It's going to be an all mounted force that is mercenary in nature where at times it found itself employed by Muslim Taifa Kings ,but more often then not in the employ of the Christian kingdom of Aragon between the years 1090(King Pedro) and 1135(Alfonso I) covering both El Cid's period and the early Reconquista under Alfonso I "The battler".The time line,personalties and armies involved,plus the look is my favourite for this period.
The General is Christian by nature and for using the lists in the book,but after that it's going to have a real mix of Christian and Moorish cultures in appearance to reflect their various masters over the years.It will start off with the various Caballeros and Jinetes and I'll add some military orders to the list when playing the Christians during Alfonso's period.
I'll be using various miniature company's together to include Conquest Games,Artizan,Perry ,Crusader and perhaps some Gripping Beast as well.
When this is finished I'll do a Almoravid army using largely Artizan and Gripping Beasts fantastic Moorish collections.
If your asking how I'll ever finish all this......army painter or the normal method and just not painting the damn eyes!
I recently picked up the El Cid book too and I can see why your fired up about it. Very well written with balanced/interchangeable lists.
ReplyDeleteDon't forget to look at Musketeer Miniatures for Arab figures also.
El cid is propably my favourite WAb supplement. You won't be disappointed.
ReplyDeleteIndeed,I've had the supplement for years and always liked it,just had other things to do first and I could never decide what army approach to take.Same reason I haven't started Samurai yet!
ReplyDeleteI've now worked that out and will start asap.The good thing about a mounted army is you don't need as many miniatures and therefore is quicker to get on the table.I'd like to be playing it by the end of December or January if possible.Time will tell if that's too ambitious.
Yes,the musketeer Arabs are very nice and will likely feature in my Moor army at a later date,but for now the Christian army will be Christian/Andalusian in appearance and so will be mostly Conquest Games,Crusader and Artizan and any Perry's I get a hold of.
I'm pretty keyed up to get started.In the meantime back to the very few Chaos in Cairo characters I need to paint up.
Cheers
Christopher
New project... Great!
ReplyDeleteDecide, Christopher!! :) :P
ReplyDeleteNo, joking aside, I am happy to see you finding more and more projects you will paint brilliant miniatures for! :) And El Cid is quite brilliant.
Looking forward to seeing you give your Christians that Spanish feel.
Hello Doc,
ReplyDeleteYour right of course,I know I have my hands in many different cookie jars as is my way.(LoL!):-)
However,of my recent projects the Fallschirmjäger in 15mm is over half finished(need to take some more photo's),Chaos in Cairo requires only around 5 miniatures or so to get started,FJ in 28mm is a long term project and Japanese in 28mm was only an experiment that perhaps could develop into more.This El Cid project is between 50 and 70 miniatures using a quicker painting method and so fits in.I'll be doing some of my AWI soon as I found a person interested in painting and playing BG giving new life to that project.
Well,different things on my plate at the moment and so should keep me busy!:-)
Cheers
Christopher
Indeed it should and I am guessing that it will! :) No, to be honest with you I am jealous of your organisational skills. I have one project with a side army forming as an idea (BoB British) and already I feel slightly overstrained! :)
ReplyDeleteI will be paying close attention to your El Cid Christians though because, with all the possible new Arthurian arrivals, I might want to venture in that Dark Ages/Early Middle Ages direction. In that case only the dip could save me and your will be good examples to have in mind, I am sure.
I hope I haven't skipped this bit somewhere in your posts, but are you planing on dipping the shields as well? I can imaging that you could dip the miniatures but keep the shields conventionally painted. That way you could raise its perceived quality quite a lot (not that the dip excludes quality, but you know what I mean...)
Yep Doc,I know what you mean and your right on target.I'll be doing slight of brush like I did with the Trojans!(LoL!)So yes, I'll army paint the horses and men( maybe 2 highlights instead of one this time),but then fully hand paint the shields to give that fully painted look.However, the shields are smaller and so the effect might not work as well.We shall see.:-)
ReplyDeleteCheers
Christopher