Roman Update

           The Roman count has now reached 4 cohorts, and this batch are ready to go off to their new home

                                                         Cohort number 4- Foundry figures -

Something a little different....The first of the Romans

One on-going project I have at the moment (and one which is going to go on for quite a long time!), is painting up a lot of Warlord Early Imperial Romans. Not for me, I might add, but fun nonetheless. Here are the first 2 cohorts- eventually I'll have a couple of Legions worth + all the Auxilia to do. So, quite a bit.
I'm not doing this alone, thank God, but as part of a team of painters in order to accomplish this massive task.

I've always wanted to do an Early Imperial army, but have never actually got round to it, one of those situations common to just about every wargamer, we all have "those projects" I guess, so having the opportunity to paint one for someone else will hopefully get it out of my system.

Early Imperials have always been the "classic" Romans for me, Square Scutem, Lorica Segmentata, I suspect my like of them goes back to a bunch of Timpo figures I had when I was a youngster.
The Warlord figures have been around for while, go together fairly easily, choices of sword-arm or pilum, a few different head choices. The ones in the pictures are a mixture of the basic set and the set sold as "veterans" - these give you a few extra choices - different heads and helmets, and battered shields. All the veterans have the additional magnia sword- arm armour a few legionaires adopted for the Dacian wars. Fortunately these are indeed for the Dacian campaigns so they will fit right in.

                       There are a few extra metal command figures mixed in- manufacturer unknown.

Anyway, I'm enjoying doing these, which is probably just as well, seeing as there are a few to paint! It makes for a good diversion from the WWII projects which I'm also doing for myself.

        So thats a few Romans, Next up, I'll be showing some rather lovely Dacian tribesmen to oppose them

And now for something completely different

The View from the Howdah

Something for a bit of a change, previously unseen on this blog; Ancients!

I went to see John a couple of weeks ago and gave him a small gift of a big piece of bunny-fur for him to experiment with. While it was rolled out on his table and we were discussing it's possibilities we thought it looked just right even unpainted for trying out his latest mini-project (mini by John's standards) of Romans and Carthaginians in 54mm.

He has had the Carthaginians for a while but recently took some time out from his world of 1/35th WWII in order to produce some Roman opponents. He reckons it took him about 3 months for a DBA army. Here are some of the results

The Battle opens: Cavalry skirmish on the flank. Warbands advance in the centre 

Most of the figures are from HaT models, with a few conversions, notably the Elephants and the cavalry, spears are all replaced by steel versions. All these figures are John's work, 54mm (naturally) and very fine they are too, he thinks the whole lot might have cost about £50...cheaper than 25mm metals.

We played the game effectively on a 9' b 5' which gave ample room.

The lines close: Legionaries duke it out with spearmen and auxilaries

While Ancients is a world I enjoy visiting, I wouldn't want to live there, if you know what I mean.

I've had plenty of ancient armies over the years but its not really my thing deep down. Having said that, I really enjoy simple Ancients games like DBA. No frills, quick, just pure tactics.

The game we played was a great example, a little hesitency on my part almost lost me the game, and John capitalised. We eventually closed, and he managed to destroy 4 of my elements to my 2.This meant a win for Carthage. We decided to play out the remainder of the turn. There were only 2 combats remaining. I would have to win and destroy the enemy in both of them in order to gain a draw. This I duly did! Thats my kind of game, down to the last throw of the dice. Its what wargames should be about.

The final turn: sticky time for the Romans

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