Firelock has just announced 3 new bundles to help new and veteran players build-out their forces for Blood & Plunder. The debut of these new boxes is also the debut of a new style of article here on DMC. So join me as we take a look at each of the new starters and ask: Will It Build?
Quick Links
- Bundle Breakdown – Bundle Contents
- Sea Rovers
– Blackbeard’s Men, 200pt
– Reformed Spanish Militia, 150pt - Caribbean Natives
– Miskito Zambo, 150pt - Colonial Military
– British Militia, 200pt - Bundle Value
Bundle Breakdown
Before we dig into each bundle individually, lets get a quick rundown.
- 3 New “Intro Bundles” – Sea Rovers, Caribbean Natives & Colonial Military
- 5 Sprues of 6 Plastic Miniatures per box
- Nice-ly priced at $69 US MSRP
- 2 new sources for the ‘Box of Plunder‘ sprue!
Plastic Flexibility & ‘Counts As’
Blood & Plunder is very forgiving in its rules for “counts-as” models. So long as the model is equipped with the proper main weapon, you’re legal. This means that not only can any plastic soldier or sailor be assembled as any nationality’s soldier/sailor unit, it also means that a Militiaman with a musket can be used as practically any unit in the game.
3 Sailor Sprue (18 minis)
2 Militia Sprue (12 minis)
1 Box of Plunder
This kit gives a solid mix of your typical pistol-and-melee Sailors, and “Colonial with Firearm.” Because the Sailors kit comes with a lot of options, it would be good to point out that you are getting the following other weapons choices from those 3 Sailor sprues:
Sailor Sprue – Build Options
18 Pistol & Melee (6 per sprue)
12 Brace of Pistols (4 left-handed pistols per sprue)
12 Muskets* (4 per sprue)
6 Lances* (2 per sprue)
3 Blunderbus (1 per sprue)
3 Explosives (1 per sprue)
* 1 Musket and 1 Lance are mutually exclusive – per sprue
It’s a bit daft asking “will this build” because it’s the most flexible of the kits by far.
With the Box of Plunder containing “Skinny Beard,” the most obvious choice is to pick up a plastic Bermuda Sloop (with Reinforced Bulkheads) and build a Blackbeard’s Men list…
SkinnyBeard’s Big Stretch – 200pt Blackbeard’s Men
Blackbeard himself is a swanky, 32-point commander, and I am admittedly, not his biggest fan. We’re “stretching” a little to reach 200 points, but I don’t want Blackbeard taking up 20% of my force on his own. We’re using all 30 models here.
Pirates are a boarding force, so even though we’re stretching, we don’t want to invest into cannons. Especially since Artillery doesn’t benefit from Blackbeard’s Cold Blooded. We’ll still grab swivels though, because To Hit: 6+ is the best we can do, and Expert Artillery Crew lets our swivels keep up with Fast Reload. Poor man’s Flibustiers; build 2x units of 6 Pirates each.
To add even more ranged capability, our Militia becomes a mob of 12 Jamaican Privateers.
We round out the list with 6 Roundsmen, upgraded to tote Buccaneer Guns in addition to their Brace of Pistols.
San Francisco Romeo – 150pt Reformed Spanish Militia
To show off how flexible this bundle is, I also built a 150pt Land force with nary a Sailor in sight.
To do that we look to the Reformed Spanish Militia, and we build all lances for a unit of 6 Lanceros with a Hidalgo fighting man.
From the remaining kit, we need to build 20 muskets. That’s 8 of our remaining Sailors with Muskets, plus the Militia kit. Build 2x units of 6 Hostigadores, plus the Mission Priest, and another 8 Soldados Avanzada.
Our commander for this is Francisco Romo de Uriza. Sure, Inspiring is overkill with the Mission Priest right there, but adding Elusive to get a unit of Save 5+ Hostigadores is just good fun.
The whole list leaves us with 4 Sailors left over that you can use to jumpstart the next expansion of the force.
5 sprues of Caribbean Natives (30 models)
1 Resin Native Commander
Being handed 30 plastic natives is pretty much a whole force ready to go, if you want to play the more Central/South America themed tribes. You can build all of their units from this kit, with enough weapon options for:
Native Sprue – Build Options
30 Bows (6 per sprue)
20 Thrown Weapons / Spears (4 per sprue)
20 Heavy Melee (4 per sprue)
20 Muskets* (4 per sprue)
* Per sprue: 3-of-4 muskets are specific to bodies C, E, and F. For this reason, I recommend building any desired musket units first to ensure that you have enough bodies.
The plastic Natives also come with enough head options to make the entire bundle as African Warriors. Which brings us to our army list – a winning tournament list at 150 points.
King Jeremy’s Miskito a Go Go – 150pt Miskito Zambo
As I said – build your muskets first. That’s immediately 15 or 20 guys down the hatch. I leave the choice to you, because Miskito replace Slow Reload with Poorly Equipped, which is far easier to work with.
This makes our 3x units of 5 Warrior Musketeers into little terrors, able to keep up high quality shooting at a cheap cost.
Even more, Jeremy’s own unit of 6 African Warriors can benefit from his Well Equipped and ignore the penalty altogether.
You could choose to leave his Africans with bows, however. It does not change their points cost.
After that, build out the obligatory “Warrior Missile” armed with Thrown Weapons. If you built Jeremy’s African Warriors with Muskets, then you should still have enough of the more universal spear hands. Build 8 Warriors with Spears. You’ll have two models left over; hold onto them for future expansion.
If you would like to read more about the Miskito Zambo, head to the faction review here on DMC!
3 Militia Sprue (18 Minis)
2 Soldier Sprue (12 Minis)
1 Box of Plunder
If you’re willing to have some real scruffy lookin’ Soldadoes Reformados, you could build out the Spanish Army list that won the Adepticon land tournament in 2024. Personally, I find that to be a little generous with the “counts-as” rule, so I want to find a list that mixes Militia units with Regulars – oh look, British Militia: North American.
Take ‘Em to Church – 200pt British Militia
This list is tournament-ready, bringing the potent combination of Ben Church‘s Very Inspiring with force-wide Tough thanks to a Grizzled Veteran joining our 10 Provincials. You can also pull this trick with Read Elding for 4 less points, but he gives up the huge blanket of Mobile, and an extra Command Point.
The rest of the force is “just” 3x units of 6 Indian Fighters each, carrying Thrown Weapons for extra impact on the charge.
The drawback to this force is that despite being 200 points, we only have 4 units. This is something that you’ll notice from all of these boxes; with just 30 models on frame, plus the characters and extras that we get from the Box of Plunder, we’re really tight on model count. The best we can do is 5 units of 6. We could get that with this force by splitting the Provincials and stripping some upgrades, but I don’t feel that it’s worth it just to be able to say you have 5 units.
If you want to read an overview of all the traditional Army factions, you can find one here!
Should You Grab One Two?
At time of writing, there is a BOGO sale going on until Aug 17, 2026.
However, even after the sale ends, these bundles offer a solid value. You all know I love my math and my cost per model, but the unit sprue alone are a 5% discount. On top of that, you’re picking up a free Box of Plunder or the resin commander.
One of Firelock’s major challenges, is competing with their own resins. The quality of Firelock’s resin is so high, that it’s no surprise to find players willing to pay a premium over plastic.
There is also a certain unfair criticism of the plastics, which I myself am guilty of: they’re generic.
The resins offer unit-specific sculpts, whereas an “all plastic” force would be difficult to tell apart.
But look at the lists we made today. They all feature large numbers of the same unit types:
– 12 Pirates + 12 Jamaicans + 6 Roundsmen
– 12 Hostigadores + 8 Soldadoes Avanzada + 6 Lanceros
– 18 Indian Fighters + 10 Provincials
– 15 Warrior Muskets + 8 Warriors + 5 African Warriors
In each of these lists, each unit has a distinct sculpt or distinct equipment. Your Hostigadores can be built from Sailor Musketeers, for example.
These bundles are set up to appeal to both new and returning players; even if you don’t need a Box of Plunder, it’s still cost effective – and now you have a freebie to entice new players into the game! Picking these up on sale is all the sweeter.