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| Couchant : Sitting Up, or Awakened |
When it came to choosing a faction to collect for our Tale4Nerds project, my first reaction was to collect Normans, which I could use in games of Saga as well as Lion Rampant. However, this idea was so good that it was stolen from me by another of the 4Nerds! Curses. My next idea was to collect Mongols, but again I was copied by an admirer. Finally I decided on a War of the Roses retinue, as I remembered I had a box of Perry Miniatures infantry stashed away somewhere. It felt like a zero start up cost, as I had bought them some years back with a view to using them in a Warhammer human army, which never really got very far.
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| Brougham Castle, who lives in a house like this? |
Having decided on the War of the Roses, I did a little bit of reading to get some ideas for a palette for my retinue. I want to base my force in the north of England (that's where I live) and wanted it to be a Lancastrian force (I am a Lancashire lad by birth). I came across the
Red Wyverns website, a historical re-enactment site with a brief history of the Clifford family. They supported the Lancastrian cause and held much of the territory of Westmoreland, Cumberland, and Yorkshire (boooo), including a handful of the castles that are local to me. When I read that one of the family became known as "the Butcher", that sealed it for me.
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| Perry Miniatures infantry |
The Clifford livery is a red wyvern on a white field, so I want most of my troops to have pale or cream garments, though not too regimented. I will add the wyverns at a later stage. I have also made a start on blocking in the colours on the billmen, so things are ticking along nicely. Historical minis never seem to hold my attention in the same way that fantasy figures can, so I hope I can keep focussed. For the bases I have taken inspiration from the wilds around me, trying to capture the drabness of the winter, without actually using snow. It's surprising that even in winter there is still green around. I'm not sure my grasses are that convincing, I might pick up a few of the tufts that everybody and his dog seem to use these days.
