The beginning of 2025 saw all hands to the pump for Winter Wonder Lard V where I had decided to run an Indian Mutiny Sharp Practice game - The Relief of Dojjibotti. Whilst Phil has happy enough to lend me his Mutineers for the game I decided that given the numbers of Pandies sat in the pile of shame (some since the late Eighties) that I would try and paint up what I had amassed over the decades.
In the main the miniatures were from Old Glory which are decent enough slightly chunky sculpts, full of character and with lots of head variants. There were also some Foundry, including the two command figures in the picture above originally painted back in the late eighties/early nineties when the miniatures were first released. There were also a smattering of Empress Miniatures which are lovely figures but whose bayonets have a tendency to break off if you just look at them.
With at least 110 figures to paint in a month I decided to forgo using Army Painter dip due to the drying time and after experimenting on a civilian figure used Sonic Sledgehammer's Marine Juice wash. If you are unfamiliar with this I very much recommend watching the video (click the link), it was a life saver. Essentially all the figures are just base coated, washed with Marine Juice then a few highlights picked out (Ivory for the white clothing)
Whilst it was somewhat repetitive I managed to get nine groups of Mutineers plus command (84 figures) fully painted in under four weeks! But that was not all...
Using the same technique I managed to paint up four groups of skirmishers with command for each too.
The cavalry had been painted for a while (indeed they made their tabletop debut back in 2018 proxying for the Bengal Lancers in this The Men Who Would Be Kings game with George), but to tie them in with the rest of the army I gave the clothing a wash of Marine Juice and applied a few quick highlights...
Following the game, and given how quickly I painted up 110 miniatures I decided to plough through the remaining Mutineer box of shame - which contains several cannon and crew and a load more cavalry. Progress without a deadline has of course slowed to snails pace but I have managed to finish this twelve-pounder with Bengal Horse Artillery crew...
And this nine-pounder with crew in native dress. The Guns I think are Foundry for the twelve-pounder and Mutineer Miniatures for the nine-pounder, the crews are Mutineer Miniatures.
For a deployment point I used this lovely Empress Miniatures snake charmer...
And no Indian Mutiny scenario is complete without some local fauna. The tiger would randomly appear out of patches of jungle and the goats (Bengal Blacks, I probably spent more time researching the correct goat breeds and colouring than I did on the Mutineer regiments!) who just sat on a hill looking at the silly humans shooting each other. All these miniatures are from Irregular Miniatures.
Lovely work.
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