Huron Warriors for French and Indian War - Batch 1

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The perceptive among you have probably guessed that my new wargaming project is going to be a force of French and Native American warriors for the French and Indian / Seven Year's War. This will be my first time doing any sort of black powder era wargaming - my first foray out of WWII wargaming, actually.

I was drawn to model the French side because of their interesting uniforms and heavy reliance on Huron and other native allies. Plus, everyone loves an underdog, right?

We'll be using Sharp Practice by Too Fat Lardies, but I suspect we might end up giving Studio Tomahawk's ruleset Muskets and Tomahawks a try eventually as well.

This Christmas, I was gifted a box of Warlord's Woodland Indian War Party, which are actually metal sculpts by Conquest Miniatures. I've always loved these characterful and detailed figures, and painting them has been great. This is just the first batch of them, and I also quickly added to my collection some plastic natives, also from Warlord (via Wargames Factory), some metal figures from Brigade Games, and Warlord/Conquest Compagnies Franches de la Marine.

A quick note on historical accuracy with these warriors: I did try to consult reliable references on period appropriate clothing, hair, jewelry, etc, and looked for references on war paint. But there's fairly limited info online, from what I've seen, especially for the Wendat/Huron. So I'm sure I have gotten something wrong. I hope to learn a lot in the process of this FIW project.

This group of warriors is led by the crimson-cloaked Huron sachem known to the European colonists as Hardheart. The blanket here was a joy to paint, even if I essentially just copied the colors shown on the box. I'm putting my leaders on slightly larger bases to indicate their status. All these figures are based on metal washers so they're magnetic for storage and transport.

The terror of the Hudson River Valley, these warriors are on the move looking for valuables, captives, and scalps.

I would say I'm about 90% satisfied with the war paint on these figures. Some look really good, others seem a little overboard. I still have a number of figures to play around with, so hopefully I can learn a thing or two and improve my painting technique.



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