Der Kriegspielers catalogue....1977/1978

A hobby friend, Terry Schneider, sent me the scans some while back and, post divorce and house moving I have finally managed to upload the scans on the copies he sent me. Full cudos to Terry. These were a loose set without binding.

More on Der Kriegspielers here; http://www.deartonyblair.co.uk/search/label/Der%20Kriegspielers

As always; enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk

Minifigs Sword & Sorcery - 1970s revisited.....just the cavalry for now....

The old designer, Richard 'Dick' Higgs apparently sculpted using solder and a 25 watt soldering iron....the Sword & Sorcery range was one of the earliest fantasy ranges (their ME range in 1972 was, I believe, the earliest) based on the works of Robert E Howard...they even changed the names at some point after legal wrangles...I'd love to know more.......anyway, I'll start with the cavalry....pics of what I have and blanks of what I'm missing...as time goes on I'll hopefully fill the blanks in. The Lost Minis WIKI has some more pictured here but still not all....help! If you can correct anything misidentified let me know please! There was an early catalogue with a page of pics however my copy has disappeared and Richard (Stuff of Legends) Hale can't remember giving me a xerox of the relevant page ....aaaggghhh!!!

SSC1 Cimmerian Light Horse with (missing) spear (I think)

SSC2 (Caravan City Lancer) / Cimmerian Light Horse with sword

SSC3 Zamporan Spearman

SSC4 (Eastern Empire Light Horse) / Eastern Light Horse Lancer

SSC5 (Eastern Kingdom Heavy Lancer) / Eastern Heavy Lancer

SSC6 (Eastern Empire Mounted Officer) / Eastern Officer

SSC7 (Eastern Empire Imperial Lancer)  / Eastern Standard Bearer

SSC8 (Eastern Steppe Nomad Lancer) / Hykranian Light Horse   

SSC9 (Steppes Swordsman) / Hykranian Officer

SSC10 Poitevan Knight with lance

SSC11 Aquitanean Knight with Battleaxe          

SSC12 (Western Kingdoms Mounted Knight) / Aquitanean Knight with Standard           

SSC13 Mid Western Knight with lance

SSC14 (West Midland Kingdom Knight Lancer Mounted) / Mid Western Mercenary

SSC15 (West Midland Kingdom Mounted Standard) / Mid Western Standard Bearer

SSC16 (Southern Grassland Kingdom Bowman) / Shemite Horse archer

SSC17 Shemite Officer

SSC18 Vandan Lancer

SSC19 (Kingdom of the Hind Mace) / Vandan Officer

SSC20 (Desert Brigand Tribe Mounted Horsebow) / Desert Horse Archer

   

   

SSC21 (Desert Brigand Tribe Chieftain) / Desert Officer

SSC22 Hill Tribesman

SSC23 (Eastern Free City State Knight Mounted) / Khojan Knight

SSC24 Khojan Lancer

SSC25 Khojan Officer

SSC26 (Black Kingdom Mounted Spearman) / Kushite Spearman

Not sure which these 2 are although they are (pretty certainly...) from this range.....

Edit - he's from the Alexander Nevski range. Lots of compatible figures in that range once Dave gets them all re-released.

(possibly SSC26) - thanks to Tim Peterson for correctly identifying this one below.

'The bottom picture is not from the S&S range, it's the later style adopted after they redid the old PB ranges, and is from a Personality range. It is presently available as IRCX 3 Dacian King.

I double checked with Caliver Books. (I was originally wrong as to the code, but I knew the series it was from.... from about 40 years ago. Gad I'm old, I still think of it as new...'

I had to leave the last bit in just to remind me that I'm not the only old school hobbyist around :)

If you can help please give me a shout on enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk

Lord Dozy of the Dragon Isles......I've painted myself.....

As a follow up to the earlier post, I've now painted the TAG Tudor mini...great fun and I have a few more of the associated range to finish....previous post about them here.

  

The actual sculpts below and more details about the adventure from Pete Brown himself here.

All now available as part of Tudor Pack III....get a piece of me folks whilst they're still hot!

As always; enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk

Fantasy Wargaming a la Tolkien by Gary Gygax

From Panzerfaust magazine, September /October 1973. I hope you can make out the text. Gary Gygax was then the 'Miniature Warfare Editor'. Interestingly he makes no reference to any line of miniatures so I assume he was avoiding the Miniature Figurines (Minifigs) ME range as that was released in 1972. I wonder if he had not heard of it at the time which baffles me. Was there a reference to any range in his Chainmail rules? Mine are in storage for the time being......

I added the front and rear pages plus the contents as a taster. A good article on the magazine is over on The Tactical Wargamer.

As always; enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk 

Greenwood & Ball Catalogue - 1975

Well, I have finally found a piece of software to edit photos on the new laptop......one that I can almost understand. Window Photo Viewer has changed so there are no editing tools like the old simple crop I used all the time......God Bless Irfanview. It's given me an easy way to crop and rotate scanned catalogues....no longer will I have to post wonky pics! On to the goodies......picked up off eBay recently I thought it would be good to share. The errata sheet at the end shows the first pictures of a new range; 'Sword And Sorcery'. I was 14 at the time and didn't discover them till the next year or so. John Braithwaite was the 25mm designer for Garrison, the wargame figure area of Greenwood & Ball. He was, apparently, a lifelong smoker, as was the habit in those days ......my own parents were never without a Player's No.6 either in their mouth or being lit up......great for us children as the vouchers that came with them would allow us to choose gifts from a catalogue...much joy had over Timpo plastics turning up in the post.......halcyon days indeed. Cancer took John in the late 70s however his sculpts live on. Rob Young currently has most of the old molds over at Garrison Miniatures although that site is now closed for business. Rob has left a potted history of the company here and is carrying on as usual in the hobby himself with his own worthwhile blog The Eastern Garrison. As Rob has taken down the catalogue, check out the Lost Minis WIKI listings here.

Hopefully you can save the files and view at your leisure. Enjoy!

As usual; enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk