The Pikeman's Lament: The First Peninsular War

Well I lasted until the final week of the Warlord Games sprue sale before weakening, but yesterday an order for a pile of Marlburian Infantry sprues went in as each sprue has 12 figures on and costs just £2.50! Don't ask how many I ordered, but free postage is such a temptation! Unlike other ex-Wargames Factory plastics, these aren't as slim and fiddly, the main reason I resisted the AWI sprues...

Warlord Games Malburian Infantry (photo Warlord Games)

The uniforms are pretty generic, so can be painted up as a number of nations, the issue now is which ones... As interesting as Marlborough's campaign is, I have been intrigued by the operations in Portugal and Spain between 1701 and 1710, and there is a book by Nicholas Dorrell coming out at the end of the month (Marlborough’s Other Army: The British Army and the Campaigns of the First Peninsula War, 1702–1712). It looks like it will provide a good overview of all the participants, not just the British (one of the things that interests me is the wide variety of armies who operated in Spain during this campaign).

Rules wise I am looking at Dan Mersey's The Pikeman's Lament, as I have had a copy sat around for a little while now as I had not settled on what war to go for as a starter project (the sprue sale solved that!). Whilst the rules are mainly written with the C17th in mind, they do run through to 1720 so cover the Marlburian period. I also have Donnybrook which I have been re-reading and drawing up plans for...

Not quite sure when I'll start on this, I have to wait for the sprues to arrive, but I can start the planning now units now!