The Return of the Sutter Dukes and the Elusive Bratt

When I started this blog, I was in the throes of painting up a Bratt gang for Confrontation. In fact the de facto leader, the Magpie Dandy, is featured in the blog's title banner. The Sutter Dukes featured in the Ferrograd Confrontation game we played at BOYL 2014 (where all the maths was calculated by the amazing mind of antipixi), but since then have languished a little neglected in their spire-shag pads.

Over the last month or so however, a few things have come together that have resulted in some long overdue attention for the 'Dukes.

1) BOYL 2018
It's turning into a tradition that a small group of Bring Out Your Lead attendees spend the Friday before the weekend playing some sort of narrative skirmish games as Warhammer World. This year is no exception, and with the new version of Necromunda in full swing, that's what we'll be playing. 

2) Unreleased Bratt #3
It's been a real pleasure over the last few years to have regular opportunity to meet and game with some very excellent people. Playing at events like Bring Out Your Lead at Foundry, sharing a beer, trading figures, blogging and chatting over at the Oldhammer Facebook groups has resulted in me finding an excellent group of like-minded gamers.

A couple of these excellent people took it upon themselves to fulfil a long-held dream of completing my Confrontation collection. If you're not aware, Citadel and Marauder between them produced 80 models for the Confrontation range, but 17 were unreleased. Five years ago, I was lucky enough to pick up a number of the unreleased Bratts, and have steadily gone about acquiring every other model in the range. Except for the elusive unreleased Bratt #3.

And then, a week or so back, I was sent a surprise birthday present, arranged by some incredibly generous people who worked together to fill that gap. Unreleased Bratt #3 tumbled out of the package (along with another birthday gift that I'll go into in a separate post).

It seemed obvious. I HAD to paint up Unreleased Bratt #3. I had a whole Bratt gang requiring attention. And I couldn't just use an existing gang, can I?!

The probable composition of the New Sutter Dukes.

Putting the Band Back Together

I decided to use the Escher gang as the basis for my Bratt gang (agility and combat skills, access to las weapons and plenty of swords). We plan to use the same tournament pack from the Necromunda event I attended with my Techs back in April. The pack allows you a 1,250 cred budget, plus the ability to upgrade some of your gang with skills and stat increases, as well as accessing the Trading Post. My gang will largely be based on the limited release and unreleased Bratts, with a small supporting cast.

Here are the three new additions Alvis, Dayv Slaid and Rocco.

Dayv Slaid is the aforementioned unreleased Bratt #3 - a riot of extravagant costuming, with all his bows, ribbons and layered fabrics. He comes with a pretty basic weapon, but his hugely over the top outfit wouldn't look out of place in a glam rocker's wardrobe. Just look at his huge split sleeves, tripart hairstyle and fetching headband! I tried to give the figure as much justice as I was able, without complicating an already extremely busy model further - no freehand here!

I did allow myself to add a little exotic dip-dye to the tips of his hair/wig!

Rocco is one of the three Bratts which were available on general release. They originally came without arms, needing the plastic Imperial Guard arms to complete them. Whilst the IG arms are great on military troopers (and Techs), the Bratts need something a little more flamboyant. I've added the pointing High Elf arm and an exotic combi bolter-needler which was originally the exitus pistol from an Eversor assassin.

I sculpted Rocco's left sleeve over the original assassin arm to match the puffed blouse on his left arm.

Alvys is another of the unreleased Bratts, albeit relatively more common than Dayv above. I'm really pleased at how his excessively large and bright collar looks against the slashed and padded jerkin. And of course, every notable Spire fashion icon is wearing a cerise headband this season.

Alys was plagued by a truly horrible mould misalignment - the kind where you spend time working out if it is better to loose significant detail or to leave a visible mould line. Just don't look at him from the side!

It's also interesting to see the evolution of the Bratt sculpts. Rocco (on the left) is the first Bratt sculpt, originally shown in White Dwarf in 1989. Flack (centre) is one of the unreleased Bratts sculpted in 1992 according to his tab. Dayv (right) also dates from 1992, but all 3 are based on the same underlying figure. My suspicion is that Jes Goodwin sculpted the variants, adding / removing details and repositioning limbs over his original Bratt sculpt.

It's not just the three figures above - take a look at Alvys and his limited edition buddy below. Jes has repositioned the left leg and changed the head postion, but underneath is all, they're based on the same original sculpt.

All in all, I'm pretty happy with the new additions to the gang. In the intervening 4 years, I think my painting has improved, and I've had to substitute some paints that are no longer available. But these three figures fit rather nicely with their pack-mates.

White trousers are the perfect day-wear for Underhive trekking.

A massive thank you to the people involved in the delivery of unreleased Bratt #3 - a wonderful and unexpected birthday present - he will be cherished and used.