Pillage is coming soon, and all you greedy hogs are itching to get your hands on it. But hold on there, naive lambs, for how you can play a game of early medieval raids and pillages without a meaty roster of farmyard fauna to protect and/or purloin? Well, while we wait for more plastic options, we are here to lead you cattle to greener pastures with a rundown of the best 3D print options for all manner of domestic beasties.
Wargames Atlantic Digital
A veritable one-stop-shop for all manner of miniatures, bits and accoutrements, Wargames Atlantic have put out a great number of all-purpose animal kits over the past few years.
The most useful for our purposes is their Farm Animals set. For $10 you get 27 different animal models – two sheep, four pigs, three geese, two goats, two ducks, a donkey, two dogs, two cows, five chickens, two cats and two bison. The quality of the sculpts varies somewhat depending on the animal. While the cows, pigs and sheep are very nice, for instance, the goats have a chunkier, more fantasy style to them, and many of the smaller models (geese, chickens, cats) are so spindly it’s going to be a challenge to get them off the supports without breaking them. Having said that, you could easily just buy this set and you’d be completely sorted for animals, so it’s hard to dispute the incredible value.
For slightly more esoteric animal choices, WGA also has a set of six reindeer, a set of seven European deer, a set of three standing horses, and a set of four Highland cattle. My favourite of the more esoteric bunch is their set of pack mules, which contains four donkeys carrying various cargo, as well as a fifth donkey dragging a wooden cart. While these aren’t quite as good value as the Farm set (generally being $10-15 dollars for 3-7 models), they’re solid options for adding some variety to your tabletop looting.
Printable Scenery
Printable Scenery offer a staggering range of terrain for almost every conceivable setting, so you better believe they’ve got livestock and livestock accessories. Their general livestock set offers five cows and four chickens, their pig pen set includes a mama pig feeding her piglets, their hen tower and chicken hut contain a total of nine different chickens, and their oxen enclosure and ox and plow sets contain a total of four oxen (plus a plow and a chap to work it).
If you’re in need of buildings in which to house your livestock, you’re on to a good thing here as well. You can check out the full farm range here.
Piano Wargames
Piano specialises in 28mm Napoleonic STLs, but a cow in 1809 is much of a sameness as a cow in 987, I think we can agree. This company has two livestock sets available, a set of five cattle, and a set of six goats. These are definitely my favourite goats I’ve seen available, they’re excellent sculpts, and highly accurate to the appearance of domestic goats. They look great on a multi-base if you’re thinking of pillage, where a flock of sheep can best even the most terrifying warrior.
Having printed the goats before, while they are great, you will again have to be careful around their legs. Being true-scaled, they are quite splindly (especially on the kids), and it’s extremely easy to snap a leg.
VESNA
This company did a whole campaign covering scenery and models for a Dark Age Settlement, available for a bargain price. But if you’re here just for the critters and not so much the buildings, they sell those separately.
Available from VESNA are donkeys (with packs and without), chickens, pigs (medieval style and more modern), fish, cats, dogs (guard, small, herding, and medieval varieties), cows (european and zulu), sheep, goats, geese, and christ, there’s more too, you can check out their whole animal collection here.
Reconquer Designs
Reconquer are known for their excellent Spanish and Spanish-adjacent soldiers, but they’ve got a great line in terrain, general peasantry, and of course, livestock. Available are a set of seven delightfully shaggy sheep, along with sheep shearers to get them a bit less shaggy, a chicken coop complete with flocks of chicken
It’s all sculpted with the level of detail and accuracy you can expect from Reconquer, and at a solid price of around $10 per set.
Tiny Furniture
Tiny Furniture specialise in, uh, furniture, but they’ve got a few bits available for all you farmyard enthusiasts. Their Barnyard Peasants kit includes a couple of cows, a cat, and a pig slung under a peasant’s arm. Their set of carts and carriages include donkeys and workhorses with which to pull them, and their set of hungry dogs could do nicely for some canine farm guardians.
Key Capas
This company does a whole bunch of farm animal sets. Viking Farm Animals, including goats and chickens, and Farm Animal mixed sets numbers #1 (pigs, ox, chickens), #2 (horses, highland cows, carts), #3 (ponies, pigs), and #4 (longhorn cattle and cows).
Honourable Mentions
There’s quite a few animal sets that have come out as part of a wider kickstarter campaign, and unfortunately aren’t being sold separately. I’ll include some of them here, just in case you’re interested in picking up the whole set anyway, or maybe own it already but it’s languishing on a hard drive, sad and forgotten.
The Join or Die: Wanted campaign included a set of cattle, as well as plenty of horses in various poses. The Join or Die: Plains of Terror kickstarter also included a set of long-horn cows, which are a bit hilarious looking for our purposes, but could make an amusing prize-bull for some eccentric medieval farmer. For King and Country: Britain at War Vol. 1 included a terrain addon which has a set of eight cows.
That enough livestock for ya, you filthy animals?
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