Tag Archives: Black Powder

Baccus 6mm, Black Powder, Historics, Peter Holland, Warlord Games

6mm Black Powder Gaming – Part 1

February 15, 2022 Peter Holland Leave a comment

I have bought the new Epic Battles: Waterloo by Warlord Games and I’m slowly making my way through the painting much like Declan (when I’m not painting those pesky Kruleboyz). However, one thing I’ve noticed (as I’m sure many others have as well), is that the models are epic in scale but the basing and the rules are standard Black Powder. What I mean by this is that a standard unit in Epic:Waterloo is the same as a standard unit in regular Black Powder.

Credit: Yith’s Wagaming Blog – Check it out, its a fantastic read

This got me thinking to how you could have truly cinematic and epic battles in Black Powder by converting the inches to centimetres (like many others have done).

By doing this, you can play a regular game of black Powder on a much smaller play area – 2.4 feet by 1.6 feet rather then 6′ x 4′. But also, it gives you the option of playing much, much larger games on a regular table.

The only issue is the basing and miniatures. if you take a standard unit in Black Powder with a frontage of 240mm and divide this so it suits the cm measurements rather than inches (i.e. dividing 240mm by 2.5) you’ll get a standard unit frontage of 96mm (let’s call it 10cm). If we use increments of 20mm then the basing could look something like this:

The great thing about his, is that if you use Baccus Napoleonic 6mm infantry you can get two large bases completed for just £8.00!

But what about different formations. Well these could either be represented by a dice in one of the dice holders on the base (i.e. 3, for line, 4 for square etc) or you could just model some other bases as Square and attack column etc. I’m inclined by the later personally.

The other dice holder can also be used to measure the units stamina. For Dice holders I’m always inclined to use Pendraken.

But I’d like to know the opinions of those experienced in Black Powder and what they think!

Black Powder, Historics, Painting Guides, Peter Holland, Warlord Games

Paints Used for Napoleonic French Infantry

February 7, 2022 Peter Holland Leave a comment

This post is partly a reference for myself as to which colours to use (Citadel or Vallejo) when painting my Epic Battles Napoleonic French. I’ve listed colours that could be used from both systems.

All of the paints listed can be purchased from ElementGames. Why not use my referral code and get double the crystals when you purchase anything? XBJ9837

Line Infantry

An overall base coat should be applied with London Grey or Mechanicus Standard Grey.

BASE COAT

Area	Vallejo	Citadel
Jackets	Dark Prussian Blue	Kantor Blue
Belts/Muskets/Slings & Lapels	Light Grey	Grey Seer
Trousers	Any of Offwhite, London Grey or Beige	Pallid Wych Flesh, Mechanicus Standard Grey or Karak Stone
Shako & Boots	Black	Abaddon Black
Skin	Basic Skin Tone	Cadian Flesh
Collars, Cuffs & Lapel Piping	Dark Vermillion	Mephiston Red
(Voltiguers) Plumes & Epaulettes	Black Green	Caliban Green
(Voltigeurs) Collar, Epaulette edging, Pompom, Tip of Plume	Yellow Ochre	Yriel Yellow
(Grenadiers) Plumes, Epaulettes and Shako Lace	Dark Vermillion	Mephiston Red
Backpacks & Musket Wood	Flat Brown	Mournfang Brown
Musket Barrel, Bayonet & Canteen	Oily Steel	Leadbelcher
Shako Plates, Sword Hilts, Chin Scales & Buttons	Old Gold	Retributor Gold

WASH

Area	Vallejo	Citadel
Grey Trousers, Shako Covers & Steel	Dark Tone	Nuln Oil
Beige Trousers & Shako Covers	Strong Tone	Agrax Earthshade
White Trousers	Dilute Light Grey	Dilute Grey Seer
Skin & Gold	Flesh Wash	Reikland Fleshshade

HIGHLIGHT

Area	Vallejo	Citadel
White	Offwhite	Pallid Wych Flesh
Yellow	Flat Yellow	Dorn Yellow
Green	Intermediate Green	Warpstone Glow
Black	Black Grey	Dark Reaper
Bayonets	Plate Mail	Stormhost Silver

Light Infantry in Greatcoats

An overall base coat should be applied with London Grey or Mechanicus Standard Grey.

BASECOAT

Area	Vallejo	Citadel
Greatcoats	London Grey, Beige or Light Brown	Mechanicus Standard Grey, Karak Stone or Balor Brown
Trousers & inside Open Jackets	Dark Prussian Blue	Kantor Blue
Piping, Belts & Straps	Light Grey	Grey Seer
Shako & Boots	Black	Abaddon Black
Skin	Basic Skin Tone	Cadian Flesh
(Carabinier) Straps, Plumes, Epaulettes and Shako Lace	Dark Vermillion	Mephiston Red
(Voltigeurs) Epaulettes & Plume	Black Green	Caliban Green
(Voltigeurs) Collar, Edge of Epaulettes, Shako Lace & Tip of Plume	Yellow Ochre	Yriel Yellow
Backpacks & Musket Wood	Flat Brown	Mournfang Brown
Musket Barrel, Shako Plate, Chin Scales, Bayonet & buttons	Oily Steel	Leadbelcher

WASH

Area	Vallejo	Citadel
Grey Greatcoats, Trousers, Shako Covers and Steel	Dark Tone	Nuln Oil
Beige & Light Brown Greatcoats, Trousers & Shako Covers	Strong Tone	Agrax Earthshade
Skin	Flesh Wash	Reikland Fleshshade

HIGHLIGHT

Area	Vallejo	Citadel
White	Offwhite	Pallid Wych Flesh
Yellow	Flat Yellow	Dorn Yellow
Green	Intermediate Green	Warpstone Glow
Black	Black Grey	Dark Reaper
Bayonets	Plate Mail	Stormhost Silver

Games Workshop

Hobby Update – Epic Waterloo

February 6, 2022 Declan and Eeyore 1 Comment

Painting Warlord Games Epic British

Having picked up the starter set for Epic Waterloo by Warlord Games. I have spent this weekend starting the painting for the British.

I went straight to Peter’s article on painting the British and went to Miniature Realms excellent video. He mostly uses citadel contrast which is perfect for me, as I already had most of them, so the outlay for paint wasn’t that high.

Chaos Black & Grey Seer Zenithal

Spraying in the winter in the UK is never straight forward, but I clipped off some of the sprue and undercoated some of the chaps in Chaos Black. I then applied a Grey Seer zenithal highlight to help the Contrast paint hold.

I then applied a light highlight of Corax White from the pot to bring out a little more of the details.

Basilicum Grey Trousers

I am reliably informed (by the internet) that the British wore grey trousers as Waterloo, and so used Basilicum Grey as suggested by Miniature Realms.

I’m not the tidiest of painters, but I tried to steer clear of the torso so as to keep the white as clear as possible. I did deviate a little from the guide at this stage and have changed the order of the painting. Partly because I’m not sure the method of painting red (be careful) will fit with my painting style (splash it on!), so I may need to do more white highlighting later.

Shoes

The shoes need to be black so I’ve used Black Templar on these. I didn’t take much time on these but more care is required for the Riflemen as some of them are wearing boots for variety.

I have painted the rifles here, but changed the order of painting later to speed things up

Faces and Hands

Gulliman Flesh is magic… and I’ve used it extensively on my Gargant army… they work just as well here and I’ve picked out the faces and hands.

Because the trousers are darker you can even go over the lines a little! But I try to be as careful as possible to reduce time going over the paint again.

Hair & Backpacks

Again, stealing all my colour schemes I used a mix of Nazdreg Yellow, Gore Grunta Fur (Brown), and Black Templar for the hair at the bottom of the Shako. This is such a small area, I’ll definitely need to go over the top of the backpacks in the future!

And I’ve done the backpacks and one of the containers in Black Templar as well. It’s definitely getting a lot of use and looking good so far. It’s also a large area to get completed so gives me a good bit of progress on all the models.

Batch Painting

In order to speed things up I am batch painting these… in a huge batch! So I’ve done the first steps on 60 strips for all but the backpacks – that’s this evening’s job! That means I’m doing 600 soldiers in a single batch paint!

I’ll split them up once I start to work on more detail areas, but I imagine the guns and shakos (hats) are next.

I’ll let you know how I get on! Hopefully I don’t go crazy.

— Declan

Black Powder, Historics, Peter Holland, Reviews, Warlord Games

Unboxing – French Starter Army for Black Powder: Epic Waterloo

February 3, 2022 Peter Holland 1 Comment

Warlord Games have released their Epic Waterloo miniatures and game system this weekend just gone. I was lucky enough to pick my French Starter Set from SCN Hobby World yesterday and I was eager to take a peek and see what was inside.

It’s one of the largest starter boxes I’ve seen, and one of the heaviest! I picked mine up at 20% off for £72 through Sarah at SCN Hobby World.

Lifting the Lid

Theres a tonne of sprues inside. Ten infantry, three heavy cavalry and three light cavalry. Along with the meaty full colour rulebook, a scenery piece, painting guide and flags. I

It was all very nicely packages tightly inside. Warlord must have learnt their lesson form the ACW version Starter Set here, as a common complaint was that everything was a bit loose inside that box and often some of the contents would arrive damaged.

They have coloured the plastic of both starter sets, (blue for french and Red for British) so if you’re eager and know someone with the other set you can play straight away without the need for painting.

Sprue 1 – Light Cavalry

There enough here for 11 bases of Light Cavalry, as well as 3 artillery. Made up of 4 Lancer bases (one spare model), 3 Hussar bases (3 spare models) and 4 Chasseur bases (1 spare model). None of these models are command models but the addition of two Imperial Eagles on each sprue allows you to convert some in to standards. You can also use the spare models for ADC’s or for diorama pieces on your Brigade Commander stands.

Geek Point 1: The standards were made optional as none of the French Cavalry had their standards on the Waterloo campaign.

Sprue 2 – Heavy Cavalry

These are the other 10 bases of Cavalry, but these make heavier versions of the Cavalry regiments. Here you’ll have 4 bases of Cuirassiers, 3 bases of Carabiniers and 3 bases of Dragoons. Again, you have the inclusion of an artillery piece on each sprue and two french eagles. There were a lot more Cuirassiers and Dragoons at Waterloo than Carabiniers but I can understand why Warlord have included one of each type on the sprue.

Sprue 3 – Infantry

There’s loads of infantry… all told just over 800 men. The detail on the sprues is incredible given their size, and time has been taken to differentiate the flank companies of Grenadiers and Voltigeurs from the centre companies.

This sprue is packed. You’ve eight stands of infantry and enough skirmishing Voltigeurs for another stand, as well as some foot artillery and a command figure.

Bases

Of course, none of these would play well without the basic addition of bases… just look at that pile! It’s huge.

Dice

And some dice… as if wargamers don’t have enough to build their own fort! Still a good inclusion for a starter set.

Decoster’s House – Building

Warlord games have teamed up with Sarissa Precision to bring some scenery with the boxset which also comes with its own painting guide and stencil.

Flags & Painting Guide

A great addition is a full colour sheet of French flags. This will really add to the colour and make the regiments individual on the tabletop. Well done to Warlord games for this inclusion.

Rulesbook

The full rules book for the Waterloo Campaign in Epic Battles. This appears to be a full rulebook at 260 pages. It’s in glorious full colour as well and means you don’t need a separate copy of any of the existing Black Powder rule books.

Summary

This is a great box, and real value for money. It should draw many GW fans looking to get into Napoleonics. Declan and I are just two of them.

Black Powder, Historics, Painting Guides, Peter Holland, Warlord Games

Warlord Games Epic Waterloo – Painting Guides

February 2, 2022 Peter Holland 1 Comment

In my excitement for receiving my Epic Waterloo French Starter set from Warlord Games, I’ve been perusing the internet looking for painting guides. The below are a collection of the best videos I have found. All of these videos have been published on YouTube by Miniature Realms, Miniature Wargaming Warriors

British Line Infantry

Royal Horse Artillery

British Riflemen

French Voltigeurs

French Line Infantry

Games Workshop

Unboxing – British Starter Army for Black Powder: Epic Waterloo

January 30, 2022 Declan and Eeyore 3 Comments

Warlord Games have released their Epic Waterloo miniatures and game system this weekend after just over a month on pre-order. I was lucky enough to pick mine up from SCN Hobby World yesterday and having returned from a one-day AoS tournament I was desperate to look inside my British Starter Set and see what treasures await!

it is competitively priced at £90 and I’m sure your FLGS will look after you, or you can give Sarah at SCN Hobby World a call if you’re in the UK.

First Impressions

There’s a lot in here…!

Lots of red plastic, so you can play without painting the toys, but there’s definitely more in there, so let’s dig deeper.

Sprue 1 – Light Cavalry

There enough here for 11 bases of Lighter Cavalry, as well as 3 artillery – both key elements to the Allies’ success at Waterloo. They are very detailed models, with a number of different poses to add variety to the bases of cavalry as they sweep towards the French cannon!

Sprue 2 – Heavy Cavalry

These are the other 11 bases of Cavalry, but these make heavier versions of the Cavalry regiments at Waterloo on the British side. Again, great detail and strong plastic and the swords seem to be reasonably strong.. although no doubt I’ll break a few from being clumsy!

Sprue 3 – Foot

There’s loads of infantry… at 10 men a strip and 2 strips a base there’s a lot of paint here… and they look great. At the bottom of the picture you can also see some of the soldiers without they’re bayonets – these are the Riflemen, and each sprue comes with a command strip, a Cavalry commander, and an artillery piece to add to the ones from the cavalry bases. Again great detail at this scale and I’ll certainly enjoy trying to paint them!

Bases

Of course, none of these would play well without the basic addition of bases… just look at that pile! It’s huge.

Dice

And some dice… as if wargamers don’t have enough to build their own fort! Still a good inclusion for a starter set.

La Belle Alliance – Building

Warlord games have teamed up with Sarissa Precision to bring some scenery with the boxset. And it’s a great large piece of scenery to play around. Having played Warmaster large terrain that effects movement is critical in this scale of game.

Flags & Painting Guide

A great addition is a full colour sheet of British flags for the regiments at Waterloo. This will really add to the colour and make the regiments individual on the tabletop. Well done to Warlord games for this inclusion.

There is also a guide to painting the little chaps… and I’ll definitely need to follow this and see how I get on – inside the pamphlet there’s also a guide to the various regiments and their colours. I have some Osprey books to help, but this is a another great addition.

Rulesbook

Warlord Games have raided their catalogue of pictures to provide visual inspiration for the game.

Summary

This is a great box, and I’ve no doubt that the equivalent French box is just as jam packed with goodness. Now all I need to do is paint it all and get it on the table… this may take a while!

— Declan

Black Powder, Historics, Peter Holland, Warlord Games

Epic Battles Carabinier Test Model

January 30, 2022 Peter Holland Leave a comment

I’ll often paint a single test model before batch painting the rest. It lets me take my time on making sure I’m selecting the right colours.

In the case of Napoleonic miniatures I find this is also useful as I will refer to images on my phone about the uniform of the unit I’m painting. Then, once the model is done, I can just keep it in view while I paint the remainder. This prevents me having to keep turning the old phone on and off while I paint.

So here’s the model, this is a phone picture so apologies.

And the colours I used are:

Teclis Blue for all blue parts
Pallid Wych Flesh for the white
Mephiston Red for red
Runelord Brass for the gold
Stormhost silver for any metal
Rhinkx Hide for the horse

Simples!

Peter Holland, pile of Potential

Pile of Potential – The Full List!

January 11, 2022 Peter Holland 5 Comments

So I’ve spent some considerable time digging around my room to find what’s in my pile of sh… potential. This list is still missing a lot of non-Warhammer miniatures, but that aside this is complete. The remainder will be filled out once I get the time to look through my last remaining boxes.

As mentioned I have already posted about my Age of Sigmar collection. But here is the list in its entirety.

So what am I going to do with this? Well for a start I need to stop buying so much! Then I need to consistently paint stuff from start to finish, too many times have I painted a model to 80% completion then left it to do something else.

Therefore, this year my focus on painting will be the following:

Get the Kruleboyz Tournament Army ready for March 26th
Paint the Rogue Trader collection as and when they are received and don’t buy any more until complete
Finish the many, many models that are 50-80% complete and start clearing the semi-painted backlog
Get Cursed City painted ready to play with my family and friends.
Once that’s done it’ll be choosing units at random to paint to completion.

Peter Holland

Woehammer Facebook Group

January 2, 2022 Peter Holland Leave a comment

Did you know that Woehammer have a Facebook group? Why not head over there and post some pictures of your miniatures, we’ll include them in monthly hobby summary alongside our own.

Black Powder, Historics, Peter Holland, Reviews, Warlord Games

Black Powder Epic Waterloo British Cavalry

December 11, 2021 Peter Holland Leave a comment

So my issues of Wargames Illustrated arrived this week with their accompanying sprues.

I managed to get hold of three copies of the British Heavy Cavalry sprue.

I’ve started by painting the Scots Grey’s and first off these models are really easy to paint straight on the sprue. You just need to clip away any armatures of the sprue that are connected to the horse or riders directly.

I may have gone a little too detailed considering their size but this is only because I’ve enjoyed painting them so much.

I can’t wait to see the unit finished and on its base. I’m also looking forward to painting the cannon and seeing what that looks like. Once I’ve a few units done I’ll post again.