Evening all! As the weather turns warm, then cold again in the UK, I'm steadily working through the current Sudan project.
I knocked these 16 Mahdists out in a week, though it was a week with quite a bit of painting time, maybe 12-15 hours all told. They will join the first batch I've already painted (though I need to repaint the bases, ergh), making a couple of units of Nile Arabs and the start of the Beja. I'm happier with the colours of the jibbeh's on this lot, I've used a lot of Vallejo Iraqi sand and tan yellow. They still need a squirt of Dullcote.
I'm making up a force for scaled-down Black Powder, aiming for just 8 models as the standard unit size (I think I will drop ranges by about 1/3rd to accommodate). This puts me well over half of the Mahdists infantry painted. As they are individually based, I've unit bases from Warbases to pop them into, this should make it easy to change system or scale if necessary.
I'm working roughly from the lists featured in Black Powder, slightly reduced to suit my budget and painting speed. However, I'm making an Anglo-Egyptian force rather than pure British. I think having both steady and less steady troops in the force should give the Mahdists more of a chance of breaking the line and make for a more tactically interesting game.
This is my draft order of battle for the Mahdists, I've the miniatures to field this, albeit in various states of readiness.
Khalifa (Commander-in-Chief)
Emir (Brigade commander) leading:
-Beja tribesmen with spears (warbands of 8 miniatures)
-Beja tribesmen with spears
-Beja tribesmen with rifles
-Beja skirmishers with rifles (5 miniatures)
The Beja will be fanatics, to represent their.. well, fanaticism!
Emir leading a reserve of:
-Nile Arabs with spears
-Nile Arabs with spears
-Nile Arabs with rifles
Emir leading the cavalry wing:
-Beja camel-riders (cavalry at 3 miniatures...for now)
-Baggara horse
-Baggara horse
I'd like to add more skirmishers (those plastic boxes just don't contain enough rifles!) and a captured Egyptian Krupp to add more variety and oppose the Anglo-Egyptian firepower.
The charge as the Anglo-Egyptian firing line would see it
I also popped a few of those palm trees that I got at Salute onto 60mm round bases, which as you'll recall can go into larger bases to mark out an area. The trees are a bit plastic-y, but at a fiver for 20, the price is great.
Next up, more terrain and starting to prep the next bloc of Mahdists while the enthusiasm is there!
16 in a week, now that is impressive! Loving those palm trees too, great job Sir.
ReplyDeleteFinding the time for such a burst is all down to a very understanding other half.
Deletegreat work on both terrain and figures, but with the blogasphere full of great Sudan stuff its becoming almost impossible for me to pass over my Sudan lead pile.
ReplyDeletePeace James
Very true! I will hold other bloggers accountable for my sending a the Perry stand at Salute.
DeleteGreat painting, love the palm trees!!
ReplyDeleteGreat stuff and I agree with Ray, the Palm Trees look really good.
ReplyDeleteExcellent work Phil. Greg and I really enjoyed using BP for Suday. Gave a great game.
ReplyDeleteQuite like those palm trees as well. You've done a good job in toning down the plasticy look about them.
That is good to hear about BP, I can be quite picky with rules, as is Gharak! I wondered if BP wouldn't work so well, being right at the end of the period it covers and perhaps a more specific ruleset might have been a better choice. But we'll give it a try and hope it makes both an interesting game and be easy enough to game occasionally.
DeleteThe thing I really like about BP is that it's figure agnostic (meaning it can adapt to any figure collection) and that its very tweakable to suit particular tastes/periods. We also like it as the base mechanics are very easy to pick up/remember, which is good with the groups I game with as we play with so many systems.
DeleteThis is all exactly what I was hoping, cheers.
Delete