Malcolm III and William Rufus 1093 - Battle Ravens

Since discovering that the boardgame Battle Ravens translates so well to the tabletop for a wargame with 54mm toy soldiers we thought we'd give it another outing.

  Our first trial of the game was a standard shieldwall encounter between Vikings and Saxons, but the game also offers sets of cards to portray the national characteristics of Scots, Welsh and Normans so we decided to try something different. 

  For a scenario I chose the border raid in 1093 by the Scots of Malcolm III, in support of Saxon refugees, against a frontier outpost held by the Normans of William Rufus. 

A Frisian trader has beached his ship alongside the Norman keep and is unloading his trade goods in exchange for Saxon slaves, when the alarm is sounded!  A Scottish warband has been spotted approaching the stronghold.

The Frisian crew join the Norman garrison and form shieldwall outside the stockade to protect the ship from the Scots and their Saxon allies.

Lessons learned from our previous encounter meant that the action flowed much faster and furiously this time around, more risks were taken and the subtle nuances in the rule system became more apparent. 

The game is played from two static shieldwalls and despite the lack of manoeuvre there is still a great deal of movement as warriors are pushed back and forth to reinforce holes in the line.  

The Playmobil viking ship with sail down serves as the Frisian merchant vessel, it only acts as set dressing but adds depth to the scenario.

The Scots command group, King Malcolm with his retainers and priest.  The standard bearers here and below are conversions by Eric Kemp acquired at the Plastic Warrior Show in May.

There is a temptation to press heavily on one sector of the enemy line and attempt a breakthrough but this can have repercussions later on, in the long run it's often better to give ground and degrade your opponent's forces.  

The game plays comfortably in a couple of hours but you could easily expand it by allowing reinforcements to be fed in at set points.  It would make a great demonstration game at a convention, easy to transport, limited number of figures involved, several participants could take different sections of the shieldwall and the larger figures add a bit of spectacle for the spectators.

It was a close run thing and looked as though honours were even but on closer inspection and a recount the Normans carried the day by one point.

Those with sharp eyes will recognise figures by Timpo, Johilco, DSG, TSSD, Emhar, Cherilea, Del Prado, Jean Hoefler, Elastolin, Jecsan, Reamsa, Oliver, Conte, Fontanini, Replicants, Marx, Armies in Plastic, Starlux, and Cafe Storme.

An interlude while I do some 1:1 scale painting

This past week I've been up a ladder with a paint brush redecorating the hall and this has necessitated taking down the display of toy soldiers I have there.  The figures need to be individually removed and dusted so I took these photos to remind me where they go when I put the display back up, as I'd taken the pics I thought I might as well share them with you dear reader.

Discreetly camouflaged by several years of dust, the figures here are not any particular favourites just odds and ends that I've taken a shine to and picked up over time. Occasionally things get moved around but the order of display is largely governed by the size of each compartment.

I've always been very open about collecting toy soldiers and when I mention my interest to anyone they immediately assume that I mean lead guardsmen standing to attention in red tunics (and in fairness there are a few of those), so this little display is my way of showing the diversity of the subject.  Click on a picture to enlarge, there are no prizes for identifying what they are but it might give you a minute or two of fun, now where did I put that duster?

Converting Monarch Conquistadors

Back around about 1960 toy manufacturer Cherilea acquired parts of it's competitor Hilco (Johillco) which was more or less imploding.  Among these assets were a small range of toy soldiers being marketed under the brand name Monarch, there were some modern marching Highland bandsmen, a set of three "Rob Roy" type Highland clansmen and this set of six Conquistadors which were designed by sculptor George Erik, a prolific talent probably best known for his work at the Spanish firm of REAMSA (Resinas Artificiales Moldeadas S.A. )

The pikeman (back left) in cream plastic is an earlier figure which carries the distinctive Hilco lozenge shaped indentation under the base, in this case it simply says ENGLAND, probably because it was made after the moulds were acquired by Cherilea.  I don't know if Hilco ever produced these figures and I don't think I have ever seen one actually marked Hilco.  The remaining five in black plastic are the more common Cherilea products sold in vast quantities through Woolworth's stores, they all have the simple blank circular indentation under the base common to Cherilea figures.

Above: the distinctive Hilco style indentation under the base.

In the summer of 1990 the brass moulds for all the Cherilea figures were owned by Triang and were due to be sold for scrap.  Giles Brown of Dorset Toy Soldiers got wind of this and in company with toy soldier enthusiast and author Andrew Rose set off with a truck for the Triang factory at Droylsden near Manchester to rescue as many as possible.  They loaded up as many bolsters as the truck's suspension could take, including the one for these Conquistadors and took them safely back to Dorset (a bolster is the steel plate that the individual brass moulds are mounted on for fitting to a plastic injection moulding machine, each bolster would typically hold six individual moulds and weigh as much as a large truck battery).  Giles phoned me to say he'd had to leave a lot of the moulds behind if I wanted to try and save them from the scrap merchants, I had just been made redundant so with time on my hands and money in my pocket I set off for the North, but that's another story for another day.

The three poses above were all made from the same standing swordsman with just a change of head or arms.

Back in Dorset Giles discovered that the bolsters would need a lot of work and investment before they could be brought back into production, fortunately he found a "white knight" in the form of Jamie Delson of The Toy Soldier Company who ordered sufficient of each range to justify the cost of the renovation work.  So that is how these fine toy soldiers came to be available to us once more as remoulds, and the great thing about remoulds is that you can convert them to your hearts content without feeling any guilt that you are destroying something old and original. 

More simple conversions, the bases have been extended with Miliput to make them more stable, a laborious process which is not recommended. 

Which brings me to the point of this post, I collect toy soldiers to play wargames with and for this purpose it's fine to have lots all in the same position but sometimes you want a little bit of variety and that's where converting comes in.  The examples in the two pics above are my own humble efforts and in each case are little more than an adjustment of head and arms.  The two pics below show the work of others more skillful than myself, some were made by the late George Weygand (who founded Maros Models) and others by Mike Ellis (who produced a range of figures under the Marksman Models name).

Sadly I can no longer remember who made what but I picked these up many years ago at a Plastic Warrior show and they have been languishing in a drawer until now awaiting completion.  You can never have too many pikemen for this period and it's amazing how much variety you can create when you start cutting figures at the waist and swapping the bits about as has happened here, note the use of a sash to hide the joins.  When it comes to conversions I have never had any qualms about copying other peoples ideas and am always flattered when others improve on my own.

My only contribution to the process has been to mount them on Tu'penny bits for stability, the original slim bases being annoyingly unfit for purpose.  Now gentle reader before you reach for the comment button to tell me that defacing the coin of the realm is a criminal offence let me assure that it is not, or at least not any more.  Some years ago I wrote to H.M. Treasury seeking clarification of this very point but in the time honoured practise of the Civil Service and perhaps a spirit of Non Culpa they chose to simply ignore me.  Undaunted I researched further (you can see this matter was causing me some vexation) and discovered that new legislation was passed in 1982 overturning the old rules and I am much relieved to know that I am not committing a felony.