Blood & Plunder: Painted English Militia

Recently, I decided to give Blood and Plunder from Firelock Games a go.  I picked up an English starter for myself, and some French stuff for my daughter.  (She's a little Francophile)  Ive also been taking the time with this to try and teach her a little bit about the basics of miniature painting, base coats, layers, and inks mostly.  Above, you can see how her French leader, Francois L'Olonnais, turned out.  She did a lot of work, but wanted me to do some of the detail stuff like his face and the blood on his sword.  She's now also working on a couple of her units to go along with him.

On my end, I ended up going these guys, start to finish, in about a week.... or 3 full seasons of Black Sails, which I watched on Hulu while I painted!  I also had a lot of fun researching 17th century English forces, a subject I knew next to nothing about prior to starting Blood & Plunder.




Up first, my Commander, which also served as my test model.  I wanted him to have the signature English Red Coat, which also helps him to match the Militia, I also wanted to do some things a bit differently from what I have seen in the book and elsewhere on the B&P FB page.   Usually, you see a lot of blue cuffs on the coat, but I instead utilized the blue on his sash and belt, and kept the cuffs red. I also wanted to make sure that the red coats looked a bit more weathered, so he's a bit on a darker side.  His commander status is noted by the gold thread on his coat.


Next, I worked on the Sea Dogs.  These guys are sailors and mostly artillery crew, and seeing as they'd typically be below decks, around a lot of black powder, I wanted to look a but darker and dirtier compared to the rest of units.  I also kept their color scheme to a limited pallet, so they are much easier to keep apart on the battlefield or on a ship.

Next, I did my freebooters, which were the basic, musket-armed sailors.  Just like above, I kept them to a matching color pallet, so as to easily pick them apart from other units in the army.

Finally, I worked on my Militia, which will form the main bulk of my force down the road.  Seeing as these guys are militia, and not part of the actual British army/naval forces at the time, I wanted to make sure that while their coats may be a more uniform in appearance, they also look a bit mismatched.  I do plan to get some proper English Land Forces once they are released, which is also why I wanted to make sure their coats looked a bit weathered, like the commander's, in order to also set them apart from what will be the cleaner, nicer, proper looking soldiers.  I also kept their cuffs red, instead of the commonly seen blue color, as another way to tell them apart from the regular land forces which will have a different colored cuff.

Model wise, clean up wasn't too bad.  I'm only noting this, because that seems to be a common comment on the models, that cleanup can be extreme.  The level of flash and mold lines didn't feel out of the ordinary for the typical metal mini.  The only issue seemed to be the fragile ankles, and bent guns.  (you can see some cracks in the ankled of a few models, as I hesitated to file them down too much. There is also a bit of repetition in the sculpts, but nothing more than I've experienced in other games.  Other than that, they were a joy to paint, with lots of of detail, that all came out rather nicely!

... and there you have it!  All in all, I'm pretty pleased with how they turned out.  Only issue now will be waiting for my daughter to finish her minis, or finding another local player interested on playing.  (I'm betting on it will be quicker for my daughter to finish her minis)  Other player's interest in playing will really dictate how much further I invest, and if experience has taught me anything, its that finding games in KC can be difficult at best!  IF I can find players interested in gaming, then I'll definitely be adding to the number of Militia, adding in ships, and eventually the Land Forces once they are released.  Finding people to play with are a big IF though....


Until Next time,
-WuhSawBe-