Rooting Around - Turnip28 Spring Clean Challenge
Next Steps - Brutes and Whelps
At this point, I’ve finished what I initially wanted to achieve for this project. However, it has been a lot of fun, and getting a Golden Button has given me a bit of encouragement to expand my ambitions a bit more.
A standard Turnip28 Regiment is comprised of three Snobs ( a Toff and two Toadys), and four units of Followers. The Toff is accompanied by two units of Followers, with the two Toadys each bringing along their own unit of Followers. It would make sense to try and get a full force completed.
At the moment, the 17th Beetroot are comprised of a Toff, Major-General Bolthardy, and his followers ( a unit of Fodder and a unit of Chaff). I have one Toady finished, but he lacks any Followers, and I’m missing the second Toady plus his retinue.
Since my completed Toady looks to be a bit keen for the melee, it seems appropriate to make a unit of Brutes as his Followers. Since I quite enjoyed messing around with the horse for Bolthardy, I think the final models will be cavalry, a unit of Whelps (light cavalry) and a suitable leader.
One consideration is that I’m almost out of the 3D printed Turnip torsos. I don’t have enough to create any consistent looking unit, so I’ll have to experiment with other ways to get the right feel to the models.
I’m going to start with the Brutes. These are a 6 figure strong unit, and I want them to be brandishing close combat weapons and looking to be heavily armoured. There’s a pretty easy solution for where to begin – Perry Agincourt Foot Knights.
These are specifically the French foot knights, as I like the long surcoats that most are wearing, which are absent from their English counterparts. These foot knights have long been one of kits used for Turnip28 kitbashes. They come with full face visors for their helms, which instantly creates the ‘visors-down’ Turnip28 look without messing around with any sculpting. I’ll raid the left-over parts of my Bavarians to see about adding a few Napoleonic elements such as backpacks, maybe some plumes or other uniform frills, but I think these will largely be used as they come.
For the Whelps I have some sprues of Austrian Hussars to use as a starting point. Not sure quite what I’m going to do with them yet, maybe something with cloaks? I’ll see what sort of inspiration strikes when I get there.
Will you be embiggulating them? For example, elogating the legs or widening the shoulder area? Also love the flag.
Probably not. I think I’ll try and see what I can do with relatively simple things first, and see how they look against the Fodder and Chaff. The way the surcoat hangs gives them a bit more bulk, plus there’s more material over the arms compared to the Napoleonic style jackets. I’ve already played around with adding the top part of the Bavarian fusilier hats, and that adds a nice bit of additional height.