For historical gamers, the Ottoman Turkish Empire has much to recommend. The Turkish armies have some of the most exotic and colorful units you'll find and they bumped up against a multitude of other nation-states during their 500 year empire. For purists, there are abundant historical adversaries and also research materials to recreate armies and battles.
I chose Later Ottoman because I wanted to paint up a colorful army that would be significantly different to run from my other armies. The Turks delivered in spades! I'm not exaggerating when I say every unit in this army shoots, except for the camp. The emphasis on cavalry units means that you get a very fast AND shooty army.
Janissary handgunners: These superior handgunners are a "must have." In addition to rerolling 1s, shooting at an enemy with firearms means that unit tests at -1 during any cohesion tests in the shooting phase, regardless of whether they were actually hit by the firearms!
Azab Handgunners: You can't have too many handgunners in a medieval army so take these handgunners as well. These can be taken as average or poor. I take them as poor. While unlikely to hit, the smoke and sound of their guns can frighten enemy troops and inflict the -1 cohesion during the shooting phase.
Azab Archers: These fellows aren't discouraged at all to be using B.C. technology on an A.D. battlefield. They're decent skirmishers and a required unit in the Later Ottoman list. They have a job to do and they do it in high fashion!
Akinjis: You may have noticed I'm a big fan of Light Horse. How big? How about 20 bases worth in this instance. I used a trick painting these up. I chose 5 color schemes-blue, yellow, green, orange and purple-and repeated the patterns over the 40 figures that make up the 5 battlegroups. I'm very pleased with how these turned out.
Janissaries: Superior, protected, drilled, medium foot armed with sword and bow. Whew! I'm guessing they will be tough as nails on the battlefield and I can't wait to take them for a spin.
Qapu Khalqi Cavalry: These are the elite guard cavalry responsible for protecting the Sultan. Drilled, armored, bow and sword armed, they are "Death on Horseback."
Timariots: Timariots are the bulk of the Ottoman heavy cavalry.
While they'll have difficulty going toe to toe with knights in melee,
the trick is to retreat in the face of a charge and arrow your pursuers to death.
Serbian Knights: As if the Ottoman army isn't tough enough, you can take Serbian Knights as an ally. I figured with all of the medieval armies built around Knights, I better have a few stands of my own.
Commanders: In the Ottoman Empire, the more important you were, the bigger and more elaborate your headdress. My Minnesota Vikings ball-cap tells you everything you need to know about me, by Ottoman or modern standards.
Camp: I think you'll agree these tents are in keeping with the subtle color scheme of this army.
If you're thinking of painting up a medieval army, consider the Later Ottoman Turks. Their fighting style is radically different from the knight-centric armies that dominated Europe during this era and the wild colors speak for themselves-quite loudly in fact! As a bonus, a Later Ottoman Turkish army can easily morph into a Seljuk Turk army if you're willing to paint up additional light horse and heavy cavalry. It could also be fielded in the Renaissance era so you might say it's a 3 for 1 special.
This army is composed of Old Glory figures and I found these sculpts to be almost uniformly excellent. They are the best I've seen from Old Glory and were a joy to paint. I'm going to bring this army down to our club games for the next 3 or 4 months and see what I can do in the Medieval era. Only two weeks until I get to put them in battle so stay tuned!
