White Eagle Clan Infantry Unit

This evening, after dealing with a home problem (of which I will tell anon), I finished the last 8 figures for a 20-figure unit of infantry for the White Eagle Clan.  They now have three infantry units and one cavalry unit ready for play-testing for my June convention game (Bayou Wars 2010).

This unit is composed of 12 Falcon Miniatures sword-armed Arabs (with one converted to the leader/standard bearer) and 8 Iron Brigade rifle-armed Arabs.

I received the Iron Brigade miniatures from their new owner, The Lost Battalion Miniatures.  The owner has many of the Iron Brigade moulds and is going to be casting and, I think, upgrading them.  He also has a number of figures on-hand.  I ordered some of the rifle-armed Arabs, a French Foreign Legion command group (for a batch of Iron Brigade FFL I have), some ship guns, and a horse and musket artillery limber with two horses and attendant.  The service was great!

Now to the house problem.  This past Wednesday night, while getting some foamcore out to make some movement stands, I discovered that I had a water leak along the outside wall of my wargaming/computer room.  My wife, son, and I moved a batch of wargaming and stamp stuff out and discovered mildew and ruined box bottoms and loose-leaf binders.  Before it was all over, I had filled two large trash cans and had the rest of my house stacked with troop boxes, terrain boxes, etc., etc.  I only lost some stamp collecting material and some cardboard boxes.  None of my troops were affected.  The only terrain I lost was one 2' square terrain board made from a ceiling tile.  It was the bottom of a stack of them.  We tore the carpet out today and the resulting picture tells it all - a bare room!  Isn't the original 1970s tile simply horrid!

At least it will give us a chance to repaint the walls.  And we still have to figure out how to seal the exterior wall (which "backs" onto a porch) to keep the water from entering in the future.  Plus a new floor.  The adventure of a homeowner never ceases!

Happy Birthday Celebration!

All of Carpania is in celebration today as their beloved Scottish mercenary leader, General Seamus Campbell, celebrates his 60th birthday.  The Margrave has issued a special proclamation and will hold a banquet in Campbell's honor tonight in the stadtplatz of Potsdorf.  The centerpiece will be a giant birthday cake:

There will also be a magnificent fireworks display to end the programme of celebration.

General Campbell has protested all this falderol and has stated that all he desires is a quiet night at home watching a performance of NCIS on this new-fangled contraption called a telly-vision device.

Red Hawk Clan Infantry

I've just completed the second of two infantry units for the Red Hawk clan.  They are Iron Brigade figures armed with rifles.  They should provide some welcome firepower to the mostly sword and spear armed native infantry in the rest of the Agandar's force.

If you count the figures, you'll note that they are one man shy of a full TSATF 20-figure infantry unit.  I have an extra figure to add if necessary but I have been in contact with the new owner of the old Iron Brigade molds.  He is sending me a copy of the old catalog so that I can round-out not only this unit but several others.  More on this development later.

White Eagle Clan Cavalry

My second Arab clan for my June convention game, The Relief of Wadi Zoum-Zoum, will be called the White Eagle clan.  So far they have two spear armed infantry units, one of which can be seen at this link.  I've now added a unit of rifle armed cavalry made from 11 Falcon Miniatures Arab cavalry and 1 unidentified Arab cavalryman.  Like the Red Hawk cavalry (see previous post), they are mounted on Miniature Figurines horses.

 

These cavalry will bring some degree of battlefield mobility to the White Eagle Clan.  I still have a third infantry unit to paint this month.

Sheikh Abdallah

My final figure painted in February is the leader of the Red Hawk Clan, Sheikh Abdallah.  This mighty warrior is also a Falcon Miniatures figure, but this time mounted on a Falcon horse.

 

I tried a new technique with this figure, using a three layer paint scheme on the horse's caprison and a two layer scheme on Abdallah's robe and headdress.  To my eye, it turned out much better than I thought it would.  I probably won't use it for "ordinary soldiers" but will probably use it again for senior officers.  It makes them stand out a little better from the rank and file. The base will get a terrain treatment similar to the camelry unit's bases (see previous post) once I get the second cavalry unit painted and mounted.

February Painting

So far February has not been as productive as January for painting.  I've only done a 12-figure camelry unit and a 12-figure cavalry unit for my convention game play tests that start in April, with the convention in June.  Both of these units are Falcon Miniatures (www.falconminiatures.com/), but with the cavalry mounted on Miniature Figurine horses (which is the way I bought them on eBay).  These two mounted units along with two infantry units (of which only one is painted) will comprise one of the four native commands in my convention game.

Camelry Unit, Red Hawk Clan

 

These 12 stalwarts are all armed with rifles and ready to smite the infidels.

Cavalry Unit, Red Hawk Clan

Armed with a mix of rifles and swords/pistols, these desert raiders can ride rings around the slow moving Egyptians.  You'll notice that there is one dissimilar figure in the right rear.  Since I only had 11 mounted figures, he was "drafted" to fill-in as the "12th man."

The painted infantry unit of the Red Hawk clan was included in my Colonial game at last year's convention.  You can see it here:  Red Hawk Clan Infantry 

And a few words about the convention game:  This game will pit a heterogeneous force of Mahdist, Beja, and desert Arabs led by the Agandar of Karres, one of the successors to the late Mahdi and the late Khalifa.  They will be besieging the Eyptian supply base at Wadi Zoum-Zoum on the Green Nile.  Coming to the base's rescue will be a British river column including Royal Navy landing party troops, Royal Marine Light Infantry, and gunboats.  The game will be presented at the HMGS Gulf-South Bayou Wars 2010 convention in New Orleans on June12.  Convention Link.

Well, back to the painting desk for another Arab cavalry unit and two more Arab infantry units.

More Snow in Mississippi!!

After getting a snowfall back in December (see Snow! in Mississippi?!?), most of us thought that would be all for this winter.  But then we had over 72 hours of below freezing temperatures in January that resulted in ruptured water mains all over the city (Jackson, state capitol), little to no water pressure, and a "boil water" alert.  That shut all the schools, city and state government offices, and many businesses for 3 to 4 days!  And now, another snowfall.

It has not been as traumatic as the huge snowfalls over the mid-Atlantic states. But for the Deep South, it is a very unusual occurrence to have two snowfalls in one winter season.

And in a late entry, I heard on the CBS evening news that 49 of the 50 states in the USA had measureable snow on the ground today, all but Hawaii whose volcanoes on the Big Island had no snow.  Wow!

 

Part of my backyard on Friday morning.

The snow started falling very late Thursday night and continued until early afternoon, Friday (today).  Many schools announced closings Thursday night and the rest of them in central, south, and south-west Mississippi were added early this morning, as were the state  government offices.  So I had a SNOW DAY!!

The woods behind my house, looking pretty with the snow on all the branches.  But just at the right edge you can see a big pine branch over the back fence which dented the top rail.  That was the only damage my property received, thank goodness.

 

The trees across the street also looked pretty but in the lower right corner of this picture you can see another large pine branch which, I think, just missed the back porch roof of the currently vacant house across the street.

We only lost power for about an hour and a half this morning, but there are many across the state who are still without electricity.

We got about 5" (125mm) of wet snow in the south part of the city where I live, as you can see from the accumulation on two of our cars.  There was some sticking on the streets in our neighborhood but as I didn't get out and drive around, I don't know how impeded the streets and highways were.

 

My other across the street neighbor also has a bunch of pine trees in her front yard and lost several limbs, including at least two large ones on her driveway.  And yes, the grass in the yard to the left is that green.  It is winter rye.

 

 

But by mid afternoon, the snow had stopped and the sun came out.  I "plowed" and cleared off the cars before I took this picture about 4:30 pm.  Unlike back in December, it will probably be a couple of days before all the snow is melted since the overnight temperatures for the next week will be below freezing.

All in all, for us it was a pretty event as neither my wife nor I had to get out to go to work and our power was only out for a short time.  We stayed warm and dry inside the house and will be having Rostbraten and spaetzle for supper tonight - a "German" meal for a cold, snowy day!  Schuss, y'all!