Introduction

My entry in the Battles for Beginners Contest is a man-to-man game set loosely in the 14^th century and designed to use 1/35 scale (or 54mm) plastic figures. I chose this project from a list of possibilities for several reasons:

1) I prefer small (and therefore faster) games to large (and therefore slower) games, which made a skirmish or small battle game a natural choice.

2) One of my two favorite works of fiction is The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (more famous for his Sherlock Holmes stories), a story of a young squire and his companions, set during the middle of the Hundred Years War.

3) I have long admired the Accurate line of Hundred Years War figures and had been looking for a way to build a wargame around them. Large scale plastic figures are relatively inexpensive (50 cents per foot figure compared to a minimum of 90 cents per figure for smaller metal figures) and easier to paint adequately than smaller figures.

4) My first serious historical miniatures wargaming project when I reentered the hobby as an adult was a medieval skirmish game using 25mm metal figures, and therefore I have had an idea of what I wanted things to look like, and what sorts of situations would be suitable for play.

5) I thought that most people would be generally familiar with knights and chivalry and would therefore be able to connect with the action of the game.

Wargaming is a modular hobby. Any game consists of four elements—figures, scenery, rules, and situation (or scenario). I will consider each of these elements in turn.

Figures

Figures are the heart of a miniature wargaming project. Once a group of figures has been prepared, it may be used with different scenarios or different rules to produce radically different games. They may be used for many years (I am still using some figures I bought thirty years ago) and therefore deserve care and consideration in their selection and preparation.

For this project, I started by buying three boxes of Accurate Hundred Years War English Foot figures (20 per box) and three boxes of Accurate Hundred Years War French Knights (10 foot and 2 mounted figures per box) for $60, giving me a total of 90 figures on foot and 6 on horseback. I began by cutting all the figures and parts from their sprues with a hobby knife. I then carefully cleaned up any flash and mold lines using the knife, taking the figures in groups of six in the same pose. The figures were washed in soapy water, either by scrubbing them with an old toothbrush or by putting them in a covered plastic dish for several days and shaking it up now and then, depending on whether I was ready to start painting the next batch. This is necessary to remove any mold release compound remaining on the figures from manufacture, which will cause problems with the paint if left uncleaned. Based on techniques gathered from the Internet, I usually soak the figures in vinegar overnight after the soap stage. Any figures in multiple parts are glued together using contact cement after the vinegar stage. Once these preparations are completed, I glue the figures onto cardboard strips for painting. Strips of three to six figures are convenient for handling the figures during painting without touching them.

The actual painting of figures begins with a primer coat. I have recently been using Liquitex Acrylic Gesso as my primer coat. This can be applied with a fairly large flat brush. I normally follow this up with a coat of black paint thinned about 1:1 with water. A black undercoating has two main advantages. Any small missed areas end up black rather than white, and are therefore inconspicuous. Colors tend to be less intense over black than over white, which is appropriate for this period of history before the invention of brilliant artificial dyes. Some people object to the use of black undercoats because it can be necessary to use more than one coat of lighter colors to cover them. I find that I end up using multiple coats of darker colors to cover white, so there isn’t really much difference as far as that goes.

Once primed and blacked, figures are painted in the final colors using acrylic craft paints. I like to work on groups of figures in the same pose even when painting them in varied colors. I use the method of progressive neatness. I start with the largest areas of color and paint them with the largest possible brush. As each color is added care is taken to ensure that the lines formed by the boundaries with colors already applied are neat. As the areas of color become smaller I change to smaller brushes. A brush with a good point can be used to apply very small areas of color, so I find that points are more important than brush sizes. I used some dry brushing to modify colors and highlight texture on these figures, but neat “block” painting can be very effective on larger figures if you lack time or are uncertain of your skills.

After the colors have been applied, a protective clear coat is applied. This step is crucial. I generally used Liquitex Medium Viscosity Gloss Medium and Varnish for this operation. If all has gone according to plan, this leaves the figures with a clear flexible coating which is resistant to minor bumps and bends. The paint can still be scraped off of the figure with a determined effort, so painted figures should always be handled with some care.

The next stage is to base the figure. I used heavy cardboard for my bases, cutting it into 40mm squares for foot troops and 40mm by 80mm rectangles for mounted troops with a paper cutter. I attached the figures with contact cement, and then painted the edges of the cardboard dark brown for inconspicuous neatness. I don’t like the look of figures standing on little mounds in the centers of their bases, so I built up the area around the integral plastic bases by applying a liberal layer of white glue (Elmers or the equivalent) and then dipping the bases in sand. Once the sand layer was dry, the process was repeated with a lighter glue layer and green model railroad flock (Woodland Scenics ground foam) to represent grass. A final spray coat of Krylon matte acrylic clear paint was applied, to reduce the shine of the gloss varnish on the figures and ensure that the flock is firmly attached. All the stages of the basing operation can proceed in large batches, as the actual time invested per figure is minimal.

I have several books on heraldry on my shelves at home, which provided the necessary inspiration for painting the knights. Men at arms were generally painted in less flamboyant colors, with a lot of gray and brown representing undyed or unwashed cloth. Color schemes can be suggested by the packaging of the figures, various Osprey books, and the N.C. Wyeth illustrations for the Scribners Illustrated Classics editions of such books as The White Company, The Adventures of Robin Hood, and The Black Arrow.

The many steps needed to prepare plastic take time. I was able to save some time by painting figures in batches, though not as much as would have been possible had the figures been wearing uniforms. Given that I could usually finish the painting of a group of six figures in two one hour lunches, the total time per figure must have been under an hour. Still, something close to 100 man-hours was needed to paint the figures.

Scenery

Scenery is important to a game for the visual impact. It also breaks the playing area up giving a reason for players to maneuver the figures, and can serve as objectives for the fighting or to allow determination of victory at the end of a game. I did not have a particular scenario in mind when I started this project, so my goal was to construct some scenery which would support a variety of possible situations. I also had only $40 left in my budget to spend on scenery, so I had to stretch my money. I wanted a basic village (at least four buildings), some hedges or walls, some woods (at least half a dozen large trees), some roads or tracks, and a stream. I had also hoped to add a bridge as a possible focal point for action, and a representative length of castle wall, but ran out of time before either of these was prepared.

Ground Cloth

Scenery starts with the ground. I had a surplus store army blanket in my camping gear, which I adopted for this project. It was a slightly mottled olive drab color, which was ideal for this use, and had a slightly shaggy texture, which was also ideal. I priced similar emergency blankets at the surplus store for $11. A piece of sage (not pool table green!) felt would be a suitable replacement, but sage felt is usually only available in 36” widths at my local fabric store, which was either too narrow or which would have required a seam down the middle of the table. I also invested about $3 in a bag of decorator moss from Michael’s craft store to scatter around the cloth to visually break up large open areas. Most of this material can be recovered after a game and reused. Large rocks were gathered around the house.

Roads and Tracks

The easiest possible system for roads is to pour loose sand directly onto the ground cloth. It also looks good, and would look even better if I could find sand that wasn’t bright yellow. I was originally shown this technique by my friend Ross Macfarlane. I counted sand among my salvage items at no cost.

Trees

Because I was using 54mm figures, I wanted large trees, up to 12” tall. Despite the wide availability of products for model railroaders, large trees other than pines are very hard to find and quite expensive. I decided to build my trees using dowel rod cores, over which I added layers of high-density upholstery foam to form to foliage structures. The dowel rods were roughed up with a wood rasp to represent bark. The foam layers were roughly formed with scissors, had holes punched through them for the dowels, and then were roughed up by tearing small bits off to make them irregular. They were glued to the dowels using contact cement. Once the glue had dried the whole assemblies were sprayed with black paint. The foliage forms were sprayed with glue and then sprinkled liberally with the ground foam flocking also used on the figure bases. When the foliage was dry the trunks were dry brushed with a light gray/brown paint. Bases for the trees were prepared by cutting them out of corrugated cardboard, spraying them with glue, and covering them with flock. Bases were sized to carry two or three trees. Trees were attached to the bases with wood screws. More permanent bases could have been prepared in the same way, but using masonite rather than cardboard. I had no scrap masonite handy and no slack in the budget to purchase any. I purchased both the upholstery foam and the dowels at a Joann Fabric store. All foam was on sale that day, but most days remnants of foam are available at a discount. Large pieces are not needed, since it will be torn up anyway. My investment in foam and dowels was a little under $6, and I got seven trees and a lot of foam scraps out of it.

Hedges

Hedges were made by a technique similar to that of the trees. A basic cardboard form in an inverted T shape provided the core of each hedge section. Foam scraps left over from the tree process were applied with liberal amounts of tacky glue. When this was dry the assemblies were sprayed black, then sprayed with glue and covered with flock. A gate was formed for one section with heavy cardboard strips for planks. I had intended to use a similar technique with rocks instead of foam over the cores for walls, but was unable to test it due to time constraints, and the $4 for the bag of appropriately sized stones from the aquarium supply store was therefore not included in the budget. The hedge sections were built entirely with salvaged materials (plus glue) including scraps from other scenery elements and leftover flock, and therefore did not cost anything against the budget.

Stream

I had originally intended to build a stream in sections using cardboard as the base, building up banks with sand and glue, and then painting the stream with the gloss acrylic varnish, but time was running out and it didn’t get done. I found a water/wave print fabric at WalMart on a trip to pick up more glue and spray paint, and invested about $4 in a yard of it. A 4-5” wide stream was cut for the project scenario, leaving plenty left over, suitable for additional lengths to allow some variation of stream position in future scenarios.

Buildings

Several years ago I noticed that the large cereal boxes we got from the discount stores (e.g. BJs, Sam’s Club) were often made of a thin corrugated cardboard, which turned out to be very suitable for scenery projects. I have accumulated as many of these as possible since then, and had a stack of them ready for this project, as well as a stack of cereal boxes of a more conventional thinner cardboard. Detailed descriptions of building construction can be found on The Major General’s Page on the web (www.zeitcom.com/majgen) and in the Games Workshop book on constructing wargames scenery, which is one of their best products. The basic procedure is as follows:

1) Draw the outline of the walls and any open windows or doors on the cardboard, using a straight edge and a triangle. Two or three walls can and should be left connected depending on the size of the building and the piece of starting cardboard. (Use the corrugated boxes for this stage.) Draw a separate roof piece, allowing for appropriate amounts of overhang.

2) Cut the pieces out, using a metal ruler and a hobby knife.

3) Lightly score attached wall joints before folding them.

4) Fold all pieces to shape and test fit them. Make L-shaped gluing brackets from thin cardboard necessary. (Rough up thatched roofs if necessary at this stage.)

5) Glue main pieces together, with optional duct tape on the inside to hold while the glue dries.

6) Add detail work (doors, shutters, wall posts, roof slates) in thin cardboard.

7) Paint.

Ross Macfarlane volunteered to help me build the buildings (under direction). We assembled four basic dwellings, a small church consisting of a main building section with an attached square tower section, and a small shed. Thatch work was represented by lightly scoring the roof pieces, and then dragging a dull knife sideways across the score lines. The buildings were built entirely out of salvaged materials, and did not cost anything against the budget. The entire scenery assembly, trees, hedges, and buildings, was done by two people in two ten hour days, with time left over to build some buildings for a different project and play a test game of the convention scenario, so about 40 man-hours of total work was needed.

Things Not Built

I had hoped to add a bridge, which would have required a little more complicated cardboard work, and a castle wall section. I had salvaged several Quaker Oats oatmeal containers to form the basis of round towers for the castle.

Summary

A large bag of Woodland Scenics green blend ground foam flock cost $8. When added to the $11 for the blanket, $3 for the moss, $4 for the stream cloth, and $6 for the tree materials, my total budget for scenery was $32. Total time for scenery construction was about 40 man-hours.

Rules

I wanted to find a set of rules on the net for free for this project. I used Google to search and came up with three or four candidate sets of rules, mostly through the Free Wargames site in the U.K. Unfortunately, I also wanted the rules to be simple enough to teach to new players and suitable for use with up to 50 figures per player. I couldn’t find anything that met both of those requirements, so I was forced to write some rules for myself. They are attached below, and will also be available on the web in the future. If these rules do not suit the reader’s taste, the available free web rules may be substituted. It might also be possible to find a copy of Donald Featherstone’s Skirmish Wargaming at a library, through Interlibrary Loan (ILL) if necessary. This book includes a set of general skirmish rules plus the special rules needed to adapt them to a variety of periods, including the Hundred Years War. For someone with less strenuous budget constraints, commercial rules are available. I’ve used Retinue from Table Top Games (TTG) in the past, as well as Knights and Magick from Heritage, a long out-of-print set of fantasy/medieval/ancient rules for relatively small quantities of figures.

Scenario

For the convention, a set up something like the above was laid out. The small rectangles represent the buildings, the circles represent the trees, a stream crosses the corner of the table, and the roads are laid out in a broad T shape.

I had 76 figures completed: 19 knights and 57 sergeants, including 12 longbowmen and 6 crossbowmen. Because the 4x6 playing area was fairly small for the amount of stuff on the table, I thought that it would be a good idea to set up a situation to use as much of the area as possible. Therefore I decided that the game would involve two groups from one side (the English) advancing toward the village from both ends of the table, while the other side (the French) started in the center and was responsible for defending in both directions. The story that made sense with this was that a scouting party from an English held castle somewhere in France was caught away from the castle when the French attackers arrived. The English troops arrived through the woods on the right were the scouting party, while those advancing along the road from the left were a rescue force sallying from the castle, which was off the board somewhere to the left. The French, watching the castle, naturally occupied the buildings in the village rather than sleep out in the open. The available figures were divided up with 10 knights, the 12 longbowmen and 20 of the remaining sergeants forming the English side, and 9 knights, 6 crossbowmen and 19 sergeants forming the French. The French started by setting up in and around the village buildings. The English were further divided into two roughly equal groups, and entered the table along the roads at either end on their first move. The objective was simple—the English won by linking up their two forces, which would allow the scouting party to return to the castle, and the French won if they prevented this from happening during the time allowed for the game. This situation would be playable by two people, though a little slow, and was ideal for four, two to be the French and one for each of the English forces. With three, one player would take all the French, and with five or six, I’d move a few more troops to the English castle force and divide it in half.

Other possible situations could be devised using this set up. Two forces entering from opposite sides could attempt to seize and hold the village. A single force could be attempting to loot the village, with the defenders starting on the table, or with part of the defenders entering later as a relief force (especially once the mounted figures are painted). The woods could be arranged to provide cover for an ambush on a party advancing down a road, and so forth. There are many possibilities, and, as with the situation chosen, they can be made to fit the troops available while one is still in the middle of the painting process, so you don’t need to wait until everything is painted before trying a game.