Eastern European Buildings

Week 18 of backlog. For games set in Eastern Europe  (East Prussia, Poland, Russia) I wanted some simple buildings of wooden construction to match the typical villages found there during Napoleonic times. I collected this selection from Renedra and Pegasus as a start on this.

Renedra church and barn, theoretically Amercian I think, but pretty generic. Simple modest structures that could be used in many settings. 

Possibly I may replace the steeple of the church with an Eastern Orthodox dome if I can find something suitable. E.g. see this conversion of this kit.

Small Renedra Outbuildings, in stone, wattle, daub and timber.

Pegasus Hobbies, Russian farm houses. (172nd Scale but close enough )

Pegasus Hobbies, Russian log houses (also 1/72nd scale).

Western European Buildings

Week 17 of backlog. This is a selection of resin buildings that I picked up and painted (well 3 of them), mostly in an estate sale of a local wargaming buddy who sadly died over a year ago now.  

These buildings will supplement my existing Tabletop Workshop (now Warlord), range of plastic buildings. 

I'm not sure of the providence of these two thatched buildings, if someone let's me know I will add the details! (EDIT - thanks for comment from Mark Strachan below, he made the one on the right for Military Miniatures Range approx 1990, now out of production).

I believe this building is from Steve Barber Models German Renaissance range. An impressive structure that takes some patience in painting with all the panels! 

Lastly some of this range that was popular in the 2000's but now out of production. They came pre-painted and were a good price. Made from some sort of hard, but relatively brittle resin.

Southern European (Mediterranean) Buildings

Week 16 of backlog. With some Peninsula games planned, I thought I should get a few buildings that are more atmospheric for that theatre, and will also useful for Italy. These are 3D printed buildings I purchased from Tabletop Battlefield Terrain in 3D in Australia, the owner Dave Knowles being very helpful in the process. He also ships to US if anyone from there interested.

A Spanish style chapel. The roof is removable.

The regular buildings come in three parts, a bottom section, middle section and roof, but of course you can combine to make single or three or four story buildings. You could also do more work than I bothered with on the interiors, if you wanted, so as to use them for skirmish gaming. There are  seven different designs of buildings, in terms of the layout of windows and doors and detail, so I would ask for some variation as I did if purchasing.

Happy with these and will help games in these theatres feel more thematic :)

Terrain - Renedra Castle

Blog has been a bit quiet, but I have not. Amongst other things I've painted up this rather large castle set. It is from Renedra and is their "Small Castle"(!) set. Small compared to their larger castle sets perhaps but quite large enough for me! I've added two ruined wall sections and another tower for some options.

I painted it quickly with only three shades of grey and drybrushing, and could be improved with some green brown washes to weather it no doubt. But good enough for wargaming for me.

The wall and tower sections are modular and can be fitted together to make different setups.

I did not buy this castle specifically for Napoleonics (and especially not the siege equipment below!) but it may well see some use for Napoleonics as there were many sieges or assaults on forts or walled cities during the Napoleonic period.

The siege equipment incidentally is from Ironheart Artisans Kings of War range.

Modern military forts for the Napoleonic time period were like this Star Fort below, which were considerably more effective at withstanding assault than the much earlier sort of castle this kit represents. However, star forts were very expensive to construct, and in many situations these older castles or city walls were still present and provided some protection. Blowing a hole in the wall of these older structures with cannon and then assaulting was a not uncommon tactic. For Napoleonic wargaming purposes, I may use this castle to represent sections of either city walls, castles, or perhaps even star forts with a bit of creative license and imagination!

For inspiration here are some pictures of Napoleonic Siege Warfare.

Siege of Acre

Siege of Badajoz.

An amazing 1/56th siege diorama of Siege of Badajoz, see some more pics here.

Siege of Zaragoza.

Siege of Burgos

Siege of San Sebastian

And not sure what this is,but some Prussians assaulting a high walled structure of some sort!

One detail I changed with this kit was the wall sections. As they come they give you about 4cm depth atop the wall, but I wanted to make it about 7.5cm so it can hold my artillery bases and larger units in other systems. I did this by doubling up the wall section dividers you get as below.

And adding a strip of black plasticard to expand the wall section as follows.

And some sprue for support given I removed the supports from the centre of the wall section.

Some ballast/sand across the top. I was going to do stonework, but stonework plasticard I ordered turned out to be too small and I was impatient to get it done!

And for the ruined wall section I did a similar process, adding some cork and greenstuff as below.

And ballast/sand again.

And again below how these wall sections look when painted.

And lastly the entire castle including siege towers above, JUST fits into a 60 litre container for storage and transport :) 

28mm Windmill

Windmills - an ingenious method of energy generation pre-fossil fuels, and after for that matter! Windmills like this were a common site in Europe in the 18th and 19th centuries. Being able to reliably mill and then store grain (see the Granary), helped generate an economic energy surplus that fueled important technological and cultural growth - like making fancy hats for the Guards. ;)

This is a modified Sarissa Precision Post Windmill. An MDF kit, which is rather impressively large, and was cheap worldwide postage to New Zealand too. Post windmills were so called because they sat on a turntable post that enabled them to be turned to face the wind in optimal fashion. 

The modifications I made in assembly of this were firstly to triple the thickness of the posts at the base, as these looked a bit anaemic being just 2mm MDF. Really it could do with a central post too  but I decided I could live without that. I also chopped the based size down from 13cm square to 10cm square, to reduce the footprint.

I discarded the rather nice staircase it comes with (but will use this for something else in the future), in favour of a more modest ladder. I made this from scraps of MDF in the kit.  I also cut down the loading crane above the top door to a retracted position. The purpose of this was similar to that of reducing the base size - to cut down the footprint. I want it to be a minor terrain feature, rather than something takes up significant space and gets in the way. Also helps with storage!

The colouring is a bit dull and monotone, but then they were functional buildings that tended to be pretty plain! I was originally going to add tiles to the roof, but decided to paint it first to see how that looked and thought it was good enough.

The windmill blades come off for storage and can thus lie flat and take up little space. I magnetised them but this turned out to be unnecessary as they have a socket fit which is pretty secure.

Windmills were iconic features of many Napoleonic battlefields. The tall tower structure, and perhaps ability to be turned, also made them excellent command positions for Generals to get an elevated view of the Battlefield. Army engineers could quickly make a few suitable 'windows' in the upper story if needed...

Below is the Moulin de Valmy, a rebuilt post windmill which is a memorial to the Battle of Valmy in 1792, where Revolutionary French forces defeated the invading Prussians.

A painting of the battle.

Here's an image of the windmill at the Battle of Leipzig. Napoleon flanked by Murat and Poniatowski. The windmill was used as an observation point by Napoleon.

A windmill at Battle of Ligny.

Another post windmill from the present day, with  similar appearance. The Sarissa kit comes with this sort of staircase.