Several manufacturers have felt the need to provide sets of accessories in their range, and these often find their way into battle sets. This set from Esci was pretty much the first of these, and differs from those that followed in that it is primarily filled with components with which different models can be constructed. The set includes instructions on the building of a number of different items, but there are not sufficient parts to make everything illustrated, so it is not possible to picture all these models as the customer must choose what to make. Equally, many of the 136 pieces can be used to make something other than the suggestions, so this is quite a flexible product.

From the pictures of the sprue it can be seen that a large part of the set is made up of the same item repeated many times. The items on the right of the top picture are all sticks or logs, which are perhaps the most flexible parts as they can be put together in many ways as illustrated. In the middle of the sprue are some boxes, and to the left is a ladder, some sort of open box and two flat pieces that are meant to be curled round and joined to form a kind of gabion. However, this last piece is fiendishly difficult to do, and the resulting model is hardly realistic as the join strains and it is in any case hollow.

The lower sprue is dominated by 36 sandbags. All have a peg and hole on one side, and 12 have another peg and hole on the other side. This allows them to be put together to construct a wall of sandbags, the exact shape and size of which can vary, particularly if more than one set is used to supply the bags, as in our example. The position of these pegs and holes does not allow for 'corners', unless of course the items are merely glued together without the aid of the pegs, but the 'wall' is flexible enough to be curved as shown. To the right of the sandbags there are two chevaux-de-frise, basically logs with spikes sticking out of them, particularly effective against cavalry. Then there are two barrels (in halves), and some lengths of sharpened stakes bound together to make a sort of fence or platform.

In general the bits fit together OK, though we found some of the separate 'spikes' on the chevaux-de-frise needed coaxing to get them in as the holes were a little too small. Constructing the wooden items is a very fiddly affair, particularly if you choose to place many logs beside each other to make a fence. However there is certainly potential for a lot of uses, if you have the patience.