Not so much variety here lately...

Guess what I'm posting today!

More WiP Pancerni (I'm on a roll!)

Six more normal Pancerni here.

And then, two unit leaders and a musician. The musician was easy, just a Warlord Games cavalry trumpeter arm. I will eventually make a kettledrummer for the other musician, that will be a bit more involved. The commanders are both wearing scale mail. At first I didn't know what to do with the one scale-armored body in the Normans box, but then I remembered seeing something about scale armor as a "Sarmatist" affectation for Commonwealth officers, something like this or some of these. So, I decided to use the scaled Norman after all, and a random Rohan guy too.

Now, these guys will probably need a little more embellishment before they look properly "Sarmatian", and I think the golden age of Sarmatism was during Jan III Sobieski's reign, not Jan II Casimir's which is the era I'm theoretically collecting, but I'd rather be slightly anachronistic than waste a couple perfectly good bodies.

some finished pancerni

These guys are the most fun I've had converting since I first figured out how to make Cossacks from Zouaves. More to come.

Pancerni WiP

I converted my first pancerni from Wargames Factory Celt cavalry with WSS arms and horses. I think I did reasonably well despite the soft detail and awkward posing, but I think this newer kitbash (with Conquest Games Normans and Perry Zouave heads, and obviously some greenstuff) is going to turn out much better. I still need to fill some gaps and add pistol holsters before painting, which will hopefully happen tomorrow.

Cavalry WiP

So I smooshed together some plastic reiters and metal dragoons (all Warlord Games) into this unit.

 Armed mostly with carbines/half-muskets, but with the occasional pistol, and a couple of helmets, it's hard to tell if these are poorly-equipped reiters, or dragoons that have been unusually successful at looting.

Turns out, it's both. When I field them as reiters, their musician will a bugler, as befits a proper cavalry unit.

 

But when they are dragoons, it'll be a drummer (arms and drum from Wargames Factory).

So of course I had to make some dismounted versions. I had particular fun with the leader, he has some big beefy GW arms, and a bit of added height so as not to look apish with those arms. The mounted version also has a GW arm, even if it's hard to see in the picture up there.

Pospolite Ruszenie and Happy Labor Day

Here are some pics of my noble levy cavalry. They are converted from Wargames Factory WSS cavalry, with some heads and arms from other kits mixed in. I did not really enjoy making these guys, the conversions were too fiddly, especially compared to the underwhelming appearance of the finished bunch, and their thoroughly unimpressive tabletop stats.

I might go back and give some of them bows and carbines, so they can be fielded as a lighter Cossack-style cavalry squadron.

Incidentally, it is sort of ironic that I'm ending up posting these self-important serf-exploiters on Labor Day, the day when Americans are supposed to pretend that we aren't being exploited by a magnate class just as greedy, manipulative, shortsighted, unpatriotic and arrogant as any szlachta.

I need to remember to make a casualty stand for this regiment, and post it on May Day. An especially gruesome casualty stand.