Steel Fist Miniatures’ dollies

Perry Miniatures’ late medieval plastic sets are generously provided with heads (seventy different apparently) and arms bearing all kinds of weapons from bills to bows to various pole arms, swords, maces, etc. Consequently there will be plenty of spares after assembly of the plastic figures from each box.

Cue Steel Fist Miniatures with a range of headless and armless ‘dollies’, designed to fit with the Perry Miniatures range. I ordered five sets, initially to augment my mercenary crossbow and hand gun armed figures, and to fashion gun crews for my Front Rank canons.

As you will see, the sculpts are very finely detailed, and, I would say, very slightly shorter and very slightly leaner than Perry Miniatures’ plastic and metal figures. This is an observation rather than a criticism, and I am really looking forward to assembling a few of these to see how they look when combined with Perry’s heads, arms, and weapons.

Steel Fist Miniatures’ standing retainer dollies …

… crouching and kneeling retainer dollies …

… retainer dollies in brigandines …

… dollies in padded coats …

… and men-at-arms dollies.

Steel Fist Miniatures (centre) compared to Perry Miniatures’ plastic and metal figures – very slightly shorter and slightly leaner.

Timely inspiration

I first became interested in the Wars of the Roses in the early 1990s. I bought some books and a handful of Wargames Foundary figures, painted a few, but allowed the project to be eclipsed by everything else that was going on in the early years of my career.

Thirty-odd years later my interest has been rekindled by a rule set, Andy Callan’s Never Mind the Billhooks. As the collecting, modelling, and painting of my Sudan project drew to a close (for now) I began re-reading a few histories of the late medieval conflict, and then, right on time, Graham Turner announced his fabulous new volume The Wars of the Roses: The Medieval Art of Graham Turner.

At the end of last year I ordered a small host of Perry Miniatures’ late medieval metal and plastic sets. This year I have ordered some Steel Fist Miniatures’ dollies, mainly to make use of the many spares from the Perry sets, but also to fashion gun crews for a couple of Front Rank canons.

With the arrival of Turner’s book I have everything I need to get cracking.

Cover and spreads from Graham Turner‘s magnificent volume.