Perry Miniatures Wars of the Roses Militia Archers

I was asked to come up with some 'Welsh' militia for an ongoing commission, and wanted them to look distinct from the liveried 'factions' on the field of battle.  I needed two solutions really, as there would be two types of militia, which needed to look different to the factions, and different to each other.  The first solution was to go with mostly earthy colours, neutrals and 'vegetable' colours.  This was the approach I took to the Welsh spearmen (in an earlier post), now applied to some archers too;

The recipe was simple - no body armour (except for the captain), mostly helmetless heads (including some bare heads), and the range of colours mentioned earlier.  I like to put a story behind a unit, especially when I'm putting some thought into it, and the story behind these archers was that each unit was captained by either an old veteran (too old for frontline service) or else a younger knightly son, proving himself.  So the captains were armoured, though not as completely as a regular men-at-arms might be.

The head selection includes the 'Brian Blessed' head from the Wargames factory Viking kit (leftmost miniature, rear rank), plus the 'hatted' heads from both the WoTR kits and the 'European Mercenaries' kit.  Not visible in this image, but employed here and there, were some spare bare heads from the Warlord Games WW2 British Infantry set.

For the Captain with brigandine, I didn't want to clash with any of the liveries already being used - so I went with all-over green (sleeves too).  The locals would know him, and he'd not be important enough for the Heralds to recognise his badge anyway!