Scaling a Lead Mountain....Part 3

It has been a busy day sorting through the lead mountain. I have taken the decision to leave the listing until I get the last of the figures from Bill at the end of next month. My reasoning is simple - I would rather sort through the collection once instead of twice as although I am really enjoying the process it is very time consuming and for the time being it is rather limited.

I took the opportunity to sort out the Ottoman Turkish portion of the collection and once again a good few surprises came out of the boxes! To begin with there was a fair amount of Dixon Miniatures in the mix - Janissaries and assorted musketeer types. The infantry was split roughly into two parts - the 16th/early 17th century and the late 17th/early 18th century. The main difference being the type of firearm, either match or flintlock. The latter consists of various Balkan tribes whilst the earlier figures appear to be more Anatolian looking. I believe that Eric wanted to use this army for both the 17th and 18th century.

The next thing concerned the cavalry. For the most part Eric had mobilised an awful lot of Minifigs types. Now these are fine but do not work alongside the figures he was acquiring for the infantry. The cavalry also seemed to be quite early Minifigs which makes the difference in style all the more noticeable. This means that I will look to add the cavalry from one of the newer ranges so the Minifigs will be sadly redundant.

I also came across some figures that I am struggling to identify is if anyone has any ideas please let me know!

These look very modern compared to the other figures but I have no clue as to what they are.

I have a feeling these are Dixons but am not sure. They look very much like Anatolian types but I am not sure.

Now these look very much like renaissance matchlock types and are from the range produced by Naismith.

I also took a look at the figures Eric had planned to use for his Indian armies. For the most part these are all early Minifigs and Eric had made use of some early ancient Indian infantry to use as irregular native types. These are the ‘telegraph pole’ Minifigs and to be honest are not great to look at. There was also a couple of boxes of firearm infantry - after investigation one box contained a unit of colonial Afghan infantry whilst the other contained Dervishes. These are rather nice in a Minifigs kind of way and certainly in the case of the former I would have little hesitation in adding to these for use with The Men Who Would Be Kings.

The one thing that really struck me whilst going through all this lot is how my perception of what constitutes a wargames army has changed over the years. Back in the day aiming for an Eric sized army would have been almost obligatory but nowadays, for me anyway, I tend to work on the basis that an army only needs to be what you would use ordinarily plus a unit or two extra for variety. A good sized force for me would be a dozen units of which I would routinely use only around eight or nine. Given the representational and abstract style of game I usually fight this would translate into around 150 figures all in.

I am thinking that basing figures individually would be a better option rather than using multiple bases as I would be keen to look at the skirmish option as well as for more usual games.

As ever, much to think about - but in a good way!