Reference and Tips

Here you will find relevant painting, modelling, organisation and uniform information, and, in time, useful links to the Web.

Wars of the Roses

Longbows

For Wars of the Roses longbows, place the figure in hot water to warm up the metal, then take them out, being very careful not to burn yourself. Place a tissue over the bow arm and with pliers gently twist a small amount to the left, or the archer's right, to give the correct bow line.

To string the bow, gently drill with a pin vice up under the rear hand. Then feed in about three inches of fuse wire. Glue, let it dry, then pull gently to the bow tips at both ends. Wrap the wire around the bow, glue, then trim neatly.

You can make the longbows either shot, that is strung from top to bottom, or ready to loose with the arrow nocked.

Decals

I use Dom's Decals. They have very good detail and great colour. Use the large ones for the back of the surcoat, while the smaller ones are for the top left breast or on the arms.

Once I have painted the figure, I place a small amount of gloss varnish where the decal will go. Once the varnish has dried well, cut out the decal, dip it in water and fix it to the figure. Once the decal is dry top off with a small amount of water based matt varnish, then when dry seal it with oil based matt varnish.

Arrows

The arrow goes on the left side of the archers left hand. To make it fit better, I cut off one of the flights.

Organisation: British Army

A section is eight men, made up of two fire teams of four men. The entire section is commanded by a section commander who holds the rank of Corporal, who also commands the first fire team designated "Charlie". His second in command is a Lance Corporal, who commands the second fire team which is named "Delta".

Each fire team consists of a commander, an LSW gunner, a 94mm LAW man and a rifleman, armed with an SA80. Thus a section's firepower comprises two 94mm LAW men, two LSW men and four SA80 riflemen.

A platoon is comprised of three such sections, together with a platoon commander's group. This group contains four men in total: the platoon commander (either a lieutenant or second lieutenant); his radio operator; the platoon sergeant; and his 51mm mortar man.

Painting: British Army

The DPM camouflage tunic (Disruptive Pattern Material) comes in many shades depending on age, what dye is used, and how many times it has been washed or starched. So a soldier might easily have a jacket of a different colour to his combat trousers, and the same applies to webbing.

With desert camouflage, sets are in short supply so you will find men wearing a desert jacket with temperate DPM trousers, or vice versa. All webbing is DPM.

All officers and NCO's wear the same kit so any rifleman figure can serve as private, NCO or officer.

You may wish to place a small piece of fuse wire on the left hand side of the figure, protuding from the second pouch, to about shoulder height, to represent the NCO's radio, or on the rear right of the daysack for the platoon radio operator.


Organisation: Taliban/Northern Alliance

This really depends on how ruthless or good the commander is. There are no set rules, you might find sections of about five to ten men, and platoons of between two and five sections. There is also no fixed weapon allocation, so this must represent an administrative nightmare: the AK47, AKM, RPD and SKS all use 7.62mm ammunition, while the AK74 uses 5.45mm, and anything else that goes bang may be pressed into service as well.

Painting : Taliban/Northern Alliance

Mostly civilian dress befitting the area, with some old Soviet kit thrown in. The Taliban do like a black turban, as black is never out of fashion. Northern Alliance troops can be painted with Soviet camouflage schemes.

Organisation: Genforce

The Genforce range is intended to cover all Soviet Doctrine forces. They can be used for Soviets, Chechens, Serb and Bosnian rebels; indeed any forces that use Soviet kit.

Organisation depends on the type of troops and which units they are serving in, however as a guide here is a typical platoon set up:

There are three sections, plus a HQ pair of the platoon commander and his radio operator. Section strenth can be between 7 and 10 men. Each section can have between 1 or 2 RPK light machine guns, 1 RPG 7 and the remainder armed with AK 74 or AK47. Variants to the above include: one man may have a grenade luncher fitted to his AK, and one of the riflemen may be replaced with a sniper armed with the SVD.

Painting : Genforce

Again, this depends on the unit and where it is operating in the world. Again, as a guide, helmets just painted a green shade, with no helmet covers. Webbing is also in shades of green, however I did see some chest rigs in cammo pattern in Bosnia and on a few web sites. Combats can be a areal mixture - you can have shades of greens, and many different types of cammo patterns.