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Monday, February 12, 2018

Early Saxons!

After painting Late Romans and Picts, I decided to paint another "Enemies of Rome" faction for my Saga stable.  Bonus, I can run both sides in a Dux Britanniarum campaign as well!

I planned to take this warband to the Saga US Grand Melee at Adepticon in March.  Unfortunately, I've lost every game I've played with them. The Saxon battle board is composed of small, subtle plays and many of them are conditional.  Winning isn't everything but this has become a bit ridiculous! Looks like its back to the drawing board with 6 weeks to go.

I used a mix of Westwind Productions and Footsore for this warband.  The Footsore figures are stellar as always and the Westwind figures as well.  I liked the variety of headswaps Westwind provided.   It does work well to bring a nice amount of variety to the bunch.  Westwind figures are a bit larger/chunkier than Footsore but still mix well.  Sharp-eyed historians will notice the rugby shirts.  My Saxons have a raid and trade relationship with their Frisian neighbors.  They love to look stylish, what can I say?






The warlord is Penda the Pagan by Gripping Beast and his hearthguard are all Westwind.  




Below was my last drop of Saxons.  I went all in & added more Frisian striped shirts along with levy archers for an Age of Wolves campaign.  The archers and striped shirt warriors are Footsore.  The Saxon "killers" are Gripping Beast and the totem is from Etsy. I can imagine my Saxons yelling out from their storage box "I coulda been a contender!"  To which I'll reply, "Maybe in Dux Britanniarum, maybe in Dux B."




24 comments:

  1. Dude those are sweet! Stripes nicely done sir!

    Cheers
    Kevin

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    1. Thanks Kevin! I did one shirt and thought, more!

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  2. They're beautiful, Monty! I had looked at using SAGA for my Viking / Saxon battles in the late 9th century, but everything I read said that the Saxons in those rules were severely under-powered.

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    1. Scott! Yes, the board is a difficult one. I have checked around with some international players. They recommend the heroes Hengist & Horsa but no heroes are allowed in the US Grand Melee. No worries, I have other options.

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  3. Love these guys, Monty - great work! The clothing and shields are really well painted, and the poses are wonderfully dynamic. Clearly a less static fighting style than in the later periods!

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    1. LOL! Thanks Hugh and agreed. Part of what drew me to the Saxons were the Footsore and Westwind minis. In the last year, I've tried to follow my friend Jason's advice and paint great looking scuplts!

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  4. Wonderful figures and scenery Monty!

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  5. Well done Monty! Especially those striped shirts are a real eyecatcher.

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    1. Thanks Michael! I'm hoping in Saga v2, the Frank board becomes more manageable. And then I can run them as Franks!

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  6. What is the name of the etsy shop where you found that wonderful marker? Great work on those minis! Too bad they don't win for you...

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    1. Christopher, thanks! So I googled Lewis chess pieces and found the shield biting berserker. I can't recommend the Etsy seller as I didn't get my product in the time advertised, she ignored my email inquiries and only at the last moment when PayPal was going to return my money did she ship.

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  7. Those look awesome! I too found the saxons in saga very hard to play and have a good game. By good I don’t mean win, but I do mean feeling like I wasn’t just beaten handily. Of course, the great think about historical miniatures is that they work in all rule sets so my saxons have had good adventures in other rules! 😀

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    1. Stew, you make me feel better. I have ideas on how I'll field them in Saga v2 as Franks or Lombards. And in other rules! So no loss!

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  8. Lovely looking early saxons, great colour variety, I think I'll be revisiting when I start mine for Dux Bellorum!
    Best Iain

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    1. Thanks so much, I appreciate it. I can't wait to get these guys going in a Dux B campaign.

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  9. I love the warlord figure. And the biter Totem is awesome (although technically a VIking guy from 1200.)

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    1. Thanks Bill! Yea, he's out of scope but so cool I had to bend history to bring him in.

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