Pups of War

    My pack of war dogs for Saga -- painted as various breeds

I have been playing Picts from Saga: Age of Invasions, lately. While planning on taking them to the upcoming tournament at Game Table Adventures on Jan. 15, I was looking into the rules for it. Surprisingly, mercenaries were going to be allowed. No "Legendary units or leaders," but mercs from any of the historical books would be allowed (in the armies that are allowed to take them, I assume). For the fun of it, I checked out which mercenaries my Picts would be allowed to take and was intrigued by the Molossians.

    Most of the figures are old Ral Partha (Iron Wind Metals now) 25mm miniatures

Molossians are a breed of huge dogs common during the later Roman empire. I believe every army in the book is allowed to take them as mercenaries, and the Picts were one of them. I am assuming this is to represent the local breeds of dogs -- not that Molossian packs were actually traded to as far-flung places as the steppes of Asia or northern Britain. Curious, I dug through my unpainted lead and found my bag of 25-28mm dogs. I had plenty enough, though none were huge Molossian-sized war hounds. So, what the heck, I decided. Why not?

I cleaned and primed seven of them (the handler makes the eighth figure in a warrior unit, and I would just use an ordinary Pictish warrior for him). While they were drying, I Googled "Dog Breeds of Scotland" to see what breeds might match the castings. Most of them were old Iron Wind Metals 25mm dogs. Some of the figures lined up fairly well with a Scottish breed, such as the Scottish Deerhound and Gordon Setter. Others were obviously other breeds, such as the bulldog miniature.

    The dog laying down is painted as a Gordon Setter, while the gray one a Scottish Deerhound

Since the only equipment the figures have is a collar (if that), they painted up rather easily. I did my best to match the images I found online, like I do whenever I paint animals. It's those little patches of lighter color or white that make miniature animals look right on the tabletop. I'm not sure if it shows up, but I even put a tiny, tiny dot of white on the black for their eyes. 

 I know the poses are a bit smaller than most 28mm figures, so I decided to create special bases for them rather than use my normal large squares from Litko. I pulled out the small green plastic circular bases that come with packs of Gripping Beast miniatures. Normally, I just give those to a friend, but the dogs fit perfectly on them. I gave them a circle of magnetic material first, then epoxied the figures onto the base and flocked them the way I usually do my miniatures.

    This pair includes a brindle-patterned Mastiff and a Doberman Pinscher

I think they came out pretty good. Are they historically accurate for a Fall of Rome era Pictish army? Yeah, probably not! However, I think they'll add a spot of color to games of Saga and certainly will give my Picts another tactic to use in games.