Europe Asunder – 100 Years War – 3D STL File review.

By Tom Burgess

Henry Turner is one of the most prolific 3D Files creators for wargaming.  I first came across Henry’s work searching for STL files to supplement my Back Seas fleets. In addition to those glorious ships he has offered “6mm” collections for the American Civil War, Napoleonics, and others. Now he has entered the Medieval era with his new 100 Years War Kickstarter.

Henry asked No Dice No Glory if we would be willing to do a review of his new 100 Years War Kickstarter.  As I did a review of his 10 to 28mm  “Battleground 1983: Warsaw Pact” project previously, I volunteered to follow up with this one. This Europe Asunder – 100 Years War Kickstarter goes active on April 28th, 2023 and runs  until May 12th, 2023.

So let me start off this review by saying I am in no way an expert at 100 Years War uniforms and weaponry. I don’t know my Brigandines from my Bascinets!  I also am a bit of a novice when it comes to 3D printing, especially at this very small scale.  Nevertheless, I jumped on this opportunity to experiment with tiny 3D prints. I wanted to see how good they could be and how hard they were to work with.  So I fired up my Anycubic Mono 3D printer and got to work.

One of the first things I liked about Henry’s STL files is that they are pre-supported and designed to be printed upright directly on the build plate. The only figures that were not printed on the plate directly were the loading crossbowmen, who were tilted back slightly but had their own supports. The individual figure files needed minimal support, many figures like standing spearmen and the Knights with upright lances had and needed no support. This is a real plus for such tiny figures which presumably you will be printing hundreds of.

 

My computer is a bit dated and I found that my Chitubox program crashed after I added any more figures than you see in the above image.  I suppose that even though these figures are tiny, they have a polygon count that is as high as larger-scale figures. If it were not for this, I could have likely gotten in 100 foot figures in one print.  This will not likely be a problem for folks with more up-to-date systems who can fill up that build plate.

The prints came out crisp and pack a great amount of detail even at 6mm. Below you can see some printed samples of Mounted Knights, Spearmen, and Crossbowmen. I also printed Longbow Archers. and finally foot knights. These were the only figure types that can in the preview/sample pack.  What you may not be able to tell from the photos is that there is a HUGE variation of armor and headgear in each of those sets.

For example, there are 24 different Longbowmen divided into loading and shooting with 12 variations of headgear and clothing/armor in each pose. There are 66 different foot knight models. Henry has also added a deployed pavise shield for the crossbowmen and a deployed stake for the longbow archers.

 

To help novices, like me, sort through those dozens and dozens of helmets, armor, and clothing, Henry has created the immensely useful guide posted above. So you can build correctly themed forces, rather than a jumbled mismatch of helmets and clothing, as I otherwise would have done.

So what are my critiques? Well, overall I think this is a great set now and it will be an even great set when the hand gunners, light horsemen, and peasants get added.  I’m “in,” but I do have some suggestions for Henry that I hope he’ll consider.

1. No charging knights with lances – There is nothing more iconic about this period than a charging knight with a lance leveled. This is a must add in my opinion and perhaps Henry is already working on them as I just had an incomplete preview set to review.
2. Shield bosses – Again, I’m no expert on weaponry and equipment of this period, but the bosses (see mounted knights below) on the center of the shields seem too big and maybe even should not be there at all. They look like the bosses from earlier Dark Age Viking, Saxon, and Norman shields. I thought by this period that the front of the shields were mostly “smooth” and would not have had a boss.  Again, I’m no expert, but I know for certain the bosses will get in the way of painting that all-important heraldry on the shields. I’d remove them if I could.
3. Commanders – We have to have Henry V,  the Black Prince, Charles d’Albret, etc.  Perhaps  “personality” figures will be part of the “Stretch Goals.”
4. Tiny bastards – There is no way I could work on these as individual 6mm pieces. My big meat paws would block most of the models while trying to remove supports and paint the models. Fortunately, I can solve this problem on my own as described below.

So when I create my armies with these STL files I will not print them as individual figures. Instead, I’ll take a clue from Warlord’s “Epic” lines and print them in strips.  To do this I imported the models one at a time into “3D Builder,” which is a free file editor for MS Windows. I then created a 40mm wide by 10mm deep by 1mm high strip which I arranged the figures on.  Then I grouped them all and saved the strip as a single model.

 

 

 

The strips being 40mm wide by 10mm deep means that I can place two of them in series to create a 40mm wide by 20mm deep base which is more or less the “standard” in many medieval and ancient 15mm miniature game systems for foot troops.  Where a 15mm base of archers like this might have three or four figures, using Henry’s STL files I can get a much more “massed” look with 12 archers on a 40mm by 20mm base.

For the knights, I put two mounted figures front to back on a 10mm wide by 30mm deep “base.”  Combining four of these bases lets me create a 40mm wide by 30mm deep base which again is the “standard” mounted standard for most 15mm ancient and medieval wargame rules for 15mm miniatures. So rather than having three or four knight figures, my bases will have eight of Henry’s 6mm figures.

Henry states “While natively scaled for 6mm, they can be printed at 10mm (145% Z axis, 130% X/Y) or 15mm (210% Z axis, 185% X/Y) and still look good.” So I wanted to test out these files at 10mm print on a “Warlord” Epic size 60mm by 10mm strip. I used Spearman so I could get them ranked up as best as possible in order to compare them to Warlords “Epic” 13.5mm Napoleonic Prussian that I got on a sample sprue in Wargames Illustrated.  They look really good to me and I think I may bump up the scale to 10mm or maybe even 13.5mm when I start doing my armies.

Lastly, as Bob Ross used to say; “We don’t make mistakes, we just have just happy accidents.” I made a “happy accident” on sizing for one of my print runs.  I printed the figures much smaller than intended, maybe 4mm.  But those prints came out just fine. This might be something to consider if you really want to stress the massed look effect in your games.

I recommend this Kickstarter if you are into 3D printing. Henry has done a great job getting in just the right amount of detail into this small scale to give the models the look and feel that they need. This small scale will really help facilitate you getting that massed look or it can let you go the “Battle in a Box” or “Travel Game” route for small portable gaming.

I think for me I think I will go the mini “Battle in a Box” route.  I will finish building a French and English army for the battle of Agincourt using the rules sets De Bellis Antiquitatis (DBA) that’s just 12 bases in each army and will be a great starting point for me to grow the collection into bigger games with other rules sets.

Henry Turner’s Europe Asunder – 100 Years War Kickstarter goes live on April 28th, 2023, and is open until May 12th, 2023.