Sunday 1 March 2015

King Richard and the Sheriff of Nottingham

Introduction

The weather is poor, the family are all bad-tempered and surly; I'm fed up!  At least it's not February any more (the worst month in the year, probably), so things might start to improve new.

So, what have I got for you today?  No game reports (sorry, another time...), but here are a couple of new figures to expand my Robin Hood forces.

The Sheriff of Nottingham

You may be asking at this point "Hasn't he already got a model of the Sheriff of Nottingham"?  If you look at my older Robin Hood battle reports then you will see that I did indeed play with that character.  However, the model I used was an old miniature of (I think) a fantasy merchant.  While it worked well enough, this is a new, "proper" miniature of the Sheriff.

My new Sheriff model comes from North Star's small Robin Hood range and he's the best of the bunch by quite some way, I think!  Not that there is anything wrong with the other models in that range, but they just don't have the same character.

He's clearly a scheming, evil overlord, so painting him in blacks and greys was a given.  I just cannot imagine this character in a different colour scheme!  However, there's nothing about his clothing that really marks him out as medieval; I think that this miniature would be effective as a modern, east European crime boss, a cult leader, a Bond villain or many other evil characters from the past 1000 years or so.

King Richard ("the Lionheart")

King Richard features heavily in the legends of Robin Hood as the rightful, if absent, king.  Indeed, he's almost seen as something of a messiah figure; when Richard comes home then all the ills of the land will be put right and the evil Prince John (and his henchman, the Sheriff of Nottingham) will get their just deserts.

In reality, King Richard I seems to have cared about England only insofar as the country could continue to finance his crusades and other military adventures.  He barely even visited England during his entire reign!

I cannot remember where I obtained this model, though I suspect that it was a "free gift" for renewing a subscription to some wargaming magazine many years ago.  Still, it's obviously a miniature of Richard the Lionheart!

I'll use him in occasional Robin Hood games, though I'm tempted also to think of him as the start of a Crusader warband for The Crescent and the Cross (the medieval version of SAGA, set in the crusades).  Must't get too distracted by this idea, though.

28 comments:

  1. Great looking characters; the Sheriff looks very devious/unscrupulous and the Lion Heart looks superb. I do like that figure - sounds like a special one-time model though :(

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    1. Thanks, Dean. I've done a little research and the "Richard" model is actually "NC05 - King John", available from northstarfigures.com . It looks as if a lot of these "Newark Character" miniatures are the ones I remember as give-aways with magazine subscriptions, but they're still available separately :-) .

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  2. I agree, they are both great! Sheriff does look downright evil! Now that you've mentioned how much the Lionheart cared about England, I did read a while ago that he barely spoke any English!

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    1. I believe it was quite usual for the ruling classes in medieval England to speak French, not English. Not unlike Imperial Russia, where the court spoke French or German? There are probably many other such examples from history where the rulers were culturally quite distinct from the peasants :-) .

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  3. Great job C6! The sherrif is very characterful. King Richard looks pretty cool too, love what you've done with the horse.

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    1. Thanks, Bob. I don't normally paint horses as greys, but I figured that this model would be too dark if I put him on a chestnut or similar. It worked out quite well, I think!

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  4. What wonderful figures! King Richard is superb - is the shield handpainted?

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    1. Thank! The shield has a home-made decal for the lions, with a bit of weathering added freehand over the top.

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  5. That is two Lovely painted models.... great work.

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    1. I'm very pleased with the way that the models turned out. Not so much with the photographs, though - I'm having great difficulty getting good light levels at this time of year.

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  7. Excellent modelling.
    I've always struggled to imagine Crusader cavalry.
    The accounts describe near unstoppable cavalry charges, but also a terrible wastage of horses.
    It seems likely that many horsemen were mounted on pack-horses or ponies.

    However the King would certainly have had the pick of the mounts, so a powerful grey seems quite appropriate.

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    1. Thanks, Steve. I seem to remember that one of the minor military orders showed their devotion to poverty by mounting 2 men per horse. Perhaps this was making a virtue out of a necessity?

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  8. Excellent modelling.
    I've always struggled to imagine Crusader cavalry.
    The accounts describe near unstoppable cavalry charges, but also a terrible wastage of horses.
    It seems likely that many horsemen were mounted on pack-horses or ponies.

    However the King would certainly have had the pick of the mounts, so a powerful grey seems quite appropriate.

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  9. That has to be the best Sheriff figure I have ever seen and very nicely painted too. Its snowing again here today this has been a terrible month.

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    1. Well, I can't really take credit for the model - the sculpt is superb and I've pretty much copied the colour scheme from the North Star site. Low cloud and gusty here today.

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  10. Nice work. I particularly like King Richard, very smart.

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    1. Thanks, Irqan. I think he probably needs a few retainers or brothers-in-arms (no Saracens, though!)

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  11. Fabulous addition, the Sheriff looks wonderfully menacing.

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    1. Funnily enough, he looks a little like a system administrator I knew in a previous job :-) .

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  12. Nice additions! If your on facebook check out the Crooked Dice Robin Hood themed board they have had made for Salute. It looks great.

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    1. Thanks, Simon. I recognise several of the same miniatures as I use for Robin Hood et al. Old Games Workshop figures, but still hard to beat!

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    2. .Classic figures are sometimes the best! The board is great as well. Lost of fun places for swashbuckling and deft archery :)

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  13. When I saw your new Sherriff Iimmediatley wanted to boo andhiss at him like the pantomime villain he's made out to b, so you've obviously done such good job on him.

    Richard involvement with the whole Robin Hood thing leaves me cold and uncaring like the real Richard as you point out. Your figure of him though, on the other hand, looks great and just the type of heroic leader you want leading your forces !

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    1. I agree; this Sheriff is a thoroughly bad lot. My Richard is definitely the legendary returning hero rather than the callous, absentee landlord, though!

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  14. Nice job on the shield. Are they decals or freehand? Regardless, they look realistic! :)

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    1. Thanks! The shield is done with a home-made decal as a base, then freehand "weathering" has been applied on top of that.

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