I recently finished up painting a batch of British Regulars from the Blood & Plunder hard plastic Soldiers Unit Box and it’s time to share some pictures.
Blood & Plunder Soldiers Kit
The hard plastic Soldier kit can be built up several different ways. You can create 17th century soldiers with Matchlock Muskets or 18th century soldiers with Firelock Muskets. There are three hat options: floppy 17th century hat, grenadier hat and classic tricorn hat. There are options for plug bayonets for your matchlock muskets or socket bayonets for firelock muskets. There are also two options for cartridge boxes. I used the larger box on these minis.
For this set of minis, I built them as early 18th century soldiers, representing British Regulars or well dressed Provincial troops from Queen Anne’s War. While this kit isn’t as customizable as some of the other hard plastic kits (Sailors for example), it’s very well constructed and miniatures go together really easily and cleanly. This is probably the fastest and easiest set of minis to glue together of all the Blood & Plunder hard plastic kits.
The Paint Scheme
It’s surprisingly difficult to find images of late 17th/early 18th British soldiers in the Americas. There’s lot of great images from 1754 onwards, but anything before then is harder to nail down. I ended up using an image from the Osprey Men-at-Arms series as my guide.
The page on the L is supposed to be soldiers from 1705-1715, perfect for the time period covered in Raise the Black. I used the figure in the center as my guide.
The distinctive features include:
- Red coat and pants
- Blue cuffs and facings
- Light buff belt and straps
- White stockings (or blue)
- White cravat and hat trim
- Brass sword hilt
- Silver buttons
- Black shoes and scabbard
- Brown cartridge box
Paints Used
Nothing fancy here. I used a mix of Vallejo and Citadel paints for this project, using the standard Prime/Base/Shade/Highlight process.
Colors used include:
- GW Mephiston Red for coat and pants
- Vallejo Prussian Blue for cuffs
- Vallejo German Grey for shoes and scabbard
- GW Dryad Bark for musket
- Vallejo Steel and Silver for musket metals and buttons
- Vallejo Brass and Gold for sword hilt and belt buckle
- Vallejo Ivory and White for stockings, shirt and hat trim
- GW Mournfang Brown for cartridge box
- GW skin tones for flesh
- Vallejo Ivory and German Grey for eyes
I used GW blue, black, flesh, brown and red washes before highlighting with lightened base tones.
Complete Unit of British Regulars
Now I just need another 18 painted up for a full British Army force!
Had to add a little blood to the bayonet.
This unit is also a great Support Unit in the British Royal Navy which I play regularly.
The Officer from the Plunder sprue works well with this unit.
I hope Firelock releases this figure as a standalone model soon!
Final Thoughts
These models were fun to paint and I’m eager to get them to the table!
Now I have a set of Dutch and British soldiers. I have 4 more soldier boxes I need to paint up! It’s going to take a lot of painting to get full army forces for British, French, Spanish and Dutch!
I hope you enjoyed these shots of British Regulars for Blood & Plunder. Keep your eyes peeled for new regarding our annual painting contest coming up soon!
Additional Recommended Reading
- Guy’s Pirates of Legend Showcase
- Anne Bonny and Mary Read Miniature Showcase
- Complete Guide to Raise the Black Hard Plastic Sprues
- Blood & Plunder Sailor Unit Showcase
Great job! I’ve been wanting to paint mine up for a little while; this might be the kick of inspiration I need to get started.