A New Parade - Girl Power

Today my family decided they wanted to go out shopping and I managed to get out of it...phew! To celebrate this lucky escape, I decided to throw my one and only base cloth over the dining room table and present a collection that has hitherto remained primarily in the shadows (pun intended!)..my Dark Ages Valkyrie Army, mainly consisting of Shadowforge figures from Australia. At around $5 per figure, this could possibly be my most expensive army, but then, pretty girls always cost more, but you don't mind paying!

Quite a few images here and some are not the best ever, but hopefully you enjoy them. This army has seen action a few times at my mate Julian's, taking on his Arthurian Britons or Saxons.

First up is the light infantry contingent. These are a mixture of Shadowforge "Tribal" and  Eureka Amazon ranges

The "Tribal" commander  (centre stand)

Tribal archers (the pretty girls) by Shadowforge

Next, the actual Valkyries, all produced by Shadowforge Miniatutes, now available through Eureka.

The first batch were my original basing...I only did a few figures like these before reverting to my standard 3 figures on a 40 x 40 base

Fifteen units of Sheild wall infantry

A few close up shots of some of the Shadowforge Valkyriies

Focus on Foundry - I added a few Foundry Valkyrie figures to the mix - easy to spot as most of them are  'en deshabille" !

Next up are the SLT (Senior Leadership Team)

This leader with her wolf companion is by Reaper Miniatures

The lady in the middle is again by Reaper

A male drawn chariot by Amazon Miniatures...the crew member with shield and spear is a Shadowforge addition

Princess Clodhna and shield bearers from the Gaels range by Celtos miniatures

The cavalry leader is also from Celtos - I think she was intended as a mounted heroine...

And finally, the cavalry force. To be fair, these are not actually Valkyrie cavalry at all, because Shadowforge dont make any...so I drafted in Eureka Amazon Light, Medium and Cataphract Amazons to help their sisters out... the first three images are light cavalry

Next up are the medium cavalry - I think the Eureka horses are particularly nice sculpts

Finally, the Heavies - Amazon Cataphracti from Eureka. I actually contributed to having these figures produced, by committing to buying a certain number - like a Kick Starter before anyone had coined the phrase!

So that's my Valkyrie army collection. Its been a while since they graced a table - my regular gaming buddies seem a bit wary of taking them on, as they generally do quite well...their male opponents perhaps give way to misplaced male gallantry, which they are happy to exploit to the full....long live Girl Power!

Last of the 1879 Colonial Infantry AND a bonus parade!

Here are the last few Old Glory 1879 British figures, which I completed a couple of days ago

And now for a small parade, inspired by the following Edwardian (1909) song that many readers would probably recognise if they heard it

All the nice girls love a sailor

All the nice girls love a tar

For there's something about a sailor

(Well you know what sailors are!)

Bright and breezy, free and easy,

He's the ladies' pride and joy!

He falls in love with Kate and Jane, then he's off to sea again,

Ship ahoy! Ship ahoy!

Which leads nicely into the very few units of Old Glory sailors in my Colonial collection:

Naval Brigade in Sennet hats

Naval Brigade in standard navy caps

Two gardener gun (I think) crews

Two naval gatling gun crews

That's it for this post - take care all!

Some More 1879 Brits

This week I have painted and based a few more of the individual Old Glory British infantry from my small lead pile. I am not sure these will ever see action, as I have never had any real desire to pursue skirmish level games in this period, but painting them is keeping me sane till I can get started on something more exciting again post all the Covid kerfuffle.

As others have pointed out, these are some of the  better OG figures, although one of these isn't the best, the figure doubling forward with his face buried into the barrel of his rifle. The head chosen for this pose is the same "screaming"mouth option as on the guy in the red jacket pointing, and it doesn't really work very well, the open mouth just looks like a grotesque facial deformity!

A group shot

Officer in blue patrol jacket

Not sure about this figure...is he an officer? He has no equipment and is wearing knee high boots, so I think he may be....

This is the guy with the deformed face 0- I took the image from an angle where it does not show

A couple of private soldiers advancing

A sergeant encouraging the front rank to keep moving forward...the pose does not work so well when individually based of course!