Green Martians - backstory

Here's a topic that is so far off-canon for Space:1889 that I almost hesitate to mention it.  Almost ...

Black Hat EMP401

The Meandering Intro
The fact is that I love the look of the four-armed giant green martians from Black Hat and I've been looking to find a way to squeeze them into My Mars somehow. I mean, what could be more typically Martian that a big green creature with four arms? No, I never mentioned Barsoom, not me!


But, being a slave to rationality (not to mention one with time on his hands), I needed to have some justification or backstory to have them on my oh-so Chadwickian Mars.

Black Hat Octosaur vs Hexosaur

The solution came to me when I was tinkering with a couple of ocotosaurs (stop sniggering at the back!), basically removing the rear pair of spindly legs and converting them into hexosaurs.  I think it's quite an improvement for a small investment in time. Just my ha'pennyworth.



But I digress.


The said tinkering led me to thinking about the triceratops-like hexosaur which looks like it might worm its way into my collection if I'm not careful. And how the giant martians also have six limbs. And how their mounts have six limbs as well (or they will once I chop the rear ones off like I did with their smaller cousins). Then the thought occurred that this might be a very different branch on the Martian evolutionary tree; one with six-limbed creatures, hexapods if you will, rather than the "normal" four that is seen elsewhere.

So far so good, but how had these escaped the notice of Earth explorers and, more importantly, how are they absent from Martian records?

Then ideas fell quickly into place, involving some sophisticated selective breeding, experiments that-are-not-permitted-for-a-very-good-reason, rioting mobs, coverups, evil geniuses (genii?) looking for the Ultimate Weapon, and other pulpy goodness in general. I think there might also have been a "bwahahahaha!" in there for good measure.

The Backstory Bit
The rapid evolution of hexapods was kickstarted millennia ago, as the seas receded and Canal Martian scientists were looking for a way to improve drought resistance in domesticated animals. Their experiments mostly involved selective breeding of a variety of six-legged rodent-sized creatures that already survived well in arid conditions. Some of their work was very successful indeed, enabling them to breed quite large creatures that could be bred for food or used as beasts of burden and yet still survive extremely dry conditions. In fact the experiments were so successful that some scientists strayed across a line-that-should-not-be-crossed, and attempted cross-breeding between Canal Martian and hexapods. Against all the odds they were successful. How it was achieved is not known - those records were destroyed long ago - but they had succeeded in breeding creatures about the size of a roogie that were fertile and even bred true. The creatures had a bipedal stance, and both pairs of upper limbs had the standard Martian hand (three fingers and a thumb). The upper pair were capable of finer manipulation than the more muscled lower pair. Their intelligence was soon bred and trained to the level of a young child. And there the work stopped. The hubris of the scientists knew no bounds, but the religious establishment determined that abominations had been created. Overnight there was a huge backlash against the scientists. Laboratories and breeding centres were attacked and razed. Anything that moved, whether it had four or six limbs, was killed and thrown into cleansing fires. Records were destroyed. It became a taboo topic. It never happened.

Of course not all of the more remote research stations were ever found; stations that became more remote year by year as the waters receded and the lands dried ever more. Some of the breeding stock survived, and even thrived in the dry conditions. They were never huge populations but they were large enough to be self-sustaining and life was challenging enough for the bipedal forms to evolve in size and in intelligence.

Then about two Martian centuries ago (that's about 300 Earth years) the Worm Cult came across some strange writings concerning a time of cleansing, and started to look for remnants from that time. For some years there had been tall stories from Hill Martians about large green devils erupting from the desert. Not unnaturally these had been discounted by civilised types, but the hints were suggestive enough for the Worm cultists to locate a couple of tribes and to nurture them, hoping to develop them into a tool to destroy civilisation and return the planet to the chaotic state they craved.

And what a tool they have found! By dint of further breeding they developed warriors that now stand over three metres tall, and that can tear a man's head off with their bare hands. They are not rocket scientists, but they certainly aren't stupid either. They are hardened desert warriors, with cunning and a natural gift for combat. When they ride to battle, it is on large aggressive war mounts. They can appear from the deep desert, strike hard and then disappear again as if they never existed.

The next step in the appearance of the Giant Martians was when the Worm Cult was able to negotiate agreements (alliances would be too strong a term) with several High Martian clans, and migrated some Giant Martians family groups to live in the rugged canyons of the highlands where they would be difficult for sky navies of civilised states to find. That was the point at which their numbers started to explode - what looks rugged and parched to a Canal Martian is a land of milk and honey to a Giant Martian.


The Wrap
This all explains why the Giant Martians have only been a problem for Canal Martian for the last 40-or-so Martian years, since about a generation before the arrival of the Red Men. Any records that still exist are either buried very deep or phrased in such a way as to mean nothing without knowing a lot about the context. And if anyone does know the context, they aren't about to have their dirty racial laundry washed in public - it would again be a matter of great shame to the Canal Martian psyche. Thus the Giant Martians have, in effect, burst out of nowhere, and they are starting to run amok.

The Worm Cult now works hard to keep them supplied with weapons, ensuring they cause general mayhem and destruction where they will. High Martians recognise that they can get their Giant Martian neighbours to do a lot of hard fighting for them and will often tag along, providing airborne support (an area where Giant Martians are vulnerable). If the Worm Cult have a specific task in mind for their Giant Martian allies (for they are no longer clients) they will deploy small detachments of their robed cultists to maintain focus.

Linguistic footnote - the Parhooni word for a Giant Martian translates as "man-and-a-half", referring both to their height and to the number of limbs.



This post has rambled  on quite long enough, but I'm quite happy that the general outline will let me add Giant Martians to My Mars without it disrupting the background. In fact I think it makes it a lot richer for the purpose of wargaming, but I'm biased.

If you're unfortunate enough to game the Space:1889 background in 25/28mm, you don't need to feel left out - there are several figure suppliers out there who are ready and willing to help you bust your budget! *evil cackle*


Comments and improvements always welcome!

Daa-nuu

Per the Space:1889 canon large quantities of metals, and thus cannon, are fairly rare on Mars. I have posited elsewhere that this is not due to lack of skills, but a shortage of resources and lower levels of atmospheric oxygen (which make smelting that much more difficult). It's not that the Martians are backward, it's just that they can use their limited supplies of metal more efficiently on other things.

But being an ancient and inventive people, could they not have come up with other ways of protecting missiles with an intent to do damage? (That's "shoot things" for those of you who aren't yet awake.)

Why not torsion engines? Basically we're talking giant arbalests or "Daa-nuu" as they are known in Parhooni

Classical Antiquity
Here is an interesting site with a ¾ size working model of a Roman stone-throwing engine. It mentions that the model (a "medium" engine) can throw a 3-pound ball 200+ yards. Without intending to belittle their efforts in any way, if weekend reenactors can achieve this performance then I am quite sure that thousands (or even a few tens) of years of practical development would easily top that. Josephus mentions a Roman engine with a range of up to 400 yards in his Jewish Wars, for example.

These engines varied in size, from 10 minas (over 9lb missile weight) up to 2-talent monsters (over 100lb). These were the field and siege artillery of classical antiquity! (Lots of wiki goodness here!)

The Daa-nuu
OK, but how would these fare on My Mars?

Wood to make the frames isn't exactly abundant on Mars, but it's not scarce either. Metal could be used for the small parts where required (nuts/bolts, clamps, ratchets, ...). The skeins used for the torsion by greeks and romans were hemp, hair, leather or animal sinews, and I could see the tendons of gashants and ruumet brehrs easily being of the size and strength necessary. Alternatively my jee-oo is a material that naturally resists deformation, so perhaps if properly harvested and preserved it acts as the perfect skein for a torsion engine.

So what might be the downsides of such machines?
- Maintenance was apparently difficult in classical antiquity, with damp being the number one headache. That one's not much of an issue on Mars at least! Wear and tear on the arms and the skeins are also mentioned, but these are at least renewable resources, and I'm sure that Martian skill and ingenuity could get round some maintenance issues. It's still a weapon that requires some technical expertise, but so are cannon.
- Range might be a problem, being outranged by cannon and not out-performing martian muskets by much, if at all. This reinforces the need for daa-nuu to be area effect weapons: there's no point one engine trying to outshoot ten musketeers if all it can fire is a 10lb rock, and that more slowly that a musket can reload.


Missiles - what would daa-nuu fire?
They can fire stones obviously.  If you want some obstacles knocked over they'll do the job, but they aren't going to have much effect on anything solid like a city wall or an entrenchment. I'm pretty sure a 20lb rock travelling at speed would give even a ruumet brehr something to think about.

How about an explosive shell? Space:1889 canon is silent on these as far as Martian technology goes, but perhaps that's the fault of extant Martian metallurgy, with shells being unable to survive the pressures of being fired from a cannon. But being fired from a daa-nuu is a very different prospect and should be a simple manufacturing job. They could even be a ceramic casing, with a simple burning fuse to light the breaching charge. Pack in a few sharp objects as well, if you want lots of shrapnel. That should keep musketeers' heads down!

How about gas of some description? Or smoke shells? Perhaps flashbangs (or caltrop-filled) to disrupt gashant charges? The only limit is Martian ingenuity.

Deployment
I would see daa-nuu being deployed behind walls and in entrenchments, and masked from artillery fire until the enemy starts to close. Their main use is to break up enemy attacks.

They might be wheeled for improved manoeuvrability, but they are tall and bulky by the nature of the drums/skeins, so I can't see them being horse artillery analogues. You might be able to mount them on a solid cart, but this just raises their profile and makes them an even easier target for artillery. That might still be a handy way to use them against the more backward hill martians, of course.

Daa-nuu would work well on the back of a ruumet brehr as well, as there is far less recoil than with a cannon, and they are also MUCH quieter.


Modelling
In terms of modelling, there are plenty of companies that make them, with the Essex "30 mina bolt or stone thrower" (XEQ12) being a good size for my Black Hat figures. Unfortunately there's not a photo on their website, so you'll just have to believe me!


Again, that's my shilling's worth.  All comments and suggested improvements gratefully received.

Edit July 2015
See my Hojaan-nuu I post discussing rocket-assisted munitions that would work well fired from a Daa-nuu. But bigger, of course!

Big Guns

As I collect my minis and pile up an absurdly large painting queue, I got to thinking about guns and cannon.  As you do.

I have several of the Black Hat guns, and they are lovely, but the hover sled idea doesn't really do it for me.  I can't see liftwood in My Mars being used in this way.  It's pricey stuff, it wears out over time, and just think of the recoil - it may negate gravity, but inertia's a killer! So I had resigned myself to using the crew with some Old Glory SYW Ottoman cannon (in 3 sizes) I had lying around.  As you do.

So there I was, reading the latest post on the Warlords of Mars blog here, and revelation struck me.  He mentions "heavy guns" and "Martian artillery stationed in the Keep and the gun towers" and I realised that the models really are of quite large guns, and that my Martian guns might be placed into fixed positions.  The grav sled was suddenly converted in my mind to the return carriage of a fortress gin.  Simple!    

All I would have to do is build the recoil carriage and a way of traversing the gun ... something along the lines of the is 10" Columbiad from Freikorps, but make it more Martian.  As you do. 

Nice concept.  But what was I going to use?  It took a couple of days to collect ideas, but in the end the materials were surprisingly easy to amass. 

 

Materials:
- A 3cm x 4cm base (all my figures will be mounted on 3cm frontage bases)
- A couple of matchsticks
- An old coke fizzy soft drink bottle top
- Two 15mm diameter MDF bases (mine are 3mm thick), but I'm sure washers would do the trick just as well
Oh, and the Martian gun of course. 







First I marked out the approximate dimensions of the assembly on the base, drawing a cone (actually the segment of a circle) with a 2cm diameter for my purposes.  The degree of traverse is limited, but I'm only looking to make an impression here rather than a fully functioning model.

Then I cut the matchsticks to length (30mm) and inserted the offcuts as spacers to add some width and stability. The two round bases were glued together to create the impression of a rotating drum. This will also add some height, and also allow the gun to fire over a 1/2 inch parapet. The depth of the base, the two disks, the matchsticks and the height of the gun model itself come to about 14mm below the barrel.  You may prefer to have the gun nearer to the ground, but this arrangement works for me.

I cut a segment out of the coke bottle top.  This was to represent a runner to support the rear of the gun while it traverses.  I cut it slightly taller than the height of the drum to allow the rails to angle down towards the front, and sanded the edges smooth before glueing it over the end of the cone. The curve isn't a perfect fit, but it will look fine from a distance!

Then I drilled a guide hole through the centre of the rotating drum and at the apex of the cone, and then threaded a piece of wire through both to help position the drum in the right spot.  The matchstick "rails" were then glued to the underside of the gun sled.

Then I glued the gun sled and rails to the base assembly.  Once dry I also used the guide hole for the drum to drill and pin the sled to the rest of the assembly. just to give it a bit more solidity.  

Add the barrel, and hey presto; one fortress gun!























Not the clearest of photos, but it should look good behind a wall.  



I'll still use the Ottoman wheeled carriages for my field artillery, but I am truly glad to have found a use for the Black Hat guns. 

Thank you Warlord Mike for the inspiration!

Gashants III

Yes, I'm still in the land of the living, but this working lark has taken its toll on hobby time.  It's hard to believe that it's over 6 months since the last posting.  Anyway, the inestimable Rodrick Campbell fired off my order of gashants in very quick order, but they have been languishing on the work table since then.

However  today I bestirred myself to actually do SOMETHING, and that something is shown below.

There was a certain amount of clipping and filing to do on the saddlecloths of the Black Hat figures, and  I also had to trim around the reins and saddle on the gashants, but all of it was quite simple. The most difficult is the pinning of the rider to his mount, but I imagine that's just me. After an hour's work for the first four, it's looking like a good fit and I'm glad I went down this route.  

They still need some filling with green stuff around the edges of the saddlecloths, but they're almost ready for the painting queue.

So a big thumbs up from me for the marriage of Black Hat riders and Highlander gashants.

EDIT 15 May 2014: I should also add that Mike Lewis at Black Hat was happy to send me packs of eight riders (without Octosaurs), so this is looking better cost-wise too!

Gashants I

Gashants or Octosaurs?  Of course as  a fan of Space: 1889 there isn't really a choice to be made.  My problem, rather, is how to amass a herd of gashants in 15mm.

Gashants from Highlander Studios

Rodrick Campbell over at Highlander Studios Inc does some lovely ones.  That's it.  Period.  I haven't yet spotted any bipedal dinos that might do service with a little work, so Highlander is the only game in town!  Unfortunately for me, they cost US$ 10 per pack of four gashants with tack and harness.  I really don't begrudge him the money - as I say they really do look good - but by the time I pay import duty they'll cost more than twice as much as a pack of 4 Black Hat octosaurs (£3 per pack, and that includes riders).  That's not even looking at postage across the pond versus across the channel. (Did I mention that I am Scottish?)  And I want lots of them - more that 60 easily.  Plus artillery draughts (probably).  So I really need a different solution.


Given that I already have the Black Hat octosaurs, I really should look at ways to convert them without it becoming too much of a chore.

Here are the three variants of octosaurs in the Black Hat range:

First impressions in term of work needed to convert them are that ...
- The posture of the octosaur is much more horizontal than that of a gashant
- The larger pair of rear legs on the model are very vertical.  Gashant legs are much more digitgrade in shape, and bunched under the torso nearer the centre of gravity
- Octosaurs have four appendages too many - but the small forelegs look good for a gashant conversion
- The octosaur's head is wrong - it needs to be more bird-like
- The neck and tail should have frills
- The tail might be a little heavy, and not long enough
- Gashants have really enormous thighs and rear ends.  And I mean HUGE.  (Weightwatchers should branch out and sell plans for the reduction of gashants' thighs and bums!)


Anyway, that's quite a long work list, although the first two are probably the most serious issues.  Change the angle of the torso, and the rider's sitting position changes too, leading to MORE conversion.  I suppose that might tie in with the green stuff that will be used to increase the bulk of the haunches.  And if I have to rebuild the legs, how stable will the casting be once complete?

I'll work on this over the next few weeks and see if converting is really feasible with the limited time and skills that I have.

Shieldgunners

It's been a while, what with the real world taking its toll, and being distracted by the Boxer Rebellion.  But I have been tinkering with shield gunners, that trademark Oenotrian troop-type from Soldiers Companion, and I see no reason why other city states won't have borrowed the idea.

So here's what I have managed so far.

The raw materials are just a Martian Imperial Guard Halberdier - one with the halberd held close to horizontal should work best - plus a pavise from the Imperial Guard with guns.

I trimmed the halberd a few mm forward of the left hand, to allow the "shotgun" to project through the shield a bit.  I also bent the end of the halberd down to suggest a shotgun stock.  I then chopped and filed the pavise down a bit, and drilled out a hole slightly off-centre to take the shotgun.

And that's pretty well it.  Between the left forearm and the "barrel" you've got a pretty good surface area to glue the shield on, and here are three based up.  I think that the notch in the pavise/shield works nicely for the look.

Not too bad for 5 minutes work really, although I may add a shield strap if I'm feeling adventurous. I also have to decide out how to deploy them.  I may mix them with my halberdiers, as shield guns are essentially close combat weapons.

Jingals (San-bujaan)

"A jingal or gingall, (Hindi janjal) is a type of gun, usually a light piece mounted on a swivel; it sometimes takes the form of a heavy musket fired from a rest."

Here's how I'm making the "form of a heavy musket fired from a rest" as will be used by my Martians.  As always I'm using the Black Hat imperial martians. 

Raw materials: Figure firing from shoulder; pavise (from the imperial martian guard pack); a 28mm martian musket I picked up a while back from Bob Charette's Parroom Station range (two on a sprue); some skin and/or blood* 

*optional but inevitable  

Here are the bits I used:

First I trimmed back the stock and bayonet to make the jingal. I then hacked the musket off the figure, and "carefully" opened up a gap between right arm and body to accept the stock.  (That's where the blood donation came in.  Again.)  

Here's the half-way stage:

One of the two muskets is probably a bit short, so I'll see if it can be used for something else - perhaps an organ-gun or something.  It'll go off to the bits box for the moment.

Then assemble, with appropriate filing to fit, and mount on base with two other figures to maintain the 3-infantry-to-a-base ratio: 

I'm hoping that the pavise will help to secure and stabilise the figure.  I could have attempted a bipod/tripod, but the pavises weren't going to be used for anything else (and you get 8 in a packet for "free" with the Guards), so why sweat it?  It looks good, and I even get to use a handgun figure as a loader!

Polearm Infantry

I'm using Black Hat figures for my Martians.  It's a nice range; well-detailed and quite diverse.  You can find them here. 

There are three main types of infantry packs:
- Imperial Martian Guard infantry, with helmets and corselets and musket or polearm,
- Imperial Martians with guns or swords
- Askari with guns or swords
They have good command packs of each of them as well.  I'll get to mounted troops later.

So far so good.  I'll be using the non-guard troops as the mainstay of the army, and I need a mixture of muskets and pole arms. There are no polearm figures for the non-guard troops, and the packaging of the gun troops poses some problems.  Here's a pic of the contents:

As you can see three of the eight in the packet are armed with handguns, and I don't need handguns.  However I can use these handgun figures by converting them into polearm figures.  A bit of brass wire, a plasticard blade, et voila - here are before/after pictures:

My guns  and polearms are in a ratio of about 2:1, so I can use pretty much all of the figures. Being a Scot I hate wasting money on figures I can't use, so I'm glad I can use them pretty effectively.

They rank up pretty well, and hopefully the polearms will be fairly robust.  I'll probably replace the alloy polearms on the Imperial Guard figures with wire ones in due course.

Jingalls next - more conversions!