By chance I bought Neil Thomas' "One hour wargames" last year and got very inspired to start with historical wargaming. Being a warhammer-player for 20+ years, I have always been interested in history and played some dba and field of glory now and then. But this time it was for real :) Since I have only played Epic the last 10 years the decision for 6 mm scale was pretty easy. The choice of "period" was harder. At first I was thinking of SYW, but decided against it since I know that I someday will feel that it's kind of a "Napoleonic light" (a period I'm afraid of because of it's complexity). I wanted more different troops and units, which ruled out medieval, and I'm not very interested in "ancients" or ACW. WWI and/or 1870 will be someday. So there I was left with Pike n Shot! (Can't spell the R-word.) Being a Swede I went for the TYW instead of ECW.

At first I just wanted "some units to play NT's OHW with" but inspired by Richard Brezezinski's excellent book and spurred by a friend (with phd in history) I made big plans: A diorama battle of Lützen 1632. 
(After that I may paint some more units for OH-wargaming)

The rules aren't written yet, and the basing is somewhat irregular on 75 mm/3 inch for brigades/batalions, 50 mm for cavalry and single infantry regiments, and 25 mm for commanded muskets. It's more an approximation of how much space did X men need to stand in 6 ranks. The two armies Swedish and Imperial will be based on RB's battle orders. But more about this in later posts.

Anyway, here are some of the first units, until the glue dries under the grass of the rest of the Swedish infantry units. Since there weren't very many real uniforms the Swedish units (native/Finnish/Baltic and Swedish regiments with German/continental/Scottish soldiers) will mostly be yellow, blue or greyish, while Saxon/German will be black or sometimes green, but with some yellow to mark their allegiance. 

The imperial troops will be red or black and red, also a bit based on wheter they are Imperial, Leaugist or other troops in imperial service. 

The Yellow brigade. In the brigades I have tried to make the front pike formation and wing muskets roughly the same size in all units. Then based on the lists in RB's book I have placed "reserve muskets" and more pikes in the middle behind the front. And then added some more command models for show. The four front brigades have a regimental gun (but I have plans to make separate bases with those as well).

Thurn's brigade.

And here is all the "Swedish" infantry. Commanded muskets in front, first line with (from left) swedish, yellow, blue and duke Bernhard's brigades, first line reserve Henderson's regement, and second line with (from left) duke Wilhelm's, Knyphausen's, Thurn's and Mitzlaff's brigades. The models:men-ratio is between 1:20-1:25. 

(I don't understand why the picture is shown with wrong proportions :/ )

Very impressive looking units. I really love the way 6mm allows for diorama bases.