Duke Donald's Kislev army

[Duke Donald]

Hi All,

I got a bit bored with my "count as ogres bear riders". I may go back to them at some point but needed a break for them. I don't know whether it's due to all the bears I sculpted but I felt an urge to start a Kislev force, which is something I wanted to do for a long time anyway. I will try the unofficial Kislev army book, which I find very nice. However, I also want to make sure that each unit can be played as Empire. The style will be somewhere between fantasy Kislev and historical Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth armies from the 16th-17th century.

I started off with the most iconic unit, the Winged Lancers/Gryphon Legion, which GW based on the famous Polish Winged Hussars. While I like the GW Kislev infantry, the cavalry is really showing its age and while they can be easily purchased on eBay, the prices have become mental. Thus, I decided to scratch build mine. This allowed me to make them look closer to the real Polish Winged Hussars. The unit will count as a knights or Inner circle knights if I play Empire rules.

Here's the first test mini (still WIP but slowly getting there).




One issue I had to solve were the wings. I started by using bits of pegasus plastic wings. It wasn't really ideal and would have added a significant price tag to each mini. In the end, I used the feathers on the helmet of the Elyrian Reaver from the IoB set for the top part and built the lower section from plasticard and greenstuff. I then used this template for a greenstuff press mould, which works surprisingly well.



C&C most welcome and appreciated. I just wanted to mention that the length of the lance is intentional. Polish Winged Hussars had lances between 4.5 and 6.2 metres (longer than infantry pikes) and the one carried by the mini would correspond to the short end of this spectrum.

[Mr. Ultra]

That's a serious looking project! You have all my support, but I give you an advice: use the Ravenwing plastic wings, there are plenty in the bitz online shops and are cheap, and looks better and more solid than the high elf ones.

[mdiscala]

Wow great sculpting, and, yeah, very ambitious. Keep up the hard work.

[Grain Weevil]

As mdiscala said...Great sculpting! And as a Pole I'm keeping my fingers crossed for you!
Keep the great work!

[Duke Donald]

@ Mr. Ultra

Thanks for the feedback and support as well as for the suggestion to use the ravenwing wing


It's a good idea and I feel it could work, but feel it doesn't fit the picture of what I want to achieve. My inspiration are the real Polish winged hussars (picture below).


@ mdiscala
Thanks for the encouragement and the nice words

@ Grain Weevil
Thanks also for the nice words; I hope the next minis won't offend your patriotism.

I'm going abroad for ten days tomorrow and was hoping I could post the second winged lancer this evening, but I didn't find the time to finish him. Here he is very, very VIP:


One reason I didn't manage to make more progress on him was that my youngest daughter got all excited when she saw a converted marauder horse next to a set of pegasus wings, and wanted a princess on a pegasus. I didn't feel like turning down her request, and I now have this to paint (pink and purple of course).

[Grain Weevil]

Princess looks Great!
Maybe she will be Tsarinas Katarinas daughter
Here is some interesting link http://warhammer-empire.com/theforum...opic=22054.300
...and with minis this quality You can't offend my patriotism

[Student]

Great sculpting. Subscribed.

[tancrede]

Very cool project, as I always loved the winged lancers and Kislev.
Hope to see more nice sculpting soon, and painting too ! ^^

[BeatTheBeat]

You know that you do have to include that princess model in the finished army, right?

Great sculpting btw, really like where this is headed.

Cheers,
BTB

[intact01]

Oh wow this will be great, Scupting is amazing, and have not seen anything like it yet, Great ideas and all so far. cant wait to see stuff painted

InTact01

[Lorden88]

A very impressive conversion work.

Very good figurines with lot of details!

Cheer!

[Sully]

It's really a shame my home country's history is appreciated more by outlanders and less by most of Poles ourselves. I love your work on the hussars and the whole project, consider me subscribed.

Panowie bracia, polać mu!

[Astraeos]

This is looking like the start of a very promising army! I'll subscribe to this!

What model did you use as the princess? It's not a GW fig is it?

[silverstu]

Really lovely sculpting there - that is some commitment sculpting a whole army.

Where is the female rider of the pegasus from?

[Duke Donald]

Thanks to everyone for all the feedback and encouragements. I'm really glad you all seem to like my new project. I'm afraid I don’t have anything worth showing at the moment. I came back home today from a week abroad. I managed to finish the first winged lancer, got some work done on the second and have started a third. I'll put up pictures at some point next week when I made sufficient progress. I may even start painting when I've finished the first three.

The "princess" is a beautiful sculpt and the level of detail is just mindboggling. It's a Dark Sword mini in the Elmore Masterworks series and is called "The last charge of Melissa and her immortal schnauzers”. The mini is still available from their site. She was sculpted by Tom Meier and represents his wife and their dogs. I had to convert her slightly to put her on the Pegasus but I've got a second one still in the blister.

[Duke Donald]

Hi All,

A fairly minor update, but still quite a few hours invested. I've now finished the first two Winged Lancers. However please let me know if you see anything that needs being fixed or have any suggestions for improvements. I've started working on the next one (well I hope you will find out which one it is on the pics below).

[Duke Donald]

I decided to do some tests on the elite elements of the infantry (I'm also planning to include peasant militia as spearmen or halberdiers). I had a go at converting 40k Vostroyans as I always liked their look. However, I had partly forgotten how much I hated converting metal minis. Below are a handgunner and a captain.

I'm globally pleased with how they turned out. In particular I feel I managed to de-40k-ify them. However, they still feel a bit too modern to me as they look somewhat more Napoleonic than from the Renaissance. I'd really value some C&C, as I'm unsure whether I want to pursue this concept. If I did, I would use converted Vostroyans for handgunners and warmachine crew and replicate a similar design for the Greatswords.

[Student]

I think they look good and they look like they are from Kislev but I agree there is something not quite right. First off there are a couple of 40k details still there, an imperial aquilla on the captain's remaining boot and one on his chestplate. Also I'm not sure about the winged skull on the handgunner's hat. Maybe they would look more right if they were painted.

[gogs78]

Well this is impressive! Those modelling skills on your lancers are fantastic, must be a hell of a lot of work though?

I like the vostroyans. If i hadnt seen the models before i wouldnt know they were from 40k. The fact i have seen them before makes me try to pick out details, but if your painting matches your sculpting they will look great!

[Duke Donald]

@ Student
Thanks for the feedback. I removed the Aquilla on the boot which looked a bit silly anyway, and changed the other one to a "single headed eagle", which would be appropriate for a Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth army". I also redid the shaft on the axe of the captain. Anyway, the "something is not quite right" feel probably goes beyond the Aquillas. It may bethat we spontaneously associate Vostroyans with 40k. Alternatively they may be too bulky for fantasy.

@gogs78
Thanks a lot for the kind words. My greenstuff skills greatly improved recently when I realised you simply can't rush things. Sculpting a little detail is actually not that difficult. The problem I had before was that I wanted to do too get too much done at once and invariably ended up ruining the previous bit by putting my fingers on it when working on the next. I discovered that for me he key is to do a tiny bit, let it dry and only then move to the next. This slows down the process a lot but is not too bad as you I sculpt at least two minis at the same time. I'm afraid my painting skills may disappoint you but I've decided to apply the same philosophy of not rushing things and I hope this will lead to a similar improvement.

I’m not fully convinced with the Vostroyans conversions and as I really hate working with metal, I'm afraid they may have to go in my failed minis drawer. I've started working on a different concept which will be closer to the GW Kossars design. Below is a picture of them in their very WIP status.