The Prince's Own Regiments

The Prince of Estria maintains two regiments, both based in Orlezzo: the Granatieri della Guardia Principesca, and the Veliti della Principessa. Both have turquoise coat colours, the facing colours being green for the Granatieri and blue  for the Veliti.

The Granatieri della Guardia Principesca, commanded by Pierre-Paul André, Chevalier de Montcarnet, guard the Palace at Orlezzo and serve as the personal escort for the Prince and his family. Like most Estrian "regiments," there is only one batallion. Recruitment is largely from Orlezzo and its environs, with cadres of veterans recruited from the grenadier companies of the Dukes and Grand-Dukes of the Principality. They are considered the elite of the elite.

The Veliti della Principessa (Colonel: Friedrich Adelbrecht, Ritter von Adlerberg), unusually, boast a strength of two full batallions. The first batallion garrisons the City of Orlezzo, and serves as a municipal police and firefighting  force. The second batallion mans the guns of the city fortifications, including the outer shore batteries that command the seaward approaches to the city. Recruitment is largely from Orlezzo, but the second batallion includes heavy  artillery specialists recruited from across Europe, and the officer class, at least, has a somewhat international flavour. The fusilier caps sported by the first batallion are a fairly recent introduction. The Colonel is rather keen on them.

Back again

Well it has been a while since I updated things in Estria.I have been away from home for much for most of this year doing fieldwork for a project I have been waiting for and hoping to begin for over a decade, and it looks like the that will continue for the next 3-4 years.

Nevertheless, I have been able to tinker with the Principality a little now and then. And now that HaT's Seven Years War sets are slowly marching to their muster points, I have been doing up some uniform plates, preparing for the day I can finally put paint to plastic.

So far, I have done plates for the Prince's own two regiments, and for the forces of the smaller Duchies. For the armies of the Grand Duchies, I have only done the cavalry so far. All plates are based on the excellent uniform templates you can see over at "Not by Appointment."

Back again after a business trip

A couple more character sketches done, but otherwise nothing new to report.

Next time I get the graphics bug I will probably work on some combination uniform/standard/regiment name images, like those you know so well from the Defiant Principality (http://what-if-catalonia.blogspot.com/). To my eye, those Catalonian uniform/flag plates are extremely attractive, and also a blog-friendly way to go. For uniform templates, I expect I will use the very helpful and attractive templates from Not by Appointment (http://nba-sywtemplates.blogspot.com/).

In the meantime, the intrigue game is still, as always, very much on my mind. I am looking forward to seeing the Estrian nobility screwing each other big-time, both literally and figuratively, in the run-up to the coming electoral conclave.

In which regard, does anybody have any experience using the VASSAL game engine? In particular, has anyone ever designed modules for it?

I have downloaded VASSAL (but not installed it, since I would be running it on a different computer). It looks intimidating but potentially very flexible and possibly adaptable to an intrigue game. It seems like it can be used as a moderated PBEM game engine, and possibly also, with refinement, a stand-alone real-time online game, possibly without a moderator. Does anybody here have any thoughts/experience?

Arms and Flags for the Fifth and Final Duchy

That would be the Ducato di Rimaldi. The double-headed eagle on the coat of arms displays the sword-and-key so emblematic of the Rimaldi dukes.

Rimaldi, like Marignac, is a small duchy with a small army, so it was quick work to do up all their standards.

First, the Reggimento di Fanteria di Rimaldi:

Next, the Reggimento di Fanteria del’Estroponte:

and the Reggimento di Fanteria della Fera:

and finally, the guidon of the Reggimento dei Dragoni Ducale:

And that is about it for designing arms and flags for Estria. I do have to redo the arms of Brescegna, but that is a matter more of execution than design.

Time to move on to other things: those interminable character sketches, and also rules for the intrigue game!



and so it goes...

I am up to 22 character sketches, a little shy of 20% done. For the flags, I can't look at those dolphins any more. I have now blown them up a few 100 times, greyed them out and I am slowly tracing them out with finer lines.

In the meantime, to cleanse my palate, I thought I would try something easier: The Duché de Marignac.

Maroon and grey/silver is the theme here, and this will play out in the Duchy's uniforms and standards as well. In fact, since the Duke fields only a tiny army, with two regiments of foot and one of horse, I can clear the standards in pretty short order.

First, the guidon of the  Régiment des Dragons du Confluent (maroon coats, powder blue facings):

Next, the Régiment des Fusiliers des Trois-Villes (maroon coats, grey facings):

And the Régiment des Fusiliers des Saints (maroon coats, salmon-pink facings):

Finally, there is also the small Compagnie des Artilleurs du Duc:

Their standard mostly gathers dust in the depot but now and then they bring it out on parade. Maroon and  black.

To me, the regimental standards of Marignac have a slightly archaic look, perhaps more 17th century than 18th. But that's okay, a little archaism doesn't hurt. Maybe I should go whole hog with the archaic theme and use outmoded GNW figures for the Duché de Marignac. Any thoughts?

more arms

the arms of the Granducato di Brescegna. This is the concept, anyway. The mermaid and especially the dolphin images were small to start with, so they end up looking coarse and heavy-handed. The mermaid is okay, but I am not all that happy with the dolphins. If I can find higher-resolution ones that I like, then I'll re-work this. If not, I'll live with it.

For some reason I insist that the heraldic dolphin supporters be in this doubly-embowed diving position, like on an old lamp-post. But sadly, it's not common to find drawings of them like this. The mermaid reminds me very much of one that has already been used in an Imagi-Nation: specifically, the lascivious creature on the flag of the Presipality of Monte-Cristo. I expect mine is derived from the very same image. 

...but there will still be banners and battalions....

Rather to my surprise I finished six character sketches this evening, that's 18 done in total. So to take a break from that, it's back to flags. The fleur-de-lys ground looked so nice on those cavalry guidons I decided to try using it as a ground for some Anchoise infantry flags.

Yes, I know, another flag design with terribly obvious historical precedents. Then I tried plonking the Anchoise arms in the middle of one of them:

Check it out! I wasn't going to go that route, Originally, I was planning just a simple white cross on a facing colour ground. But I like the look with the arms added. And they move the design one step further away from historical French, which is good. Yup, I think I'll add the coat of arms to the others, too.