Project Waterloo Strike One! Blog Giveaway To Celebrate

With a great feeling of achievement and I have to admit also of loss, I would love to announce that the French are finished! Yes Finished, well my half at any rate. Lee of course has also more or less finished his as I believe he collects the last of them on Saturday with just the basing and flagging to do. Given that he already has the allied troops including the British almost fully flagged he is ahead of me as I still have some of the Prussians to finish.

So I have finished off the French and will be moving on next month. I actually have four Horse Artillery bases to finish but these are actually in excess of what is required. I now have 75 battalions of French Infantry. I can add these to the 14 allied battalions that have been painted with Spain in mind. I also have a mass of French Cavalry, more than double the number required for Waterloo as I have 11 regiments of Hussars needing just the one. Again these were raised for use in Spain and I have to admit I am looking forward to getting back to the Spanish Ulcer at some point next year.

Two battalions of line infantry, these are sporting the 1812-15 flags though one battalion is 1806-12 figures, oops must sort that out later. I have added an old test casting of a Leven wall to these.

The figures are some of the new Baccus castings which have continued to grow on me. Well I have now painted up 24 battalions of the 1806-12 and 12 1812-15 so I think I can say with some authority that these are the best 6mm French Infantry I have painted yet based on quality to speed ratio that works for me. Your mileage may vary but I still have A LOT more ahead of me, but at a slower pace.

With these lot done, we are looking to be able to get the game started early next year if we wish, this it turn makes it probable that we will take the battle to Joy of Six as a static display. Peter is keen for us to do this and his faith in us and excitement has been rather infectious so it would be a shame not to be there. The table looks now to be 6-8 feet deep by 16-18 feet long. About 1/4 has been made up already by Lee he is waiting for some of the major buildings to be finished by Leven before committing 100% to the table.

Another two Battalions again one each of the newer releases by Baccus. NOT to be confused with the new Old Guard that will be ready (hopefully) for Castle Donnington (I want some please). So I guess I will be painting up a few more French figures after all ;-)

So that's the last four Battalions of Line I needed to paint up. I had been very confident I only had a few Light to paint up so it was a bit of a shock when I found out I needed another seven lights, so I dug deep into the 1812-15 booster and dashed these off at the same time.

Last shot of the Line before I move onto the Lights, just the usual basing style but I have discovered a new stand in for Sandtext that seems to de the job just as well but the cost is lower and better still can be bought in smaller pots, more on that in it's own post.

The lights are actually easier to paint than the line, though strictly speaking I really should mix up the trousers to include some white but I think that's more than is needed in 6mm. Next time I am bound to disagree and will add the extra detail.

Another Leven wall but this one is for release soon. I just had to add a little track to the base as well, well I do like the bases to be fun. The 1812-15 figures are actually faster to paint than the 1806-12 and not just because of the Shako Cords, I do think they are slightly better figures. It's odd then that I actually prefer the 1806-12 figures, possibly as these are the ones I have done the most work on.

The flags seem to be larger than the earlier period, that and the flag pole is attached further up the head than the earlier figures. I found cutting the flag at the bottom allowed the flag to frap around and worked well.

As you can see the wall is very nice and matches 6mm figures well. I think the pack will contain four wall sections and four pillars. I am loading so many images onto the post so Mike can pick which he wants to use (if any).

What I like the most is that the wall also has brick pattern around the edges allowing the wall t finish without butting onto some other piece of terrain.

This picture shows the quality of the castings, both the wall and the skirmishers. I really do like the finished base and thanks Mike for giving me the props.

Rear facing showing the bricks of the wall and the detail on the backs if the infantry. It's the view I want to see the most when I am playing with or against them LOL.

OK onto more of the lights most of the ones I have painted to this point have been in line so I thought I had better make up more in column formation to balance the forces some.

The figures are really crisp in detail and in some cases have moustaches though I did not go as far as to paint these details in.

All eleven new Battalions ready for action. I can not express the joy of getting all these finished but strangely at the same time a bit of a regret that this part of the project has come to an end. I still have lots more in hand to paint up at a later time but for now the focus has to change to other aspects such is the size of the project.

GIVE AWAY.

To celebrate the accomplishment I will be holding a giveaway starting tomorrow open to all even none followers, I just need to change the settings to again allow anyone to leave comments. Full details are not in place but so far I have thus

1. First Prize £20 gift token for Baccus, this is because almost all the figures are Baccus and I wanted to acknowledge the fact and thanks to Peter for his interest in the project.

2. Second Prize £20 gift token from Baccus for more Baccus toys. Peter offered this prize in answer to my request for him to agree to me giving him some money (not that he has ever said no to that!!) so a big thank you to Peter.

3. One of the Leven Miniatures Napoleonic building complexes yet to be decided. I have not discussed with Mike but I will buy something from him for a lucky winner.

In the case of 1 and 2 the winners will contact Peter and can spend as much as they wish with a total of £20 being deducted from their order. If the total comes to £20 or less including post you pay nothing but no cash or credit will be held for future use. 

In the case of 3. I will pay cost of the building and postage though you are welcome to add to the order and postage cost in excess of my contribution will be at your cost.

As I said all are welcome to join in but can I please ask you only to put your name in if you are interested in the scale as I want a few peeps to benefit from the give away rather than for general interest. If you want Leven buildings but not the Napoleonic one's let me know and I will give a cash value instead. The winner of the Baccus prizes can use it for any period.

Don't put your name forward yet that's all for tomorrow, the games will begin soon.