an extremely useful reference guide, thank you very much!

[PsychosisPC]

That's an extremely useful reference guide, thank you very much!

No problem.

[PsychosisPC]

This for me is an army years in the making, one I have been very apprehensive about starting.

A small update, my crossbowmen. 7 of the 16 that are done. No real conversions, just paint work. And no movement tray either, which I think hides the ugly edges of the GF9 magnetic bases. They are a very characterful group. So fire at will boys.