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To be honest, I feel that the biggest gap in terms of late Napoleonic period Prussian cavalry is the lack of 'mainstream' dragoons, uhlans, and landwehr dressed in litewka coat and covered shako.
If we disregard the completely out-of-scale and truly useless Italeri 'Prussian Light cavalry' set, then there are only three sets of Prussian Napoleonic cavalry dressed in campaign gear in 1/72 plastic; two of these are very early HaT, and there is no chance that that maker will have a go at re-making these sets any-time in the next 10 years (unless they are taken over perhaps). The other is the 'at ease' Strelets set, good, but....at ease.
I'd suggest that Strelets have a go at the mainstream stuff, ideally in 'useful' poses - which would sell very well, I predict - before embarking on more one-off units.
I would like to see Strelets take on seperate mounted command sets for the Allied, French & Prussian armys of 1815.
Obviously the "celebrity" generals of course, but also at divisional & brigade level. (Hill, Rebeque, Maitland, Halkett, Kempt, Bylandt, Kruse, D'Erlon, Reille, Lobau, Kellerman, Donzelot, Marcognet, Bülow, Zieten, Tippelskirch, maybe even a Lützow figure etc.)
However I am not sure if Strelets are keen on sets like that anymore. The horses would have to be top notch, what with being figures that draw attention on a diorama or wargame tabletop.
I wholehartedly agree Minuteman, in terms of making much more battle ready Prussian line cavalry, as I was disappointed with the Dragoons & Hussars. Apart from the horses I liked the Uhlan set.
Lets have all them sabres drawn, resting on shoulders moving forward at the walk or trot!! Or of course charging.
Some of the Landwehr cavalry looked the same as the line Uhlans, but there were some that had their own distinct look, like wearing stovepipe shakos, coats that were single breasted, and of course the distinct landwehr caps.
I only highlight the 3rd Silesian Landwehr cavalry as these guys did not have the usual Shako but a Czapka version of headwear with plume & cords, dont seem to have been wearing their Litewka coats at Waterloo, & all 4 squadrons of the regiment looked the same, compared to just 2 squadrons of the 7th Uhlans. They were also active at Plancenoit.
Its a regiment that would take too much modifying of existing sets to make it. I know some have paint converted the Crimean Russian Uhlan set, but I find some of those poses a little wild, plus I am hoping for something more in line with how recent Uhlans have been made or all poses ready for the charge or indeed charging.
The Waterloo 1815 sets are good as far as they go, but not very accurate. I use them for Napoleonic Hussars, but not Prussian ones. The HaT set are pretty accurate, but the horses are not great. But they are better as Prussian hussars on campaign than the Waterloo 1815 ones, so I use them just as it says on the box.
But the point is, these are not Uhlans, Dragoons or Landwehr, which made up most of the Prussian cavalry.
Fantastic Gerd! A lovely mix of figures and poses producing an excellent result. It's wonderful how you changed nominally 'at ease figures' to active ones, adding in a few conversions too (I'm wracking my brain to recall which figures they are based on! :).
As James & Mark have said Gerd, some wonderful figures there. (Pictures didn't load up on my browser earlier for some reason, so couldn't see them).
However as I mentioned before & as Mark has hinted at, conversions are ok....if you have the time & skill. Not everyone has, or in fact wants to mess around with scalpels etc.
I don't mind doing some conversions, even making some regiments from scratch, but I don't want to keep doing it all the time. I enjoy painting the figures, not performing Frankenstein like operations all the time!
My main focus (which perhaps has gotten a little lost), in this thread was the 3rd Silesian Landwehr cavalry. I already pointed out that this was a hard regiment to convert properly. For a start we are not just talking putting czapka style heads on Prussian Uhlan bodies...as they don't seem to have been wearing their coats. There is also the large plume & shako cords/braiding that would need recreating.
Fact is if it is ok to have a set recreating just 2 squadrons of the 7th Prussian Uhlans, why can't there be a set for the entire regiment of the 3rd Silesian Landwehr cavalry?
Having these sets offering a unique regiment, sometimes also having a unique look to them, offers someone a nice change to the run of the mill sets every now and then.
Yes, I already understand what you mean. If you want to recreate this special regiment of the Silesian Landwehr cavalry, then this is very expensive. Because in addition to the special chapka (it is a bit narrower at the top, so-called Polish cut), all the fishing lines must be shown. If you look at the ZVEZDA sets of the Polish lance riders or the Russian hussars, it becomes clear how many cords such a rider had on his uniform, with which various pieces of equipment were secured so that they were not lost during the gallop.
I used the STRELETS set of the Prussian uhlans as a basis for my uhlans, but cut the lances away and replaced them with thin pieces of brass wire. I also cast several dozen new heads out of resin and placed them on the figures with metal pegs. That was a lot of work ... and took a lot of time.
Basically it would be great if Strelets produced a set of the Silesian Landwehr Uhlanen. But over the years I've just realized that I don't want to wait any longer for this or that set to appear ... and instead I have created the means to be able to build (almost anything) what I would like by making modifications.
This also put an end to the wait for a good Prussian artillery unit for me. I just created it myself...