A few months ago, a couple of my buddies reached out to me separately with an interest to start playing Warmaster Revolution. I was holding back at first, just to see if it actually turned into an action and not just an idea. One of my buddies who lives in the south started sending me pictures of his troops and telling me about his games at his FLGS. My other buddy showed me his box of High Elves he got printed. Another of the guys in his Sunday group started painting forces. I was getting more interested….
I started to look at the Warmaster Revolution website and looking what it would cost to order some 3D prints online (the old GW model prices are crazy). I also looked at some of the offerings from more traditional war-game companies. I was getting a little more interested… While looking over the shelves at my FLGS, after running a game, I saw that they had a box of the new Ashigaru and Samurai from Wargames Atlantic. The price was right, so I finally jumped in and bought the boxes. I then did some Youtube research to see how people painted their figures (these would be my first 10mm figures). At this point, I saw there was another box for the force that included all the command stand and commanders. I set the sets aside, until I found that box at Historicon.
I decided I would try to paint these on the sprues, so I snipped them back, so they were only connected at the base (being very careful not to snap the pikes). I split the set into two, to do two different color schemes. This would enable me to add color and be able to split the force, should I need to do red on red action.
The photos here are of the first of the two batches. These would be done in red brown armor. I just sprayed these sprues with some Krylon red brown primer as the base. Next, I dabbed the uniform colors, followed by the flesh. I was not exacting, planning on the later wash to tie things together (at least I hoped). I used reds and tans for the uniform a some of the equipment. This would allow me to just apply a single wash on the final figure and not have to do pin washes. After the colors, I hit everything else with some contrast black (weapon shafts and standard poles). Once all that was done, I removed the figures from the strips, so I could stand them up to apply the wash (I wanted it to run down, not pool in the wrong area). It is at this point that I realized that the model counts did not work out for the units I wanted to field…..
I found some figures from Pendraken and ordered those (along with their decals and some buildings). The figures arrived and I found that they did not match up at all…. The decals were very nice and perfect for all those banners! I then went on Ebay and found a seller that was selling individual Wargames Atlantic sprues. I ordered one from each set to fill out the force I had.
While I waited for all that to show up, I painted the banner colors on all the figures. Once the sprues I ordered arrived, I removed the figures I needed to finish off the units I wanted and painted them as above. This time, I mounted them on painting sticks. As these spores are intermingled, I think this is a better way to paint these, just to match up the models to the units!
Even with the extra sprue, you still do not get enough short pole arms. To solve this, I decided to cut down some of the pikes to fill out the figures. The pikes themselves are just too fragile. While I got them off the sprues fine, I managed to keep breaking and glueing them repeatedly while painting. I tried adding a gloss coat undercoat to them to make them a bit more resilient. Even with that, the breaks keep happening…
In any case, with all the figures painted, I added the decals. I paired one regular infantry with one shooting unit to reflect the units and give a minor variation in the force. Once those set, it was time to do the basing. This is something I went back and forth on… I thought about doing straight flock, but thought that would not be the best, as a good deal of basing will show on many of the units. I thought about pumicing and painting, but that was more work than I wanted to do on the whole army. So, I split the difference.
I made a flocking mix! I started with a few spoons of regular flock, added a couple of turf and a spoon of sand. I added an another spoon of turf and affixed it to a test base with white glue to see how it looked. I liked how it turned out, so tippled the formula for the whole army. I then affixed it to all the bases of the figures I had painted (I had sprayed them tan and painted the strip bases tan also). Once that set, I sprayed all the figures with some Krylon mat to give them a sating finish to reflect the laminated armor.
Once the figures dried, I thought they needed a bit more shine, so I hit all the hats with gloss coat. I also painted all the arrow heads and blades silver to finish up the Ashigaru.
While working on the Ashigaru, I received my order from Alternative Armies. It included some Japanese demons, including some Nekomata (forked tail demon cats). These are not in the warmaster army list, but I figured I could use them as a proxy. I sprayed these white, hit them with a white contrast and then just up painted the white and added a few details. I affixed these to the base and tried to putty up the overly thick figure base to hide it on the base. I flocked these like the Ashigaru and spread them with the rest of the troops.
Well, with this batch, I have my first nine units of troops for my army. I need to complete some samurai and characters to have enough to play a legal 1000 point force, so those are next on the painting table. After that I can be more leisurely about which units to work on (I am still awaiting some 3d prints for the other fantastical units in the army). Banzai!
- Manteuffel