Plasticine Dreams

Here are some more of those cheap made in China toys I've been messing with. These guys are French style troops with plasticine hats, coats and packs, and toothpick guns and bayonettes.

The command grouping. An officer, a flag bearer, a pioneer and a drummer.

On their way to 48 ranks each some day.

These are an odd pose that I'd thought I'd use. They are the "Follow Me!" WW2 US G.I. officer waving his hand and a pistol. Plasticine tricornes and a toothpick gun and now they are marching enthusiastically. At least I hope so....

Some Pom-pom trees, just a nail, a poker chip and one of these fluffy pom-poms you see at the craft stores.

The start of something new. French style hussars from plastic cowboys and indians I bought from a guy in Thailand. I removed the head and an arm and replaced with 20 gauge florist wire from Michaels. Then I built up the arms with a thick contact cement, and added plasticine for detail. The horses are Giant knock offs, but these are thicker with sturdy legs.

A French General

A shame this picture didn't turn out. I'll replace it eventually. Again, this is a chopped up cowboy figure.

A French Hussar General from the Funcken Lace Wars book, and an ADC.

I rather like these guys.

Arquebusiers de Grassin from the Funcken book. Riding two to a horse. On a sad note, I read online that Mr. Funcken recently passed away. He was a real talent and very influential to many wargamers. In point of fact, I recently purchased 2 seasons of "Callan, and one of Mr. Funcken's book was used by a character as a reference.

A full regiment of Imagi-nation Dragoons. These are all the Thai cowboy figures with plasticine additions, including the trumpet and flag.

The full regiment. Silly pose perhaps, but these guys are loaded for bear! Pistols and carbines and no reins!

Here's a look at those Thailand imports. Very affordable and with new poses I've never seen before. The plastic is nice and soft, carves easily, is easily drilled, takes glue and acrylic paint. I've more on the go. I'll post again soon.

Wargames Factory War of the Spanish Succession

Wargames Factory is a real inovator in that they create figure sets that are plastic, a large 28mm in size, with customizable heads and body parts and accessories. I picked up a couple boxes, infantry and cavalry for about $20 each. The infantry make 36 figures and the cavalry 12.  They also offer spare bodies in groups of 12 for sale as well as any other parts, on ebay and at their website. I ordered more and ended up with 144 marching figures, some of which are here:

They paint up well, and they really are nice and sturdy. The hard plastic bayonettes have taken some abuse and they remain OK. Wargames Factory is now releasing their artillery and mounted commanders sets. I highly recommend these for anyone wanting to try a new period without a lot of upfront cost.
They also do ancients, samurai and World War 2, and fantasy as well.

El Cid

I picked up a copy of Games Workshop's El Cid source book.
It was the usual well produced and colourful item that got me to make some Spanish figures from what I had to hand. To whit, HaT Spanish and Gaullic cavalry, some home cast Normans and some Revell ones, and Airfix and Italeri foot soldiers. The flags are really what sold me to do these:

More Thirty Years War

Here's a few more Dollar Store Thirty Years War guys and some from the Russian maker Mars.

It's somewhat unfortunate that makers often focus on famous units, even if their actual number was very small.

Wikipedia mentions that the famous French Musketeers were a small unit of some 150 men at this time.

Anyway, I have 2 units of men on foot painted up and 3 mounted. The Mars set doesn't have mounted troops, so I just did a conversion with Giant horses. I also made a Conde like figure from an Australian.

My penchant for big flags, these made out of hobby wooden squares, continues apace.

On the good news front, Mars has made a fine artillery set, three per box with crew and 6 mounted figures (2 poses), as well as others from this period to come. I hear tell that some of Cardinal Richelieu's guards are on their way.  D'artagnon, ou etes-vous?

Still More Marx Madness

More Marx Captain Gallant conversions. These are British 19th century. Straight paint jobs with some plasticine packs. The guys on the right have a blue painted Portuguese soldier in their ranks, a militia man from the Napoleonic wars. I had hopes of making enough of these redcoats to use them in Crimea or maybe India.

Rear view of the packs, showing some of the damage plasticine is liable to over time.

My Greeks. I made 150 0f these one summer long ago. The hardest part were the spears, they just keep breaking off.

A mix of heads and hoplons. Who needs Helots when you have topless babes running the camp? These are Garrison Sword and Sorcery figures.

These are about half of what I made. I'll find the rest and post them all together someday.

Some figures, one showing the plasticine I added. I also have made skirmishers and archers and a nice mounted Pausanias figure for Platea from a mounted Marx 7th Cavalryman. He's around somewhere.

Lucky Toys 132 Piece Roman Soldier Set Addendum

I found another box of Lucky Toys Romans. As you can see the box fits inside the cardboard mailer perfectly.

The box top.

Side

Ends

Nice art from the ad on the front side.

Inside are the usual contents, but these are a little different. They are hard plastic, but actually fairly strong plastic. Also there are some differences.

Here are the catapults and their ammo. The ammo is two piece hard plastic, and these catapults actually do work. You hold the catapult down and flick the spoon part back and release. These do work, unlike the soft plastic ones.

A teaser. These are some of my Giant knights, the same poses one would find in the later issues of Helen of Toy's Gold Crown Game. There are a couple thousand here, all from online purchases. They aren't as rare or expensive as some people would have you believe.

Comic Book Toy Soldiers: Lucky Toys 132 Piece Roman Soldiers Set

Here's the original ad from the back of the comic books:

Certainly colourful enough! Full of action and promise for the young reader.

A close up of the contents that make up the two Roman armies.

The box an army arrived in long ago.

The contents spilled out. In this case, an incomplete army due to age and use.

Here's what you would have received, arrayed for battle. Sharp eyes will note the different hues of plastic, additions to flesh out a complete set from other partial sets I own. As with the Lucky Toys 204 Revolutionary War set, the plastic soldiers do vary in shades of colour.

Another view of the full set.

The Commanders. There were 4 in each set.

The Cavalry Banners. There were 4 of these.

The cavalry. 24 of these were in each set.

Spearmen. 16 per set.

Archers. 16 per set. These figures are in full Roman armour and are wearing rather short tunics.

Slingers. 16 per set. These are a fanciful pose, full armour, a heavy spear and shield and a sling.

The Chariots, some of the nicest pieces in the set. There were 4 of these.

The catapults, 2 per side. The ammunition is a feather light hollow soft plastic ball. There were 8 per side. These catapults don't really work. I imagine a lot of frustration arose as kids tried to fire them at their carefully lined up troops. Probably the ammo was discarded and rolled marbles took the place of this "artillery".

My favorite of the infantry poses, the 24 swordsmen per set. These closely resemble some of the fighting men depicted in the ad.

4 Trumpeters were in each set.

Spearmen illustrating the different hues found between sets. Also, some sets like the man on the right, were of softer pliable plastic. Even today you can bend them and they bend back in shape. The man on the left is of a hard brittle plastic that snaps at the slightest touch. This isn't "plastic disease" as one finds with old Airfix sets. Rather it is the nature of the plastic some of these sets were made of. I suspect that these harder sets were later, as the detail is less than that of the soft plastic soldiers.

I painted a few of the brittle soldiers. At least on a wooden base, they stand some chance of remaining whole.

A comparison. An Airfix centurion (who followed Mark Anthony to Egypt to train Cleopatra's hordes, judging by the shield) next to the chariot. It is close to 20mm in scale.

Mark Anthony next to a painted cavalryman. These figures, while flat, do fit in well with standard HO figures.














All in all they are a nice set for the nostalgic old man. The foot soldiers all stand about 1 1/2 inches tall from the bottom of the base to the top of the helmet. The cavalry are a fraction taller, usually just their plumes are above 1 1/2 inches. I found that the brittle soldiers had less flash and that their bases were flatter, so they stand better. The softer figures had some flash around the bases, and some bases are slightly warped, leading to catastrophic domino like collapses. In point of fact, it took me two tries and a glass of beer to steady my nerves just to line up the figures for the photos. I'm sure a lot of anguished and frustrated kids were heard yelling from the other room as their legions suddenly decided to lay down on the job.