the Miniature World of Mike Peters

 

Flags of War  pic: BW04 the mounted Grahams and BW 21 the mounted Warden

Border Wars- Under a Reiver Moon

For me and for Ruckus, 2026 will be the year of the Reiver! I have been writing the Ruckus version of these “Pirates on Horseback” for a little while now and some extensive playtesting shows that they work! The Border Reivers, these “Perverse and Crooked People” are perfect for Ruckus. Primitive firearms, basket hilted swash-buckling swords, little shaggy ponies that can run for miles over the worst possible terrain and a penchant for revenge make for some excellent adventures.

I will be presenting a Ruckus of Reivers at Partizan, Attack, Colours, Crack Con and Reveille this year as a Participation and as a Demo game. I will write more on this in a future blog

These warlike aggressive border people fought each other for three hundred years and  created blood feuds that endured for generations if not centuries. Their only real livelihood came from rustling their foes’ cattle and robbing their houses. Any money they accrued they spent on the finest weapons and armour available.  Pic the Hot Trod Angus McBride

Such law that existed in the Region was applied by local Lairds on the Scottish side and Lords designated as March Wardens by Parliament on the English side of the Border. It was ineffective and often corrupt. This all makes for some excellent gaming opportunities.

There are several manufacturers producing appropriate figures Colonel Bills has some lovely quite distinctive figures link here

https://www.colonelbills-store.co.uk/

And so do the Assault Group https://theassaultgroup.co.uk/

But without doubt my favourites are those from Flags of War

I have recently started collecting these marvellous figures and being curious about the origins and thought behind them I contacted Iain McDonald, whose middle name, incidentally, is a Reiver name- Kerr, and we were soon chatting merrily away. Iain is a very friendly, immensely likeable man who is passionate about the hobby and the Reivers history, and an hour passed in what felt like minutes.

From the website- “Flags of War is a small business that began in 2011. It began when I was painting some Covenanters and required some flags. After researching the period, I drew the flags I wanted using my laptop. When folk started to take interest in the flags I made and asking to purchase them I began a small website selling my new flags. Flags of War is now one of the most extensive miniatures wargame flag suppliers in the hobby.”

Flags of War-Border Wars -Under a Reiver Moon is Iain’s own skirmish game of warfare set in the Border regions and is a scenario led, narrative game in a similar vein to Ruckus. The rule book is packed with illustrations, maps and scenarios and is worth purchasing for the history alone,  best of all, Iain has produced an extensive set of characterful metal figures for his game.

Iain says he likes friction heavy elements in his games and thinks that frustration is a more engaging aspect of play than success! He says “I can remember more of the losses than the wins, but then I don’t very often win at my own games”  I know how he feels!

The FOW sculptor is Rob McFarlane who is also responsible for the lovely WGA Conquistadors,  and Iain has plans to produce a Reivers conversions set to use with these figures to make them a closer fit with the historical Reivers. The set would contain Targes, bonnets, alternate helmets and other various pieces. 

The figures are beautiful works of art. They are all characterful but retain a human physique, no giant heads or ham fists here and they appear in a variety of poses and postures.  Weapons and helmets are  faithful copies of the real thing. They are reminiscent of the very wonderful Bloody Miniatures

One of the excellent aspects of this range is that for every Mounted figure there is a dismount. Every Mounted Figure has a unique steed, all the horses are all sculpted slightly differently from each other which I think is another excellent detail.

BW 15 Grahams Mounted. Conscious of the ever-increasing price of metal, the resourceful McDonald has a plan to use the plastic WGA horses alongside metal FoW mounted Galloglass figures to create some Irish cavalry, a plan that will no doubt be welcomed by all who game this era as I know of no one else who does Irish Cavalry.

Iain also plans to produce extra Targes in resin, another welcome idea as the lighter resin shields will be considerably cheaper and more practical than metal and will adhere to a figure much more securely.  

BW 03 Grahams on Foot. Iain is presently working on version 2 of Under a Reivers Moon which will introduce interactive NPC’s  “Angry civilians, Romany Gypsies, a Gypsy Queen, Barber-Surgeons and Spies. These will be activated by Player Characters proximity and will have a predetermined set of actions or reactions and to prevent Players simply avoiding them, will be moved randomly each turn.

The present Reivers range will be increased by 10 -12 figures with “more Bad Guys” and Characters from the novel Dish of Spurs by Robert Low. Set in 1542, this story follows Mintie Henderson and a one-armed, grizzled fighter named Batty Coalhouse navigating the dangerous "Debatable Lands". Iain plans for there also to be an alternative two-armed Batty figure for those Players who wish to play the back story.

BW 14 the Irish. There will be a range of Elizabethan Irish War figures including FoW metal Gallowglass mounted on WGA horse and Elizabethan Soldiers. The existing Irish range, a very lovely set of figures indeed -see my previous blog, will be increased by the addition of more Character types- a Piper, Priests , Lords etc. https://wilgut.blogspot.com/2025/01/flags-of-war-border-wars-fighting-irish.html

The Queens Envoy BW 30 Iain says he has been tempted to extend the Queens Envoy figures with a possible Queen and maybe a certain tall Lord Chamberlain, however he “does not want to get too deep in the fantasy aspect for what is after all an Historical game” Personally, even if it is for a different period, I would love to see a McAdder figure!

Iain has written and has as WIP several other games including a 1970’s Street Wars game and a game of Smugglers, both of which already have some figures sculpted.

stl’s A small range of Reivers characters such as a Thief, a Spy, an Assassin, civilians, animals, as well as an excellent multipart Garrison Men set can be found as downloadable stls on Ian’s myminifactory website link below. These are every bit as excellent as the metal figures and as soon as I have a set I shall blog them.

In my next post shall cover our preperations for the participation ngames and look at the individual figures that make up the different sets and discuss how I painted them

https://www.myminifactory.com/users/flagsofwar

https://www.flagsofwar.com/collections/border-wars/miniatures