Return to Ancients.

Ancients is still my prime wargames period. To be more precise, ancient Greece up to the fall of the Hellenistic kingdoms. This still is a fairly wide period, and if you also count in their possible enemies... I don't think I will ever have enough of them.
If I may give you a link to another blog with an excellent battle report and pictures of the battl of Hydaspes, head over to caliban-somewhen
20 Elephants on the Indians' side, truly spectacular!

Last year (2014) I visited Salute and bought some 1st Corps Scythian heavy cavalry. The figures were just new, and since I did not have any heavy Scythians yet, "had to buy them". Here we are, a year later, and finaly half of them actualy got painted!
The horses are a bit on the small side, compared to the Foundry Scythians, but other than that, great sculpts. One thing I didn't know when I bought them is that they come in a few pieces. You have a horse, a rider, a hand with attached weapon, a shield and a quiver with bow. It all had to be glued together, so quite a bit of superglue ended on my hands. Luckely I didn't glue my fingers on one of the miniatures, but I am out of superglue for the moment.

As you can see, nice, well detailed figures.

On top of that, I also got two other figures painted. These two Vikings were drifting along the painting table half painted since, well lets call it a long time. Over 18 months at least.
And now they are completed! Strangely enough, I don't have any other Vikings. I don't even know why I bought them. (Is that reason enough to start a new army?) It is a Viking king from Crusader Miniatures and a character from Gripping Beast. I can't find the king on the website anymore, so it could be I'm wrong on that one.

All pictures are still made on my painting table. I will try to have a proper "photo studio" ready net time.

Gaming-wise it has been a bit less recently. Only a few board games. The closest to wargaming we played was Command and Colors ancients. After several years of owning the basic box and three supplements, we are coming close to playing the last scenario of the basic box...

The last of the Greek skirmishers.

Just a short message and a few pics this time.
Well, I am cleaning out shelves of unpainted figures, and here are the last of the skirmishers I had lying around. I don't think I will need more in the future. I now have well over 100 Greek / Macedonian skirmishers!

Here are the last sling armed Greek psiloi. As always with my ancient armies, they are based on 3 cm x 3 cm bases, some doubled up on 6cm x 3 cm. Models are  Crusader Miniatures (from the Spanish range I believe, but not sure).
If it seems to you that the bases are floating just above the table, that is because there is also a strip of magnetic sheet underneat.

I also painted the last two javelin armed psiloi (Foundry Miniatures). I found them in between some Thracians and Skythians. I realy should clean out all my drawers and see what else is packed in the wrong place.

As you can see, I tried another background and lighting for these pictures. I am still not happy with them, the lighting must become better next time. The pictures are better though, I believe, but more tips are welcome (thanks Tim!)

I will put up a few pictures next week of an ongoing Napoleonic battle we are playing at a friends game  room. We are replaying Eylau in 15mm with over 1000 miniatures a side. And reinforcements still need to come on table! More on that next time.

The latest painted miniatures.

Hello again!
Here are a few pictures of my latest painting efforts.
I painted a unit of 15 Agrianians. They were ready by the end of august, but I still had to make a picture of them.

I wanted them to look very different from my other skirmishers, so they all have the same white shield with the Macedonian star on it. As they were a elite unit under Alexander the Great, I also used miniatures that had helmets on.  Nobody will take them for the usual javelin-armed skirmishers I think!

Next are some Greek Hoplites. I already have a lot of them, but reorganised them into 36 fig units. So I needed some extra. Most of them  are from Crusader Miniatures, but there are also a few from the old Vendel range. All have Vendel shields, as they will enlarge my Vendel units. I had to use some Crusader Miniatures because Vendel is not available anymore in Europe. The range was sold off to an American seller.

And some more Crusader Miniatures hoplites!
They will enlarge my Foundry hoplite units, and have been giving Foundry shields.

I still have to varnish the figures, which shows at the borders of the decals on the shields. This will be unvisible when varnished.
I now have 5 hoplite units of 36 miniatures and one 48 miniature unit of levy hoplites.
Oh, and a small unit of 20 Theban Sacred Band. (not counting the Spartan hoplites here!)
That wil be enough for a scenario I have planned: Chaeronnea!
For this I have to paint 1 more unit of Macedonian Phalanx and a few (10) light troops. I am currently working on the lights, and the phalanx will follow shortly.

Just one more picture to share.
A Macedonian foot commander.

It is a from the Foundry "World of the Greeks" range.
Lovely model, isn't it?

SAGA Warband.

Hello again!
Well it did not take as long to post a new message as before, did it?
I promised to show you my new Saga Warband. It was painted in may if I recall correctly, so it is not that new.
But here it is.

 

 

It is a 7 points Byzantine warband. Normaly this game is played using a 4 to 6 points army. This one is 7 points because I should read my armylist first before I order figures. The Byzantine Emperor has an extra cost of 1 point.

 

Most of the figures are made by Mark Sims Crusader Miniatures, except for the Emperor (with page) and two of the Varangians guards. The emperor and one of the Varangian are from Gripping Beast and there is one other Varangian from Foundry.

 

Here is a close up of the Big Man himself: 

And a few other pictures of units. All shields are hand painted.

What do you think about the models being photographed on my gaming table? Does it look better than on my painting desk with black background? Let me know!

That's it for now.
I hope to play a game with the warband soon, and another update is already being planned. Yes, I'm painting miniatures again!