Braganza's Besiegers - AKI style

The other major project for December has been a unit for my Dogs of War, who are now developing quite a base of Static firepower.  Kings of War and the Perry Miniatures Late Medieval range has given this army a new lease of life, and they have now entered the dreaded 'Third carry case' stage of army evolution*

16 figures in all in a garishly bright quartered livery, so they'll really 'pop' in the army.  As said the miniatures are Perry Plastics, and serve ideally in my Dogs of War force, being as it is a conglomeration of every race and manfacturer, in an effort to realise my old school fantasy aspirations for a mishmash army.  They are of course tied together by the painting style and basing.

In close up you can see that the Pavaises' (big shields, for the rest of you!) are based on separate strips, to allow them to be optional to the unit.  This then allows me to field the unit as the Marksmen of Miraglio instead, or simply as a default unit of crossbowmen.

The heraldry and banner were all free hand.  A word on the banner.  I painted it on paper, over a pencil design, such that the two sides would fold over to give the back to back design.  Make sure you also paint the back of the paper your base colour.  Once finished this is cut out and the back given a complete covering of pva glue.  Folded on to the pole, you'll find the paper soft and malleable; whilst it is so you can form the natural folds into the flag, as you can see above.  The shape will hold within minutes and once dry is pretty solid (though a coat of varnish will further strengthen the banner).  Try to use thin, but good quality paper, I find letter writing paper works well for this, but office printer paper is fine too.

So that's it, the last painting of the year.  The final result is a satisfactory 538 models, against a target of 360.  A lower result than previous years, but in part because I reduced the points I scored for guns and vehicles, and didn't count scenery at all.  Overall I'm pretty happy.

Happy New Year folks...

*This being a stage where an army goes beyond a satisfactory size, to one of sprawling excess.  My file boxes typically hold about 150 28mm models on average, and I consider anything over 200 models to be a 'finished' force.  Therefore once the 300 barrier is broken and a third box is needed, it is both a moment of satisfaction and of resignation - to the fact I need either more storage space, or to sell something else to make room!