Pole-armed Janissaries

All the army lists I have read, from George Gush through DBR to Field of Glory, indicate that two or three Janissary units should be sufficient for most army lists. I did think about leaving it at three but, given how much I have enjoyed painting TAG's other Janissary figures, I had to complete just one more. This time a unit armed with pole weapons and swords:

I used the Foundry Napoleonic British redcoat triad on these figures and was happy with the colour for these purposes:

I am wondering however if the colour may be a little on too much on the orange side for actual Napoleonic British as I normally prefer a deeper colour of red for them. I realise officers' coats were more scarlet in colour while those of the the rank and file were of a lighter red, and they were called lobsters during the American War of Independence which is what this colour actually reminds me of, but it is not quite what I have become accustomed to using for British troops in past efforts. That project is still a little way off, so perhaps I will have got used to the idea by then:

That's all four Janissary units completed, with two more foot, four cavalry and six artillery units to complete the project:

There are also a few more command figures to complete, including six of these special edition figures which Pete from TAG kindly throws in as extras on larger orders:

This first one is destined for my wife's desk. She has been asking me for a figure and, given that she likes to remind me that she is one-quarter Lebanese on her mother's side, I thought a middle-Eastern person holding a big stick and telling people what to do would be most appropriate. Besides which I have five more of the fellows to complete over the coming weeks, which is more than I'll ever conceivably need.

Bow-armed Janissaries

I was very much looking forward to the Easter break and four days off in which to complete my last two units of Janissaries, as well as attend to some odd jobs around the house to keep everyone happy on the domestic front.

Almost on cue I started feeling a little off around 5pm on Thursday with what turned out to be an unseasonal dose of flu, from which I finally gathered up enough strength to emerge from the bed/couch around 1pm on the Monday afternoon, feeling rather short-changed.

Thanks to my very understanding wife I managed to spend the remaining few hours on Monday afternoon basing the following unit of Janissaries, whose green caftan now roughly matches the colour our pool appears to have become during my enforced rest:

The figures are again TAG and are from one of their unit-builder sets, containing the usual four command figures and eight different poses of Janissaries firing or advancing:

I'm still not sure why I chose green for this unit and, around halfway through, began to wonder if I had subliminally picked the colour due to old Robin Hood movies:

That's it for this unit, but obviously not for me with regard to the coming weekend and the yet-to-be-completed jobs around the home.

Akinjis Completed

I have managed to complete and base two more units of Akinjis over the weekend, comprised of twelve figures each:

The figures are again TAG castings and are fun to paint. As the majority are holding bows there wasn't any drilling of hands to be done, apart from the command figures. This is one of my pet hates as, even though I have several sets of pin vices, I can be a little heavy-handed and invariably end up taking away a hand or two (including parts of mine on several occasions):

Here they are again alongside the first unit completed last month, making thirty-six figures on eighteen bases in total:

Each unit contains two command bases. This means that there are less actual horse archers but provides more flexibility with regard to unit size:

Which theoretically means that it should be easier to make an evade move, although I'm sure I'll find a way to run them through a unit of Janissaries:

That's it for the Akinjis, which I believe now represents just over the half-way point for the project.

Completed:

Two units of Janissaries  = 48 figures
Three units of Azabs       = 72 figures
Two units of Sipahis        = 48 figures (including horses)
Three units of Akinjis      = 72 figures (including horses)

Total to date                      = 240 figures

Remaining:

Three units of Feudal Sipahis = 72 figures (including horses)
One unit of Delhis                   = 24 figures (including horses)
Two more units of Janissaries = 48 figures
One unit of Tufekcis                = 24 figures
Six artillery pieces and crew   = 24 figures
Command figures                    = 12 figures

Total remaining                       = 204 figures and six guns

With regard to command figures, I have finished the first:

No doubt they will make a reappearance once I get around to the remainder, but it is nice to get one stand under the belt for now at least:

That's it for now. Hopefully I'll have the next unit of bow-armed Janissaries completed before the end of March, which should keep things rolling.

Ottoman Akinjis

I have three units of Akinjis in the painting queue, and have just completed the first of them:

These are TAG bow-armed Akinjis, with a choice of three command figures and three armed with bows. I also ended up with three of the sword-armed figures, so decided to incorporate one in each unit to round things out, placed here alongside one of the lance-armed command figures on the top right:

I have tried to keep the colours on these figures more subdued than the recent Sipahis of the Porte, using just the odd splash of brighter blues and reds on the horse furniture:

As with all TAG figures to date, I have found them fun to paint and with just enough variety to keep my interest levels from flagging:

I have two more units of twelve figures to complete, which will put me over the half-way mark for the project, and hope to have these done before the end of March.

Sword-armed Sipahis of the Porte

Here is the sister unit to the recently-completed lance-armed sipahi unit I completed a few weeks ago:

As with the rest of the army, they are comprised of TAG figures:

I have again used Little Big Men Studios shield transfers for most of the figures, but also free-handed a few including the bird motif on the figure in the middle:

The TAG packs have three command figures:

Alongside three rank and file figures, which provides sufficient variety within the unit:

That is now the two planned Sipahis of the Porte units completed. I have three additional feudal Sipahi units planned, but have two bow-armed Akinji units on the painting table which I am hoping to complete first.

Sipahis of the Porte

The first of two Sipahi of the Porte cavalry units completed:

The figures are again from The Assault Group, which are lovely figures with minimal flash, although the lance hands did take a bit of drilling out. I used a pin vice for this which did the job but required a bit of effort, and am thinking about investing in a hobby drill to make this easier.

They came with their own lances and I did think about replacing them from my supply of Northstar wire lances which would probably have been sturdier in the long-run, but decided to stick with the originals as they seemed to fit the figures a little better:

The lance pennons and most of the shield designs are again from Little Big Men Studios. The shield transfers were designed for another range of figures but some fit perfectly while others had to be blended into the surrounding shield:

The command figures are nice and include one carrying a horse-hair standard:

All figures fit snugly on to a 60x40mm bases without too much effort:

I am in the final stages of finishing a sword-armed Sipahi unit, and then hope to move on to some Akinjis to keep the project rolling.

Last of the Azabs

This unit is comprised of sword and pole-armed Azabs and represents the third and last unit:

There is a decent variety of figures in the TAG unit builder pack which makes them fun to paint, although I did notice that there was some flash behind some of the shields which I personally found too difficult to remove. I ended up leaving these parts black and painting around them, which was no great imposition:

Below is a close-up of a stand of sword-armed figures:

And one of pole-armed foot:

I probably could have been more adventurous with their shields but, given that Azabs were recruited from provincial villages and were probably not going to be spending a great amount of time worrying about shield design, I decided to be lazy and save the effort for some Sipahi cavalry which are next in the queue.

And what an effort that is proving to be with the first three horses taking the better part of a week alone, although I am hopeful I'll be able to speed up as I can lay down a template as to how best to approach this part of the project. With any luck I may have something to show for my efforts before the end of the month.