More Swiss to poke holes in the Cheese!

Here are some pictures of the reinforcements for my late-medieval Swiss army. These will fight Charles the Bold's Burgundians druing the 1470s, as well as Holy Roman Empire Landsknechts during the Swabian Wars at the turn of the century.

First up is a unit of Halberdiers in Open Order, which are supposed to be a moveable element in the Swiss Vorhut and able to negotiate some difficult terrain unpassable for the pikeblocks.

The black-and-white colour scheme shows that this unit originates from the town and bishopric of Basel. Although Basel was not formally a member of the Swiss Confederacy in the 1470s, they were closely associated and sent troops to fight the invading Burgundians. 

As Basel was also part of the Holy Roman Empire (as was the whole Confederacy, at least on paper), I mixed in some rather Landsknecht-looking types into the unit to show the south-German influence.  

Next we have another unit of Halberdiers in Open Order, but this time from the cantons of Zürich and Zug, which both had blue and white as their canton colours with the elements of red also used by Zürich troops.

These Halberdiers are rather lightly armoured to represent there tactical role as medium infantry. 

The poses of advancing models in the front rank and marching at-portée in the rear gives this unit a nice moving dynamic.

This Zürich contingent will probably be led by Hans Waldmann, the famous mayor of Zürich, which I intend to model as a command figure in the near future.

Last there are some foot skirmishers equipped with crossbows. These will scout ahead and screen the advance of my behemoth Swiss pikeblocks, hopefully disordering and killing some enemies with well-aimed crossbow shots.

The colour scheme of red-and-white implies, that this unit has been send from the cantons of Obwalden (Ober- and Unterwalden) to provide some ranged support for the melee infantry elements.

As visible from the composition of the units in multiples of 6, they are usable for Swordpoint as well as for Lion Rampant games. I am also quite happy with the Swordpoint skirmisher movement trays provided by Warbases.

All of these units have been painted on commision by my gentle painter Mike from Yorkshire. Many thanks to him again for his excellent work!

With these reinforcements my Swiss army is nearing it's completion. What is still missing is a unit of skirmishers with handguns, 12 front rankers for my Bernese pikes, a unit of close-order halberdiers and 2 commanders. Also some knights led by Duke René II. of Lorraine to fight at nancy are in the (longer) pipeline.