Things that go bang in the night.

Well I managed to get the guns ready for today's game and with everything all ready to take I am able to do a quick post. So here are the guns and crews made by Baccus.

The guns seem huge compared to all the previous ones I have used. These are the old style guns rather than the new style all in one casts. As usual only a small amount of flash required cleaning off the figures and the guns. I know that Baccus pride themselves in the cleanness of their casts so it was a bit of a surprise that the gap between the trails is filled in rather than open. I did cut the lead out of one of the guns but felt it was rather obvious I had done so. OK if I was to do a proper job on it I could have made it good but time was not on my side. The other three I left as was and this turned out to be the right decision. I have to say though that I really do like the size of them and they paint up well. The crews also have plenty of detail and were fun and fast to paint.

 

Here is a shot from above to give you an idea of the size, these are 30x30 bases. I wanted the crews to be in different positions on the bases to give an idea of movement. I mixed up the actual figure positions were possible so the commander is sometimes at the back and other times towards the front of the base. A couple of points before I move on. Baccus supply an extra wheel in every pack, this is great in case of a miss cast or damage during assembly. It also means you can add them to bases as battle furniture. Next up is the curious tab of lead under the gun that holds the gun up and keeps the weight off the wheels (I assume over a long period the guns wheels are susceptible to bending or breaking at the axle. I cut mine off but on the next model I will glue it together and check how easy it is to see.

 

Not that I just did the guns, I also ran up a few limbers for them but these are Irregular Miniatures from way way  back. The size difference is striking but they will do for today's game and I will just have to pick up some Baccus ones at the weekend along with my order.

 

 

Irregular limbers and crews (guns too) may well be small but they look fairly good.I like the way the rider at the back has his right hand resting on the horses rear, seems more natural. It was only as I was scanning images of crews that I noticed the limber crews seem to have a lighter jacket colour than the gunners themselves. So I did these a shade brighter. Even though I like them the sculpting quality difference is very obvious. On the one hand it's not fair to compare as the age difference between original sculps is a good number of years but as the Irregular are still sold today you have to compare.

 

Talking of Irregular, I had these squares hanging round for years. Our rules callow squares to be formed and markers used to show they are in square. These are great as tokens to be put adjacent to the unit, but I wanted them to look the part so a few days ago I painted them up. These are not up to standard but they are just markers. I have some already done as Prussian and yet more that need to be painted up which I will do at some point. I may check out Irregular to see if they still have them and are still good enough moulds to make them worth getting. These may well get some use today.

 

 

As I mentioned up thread, the Baccus guns are huge. Below is a pic of H&R, Irregular and Baccus guns. Some of these may represent smaller guns (I am not sure which size gun the Baccus one is that comes with the starter army). Like the figures themselves we have had scale creep and I hope I remember to ask Peter on Sunday if he has increased the scale or are his figures true 6mm. I seem to remember him saying his were slightly over and of course Adler are slightly larger still.

Here we have the guns from the front and to be fair all three have a nice look about them. The H&R even looks elegant.

 

 

The side on view is even more telling. Also note that the guns step backwards, the Baccus is furthest back but still loams large over the other two. Only the Irregular fails to have open spokes though that gun at least has an open trail. Overall I would take the Baccus guns over the others any time and will be steadily replacing the current crop as I go on.