Mongol Stocktake and the future (toy) Mongol Empire.

Having painted some more Mongols lately I thought I'd take a picture of the lot. As it turns out there are 49 mounted and 12 foot, not much of a horde but it is a start. In any case, to date they have served as mercenaries rather than a power in their own right. i am also intending to use them as irregular cavalry to support my 19th century Boxers.

One thing I have noticed about quite a few of the better armoured Italeri ones is that they are also very similar to samurai. The addition of helmet decoration, such as horns, would clinch it. if I ever do a samurai wargame I would probably just use some of these Mongols as 'stand ins'.

In a wargame I played with mat a couple of years ago the Mongols were in a castle and had to dismount. I filled in the gaps in numbers of dismounted by employing American Indians with bos. In fact some of my Mongols are converted from the same. American Indians convert easily into light Mongols or Huns and Alans etc. Iam intending to convert some more eventually - it just involves cutting off feathers and loin cloths, applying some judicious putty to simulate trousers and fur hats and there you go. Of course in a wargame situation if I was desperate for light mounted bowmen I'd just throw in some Native Americans, feathers and all. There is rarely a shortage of Red Indians, given their long history of prolific toy production,from Britains to HK.