FranzNap Chevau-Leger WIP #2

The horse is painted, rider mounted and lance pennant attached. Now to paint the rest and base them.

They're almost alive, these figures, I reckon. The horse is swishing flies away with his tail, and you can almost see him getting ready to snort and shake his head! The rider's leaning forward as if to get a clearer view of something that's caught his attention in the distance, while carelessly letting his lance tip drop.

I'm looking forward to painting more of them!

It's Over - Now for the Prizes!

Curt's 3rd Annual Analogue Painting Challenge has finally finished. Congrats to Chris, James and Kev for finishing 1st, 2nd and 3rd respectively in the production stakes. And special congrats to Ray for gracefully pointing out an error in points calculation that put him out of the running for 3rd. Well played, Ray!

After pacing myself well early on, I limped to the finish only barely scraping past my estimated total of 660 points. After reaching the giddy heights of 16th out of 47, I ended up 31st. Not too shabby for my first effort, though; there were still 16 people in my rear-vision mirror!

Now the serious part; voting on the various categories. I can take part in the Challengers' Choice, but all of you out there who didn't take part are welcome to take part in the People's Choice award. That doesn't mean you have to vote for yours truly (though I would obviously be chuffed if you did...hint, hint!), as there has been some truly top notch entries along the way. Click the link above to peruse the entries and leave your choice as a comment if you feel so inclined.

It was a lot of fun and also helped (temporarily) to increase my output, while garnering lots of positive feedback from a lot of the usual suspects, but also some new faces whose blogs I hadn't caught up with until joining in.

Here's a selection of my entries just to refresh your memories:

FranzNap Chevau-Leger Lancier - WIP

I've put aside my slow progress on the Borodino IV Corps to play with my new toys, the lovely lancers from my previous post.

Here's the first cab off the rank. Even though he looks like he's dipping his lance to spit an enemy infantryman, once he's mounted he looks like he's leaning forward squinting into the distance. As the horses are all adopting rather nonchalant poses, I may use this chap as a vedette.

They paint up very well, with a lot of crisp detail. Besides some Italeri sets, the only other similarly proportioned figures are those by Zvezda, but they suffer from lack of detail in various of their poses. These don't. They are really well detailed all over, from the lance strap over the rider's gauntlet to the imperial symbols on the turnbacks to the straps and belts. Nothing's left out.

After suffering a bit of painting ennui lately, I reckon these are what I need to get back into it. Really fun to paint. 

I've gone for the 5e Chevau-Leger Lanciers colours...

...for no other reason than I liked the colour combination!

Figure Review - FranzNap Miniatures

I've been in awe of Francesco Messori's ability to convert and sculpt figures for a while now, so when he announced he was going to start producing his own figures, I waited impatiently for the day when his figures would be available for purchase. The day finally came and recently I was very pleased to purchase some his French Cheavaux-Leger Lancers.

They're the first resin figures I've bought though I will probably wait to buy more in metal when he starts production in that medium, but as an introductory offer to subscribers to his newsletter, I couldn't go past the 10% discount offer. They may not last as wargaming figures, especially the delicate lances, but we'll see.

As to the look, Francesco achieves a very realistic look to his figures, reminiscent of Italeri at its finest. He tends to go for the poses neglected by most manufacturers; that is less active, more relaxed, stationery poses that lend themselves well to dioramas in particular.

They come in very professional looking plastic packaging, padded with cotton wool. All figures arrived here in Australia safely from the Netherlands with no breakages or other damage from the trip.

At €37 ($AU 46.50) for the 2 packs, including postage (then another €5 after a postage miscalculation!), they aren't exactly cheap, but I didn't let that stop me just to get my hands on these lovely figures. I would have to think hard again as to whether I needed any more before I bought more. I hope that he can eventually bring down the price, but I understand he's running a business and needs to cover his costs. The sculpting and production values are such that I reckon you're paying for what you get, ie. a very high quality figure. Once he starts production of his metal versions, I think it will be even harder to say no! 

He is also producing ranges that aren't catered for by other 1/72nd manufacturers, like Neapolitan troops, Sailors of the French Guard, Austrian hussars etc. He is also planning on bringing out heads for conversions, which I always like, so I'm sure I'll buy some of those, too.

If, like me, you're a 1/72nd Napoleonic figure wargamer/collector, you could do a lot worse than get yourself some of these figures. Don't be put off by the cost, because once you get them I'm sure you'll be impressed and believe that every penny spent is well worth it!

See more at his website http://www.franznap.com/

Command set

Command figures with alternative saddles and arms

Troopers set

Figures and separate arms for alternative poses.

Mini-Borodino - 3rd Club Game for the Year!

I got a game in at the club last Friday. Hallelujah!

It was a mini-Borodino scenario set up by Tim to help us Frenchies come to grips assaulting Russian gun emplacements dug in behind fortifications. The results show that I have a lot to learn!

I partnered Darren W. who has been an on-again, off-again member of the Napoleonics group, as he also has a bout of severe real-life (read 1-year-old child!). Darren was coming to grips with the rules after a long absence, but showed some tactical flair, whereas I tried to get too fancy and do too much with the numbers I had and succeeded only in spreading myself too thinly and getting bogged down.

Tim masterfully suckered me in to the gap between the town and the woods to the left, while I kept my Italian Guard brigade focused on the battery. I was hoping to get in on his flank, distract enough of his supporting infantry and charge the guns with the Guard. As it turned out, a combination of inferior numbers and some ordinary dice rolling at crucial moments, I was bogged down in my flanking maneuver and repulsed in my frontal attack on the redoubt. 

The consensus was that I should have ignored the gap to my left, secured the town, then sent the majority of my forces straight up the guts at the battery, then to worry about the counter-attack later.

On a positive note, my Italian horse gun battery survived the game and dished out some punishment of its own! Huzzah! (I'm a glass half full kinda guy!)

My Franco-Italian forces on the starting blocks

The table setup, with Russians a the top and Franco-Italians at the bottom

The suspiciously Spanish-looking town, occupied by 2 battalions of Russian infantry.

The infantry support behind the redoubt

More Russian infantry to the north of the town and woods.

The redoubt!

Tim's Russians bravely face Darren's on-coming columns

Here they come!

The redoubt's infantry support. Infantry much?

Italian horse guns on debut!

My forces start their flanking movement after the nearest Italian  regular battalion lost 2 figures in the first firing of the guns! Ouch! They are now skirmished to present a smaller target, while the other Italian regular battalion is deployed in line to also try to minimise 12lber damage.

Darren advances behind skirmish line.

Skirmishers bravely advance...

...only to be scared off by Russian Hussars!

Darren's troops square up and his skirmishers re-form into line. His Hussars then launch a charge at their Russian counterparts from deep behind the infantry.

Darren's infantry squares form a funnel that prevent Tim's hussars from effectively counter-charging .

Cavalry clash, but bounce in an inconclusive melee

Stalemate!

My cavalry move beyond the building, eyes only for the infantry ahead... 

...but not for the artillery to the flank! 

They are tough Italian dragoons, though, so they merely shrugged off their casualties and redeployed.

A brigade attack on one of the BUAs winkled the Russians out

Spreading myself thin, I send another 2 battalions to screen the Russians in the woods.

Russian skirmishers'-eye-view

Meanwhile, Darren advances on a narrower front...

...opposed by a similar force of Tim's Russians

En avant!

The Italian Guard wait their opportunity

Il formaggio grande!

My target for the night and how I hope to approach; in the flank!

These chaps had other ideas, though!  : (

Tim advances a closed column of infantry.

Too tempting a target for my dragoons!

30% casualties and running away! A good charge!

But then came Tim's riposte; one closed column approaches from the front and fires, but inflicts no damage.  Another approached from the flank and fired, inflicting a casualty and a morale check which the dragoons survived.

The 3rd battalion to approach then had a bit of luck and killed the general! Diavolo!

The resulting morale check saw them retreat, to live another day

After that setback, I set my veteran light infantry on those pesky cavalry baiting, general killing infantry.

The first battalion crumpled under their fury (can be seen fleeing in the distance), but the second battalion to be contacted in the breakthrough move was made of sterner stuff; They stood and repulsed the attackers in a bout of appalling dice rolling on my part, and good on Tim's!

Momentum building for Darren's attack

His bold Hussars charge again, but Tim forms square and repulses them with losses.
Darren's later divisional charge was repulsed convincingly and resulted in a failed divisional morale check. As I was embroiled on my own side of the table, pictures of this action are understandably missing!

2 of my battalions form up outside the town, only to be greeted by artillery and massing infantry.

Meanwhile, my battered dragoons re-enter the fray supported by one of the battalions which had been screening the woods.

The Russians' view. Not enough to break through, though.

Valiant dragoons bounce of infantry which had successfully formed squares.

The battalions facing the guns in the town are outnumbered and still have Russians in a flanking BUA.

The Guard over-enthusiastically follow the skirmishers, who had been screening their advance, but they approached too close and suffered for their keenness.

The redoubt's view of the Guard's approach

The ensuing charge was stopped in its tracks with disorders and casualties!
Game over!