Don’t you love suspense? Well, I have just a tiny bit here for you all!
I started “Mark’s Conquistador Contest” – for my loyal blog followers back on December 15, 2020. It’s purpose was threefold: one, to give myself a challenge to finish off my last 89 figures (all Conquistadores) for my for Civilizations Collide scenarios for games of Feudal PatrolTM ; two, to offer a prize of miniatures to worthy homes that could use them; and three, to have a fun journey along the way with my followers.
The entire project began nearly a year ago in April of 2020. I had spent the month of March 2020 and part of April 2020 doing my research, for the supplement and looking at sources for appropriate miniatures for the Aztecs, the Tlaxcalans, and the Conquistadores. I finished off 230 miniatures in total for the project.
I managed, with YOUR inspiration, to finish everything on Valentine’s Day, February 14th, 2021. This meant that I got the 89 done in 61 days – including all those holidays! That’s an average of 1.459 per day (according to my spreadsheet that all of you are completely unsurprised that I used).
As for the contest – the three prizes were as follows (in no particular order):
The rules were as follows:
Rules of Mark’s Conquistador Contest:
TO ENTER AND TO WIN:
- You must be an email or WordPress follower of my blog.
- You must pick a date (day, month, and year) that I will finish the Conquistador miniatures shown here in this post. Finishing means, to me, that I am ready for the figures to be shown on my blog and used in a game. That is my call!
- You must let me know that you want in on the contest by midnight EST (US East Coast time) on January 2nd, 2021. You do this by posting a comment that “you are in” here on this blog post in the comments section with the date information requested above in (2).
- Only one entry allowed per follower except as described in (5) below.
- If you get another person to follow my blog, you can earn another entry! For each new follower that credits you as a referrer, you can get another entry. All that person needs to do is comment on this post as in (3) above stating that he or she is “in” and who the referrer is. The referrer can then reply to that comment with an additional entry date.
- Winners will be whoever is closest to the date I announce as the “completion date”. That can be earlier or later – for example picking a date that is one day before is as good as if it’s one day after. As there are multiple prizes, 1st place gets first choice, then 2nd, then third. If two people pick the same date, ties will be broken by who submitted the date first. I reserve the right to add more prizes!
- I also reserve the right to be the final judge on the contest – somebody’s gotta do that. When I finish, I will announce the winners.
It’s been fun along the way – as people (Buck and Roger mostly) were telling me to SLOW DOWN. But, I kept on, hoping to get them done as well and as quickly as I could (sorry Buck and Roger!).
So here are the results – please join me in congratulating:
1st Place: Pete from SP’s Project Blog – nailed the date on the nose!
2nd Place: Mike from despartaferres/redcaer1690 – got second by the tiebreaker rule as he picked 6 days early but picked earlier than the third place winner who is.
3rd place: Leif (an email follower and fellow member of the my club The Mass Pikemen) who also picked 6 days away from 2/14 (but picked 9 days later than Mike did.
Congrats to the winners! Pete gets first choice, then Mike, and Leif gets what’s left. Just confirm in the comments section which one you want, and then email me your shipping information to MarkAMorin@aol.com (I’m sure that will work fine).
I will, as I intimated earlier, be doing this again (if there is interest) for all the terrain I have to do for the project. I’m hoping to have more prizes to give away (and maybe even better ones) but I need to get some game-specific stuff done in terms of game aids and the like first. I will NOT begin painting terrain before the next contest – which will begin, as this one did, with a blog post.
Thanks to ALL of you (even Roger😆) for playing and to ALL of you, more importantly, thank you for your encouragement and support!!! It really helped me and inspired me.
Miscellaneous details and references for those interested in that sort of thing:
Previous posts on games, units, and other projects for my 16th Century Spanish Conquest supplement for Feudal Patrol™ – “Civilizations Collide”
- And the Winners of “Mark’s Conquistador Contest” are…(this post).
- Conquistador Cavalry. 24 figures total: Outpost Wargame Services #CON5 “Conquistador Cavalry in light armour 1” (4 horses & 4 riders); Outpost Wargame Services #CON6 “Conquistador Cavalry in full armour” (4 horses & 4 riders); Eureka Miniatures “Moving Horses” #100ANM05 (8 horses used as casualty markers).
- Conquistador Falconet and Crew (Artillery). 3 figures total: Outpost Wargame Services #CONA1 “Falconet and Crew”.
- More Conquistador Sword and Buckler Men. 8 figures total Outpost Wargame Services #CON001 “Sword and Buckler Men”.
- Conquistador Sword and Buckler Men (Wargames Foundry). 18 figures total in three blister packs: Wargames Foundry #SB015 “Swaggering Swordsmen”, #SB016 “Brutal Sword and Buckler Men”, and #SB017 “Bold Bladesmen”.
- Perro de Guerra (Conquistador War Dogs). 13 figures total: Outpost Wargames Services #CONS6 “War Dogs” (8 war dogs); Eureka #100CON13 “Dog Handler and Dogs” (1 dog handler/pikeman and 4 war dogs)
- Conquistador Foot Command, Crossbowmen, and a Couple of Officers. 11 figures total: Outpost Wargames Services #CONC1 “Conquistador Foot Command” (a leader, a banner bearer, a drummer, and a bugler); Eureka #100CON04 “Crossbowmen” (5 crossbowmen); and Eureka CONC1 “Conquistador Officer” and an unknown SKU officer (2 officers)
- Merciless Adventurers (this post) – Wargames Foundry #SB014 (6 Conquistadores with arquebuses)
- Audacious Arquebusiers! – Wargames Foundry #SB012 (6 Conquistadores with arquebuses)
- Mark’s Conquistador Contest – for my loyal blog followers!
- Montezuma and Chieftains – Wargames Foundry #AZ011 for Feudal Patrol – 6 Aztec figures (Montezuma, 4 Chieftains, 1 Warrior Priest)
- Aztec Shock Troops – Cuachic Warriors aka The Shorn Ones – 8 Aztec cuachicqueh warriors
- Tloxtoxl and the Priests of the Great Temple, Wargames Foundry AZ021 – 2 warrior priests, 1 priestess, 1 priest, 1 leader, and 1 signaler
- Civilizations Collide – The Wars of the Aztecs, the Inca, the Maya, and the Conquistadores is now available as a FREE Download for Feudal Patrol™ – plus a Feudal Patrol™ review!
- 18 Aztec Novice Warriors for Feudal Patrol Walk into a Bar – 18 Novice Warriors
- Aztec Warrior Priests (painted as Tlaxcalans), Ral Partha 42-302, circa 1988 (this post) – 6 figures – 6 Tlaxcalan Warrior Priests
- Tlaxcalan Novices, Elite Warriors, and Command Group – 18 figures – 8 Novice Tlaxcalan Warriors, 8 Elite Tlaxcalan Warriors, 1 Tlaxcalan Captain, 1 Tlaxcalan Conch Blower
- Tlaxcalan Archers – 8 Veteran Tlaxcalan Archers
- Aztec Game for Feudal Patrol across thousands of miles – via Zoom!
- Aztec Snake Woman and Drummer – 1 Aztec General, 1 Aztec Drummer
- A June and July Jaguar Warrior Frenzy (plus some Aztec Veterans and a Warrior Priest to Boot) – 3 Aztec Veteran Warriors, 17 Jaguar Warriors, 1 Aztec Warrior Priest
- Doubling Down – Aztec Veteran Warriors – 24 Aztec Veteran Warriors
- Aztec Arrow Knights, Ral Partha circa 1988 – 6 Aztec Arrow Knights
- Aztec Eagle Warriors from Tin Soldier UK – 6 Aztec Eagle Knights
- Aztec Novice Warriors and a few Frinx – 12 Novice Warriors
Total figures completed to date for this project: 230 figures: 109 Aztecs, 32 Tlaxcalans, 89 Spanish Conquistadores (ZERO more to go in Mark’s Conquistador Contest!)
Woo hoo!
Mark A. Morin 
If i was half as productive as you, I might have an army finished! Well done Mark!
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Thanks and thanks for participating!
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Speedy or what, now if it was like me throwing Contrast about like a pillock, then yeah I could see that amount getting done, but you have done some amazing work on them Mark so Kudos to you mate. Excellent work. Well done to the winners.
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Thanks so much mate and I think you are pretty productive. Though I did need to Google pillock and now I’m laughing my ass off!
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Well done, Mark! You’re an inspiration of commitment!
Congrats in winning, everyone! 🙂
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Thanks Luke, and thanks for being part of it
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Congratulations to all the winners, very well picked, and congratulations to you to Mark, for completing this element of your project in such quick time, without letting the standard drop
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Thanks Dave, it was nice to have it dovetail with yours as well.
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Congrats to all the winners especially Pete!! What an epic project this has been. Your focus and commitment is inspirational Marky Mark. I can’t believe it’s been almost a full year since you started.
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Cheers IRO! I now move on to game aids and logistical stuff like that – such that when I run a game (virtually or in person eventually) it goes quickly and is a hoot as they say. I’ll be doing a terrain challenge at some point after that, with more giveaways for blog followers.
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Congratulations to all the winners especially Pete for nailing it on the nose!! And more congrats to you mate for doing such a top notch job in such a short space of time too! I know where I went wrong with my entry now, I was entering the scenery challenge by mistake 😉.
Cheers Roger. (not a bad loser at all, but I hope you all choke on your figures!! 😁)
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Ditto Roger on the winners – and all of you who inspire me – (and that includes all of you – even Roger 😆). You’ll have a chance to do better when I run the next contest! Cheers, Mark
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I’d like to thank all those who made this great victory possible! I
‘D like to thank Mark for his generosity, the US postal service and my wife and family for allowing another parcel into our home!!!!!
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Cheers Mike, got your email – thanks and I will respond shortly – I would just need to know your preference as Pete took the Aztecs. Luckily Leif is local (though I have not seen any club members live since last March). Congrats again!
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Colonials please mate- thanks again!
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On their way across the pond!
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Well done completing a very amibitous project to a high standard.
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Thanks Ann!
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Great work completing all of those models to such a high standard Mark. Can’t wait to see the games with them in.
Thanks for the prizes- could I have the Aztecs please? I’ll email you my address.
Cheers,
Pete.
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Thanks Pete and CONGRATS! I have your email – the Aztecs are yours and I will send them out ASAP!
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On their way across the pond!
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Well done Mark, thats some achievement. Congratulations to the winners too. 🙂
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Thanks TIM!
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Woo hoo indeed! 🙂 Quite an achievement, Mark, well done! And well done the winners!
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Thanks John – still have terrain to do and there are other tribes for later!
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Top work Mark, your commitment to this project has been inspirational, especially to a butterfly-minded hobbyist like myself. 🙂
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This is an impressive project, not just by the numbers, but the level of detail that has gone into all the figures. And finished on Valentine’s Day too – your wife is one lucky woman indeed!
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I tell her that all the time 😁. Thanks and now I just need to make the gaming accessories for it and paint and assemble some terrain and buildings (the next contest btw)
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Congratulations to all the winners and congratulations to you for completing such an amazing project! All the miniatures look terrific. Can’t wait to see pictures of some games. On with the terrain!
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Thanks Keith. I’m working on some game additions for eases of play like dashboards now (takes a lot of time for so many figures). I’m excited to see some games too, as well as LIVE games 😀
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Congratulations to the winners but more importantly a huge congratulations to you, Mark.
One hell of an ambitious and huge project with that many models, and all painted so nicely with care and attention to detail!
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Thanks Azazel and there will be a round two that I hope you can participate in as well. That round will focus on terrain (buildings actually). I also need to do a post on all the game accouterments and game aids I have been building, so gotta do that, plus find time to catch up on all the blogs!
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Yeah, so many blog posts to read and comment on I don’t know how I’ll/I’d ever be able to catch up. Let alone on the comments on my own blog…
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