Best laid plans

I had a couple of things I wanted to achieve in my wargaming when I started the year.

1) I wanted to play more games - that is looking likely.
2) I wanted to get my SAGA gaming underway, including painting up two or three starter warbands. Job done, pretty much.
3) I wanted to paint up a few more units for our "Malta" game. Again, job done.

I then figured I would finally move onto a project I had considered for some time, namely the Austrian wars of the mid-19th Century, with maybe some 6mm Napoleonics as a distraction and the odd skirmish force for "The Crescent & The Cross", Border Reiving or similar.

That is where the plans fell over.

It is all Nephew Nick's fault.

We had figured on doing a Verdun-inspired game in our guise as the "Wyrley Retinue", for which I already have the figures. That lack of need to paint more figures for a specific project gave me the time to paint up what I fancied.

But Nephew Nick does not really do anything beyond the death of the musket...

So, a quick discussion or two later, and 2016 will be the year of the...

Burgundian Wars!

I have been busy digging out the Swiss and Burgundians I painted for Warhammer "Armies of Chivalry" a decade or more ago. I will be adding various Perry plastics and Old Glory figures to the Swiss ranks whilst Nephew Nick finally paints up his Perries as Italians.

So there we have it. Nephew Paul is busy (???) looking for a suitable scenario, possibly but unlikely to be an actual Swiss-Burgundian affair, to which we can lay out the figures and see how things go.

So, in honour of an old collection being rejuvenated for next year's show game, here are a few Swiss by way of an introduction.

G

A mix of Foundry, Front Rank, Old Glory and Essex figures in this Berne/ Lucerne/ Appenzell pike block. All the banners are Freezywater, available from the Lance & Longbow Society.

Uri/ Zurich. Figures as before, with the Uri Fahnrich an old Gary Chalk produced fantasy figure (Fantasy Warlord?) The "Uri Bull" to his left is an Essex figure.

A mix of Basel, Schaffhausen, Unterwalden and others.

I am going 6x4 for a standard "Pike & Shotte" rules unit and 32 figures in an 8x4 formation for a large unit.

The Uri contingent in close up.