Quite a few things I haven’t posted about:

• Tested knocking down front and back to break the seam: Didn’t look that great.
• I built a set of spur/cuff combos, initially horizontal, then with a sharp angle, they give me a good chaining/locking point that make sense… I think.
• I tried to close the spur with a standard strap & buckle: Too big and impractical.
• Modified the spurs to close with a friction-type buckle embedded on the spur/cuff: less bulk, good.
• Slimmed down the boot top edge.

All in all I need to fix up the stitching on the heel and toes of the boot, finish up the strap, make a locking post and I should be good to move on to the low-poly model.