Miniatures remain the leading question for gamers coming in to Blood & Crowns. While there is a brief overview of designers in the ‘Getting Started‘ article, this article will hopefully provide you with enough information to confidently begin collecting a force, so that you are ready when Blood & Crowns finally hits your in-box or front door.
- Armor Styles
- Weapon Types
- Scale
- Bases
- Miniatures
– Perry Miniatures
– Claymore Castings
– Antediluvian Miniatures
– eBob Miniatures
– Foundry
– 1st Corps
– Gripping Beast / Front Rank
– Casting Room Miniatures
– Crusader Miniatures
– Black Tree Design
– V&V Miniatures
– Steve Barber Models - Honorable Mentions
– Foostore Miniatures
– Fireforge Games - 3d Printing
– Red Dawn Miniatures
– Reconquer Designs
Armor of the Age
Like the Crowns rulebook itself, I think it is pertinent to begin with a historical overview. So let’s talk about armor. ‘Blood & Crowns’ takes place in Western Europe, during the period from 1357-1453, with the Scottish at Bannockburn pushing the era back to 1314. The war began with many knights still wearing chainmail and great-helms, but quickly progressed until the war ended with men doing battle in full harnesses of plate. So although there is some overlap at the beginning and end of the period, the best way to work out whether a model will “look right” in Crowns is to aim for something in the middle of the two extremes.
For brevity, we can summarize these changes in 4 main ways:
- The rise of Plate – for those who could afford iron or mild steel armor, elements of plate had almost entirely replaced chainmail. Plate & Mail (platemail is an invented term) use chainmail only to protect the joints and gaps. Full Harnesses used segmented plate in these gaps, and rendered the wearer nearly invulnerable.
- The Bascinet – the helmet, not the baby furniture. With few exceptions, gone were the bucket-like great helms and elaborate crests. Bascinets are visored helms which began to incorporate gorgets and enclosing neck protection. Visors tended to be globular and round, rather than pointed and tapered. The “beaky” visors are earlier helmets but still suitable.
- No more shields – the triangular heater shield, carried with a short melee weapon – was gone. Shields in general were in decline. Sturdier armor made it easier to rely on your kit. It also meant using heavier weapons to defeat the foe; big swords and poleaxes needing both hands.
- Tabard, or not Tabard? That is the question – with all this fancy plate armor, some knights wanted to show off. English knights tended to fight in “white” or “alwhite” armor – polished, with no fabric covering. This style was also gaining favor on the continent, but not as quickly. Some speculate that this might be because they were facing English and Welsh war-bows, and the padded outer layer has been proven effective at taking the “teeth” out of their arrows. Long surcoats however, were almost certainly headed for the thrift shop.
The Footmen, Archers, Levy and so on – those are a little harder to “rivet count” and that is a good thing. It means that you can use a much wider range of miniatures for your lower-quality troops. Earlier Medieval stuff like The Barons’ Wars will do nicely, as will later War of the Roses footmen. Just keep an eye on the helmets, mostly.
Weapons
Once you have your armor picked out, you’ll probably have questions about weapons. Weapons of the age were manifold and deadly – axes, hammers, spikes, swords, polearms… Fortunately, the weapons available to units in Crowns are fairly simple:
Standard Melee Weapons (all) – single-handed melee weapons like swords and maces.
Poleaxes (Knights on foot) – bigass can-openers used with both hands. Generally a long haft, with a horrific chunk of metal on one end; blades, spikes, hammers, etc.
Polearms (footmen) – spears, bills, cut down lances, and the like. Not so good at piercing armor, but good for defensive action and for giving cavalry a hard time. The main difference between a polearm and poleaxe comes down to complexity of the weapon, and the guy behind it. You could likely count poleaxes as polearms on a unit.
Pikes (pikemen, duh) – a less common weapon in the game, most used by the Scottish forces. Long, pointy sticks. They ruin cavalry’s day.
Javelins (light cavalry, the Irish) – throwing spears. Only the Irish are desperate enough to use these on foot.
Bows (bowmen, mounted bowmen) – there are English and Welsh bowmen, and just plain “archers.” The bowmen get heavy ‘war bows’, but the difference is minor in terms of modeling. Be aware that many bowmen units can be mounted, but cannot shoot from the saddle – don’t be out there modelling steppe archers.
Crossbows Light/Heavy – like the war bows, light and heavy crossbows are pretty interchangeable when it comes to modeling. Light Crossbows can have horses, like the archers. Heavy Crossbows can have pavises.
sigh Pavises – there are two versions of these. The first is the Pavisier – some poor lackey carrying around the big shield and planting it when the unit is going to be charged. The second is a deployable shield carried by the crossbowen, which only gives cover. It’s “either/or” and not both. I would suggest that you do not model pavises onto your crossbowmen directly, but do model a few pavisiers.
Slings (Spain) – the Spanish do have a unit of Slingers available.
Improvised Weapons (Feudal Levy) – there is a unit of Feudal Levy, conscripted peasants using whatever they’ve got to hand. Farm tools, torches and pitchforks and the like.
On Scale
Scale comparison can be one of the most frustrating aspects of this hobby. Crowns is designed for 28mm figures, much like Blood & Plunder. But are those “28mm figures” you’re looking at actually 28mm – or are they ‘Heroic’ 28s, or just creeping closer to the widely accepted 32mm. Furthermore, some ranges are very visually “bulky” compared to others; particularly the old metal lines. Fun fact: the Firelock Blood & Plunder minis are closer to 30mm in scale.
Because blogging is not the most lucrative career in the world, I do not own examples of all the miniatures that I am going to list. Where I have been able to find information, I will pass it on to you. If you have firsthand experience with any of these ranges, I encourage you to leave your own comparisons in the comments.
Bases
Basing in Crowns is relatively loose. Most collector’s shouldn’t need to rebase. Even if you have multi-based elements for games like Lion Rampant, you might be able to get around it by using a few singles. Where possible however, aim for these dimensions:
– For Infantry: 20-25mm square or round. Preference towards 20mm round.
– For Cavalry: 25x50mm rectangle or “pill” bases
100 Years War Miniatures
Below are active lines of miniatures that are at least mostly catering to the era covered by Blood & Crowns. All of these land somewhere in the 28mm to 30mm range of sizes.
Perry Miniatures
Starting us off, we have Perry Miniatures. Firelock offers these directly from their web store, for those who want a one-stop-shop for Crowns.
The Perry brothers’ Agincourt line features 4 multi-part plastic kits, and a line of metals. The metals cover characters and “special” units or unique and dynamic poses.
The plastics handle your more numerous troop types. You can find our review of those kits HERE
The way that the plastics are packaged can be slightly misleading, as it is a mix of figures in each kit. French Infantry for example, are a must-have for any nation.
AO60: Foot Knights – 18x each, French and English Men at Arms. These are on frames of 6 models. Each frame includes 4 poleaxes, 3 polearms, and 2 standard melee weapons. The frames are interchangeable though. These same frames will be used in the other infantry boxes.
AO40: The English Army – packages 12x English Men at Arms (2 frames), and 24x Bowmen.
AO50: The French Infantry – packages 6x French Men at Arms (1 frame). Also, 24x Footmen wielding polearms, and 12x Footmen with either crossbows or poleaxes. Additionally, any 6x of the Footmen can be assembled as Pavisiers for your crossbows.
AO70: Mounted Knights – 12 cavalry. However, the split here is insane. You get 12 horses, 18 sets of legs, and 36 bodies. The intent is to build 12x Mounted Men at Arms in either the English or French style, and equipped with lances or hand weapons. Alternatively, you can match the extra bodies and legs to make 6 more lightly armored figures to use as either Mounted Archers or as Light Cavalry.
My recommendation is to buck the system a bit, and purchase 2 extra frames of the horses, listed as ‘B 29 Wars of the Roses / EA Horses‘. That gives you 6 more horses to make all 12x of the Men at Arms, and the 6x Archers/Lights.
Perry is UK based, their pricing is all in GBP, so conversions are going to vary daily. When it comes to pricing though, they’re a great deal – plastics will run you less than a dollar per mini, and metals are 6 for $10.
There are some US or North American distributors online. I was fortunate enough to find my plastic kits on Amazon, and they do come up there from time to time. The metals (and the extra horses) are almost exclusively through their direct sales though.
Scale: Perry are true 28mm although their plastics are known to be a bit “leggy” – skinny and tall compared to other lines.
Claymore Castings
Claymore makes absolutely gorgeous metal figures. They focus on the English and French during the early part of the period.
Stand-out offerings in this line are their royals and commanders, a characterful ‘horse holder’ for your dismounted archers, and the javelin men – who would make excellent Irish Kerns.
They also offer a line of transfer decals for heraldry, as well as French, English, and Scottish banners.
Based out of Scotland, this is another case of dodging exchange rates and suffering shipping costs for the rest of us. At $10 for 4 infantry, they’re not as cheap. The quality is worth it, however. Do note: spears are not included for any of these minis.
Scale: Claymore are shorter 28s, or tall 25s. They line up nicely with the Perry models, but are slightly shorter than the plastics.
Antediluvian Miniatures
Antediluvian makes some of the most awesome looking Scottish figures I’ve seen. Scroll past the ‘Early Islemen’ until you get to the Wars of the Bruce’s and then get ready to have your socks knocked off.
The offers here are Scottish Pikemen, Irish Kerns, and the Galloglass.The Bruce’s stuff has very dynamic poses, looking like they’re receiving a charge; hunkered down low and grim-faced.
They’ve got The Bruce of course, but the fact that they also include Douglas (looking like an absolute badass, no less) means that they automatically win.
UK based, as is the case for most of these suppliers. Like Claymore the prices aren’t cheap, but are are good for the quality of the sculpts – $10 for 4 minis. The only drawback is that – like Claymore – they do not provide the spears.
Scale: Heroic 28mms. They’re big, closer to Front Rank.
eBob Miniautres
eBob is another source for cool Scottish minis. They do have some English stuff as well though, as their focus is on the rebellions of Wallace and Bruce.
What stands out from this line are their characters, which are great looking. They do have blue-face Will Gibson-Wallace, but they also have Scottish and English pike, and Scottish warriors in proper belted-plaids.
Prices are also crazy low. How they turn a profit, I don’t know. 16 miniatures for $26.25.
Scale: 28mm and very slight. Reports put them at the same size as GW’s Lord of the Rings figures, which are known to be small.
Foundry Miniatures
Foundry was also sculpted in large part by the Perry Bros. It’s an older line and looks a lot like the old GW stuff. They would fit nicely with Casting Room.
The line is foot knights, crossbowmen, archers, pikes/spears, and armed peasants. They do have mounted knights, but they’ve got the classic problem of old Perry mounts: very small horses.
Price-wise, it’s 8 metals for $17.50. That’s not bad, but there are modern lines of minis for the same price or cheaper. You can also find a lot of Foundry stuff second-hand in places like Wally’s Basement at HMGS conventions; they’re kind of an ubiquitous “greybeard” line.
Scale: they’re chunky 25mm figures, tending to run a little smaller than more recent lines. And the horses are very small.
1st Corps
1st Corps, aka Curtey’s is a company that I’ve been watching for a while thanks to their range of 30 Years War figures. That’s not really what we’re here for though.
They don’t break out the 100 Years War as a separate section in their site. Rather, you just pick on ‘Late Medieval’ and scroll. The line does look very good though, even if some of it isn’t useful in-game yet; if we ever see a Hussite War release (wagons!) for the game, you’ll want to keep 1st Corps bookmarked.
1st Corps also offers up transfers and flags, much like Claymore does. Theirs come via Little Big Men Studio. LBMS has his own shop though, so you can check him out even if 1st Corps isn’t up your alley.
Cost is variable. They sell things in unit packs, and you can get a lot of models for not a lot of money; 24 peasants for $34.
Scale: dead-on with Perry metals, solid 28mm figures.
Gripping Beast & Front Rank
Gripping Beast acquired the Front Rank line a few years back, and has kept them in production since. The line is sold as single figures or in multi-model packs. When taken as a whole, the line is somewhat slim; Men at Arms, Footmen, Bowmen, Crossbowmen, Pavisiers, and some personality packs.
Pricing is converts to $2/miniature when bought a-la-carte, or a bit less if you bundle. This is another classic line of minis, and it’s good for Gripping Beast to keep them around for collectors. These are also large, sturdy metals. If you think some of the other lines in this article look a bit dainty, run Front Rank. I would consider using them for leaders and characters, so that they stand out on the battlefield.
Scale: big. 30mm or large 28s. Front Rank is known for big, chunky miniatures. They actually line up nicely with Blood & Plunder figures.
Casting Room Miniatures
Casting Room Miniatures is an old line of medievals. Their footmen are pretty good, but I would avoid the Knights. Anything in heavy armor is going to be a 3-way mix of Early Medieval, Late Medieval, and Renaissance armors.
What they do have, is oodles of charm. They have a wide range of civilians (some armed) and some characterful poses. They remind me of early GW stuff, back when they used to put cartoons in the margins of the rulebooks and give characters names like It’si Bi’tsi.
Scale: big ol’ chunky bois. They’ll scale nice with the Front Rank stuff.
Crusader Miniatures
Crusader has an absolutely tiny offering of Hundred Years War models, but it’s not the size that matters. Crusader are the one of the only places that I’ve seen Hobilars, or Mounted Crossbowmen. They’ve also got a very cool set of Irish Kerns.
And as far as affordability? 8 metal models for a hair over $14. That does need to be converted though, as this is another UK company.
Scale: a perfect match for the Perry miniatures, 28mm and slim.
Black Tree Design
Black Tree Designs stands out because they have distribution on both sides of the pond. This makes them enticing to those of us in North America.
The line a bit slim, but they do also offer the Hobilars. It is also split into Early and Late. The sculpts are nice, but they look a bit stocky at times. That’s also the effect of some of the armor.
Also be sure to check out their Fantasy line, for the ‘Men of Averaign’ – there are some archers and halberdiers in there, and I can’t really find what makes them any different than the HYW offering on the historical side. The mounted knights are a bit fantastical.
Pricing is not bad at $9.50 for 4 metal infantry, or $15 for 3 cavalry. Still, you’ll save a kidney on shipping costs, which could make up for it.
Scale: Pretty good for matching with other 28mm lines. Very close to Perry.
V&V Miniatures
V&V Miniatures has a growing line of 28mm 100 Years War figures of excellent quality. The armor style is a bit early in the period. The line is currently limited to only infantry figures. Unlike everything else here, these minis come as resin. V&V is working on offering the line in metal for you traditionalists.
It can’t be overstated that these minis are expensive. The ask is $15.54 for 4 figures, so very nearly $4 each. Frustratingly, all packs of foot knights include a banner bearer, so you only really get 3 “fighters” to use. They’re based in Germany (I believe) but they do have distributors around the globe, so shipping should not be horrible.
Scale: 28mm, but slightly shorter than Perry figures
Steve Barber Models
Steve Barber has a small, but very unique line of Flemish city militia in 28mm. With 6 miniatures for around $12.75, they’re fairly inexpensive. I haven’t gotten hands-on with these minis, but the photos does make the detail seem a bit “soft”. However, the uniqueness of Low Country Militia in this game is extremely cool, and the line includes a few named personalities.
Honorable Mentions
Below are popular lines worth calling out for being close to the right era, with some overlap. Although, it’s also worth mentioning that rivet-counters won’t drive to your house and harangue you for having the “wrong” era of figures. Even minis from other conflicts, such as the Hussite Wars or Italians, can be stood in using the Free Companies force list.
On the extreme end of this, there are people who would like to play Blood & Crowns but set their battles during the Crusades, or Viking Age. Personally, I may find myself using these rules for my large Samurai collection; especially if/when a War of the Roses supplement drops. Trying to cover those lines would be a fool’s errand, because there are so many options. Also, it would be an “unofficial” effort.
Footsore Miniatures
Footstore was previously mentioned for their terrain, but gamers have brought up their Baron’s War line of miniatures several times. If you’re wondering why they weren’t included: the Baron’s Wars were fought between 1216 and 1267. That’s 70 years prior to the outbreak of the 100 Years War.
Still, many units from the line would serve well enough as early Crowns figures. Notably the footmen, archers, crossbows, levy, and sergeants. Discard any models who look like they’re wearing a pot on their head, but otherwise they’re quite good – and I’m sure nobody will be too hard on you for including a few potheads.
Scale: Footsore are big, heroic 28s. They’ll go well with your Front Rank, Casting Room, and Antediluvians. A special callout to the latter; the Scottish Wars for Independence nearly overlap with the Barons Wars, being just 30 years apart.
Fireforge Games
Fireforge came onto my radar when they started getting attention from the other ex-Warhammer converts to Ninth Age. Fireforge does a lot of Crusade-era minis, and stuff for Eastern Europe during the same timeframe. This does mean that we’re talking about 13th century for armor again, but the same units – footmen & sergeants – will still carry over. Not only that, but in some areas, armor stayed light and still focused on chain. In Poland for example, some troops were still wearing chainmail into the 30 Years War of the early 1600s.
Even some of the Fantasy line can be pressed into service. The ‘Folk Rabble’ make good Feudal Levy. We’ll probably do a review of Fireforge here on the blog, and discuss using the Free Companies or other Unaligned factions to tackle some of the forces outside of Western Europe.
Scale: Heroic 28mm again, going nicely with Footsore, Front Rank, and Casting Room.
3d Printing
Welcome to the modern day, I suppose. I cannot claim to be an expert on 3d printers or 3d printing. I do, however, know where you can find some files.
All 3d printing is going to have some similarities – cost will always be cheaper than buying physical minis, provided you have a reasonable success rate with your prints, and you run off enough beds. Scale is also an advantage – you can literally scale up or scale down your STLs to match whatever line of minis you want.
Firelock is also offering 3d printed figures for Crowns. As that line expands, we’ll be sure to include them below, but for now, 2 characters does not a miniatures line make ;P
Red Dawn Miniatures
Red Dawn Miniatures offers a collection of over 100 minis for the 100 Years War. Some fo the characters are a bit fantastical and the knights are rather chunky, but the rest of it is quite grounded. It’s odd, but I think that my favorite part is the printable Pavise tokens.
Reconquer Designs
Reconquer Designs will be one to watch. They’re covering Spanish forces from the 8th to the 15th centuries (currently wrapping up the 11th century). That means they’re not at the Crowns period yet, but their miniatures are going to be great when they do get there. Maybe if we give them a nudge, they’ll speed up the timetable a bit for us?
Did We Miss Anything?
Are there any producers you feel we missed, or should have included? Also, do you have any experiences with scale comparisons that you feel differ from what we stated here? If so, let us know in the comments! We’ll check them out, and if they seem right, we’ll add them to the article. Hopefully, this will become a helpful repository for Blood & Crowns miniature lines going forward.
Dead Man's Chest 
Excellent article! Thanks for compiling all of these miniature options.
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