The First of my French.

I've found while wargaming this past so many decades that there are a lot of generous sorts who wargame. Whether its information or advice, but sometimes its a bit more. A very kind wargamer called Jason Williams sent me a pile of Corvus pikemen after I had been in contact in order to offer to buy them from him.
 Corvus were a small 28mm company from the 1980's that had some decent figures, perhaps a bit static, but still very nice. Anyway Jason very kindly refused payment and sent me a unit to paint.

 I salted a couple of Perry figures amongst the unit to give it a bit of interest, but I think they painted up really well. I have painted them as Gascon pikemen. Pete of Pete's flags fame, did me some extra large banners as I wanted to see how they would look. Again I think they worked out pretty well.

 I put the Corvus figures on one base, to save them routing in smaller groups, as pike I dont think the Gascons they were particularly good. Anyway thank you again Jason, I hope I can return the favour.

To complement the pike I painted up some crossbowmen as a sub unit. These are mainly Venexia figures.

The French always toted a lot of artillery about with them, so I have started with a couple of smaller pieces.

 I particularly liked the Grenadier model.

 And finally another sub commander, this time a couple of Redoubt figures, not my favourite range, but still not bad.I can only apologise about the quality of the photographs, I am not sure what has happened to my camera. Anyway, Happy Christmas.

A start on the French Army, via some odds and sods.

Before I start, apologies for the quality of the photographs. I don't understand what has happened to my camera, it doesn't seem to want to use the flash.

After their outing at Smoggycon, it was pretty obvious to me that I had overdone the numbers of Cesare's army. They obviously needed an opponent. I have opted to paint up some French, although technically they didnt fight against Cesare, they did fight everone else.

 Whilst starting the army, I strayed onto painting a Hinchliffe wagon. The colour scheme is a bit garish, but I got a bit carried away with the yellow. Still a nice model, and well worth buying, and still at a fairly modest price.

I then wandered into starting some new casuality markers for Pike and Shotte. I managed to pick up a few bases really cheap so I have no excuse in not doing any.

 At Smoggycon, I realised that I needed more generals to lead the various units, so I used up some of my Perry WOR leaders and personalities. I know Margaret of Anjou is stretching things a bit, but she is a lovely figure.

Which led me onto some mercenary Italian gendarmes for the French. When Peter Gilder created these figures under the guise of Connisseur Figures,  way back in the 1980's these were the cutting edge of wargames figures.I think they still hold their own with a lot of ranges. Not cheap, but full of life.

They are helped by banners from Pete's Flags. Colour, colour and more colour, not for the faint hearted.

 I was kindly given some Corvus pikemen by a wargamer called Jason. Again I would like to say thank you for the kind gesture. I am halfway through painting up a French pike block.  Again an old range, but still a great range, but hard to get hold of.