Ships from Valiant

Yet another new arrival:

These miniatures are from the Ramming Speed line from Valiant Enterprises.  At 1/900 scale, they are right between the almost too small (for me!) 1/1200 ships and the oddly shaped 1/600 line from Xyston.  I just can not put my finger on why the Xyston ships look off to me, but I am finding that I really do not want to work on them.

The variety of ships above were selected in order to flesh out my idea of what types of miniatures from Valiant could fill out the roles for Tékumel naval gaming.  Since the Valiant selection is limited, I am being careful about filling those roles in a fashion that is easily identifiable on the table top.  The information on the Valiant website has the triremes at the same length as the quinqueremes, so I am hoping that the wider beam of the quinquereme will make up for that.


Here is a comparison pic:

Each square is ¼".

Lots of good news in this pic.  The triremes are slightly shorter than the quinquereme, which is good.  Also, the triremes have a noticeable difference in beam from the quinquereme, and this will alter even more once the oar banks are attached.

 In my mind, the ships types will correspond in the following fashion:

     The pentekonter from Valiant (not shown above) will represent the Tékumeli séscha;

     Triremes will be the srügánta;

     Quinqueremes will represent the qél;

     Heptares and dekares (not pictured above) will be the Tékumeli zírunel.

The Valiant ships are plain enough that modifications will be easier than on the Xyston models - I intend to try to make some ships that look something akin to the ships illustrated in this wonderful post about Tékumel naval actions.



Although it seems simple, that bit of organization posted above is a weight off my shoulders!

New project, and old

Just a quick pic or two:

On the left, my new 1/1800 ships from WTJ, with a pair of extras that were sent just in case some of my order fell afoul of a production problem.  Awesome service from WTJ!  Now, for some primer...

And on the right, one of my 1/600 Xyston ancient vessels, and assorted bits.  I am going to take another look at this scale for my Tékumel naval project.  One item that I can see already is the size of the 'castle' from Xyston.  It seems to be slightly small.  A scratch-built replacement might be in order.


Lastly, the Tékumel naval project got another boost with this:

I finally purchased my copy, and I am looking forward to reading through it again.

Langton ancient ships

And now, a closer look at the Langton ships:

Deceres

Octeres

Hepteres

These are among the largest ancient ships that Langton makes.  For Tékumel, they will fill the role of the zírunel, the largest of the common classes of warships.  I believe that there are larger warships plying the oceans of Tékumel, but they are rare and I will not worry about them, for now...

Roman quinquereme

Carthaginian quinquereme

Quadrireme

Trireme

The next step down in size, these are slated to represent the qél for my Tékumeli navies.  I was pleasantly surprised to see that the relatives sizes of these miniatures are very close.  This will allow a lot of variety, not only for different navies but also within a particular empire's navy (Langton has other miniatures of this size that I have yet to purchase).

Liburnian

Trihemiolia

Hemiolia

These three miniatures are markedly more narrow than the previous four, as well as being slightly shorter.  For Tékumel, I think these will work as the srügánta, although the hemiolia is a bit smaller than the other two and might be better as a séscha.  Out of these, the liburnian is especially appealing with the stern platform.

Overall, I am quite pleased with the appearance of these miniatures.  There is still work to do, as the representation of a séscha is not fully set yet, and there are a couple of trireme variants I would like to look at before setting it all in stone (heh) for the building of some flotillas.

Fantasy naval, part 2

The first flotilla of Langton Miniatures (ordered through Waterloo Minis) has arrived:

They are looking good so far; I just need to sort them out by size to match their Tékumel counterparts.  I think that I will need a few more samples as the smallest ships types might not be covered...

Fantasy naval, part 1

The first set of ships has arrived - from Valiant:

A trio of Heptares.  Although a length for the miniature is given on the Valiant web site, I was still surprised at them.

Here is a closer look:

Looks like assembly will be straightforward, although I seem to have too many starboard-side oar banks (see the bottom ship in the above pic).  I will send off an e-mail about that.

No matter what scale I finally choose, and I can see using a combo of 1/900 (for larger ships) and 1/1200 (for the rest especially cargo ships), I intend to use some of the ideas found here.

Something missing?

Over on one of my other blogs, I have been slowly working on a system to create a fantasy naval collection based on Tékumel, which can be seen here.  Unfortunately, I have found that I really do not like the Xyston ships that I had originally purchased, and my source of very inexpensive Xyston ships dried up, so I am investigating a different scale.  And, recently I found these:

No actual ships though, which is a bit disappointing!  (These are bases for Langton ships)



I do have a selection of Langton ancient ships on order, and some Valiant ships as well.  I will be posting pics and info here and the other blog, so apologies in advance if you are one of the few that will getting multiple posts on the same subject matter...

Projects

It has been a little quiet here at this mini-shipyard, so as an aid to get back into gear I'm listing the current naval projects:

1. 1/2400 Armada - The discovery of some long-lost Hallmark ships was a pleasant surprise, but I have not done anything else to them since. The two small squadron packs contain plenty of ships for now, but I am thinking of spicing them up a bit. I discovered just the trick for that - Tiny Tin Troops has a set of flags for Armada-era ships, so that has been placed on the To-Buy list. After that, just some paint and a set of rules then I'm set!

2. 1/2400 Ironclads - Ten Italian ironclads have been mostly finished, and there are 8 Austrian ships - 5 armored, 3 unarmored - waiting. I'm hoping to try a variant of DBSA to start once some Austrians are done.

3. 1/3000 WW1 - Still work to be done on these Baltic squadrons. Rurik and Novik are still not finished, and most of the German ships are only partially complete. These, however, have been stashed away since my recent move, but just a smidge of work would get this project afloat. DBSA will be the starter rules for this project as well.


And now for the 'other' naval projects I have been puttering around with lately:

4. 1/600 Tékumel naval - Fantasy gaming in the world of M.A.R. Barker - follow this link for a little bit of info.

5. 1/1200 Half-Continent naval - Also known as Monster Blood Tattoo or The Foundling's Tale, this set of novels details a blend of the fantastic with alchemy and the 18th-century. More information on my take of the story here.


Apologies for the lack of pics, and thanks for all the votes and comments on the previous post!