Greatcoat Guardsmen

Things have been fairly quiet on the hobby front as of late due to various real life things being in the way of my getting much of anything of note done, which will only get worse for the remainder of this month as it is the fiscal year end for my job which means lots of overtime. Great for the paycheck, not so great for any other aspect of ones life. This has lead to a chance to reflect on my army of little toy men and where the idea started, what has actually been accomplished so far, what has yet to be done with what I currently have parts for, and where it will go from here.

The idea for my army started at least 7 years ago when I received my great grandfathers equipment from the Great War (World War 1) from my grandmother. I have always had an interest in WWI and the history and this just furthered it. I had decided that I wanted to do a WW1 themed and inspired army for the Imperial Guard. It started with a few sketches here and there, some test figures, but it never quite had the feel I was after. I had other projects going at the time and never really fully committed to it. When I stumbled across Westwind Productions and their separate heads for their Secrets of the Third Reich game, specifically the doughboy style helmets with gasmasks, I knew that was it. The next biggest question were the greatcoats, which in all honesty is still a sore point since it just is not quite right and it bugs me.

Greatcoat guardsmen are a thorn in many a hobbyists side, especially if someone wants to keep their figures GW tournament legal. The best looking greatcoats produced by GW in my opinion are the Steel Legion miniatures, and even those are not full greatcoats. The biggest problem with these miniatures, as far as conversions go, is that they are pewter which makes converting them just that much more difficult. They are also expensive, and if you are like me and are not using missile launchers in your army, you will have loads of unused figures. If I had the money I would jump at the chance to use the Death Korps of Krieg miniatures as the basis for what I want to do, but like many others my hobby budget simply does not allow for Forge World armies. So the question remains, what does one do for greatcoat guardsman on a budget and keeping it legal to use in GW sanctioned events?

So far I have been using a mix of Brettonian Men-at-arms and Peasant Bowmen. With a bit of work and trimming the bodies of these figures can do a reasonable job for greatcoat guardsmen. My problem with them is that the regiment ends up looking like a rag tag bunch of guys because the uniforms are simply not uniform, and trying to pull together an Imperial Guard regiment without uniformity bothers me. So here I am with a bunch of figures converted up using the rag tag assortment of bodies with a strong desire for uniformity. So what am I to do, since Games Workshop apparently does not want to listen to the public outcry for greatcoat guardsmen?

I have a thought on that issue which will mean a lot more work on my part. My thought is to work up some greens in various poses with separate legs, torsos, etc., and cast my own conversion bits. GW has made it very clear that you cannot use miniatures from other companies in their sanctioned events, but it is fine if you scratch build something, so long as it follows the What You See Is What You Get rulings. So going along with this, who is to say that so long as I sculpt and cast them myself for my own use, that I cannot use figures that I made in sanctioned events? I have been scratch building and converting for some time now, but I have not attempted a full sculpt of figures on my own yet, so this may very well be a lesson in frustration. At least I am always pushing myself to do better and to broaden my abilities. Now let us see if I can find the time to do this between finishing up what I already have and where I am going with this.