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Conquistadors… Day 7

These are just about done. Some gold between the white and blue on the flag and some form of design on it too and then get the bases painted cinnamon brown.

Just remembered…. the swordsmen need their shields.

Still not a bad finished force in a week…. yeah I know I have some more to go but it comprises eight cavalry, six spearmen and a bloke with five dogs.

I should hopefully have them done by the weekend.

Speaking of which the tail end of Hurricane whatever you call it has spoilt my weekend plans, we were going to take the caravan out to Fetlar, but with 60mph winds forecast, we thought ‘maybe not’

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Conquistadors…Day 6

Another evening with a smidge done…

That is all of the metalwork done by all please read …all until I notice what I missed tomorrow. It’s like this evening I suddenly found one miniature that I had forgotten to paint his doublet!

These are getting there slowly but surely…. and I rest my case… I have noticed on the command base the guy holding the flag hasn’t had his armour painted at all – you can see him there… red flag pole white helmet and armour!

On the whole I am pleased with these as they are coming together nicely

They look better en masse now that (most) of the metal is finished.

I will try and get them finished over the next couple of days. It is my good lady’s birthday tomorrow so I might not get too much done.

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Conquistador … day 5

Well day 5 is here, and I am going a lot slower than the Aztecs, probably all of the different bits need different colours, but anyway belts and woodwork done this evening.

I also printed off the last pair of lizards, I now have six of them. This last pair had a bit of a weird thing happened to them . The leg on one of them snapped, but after it had gone past the point I would have expected it to (as the rest of the print was fine-ish)

I will get them cleaned up tomorrow and sprayed white.

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Conquistadors… Day 4

Managed a bit more today. Soft kit on all of them is pretty much done. Weapons, equipment and armour still to go.

I have a couple of standard bearers, I will have to look up some Spanish period flags.

They aren’t as colourful as the Aztecs, but I reckon they will look bright enough when finished.

I based up the rest of them today too.

Furthermore I have got another couple of Lizardmen bases done. I wanted to do a third but Curator was being an absolute sod and kept on crashing every time I tried to load the last one for slicing. Each base of two miniatures took over two hours.

I will hopefully carry on tomorrow.

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Conquistadors…day 3

I managed a teeny bit of painting today, as well as trimming down the spear points. To be honest they are two big, but at least they can be seen 😂

I also managed to print off some 30 x 40 bases. A couple have a corner raised, this is due to a draft or difference in temperature on the print bed. I decided to print them off rather than purchase any more (well at least for a while).

I also managed to merge a couple of Lizardmen with a 40 x 30 base. There were five different lizards so I have come up with three different bases worth, each lizard base took and hour and twenty minutes to do.

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Conquistadors…Day 2

Day 2 and everything got sprayed white…. well almost everything.

I remembered that I needed spear points on the spears. To be honest at the minute they look like giant fans, but I will trim them down. Never done it before so wish me luck.

As for the rest I got all of the skin tone done and started on the soft clothing.

I won’t be using the bright greens and blues that I used on the Aztecs, but there will be some colour amongst the the metalwork.

I would have got more soft kit painted, but I am a bit knackered so watched lots of crap on YouTube instead!

I shall carry on tomorrow

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Conquistadors… Making a Start

So now that the Aztecs are finished, I decided to push on with the mesoamerican Shenanigans, but this time focusing on the Conquistadors.

So here we have 42 miniatures that I based tonight. It comprises:

Five bases of sword and buckler men

Two bases of cut down pikes, my plan is to give the Greenstuff pointy bits. I am now taking bets on how far I have painted them before I remember 😉.

Two bases of arquebusiers

Three bases of crossbowmen

One base of random missile troops.

And a command base on my last 30x40mm mdf base.

Still to base up….

One base of heavy cavalry (or two if I only put two to a base)

One (or two) bases of Jinete cavalry

A war dog handler and dogs (two bases)

Two or three bases of Pack mules

I will get the based ones sprayed tomorrow and make a start on them on Saturday.

Whilst perusing the school library I came across some new research material…

My favourite picture, especially after doing all of the back banners…

I am quite enjoying this podcast on the rise of the Aztecs…

A fair few things I hadn’t heard before…

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Aztec Challenge… Day 5

I seem to have run out of Aztecs!

I cracked on this evening and managed to finish the Jaguar warriors.

I am a bit miffed but you can’t really see the jaguar skin pattern. The tlahuiztli on the two at the front the red one and nearest were deliberately just done in black dots, the rest were done with black shapes filled with a darker or lighter colour. You can just about see it on the second row nearest figure.

But apart from painting the bases of the commoners brown and flocking them all then my Aztec army is done.

In the last 5 evenings I painted this lot…

This is the whole army…

in the last month (from 7th August to 4th September) I have managed to paint this little lot…

Two armies…one fantasy – the Scalians and one historical – the Aztecs. This is probably the fastest I have ever got two Forces to a quasi finished state (just the bases and varnishing to go).

I reckon I will make a start on the Conquistadors tomorrow… by start I mean get them onto bases, well, apart from the cavalry as I have totally run out of 30 x 40mm bases.

I am not sure of the number of figures, but I reckon somewhere near the amount of minis I got with the Eagle, jaguar and command group in the Aztecs at the very minimum.

I will leave you with the following, it has been going the rounds for a while but I do find it amusing…

TTFN….

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Aztec Challenge… Day 4

Well that is the Eagle warriors finished…

The command unit tagged along too it would seem, but yes, that’s those nine finished. I went for silver metalwork instead of gold, not particularly accurate, but I felt like a change.

I also found some time to paint the Jaguar tlahuiztli. My original intention was to have a mix of coloured and natural suits… technically I have done so…

I remembered on the last one to add a bit of colour. Obviously colour won’t be a problem when I get the back banners and shields done. I painted the bases at the start as I had got too much out when painting up the Eagle bases.

So some of these are going to have jaguar patterns, some plain and some with black spots… I think, only tomorrow will tell.

So my good lady arrived safely in Blackpool, 4 hours late due to someone having to be talked off the Forth rail bridge (well that’s what the reason seemed to be). Disembarked at Dundee and had to get a bus to Edinburgh, needless to say she missed her connection.

The kids were happy with my tea suggestions…. as I needed to go into town I came back with sausage and chips from the chip shop…

So tomorrow I crack on with the Jaguar warriors, then see what I get onto next… in all honesty it will probably be the Conquistadors…

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Aztec Challenge… Day 3

So, my good lady has deserted me on the boat tonight for the bright lights of Blackpool for her international conference… she is a bit miffed as the last one she went to was in Istanbul… but she is still presenting and I am very proud of her.

Anyway onto the challenge… I was worried I wouldn’t get much done tonight, but I was wrong. I managed quite a bit of total fiddlyness. It slowed me down, but I reckon I will get the Eagle warriors finished tomorrow 🤞.

They are beginning to look very colourful. I don’t know why I did nice feather patterns on the shields…you can’t see them!

Still a fair old bit to do, but getting there.

Off the top of my head… still to go:

Eyes on the helmets

Blades on the maquahuitl

Ornamentation and feathers on the helmets

Precious metal on the back banners, both shaft and tops (yeah I know it probably wasn’t gold, but I cannot think of another way to paint them)

Any other bits of ornamentation I can find

Finally – shield designs

The one thing that is really nice about doing a blog and taking photos for it is that it shows progress… a few days ago they looked like this…

It is really funny, I really disliked doing the Scalian cavalry and struggled to get them finished. These are way more complicated and I am loving doing them… perhaps it is the fact that there is a bit more about them that makes them more appealing.

I suppose I have made the back banners a bit brighter than the codices show… an example of Mendoza below shows some good examples. I really should have done one if my command troops white, the one representing a skeleton looks cool.

Interestingly enough none of the above figures are carrying a maquahuitl, all have the tepoztopilli (sorry showing off now – ain’t google great 😂).

Supposedly the last of these original weapons were destroyed in a fire in the 1880’s. I have seen other ones but they were probably post conquest.

Another of the Codex Mendoza shows more images of suit wearers… but more importantly it shows the progression of the warrior priests

This one is one of my favourite images, it shows the progression through the ranks

One started off the military career as a porter and messenger then sent off to war as an apprentice, once you got your first captive you got to carry a maquahuitl and wear a mantle of specific design… everyone would know of your prowess by the way you looked.

So tomorrow… finish of the Eagle warriors and make a start on the Jaguar bases. On the whole the Jaguar warrior back banners are a bit more simple, so shouldn’t take as long to do.