Teutonic Order Army for DBA (IV/30)

Panorama of the Teutonic Order battle line

Teutonic Order Grand Master and Order Knights

The Teutonic Order army has one variant with a few options. They are one of the most aggressive armies in DBA with an aggression of 4.

• 1x3Kn (Gen), 3x3Kn, 1x3Cv, 2x2LH, 2x4Cb, 1x4Sp, (1x3Ax + 1x2Ps) or 2x7Hd

I painted the knights in my usual manner with Vallejo Acrylic paints. The bases are thin plywood from Litko Aerosystems with flexible magnetic sheeting below to adhere them to their metal-lined. carrying case. Grass consists of flock and static grass from Woodland Scenics.

As usual, to get shading of the deep recesses, I dipped my completed models in Minwax Polyshades Jacobean polyurethane. This is dark colored, inky wood stain in a plasticized clear varnish. Although I usually like the shading effect, I did not like the results on the white surcoats and the brightly colored questing knights. Although you can remove wet varnish with a cotton swap, it still left my knights looking a little dirty and battleworn. Battleworn is great for the foot soldiers, I would rather have the knights look clean and god-like. Next time I will be sure to remove more of the varnish to keep the knights looking clean and guarderobe-fresh.

Questing Knights, Cavalry and Light Horse

To the right is are the questing knights, some ordinary cavalry, and two stands of light horse. Teutonic Knights often invited nobles from England and France to join in the battle against the heathen. Here are three of them with their brightly colored coats and lances. Knights used bright colors to let the other side identify them on the battlefield. It was considered beneath their station to fight the rabble, and hence they wore the most outlandish garb so they could meet each other in single combat. My colors are not historical. In fact I choose one to match my wife's favorite football team.

Notice the crosses on the cavalry shields and the knights from the previous photos. Rather than hand paint these crosses, I made decals with my home computer. Simply find an image (color or black and white) or draw one with a computer paint program. Instead of printing on regular paper, print on water slide decal paper such as available from Bel Inc.. After printing on the decal paper, ink jet ink is water-soluble, so you must use varnish the image (with Testor's Dullcote or any other matte varnish) to make the decal water-proof. Really soak the decal image, as any gap in the clear varnish might cause the ink to run. Then soak the decal in water, and slide onto your model. This technique work with most any scale model. Simply adjust the print to match your model size.

Snood Warriors, Spearmen and Psiloi

To the right is a photo of the auxilia, spears, and psilois. The psiloi and spears are unremarkable, but I really like how the auxilia turned out. The miniatures have cloth hoods and mantles known as snoods in the Middle Ages. They also have rather garrish tunics and stockings. I painted them up and garrishly as I could to offset the rather conservative looking Teutonic Knights. Now whenever these guys enter battle I yell "BEWARE THE SNOOD WARRIORS!", "SNOOD WARRIORS - FORWARD!" or "HOW DARE YOU RESIST THE SNOOD WARRIORS!" I don't know why I say this but it often psyches out my opponent who will always remember the Snood Warriors.

My figures are a boxed set from Essex Miniatures.

Crossbows and Hordes of Rabble

Finally, here are two stands of crossbows and two of horde. The hordes are fun to play. They run and die very quickly, but there are 7 on a stand and they look impressive.

Teutonic Order Attack

So come forward you Poles, Russians, Estonians, Prussians, Mongols, and Scandanavians! The Teutonic Order wants to make you repent.

Other of my DBA related articles and armies are available at:

• Dan's DBA Painted Army List

There are more articles on Britannia at the Britannia page and many miniatures-related articles at Dan Becker's Models and Miniatures Site.

Thanks for stopping by and reading about my figures.