I know, I know, in my last post I laid out my plans for the new year, and honestly I’m not sure they’ve changed a lot in less than two weeks. Santa the gamer was quite kind to me. Actually Missus Kevin was quite kind to me. She rounded up the remaining figures I need to complete my LOTR project, elevating it to a must do wrap up. I’ve finished another unit of Cuban rebels for the The Men Who Would Be Kings. However, my time right now is pretty focused on The Hundred Years War.

I have few project interests in the Old World. No Romans or “ancients” per se. My Dark Ages SAGA stuff for sure. No Seven Years War or Napoleonics. They’re pretty, but a black hole of gaming because I could paint my entire life and never have enough. Nope, most of my interests are in the Western Hemisphere. AWI, Western Expansion, The Mexican War, Maximilian, The Spanish American War and it’s subsidiary effects. But that Hundred Years War thing.

I find it to be a fascinating conflict, incredibly complex, with roots more than a century before its outbreak, even back to 1066. It’s a war with terrific economic stress on both sides throughout the conflict. There are great kings English and French, ineffective kings, mad kings, great leaders, poor leaders, changes in technology, sea battles, great sieges, politics, politics, politics, usurpation, civil wars, civil wars within civil wars, and the emergence of France as the first true nation-state. It’s amazing.

And I have figures. A virtual shit-pile. How many? I have no idea. I am planning to remount them for Lion Rampant. Not a great rules choice for big battles, but I think I can make it work. Daniel Mersey is quite flexible in that way. But just to give an idea of how many figures I may really have, I’ve remounted six units of crossbows plus one unit of mixed missile and melee troops, two units of French local levies, for a total of 108 figures, plus four units of French mounted knights, and a unit of Irish skirmishers for the English. A total of 140 figures. A drop in the bucket. I was looking at my painted longbows last night and they number at least 200. Maybe a few too many. That leaves aside dismounted men at arms and various other wretched infantry, many mounted figures, plus all the unpainted stuff (which will likely be added as SAGA armies for the new Age of Chivalry factions.)

So I’ve got a lot of figures for the period.

What’s changed is that these figures have mostly laid fallow for the past decade, and now I’m super enthused about them. Maybe it is the imminent arrival of Age of Chivalry, maybe it’s the publication of the final volume of Jonathan Sumptions’s history of the Hundred Years War. I’ve also read Dan Jones’ excellent new bio of Henry V and recently ridden the Michael Livingston traveling circus. But something has fired up my interest in revisiting this project

I’ve begun to consider scenario plans to go with it. I would really like to do the Battle at Blanchetaque ford in 1346 just days before the Battle of Crecy. It would be a very different, interesting game. However it would require a lot of playtesting due to the unique nature of the action. I just don’t think there is enough time to do the remount and do enough practice to make a good game at this time. Instead I’m drawn to the Battle of Shrewsbury of 1403. It’s a battle between Englishmen during Henry IV’s contested reign and the sky will be filled with arrows. It should be fun, and I’ll keep you posted dear reader.