Pezhetairoi, or the Foot Companions.

AKA Macedonian pikemen.

I promised it wouldn't take very long before I posted pictures of my new Macedonians. I expanded two smaller 32 figure units to my new standard of 48 figure units. These two units are build with Old Glory miniatures. I also have units made of Wargames Foundry, among others.

I now have five of these larger units, and my army is becoming an impressive force! Pictures might appear in the near future, a game with them in action is planned in the near future.

Alexander's Macedonian army is almost ready, I have all the figures and only a few more units need to be painted. A sixt unit is planned early next year. But the next blog will be about another subject. Some more (very) old fantasy figures maybe?

May I whish you all a happy and healthy new year with lots of great games!

End of the year catch up.

Due to certain other things happening in life, which took more time then I had thought, my blog have been a bit on the back burner. But now, with the end of the year within sight, I wanted to show that I didn't stop painting. Though not as much as I hoped.
First part are some medieval civilians. Mostly Perry from the Agincourt to Orleans and War of the Roses range. The cart and the guys with the boar are made by Old Glory. The wheelbarrow is from Warbases (only £1.00! Really good value for money).

It took more time to paint them then I had hoped, but it is clearly not "rank & file" work. I'm really pleased with the result of most of them though.

Something else that finaly got a layer of paint is this Thracian warrior.

I got it from Karawansaray, the publisher of excellent magazines like Ancient Warfare, Medieval Warfare and Wargames, Soldiers and Strategy. I believe it was cast by Relic Miniatures, but I could be wrong.
That's it for now, but of course, there is more to come.

This time it is all about new units for my Hellenistic armies. The Thureophoroi were painted last year, while the pikemen and general got their paint this year.

Thureoporoi are named after the shield they use: thureos. Most of the times these shield were painted white. But don't confuse them with leukaspides, which translates to white shields and were heavy pikemen.
 It is a troop type which became very popular in the third Century BC till the fall of the Hellenistic empires.

I'm not 100% shure if they were uniformed, but there is some proof for it.
Anyway, I picked inspiration for this unit from the cover of a recent issue of Ancient Warfare. Which is an excellent magazine for any ancient wargamer by the way. More info here .

The second unit of thureophoroi got a slightly different uniform, but still kept the white thureos.

The uniforms of these are based on a picture in "The Seleucid army", written by Nick Secunda.

It is the image on the right.
The commander of this unit got a bit of a differnt uniform. I imagine one of his forefathers was a Greek hoplite in service of Alexander the Great. Who knows!

This book, originaly published by Montvert Publ. in 1994 is now much sought after. If you find one for a reasonable price, do buy it! (I bought my copy in 1994...)
ISBN 1-874101-02-7.

Then there are the 16 new rercuits for my Argyraspides (silver shields), an elite unit of heavy pikemen. I had a unit of 32 of them, but now expanded to 48.

The complete expanded unit.

My other 32 men units of pikemen will also be expanded to 48.
Miniatures of the thureophoroi are from Old Glory.
The pikemen are from the Foundry range World of the Greeks. Still a favorite of me.

For some reason, I cannot add more pictures here. So the new general will get his own update.

Barbarians! Celts! Gauls!

Here is the next part of my painting backlog. This time about the Celtic/Galatian/Barbarians.
not a lot of figures painted for these, only a few small skirmish units. But they are needed just as much as any other part of the army!

These braves are armed with slings. Miniatures are from a few manufacturers, I think Wargames Foundry (old Perry range) and the ex-Newline range (now SHQ).

The second unit is armed with javelins and have a small shield. Miniatures are a mix of Wargames Foundry and Old Glory. Some of them have there hair dyed with white chalk to scare the enemy.

They were a quick paint job, using washes to get some depth in the colours.

There is also a fantasy part in my barbarian army. So here is the heavy siege artillery!

I bought this model a very long time ago (10 years ago?) in a sale. I believe it is made by Scotia Grendel. The crew are plastic left-overs from Wargames Factory Gallic chariots.

Next time the blog will report on new recruits for my hellenistic armies. It might be better to work on one project at a time, but that is so difficult for me. I recently bought Dan Mersey's Dragon Rampant fantasy rulesset, and now I want to have at least one army (well, max 60 figs) painted as soon as possible. I have loads of suitable unpainted figures, and finaly I might even start working on my non-GW Lord of the Rings figures. But I also have Greek mythology figures, and the rules are also usable for this setting.
Some hard decisions to make. If I only had the time to paint (and game) them all...

Third unit of Celts finished.

Yes! My third warband of 36 miniatures is now ready for battle. These fellows were painted in august. But I had a traffic accident with my bicycle, and needed some time to recover. I'm still not 100% ok (was I ever???), but I feel a lot better already. 

Anyway, some pictures of the wild folks.

The miniatures are mostly Old Glory, except for the three command figures, who are Foundry. Old Glory sells miniatures in 30 figures bags, and I don't think I will ever need that much. So Foundry it is.

I now have 3 units of 36 and 3 chariots. I still need to paint some cavalry, more chariots and some skirmishers to make it a small army, but I think I'm over half way with this project.

Unfortunately, I just can't stick to one project, so next update will probably be fantasy.

If I don't change my mind...

Off to War (Part II).

After a few pictures of the "rebel" army, here are a the pictures of the Macedonians.

Some lighter troops, as the Agrianians and the Thracian peltasts have crossed the river to protect the left flank of the column.

The Thracian commander has sought higher ground, to check if he can see any enemy troops.

On the right flank, Alexander with a few of the Companions is doing the same.

First troops in the column of heavy infantry are the Hypaspists, followed closely by Philip, the commander of the army, with his elite phalanx unit.

After them are 5 more phalanx units, making them look like a moving wood of pikes.

For those interested, the miniatures are mostly Wargames Foundry, with some Old Glory, a unit of Gripping Beast (Polemos) and a few A&A Miniatures as Hypaspists.

The scene is set, battle is upon us.
We don't have a date yet, it is not easy to get a date we (the friends and me) can come together to play the battle.
Who will win???