3rd Century AD Roman Commanders

What would be a force, or battlegroup (I hate the use of the word army for a handful of miniatures), without its commanders? Looking back in time, reminiscing on my astounding track record of glorious defeats the answer would, in my case, certainly be „better off“.

In games of Midgard by Reisswitz Press (and many other rulesets) the use of commanders on the table top is critical to how your troops function on the table. They're based separately and might roam the battlefield freely in order to perform their mighty deeds without being attached to a specific unit, but only able to influence their assigned units. Thus they're the perfect opportunity to create little vignettes. 

Figures as usual are a mix of Victrix Miniatures, partially converted with heads from Aventine Miniatures and Armorum & Aquila Miniatures. Shields are hand painted as usual and the figures were photographed in front of a Handiwork Games backdrop.

Thanks for watching and stay safe!

3rd Century AD Roman Auxiliaries

And on it goes with my Middle Imperial Romans. I can't remember when the last time was I had so much fun with a project. Though truth be told I'm by now rather looking forward to also paint some opponents for these fellas. For today though I've got two bases of lightly armoured Auxiliaries. Figures are a mix again of Victrix Miniatures and Footsore Miniatures, both converted with suitable metal heads by Aventine Miniatures and interspersed with a few Armorum & Aquila Miniatures. Shields are all hand painted as is the case with all the others throughout this project.

The figures were photographed in front of a backdrop by Handiwork Games. 

Thanks for watching and stay safe!

3rd Century AD Roman Legionaries

All those months later and I‘m still continuing with my 3rd Century Romans for use with Midgard by James Morris. As usual I'm not overly productive, but I have lots of fun with this project. A big part of that fun stems from mixing, matching and converting figures from different manufacturers to tell a story with each base. Figures used are a mix of Wargames Atlantic, A&A Miniatures, Footsore Miniatures, Victrix Miniatures and Aventine Miniatures.

The backdrop used in these photos comes from Handiwork Games. They add a lot of atmosphere without much effort and I heartily recommend you giving them a try.

Some of you might have noticed that I turned off comments on this blog. That was mostly due to all the spam, but also because I decided to move to more of a diary approach, where I only post if I really feel like. And having comments turned off takes away lots of pressure I for some reason felt when not having posted for a prolonged period of time.

So, thanks for reading and stay safe!

3rd Century AD Roman Legionaries

This week too I'm running with the Middle Imperial/ Late Roman theme from last week. This time I've brought with me a base of Legionaries, which can clearly be dated to the first half of the 3rd century by their old style semicylindrical shields. Also the broad leather balteus, from which the Spatha was suspended, which had by then superseded the earlier Gladius short sword. Most of the Legionaries are sporting the -in my humble opinion- rather fashionable Niederbieber type helmet, also dating to the 2nd to 3rd century. As for armour they're wearing a hodgepodge of Lorica Squamata (scales), Lorica Hamata (chainmail) and the rather famous Lorica Segmentata (banded metal strips), that is featured in so many Hollywood movies.

The figures themselves are a mix of Armorum & Aquila Miniatures, which by now are rather dated but almost the only commercially available figures for the 3rd century. Then there's a single Wargames Atlantic miniature from their Late Roman Legionaries set. The set fits the 3rd century almost perfectly with the inclusion of the Niederbieber helmet, but I find the details on the plastic rather soft and the Spathae much too large. That said they paint up OK. Also included are three heavily converted figures from Victrix Limited' Late Romans. To make them suitable I gave them heads from Aventine Miniatures, sculpted on the broader Balteus and designed and 3D printed  Spathae/ appropriate scabbards and Pugiones, the famous Roman daggers. Despite being noticeably larger than the other figures I do think they work together rather well. Shields are a mix of Aventine and A&A.

Painting wise I tried to give them a somewhat uniform appearance by using broadly the same colours, without painting them all the same. Personally I find it highly doubtful that Roman Legionaries ever wore anything approaching a uniform. For the shields I went with free hands and frankly, I had a blast. While at first I found it a rather daunting undertaking, I quickly realized I quite liked the look. So much so that by now I have more of those shields already painted than Legionaries waiting in the painting queue. First world problems I guess.

Back to late antiquity

I haven't painted anything for my Late Romans in a while and, truth be told, even todays offerings were finished quite some time back in 2017. But I've finally got in gear and took some photos.

First off my new mounted Warlord/ Tribune. Figures are Westwind Miniatures with heads taken from Wargames Foundry. Westwind do some very characterful figures, which fit nicely with Footsore and Gripping Beast, but some of the heads can be a little hit and miss unfortunately.

Ludi incipiant!

I hardly have touched a brush since the end of the challenge, thus I finally took the opportunity to take some pictures of miniatures I already painted last year but didn't come round to post.

First will be my small collection of Gladiators.

remember to click for a bigger picture

Miniatures are from the superb Crusader Miniatures range and were a real joy to paint. I even took the chance to try to hand paint the shields. I'm rather chuffed I have to admit.
In my opinion Gladiators also offer the perfect chance to try out some recipes for different skin colours.

I still have some more of these in the painting queue but these will have to wait till I feel a little more like painting again.

Till next time!

A hump for DaveD

At Crisis in November I had the chance to not only meet our honourable host Curt, but also had the pleasure to make the acquaintance of co-challenger, fine fellow and all-round gentleman Dave D. The state of the hobby was discussed, a few beers were had and all in all it was a wonderful time out.

From left to right: DaveD, RobP (behind), ChristopherS, JakeK, Jerry Miller and his wife Christine, myself , Curt and MikeF

3rd century AD - Roman Lanciarii

It has been unusually quiet on this blog, even considering my standards. But this doesn't mean I haven't been idle hobby wise. In fact I've been rather productive but honestly I didn't feel like taking pictures. I'm still not really comfortable with my new camera, thus I've let it slip.

Anyway, I couldn't withstand the temptation to start a new project and am about to embark onto a journey which will lead me into the turbulent 3rd century A.D., also known as the time of crisis for the Roman Empire. So yes, once more it's all about mighty Rome and her enemies.

Western Roman Cataphractarii

The Cataphractarii were the tanks of late antiquity. Like their eastern equivalent, the Clibanarii, they were heavily armoured and also made use of the contus. The contus was a long cavalry lance of between 3 and 5 meters. It should be noted that medieval lances only measured about 2.50 to 3 meters in length. Due the extreme length the contus had to be used with both hands and thus the Cataphractarii didn't use shields, or if so only very small shields strapped to the upper arm.

Eastern Roman Clibanarii

The Clibanarii are thought to have been the eastern Roman equivalent to the western Cataphractarii. Both were inspired by the heavy cavalrymen Rome encountered in her battles against the Parthians and later Sassanids. The word Clibanarius probably stems from the Persian word griwbanwar (neck-guard wearer).

Caesar ante portas...

... or at least some of his infantry. Some of you might remember the beginnings of this project during this years Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge. It has taken some time but now I've finally finished my first stand of legionaries, along with some barbarian light cavalry, for my Caesarian Romans.

Having already finished all those bases requiring a relatively low figure count, like Cavalry and Skirmishers, I got somewhat intimidated by the prospect of painting a whole base of heavy infantry. Especially as I already knew I wanted to recreate that look of massed ranks so closely associated with the ancient way of waging war and with the Romans in particular

5th AHPC VI submission: More 15mm Caesarian Romans

This years Painting Challenge seems to be rather slow going for me. Nonetheless here's my latest installment in the challenge.

I'm still alive and slowly beavering away on my 15mm Late Republican/ Caesarian Roman project for Impetus. Not much progress was made but I felt a sign of life was due.

First are a base of Germanic Skirmishers who will fight alongside my Romans as allies. As my mate ChrisS went for Germans as opponents for my Romans I decided it would only be logical for me to incorporate a few Germanic allies into my army. Probably from a tribe on loggerheads with Chris' band of unwashed barbarians. Nothing wrong with letting these uncivilised animals kill each other before sending in the legions to mop up afterwards, eh?

Miniatures are Forged in Battle again and I'm still impressed with the quality of their offerings. It wasn't till I was almost done with these when I realised I had painted their shields in the colours of my favourite football teams arch rivals. No harm though, this way it will only be easier to sacrifice them for the greater good I guess. Fortuna wills it.

The next base is of no real combat value in Impetus other than to be attached to another base in order to depict the unit to which the General is attached to. I would have loved to include a pair of Lictors (no, not the Tyranid ones from 40k) carrying their fasces to symbbolize the high ranking status of the general but unfortunately I wasn't able to track some down in 15mm. Well, at least not till the base was finished and I happened to stumble across *these*. Next time I'd say...

The General is supposed to depict Gaius Iulius Caesar, but in all honesty I don't see much of a resemblance here.

In order to not make it look silly when attaching the base to a unit of infantry I opted for a rather static pose with these miniatures.

So, that's it for today. All in all this entry should give me another whooping 30 points towards my goal but unfortunately not enough to catch up with ChrisS in our little side duel.

4th AHPC VI submission: 15mm Caesarian Roman Heavy Cavalry (32 Points)

With workload increasing to a completely unexpected level, I not only had no time swinging the brushes, but also to post my latest entry to the challenge. If things continue to eat up even the last bit of my spare time I can hardly see me reaching my goal of 500 points in this years challenge, let alone beating my friend Chris in our side challenge. But enough with the whining, here's the painted lead:
Once again work got in the way of enjoyable and civilized pastime. Nonetheless I thought it appropriate to show a sign of life, no matter how small. Thus I present to you eight 15mm Caesarian Romans from Forged in Battle/ Westwind Miniatures. The miniatures are based for use as heavy cavalry in Impetus.

Except for some minor casting issues (the feet on some of the riders were not fully cast) these, once again were a blast to paint. I think I even enjoyed painting horses for the first time in my hobby career.

A few years back I started a Caesarian Roman project in 28mm, which, due to various reasons, never got off the ground. As mentioned in my last post I'm planning to go 15mm for some of my future projects, so I thought it might be the right time to revive this old favourite of mine only in a smaller scale. And no Curt, 20mm is no option ;-) While the AB figures are certainly nice, I simply can't get to grips with that particular scale painting wise. Don't want to rant again about the subject, but 20mm to me is quite a half-assed thing. Somewhere in between the pro's and con's of 28mm and 15mm. I'll stick with 20mm for my modern stuff, as decent Bundeswehr is hard to find in both the other scales, but nothing else... as of yet ;-)

As I want my force to be based on Legio X Equestris I went for a heavily stylized bull on the signum. Thinking about how unwilling I normally am to do free hands I'm actually quite chuffed with how it turned out. The shields only got a basic geometrical design copied from Heresy Brush's take on the very same figures (sorry can't find an image for illustration).

This should give me another 32 points to add to my total. This also helps me to cement* (well, 'cement' might be a bit over enthusiastic) my lead in the 'Bavarian challenge' with 285 (Having already added the 20 points from the bonus round entry) straight points vs. ChristopherS's 244 points.

*By the time writing this Chris of course already outpaced me by a formidable 49 points.

Some last miniatures before the challenge begins...

... well, to be precise, the frenzy that is 'The Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge', has already begun.

By this time I wanted to be ready to go and to have cleared my painting table from any back log. But as every year I'm late and as I'm still in no real painting mood. I only finished the last miniatures while the challenge actually was already on for several hours.

A new Dux Brittaniarum Campaign...

On sunday Chris and I had another go at the TFL's Dux Britaniarum. As the last campaign was almost done (with the british beeing almost constantly beaten) and me having lost the character sheets of my Nobles during the summers renovation we decided to start a new one. To prevent me from loosing my stuff again I decided to keep track of my characters' developement and the general events of the campaign on a dedicated site on this blog.

The first game was to be a raid on a small british farmstead. We set up the table and I thought I was lucky when rolling for my entry point and coming out next to the farm. But as Chris rolled for how much head start he would have before my forces would arrive my luck ran out. He had three full movements with his Saxons before I was able to deploy my British.

The battlefield

The Saxon force

Fall of the western Empire 19: More Comitatenses

Well, it's been a while since I did some figures for my late Romans. But as Chris lately finished a base of lovely cataphracts I remembered I also had some half finished Foundry Late Romans in my painting queue. Then our arrangement for a game yesterday (more on that in a later post) gave me the final impulse to finally finish up those poor buggers.

Fall of the western Empire 18: 2nd unit of Palatinae ready for battle

With the football fever still raging over here at Moiti towers I have a convenient excuse not to do much painting lately.
Despite beeing still tired to the bones from a weekend in Austria celebrating the stag party of a close friend of mine, followed by two long football nights, I finally managed to make some shots of my newest additions to my Late Romans.

Fall of the western Empire 16: 2nd base of Roman archers

This week I painted up the figures for my 2nd base of late Roman archers for Dux Bellorum. This brings me to a total of 31 of 32 recommended points for DB.
The missing point I think I'll fill up with some frankish mercenary skirmishers for now.

Death of King Arthur - 11th Painting Challenge Entry

As the "4th Annual Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge" is coming to a close it's the last time for me to urge you to pop over on Curt's blog to vote for your favourite entry in the last "Fortnight Bonus Themed Round". This round is called "Last Stand" and you'll see there are some pretty stunning interpretations of of the topic.

 

 This was maybe the only themed bonus round I knew what to submit for from the beginning. Originally I had intended this set for use on a scenic base for Impetus but as I had it lying untouched on my desk for what felt like ages the "Last stand" themed round gave me the excuse I needed to finally paint it. The set is called "Death of Arthur" and is from Westwind Miniatures nice 28mm Arthurian range.

As Comitatus didn't show up with their Gripping Beast and Musketeer stuff at Tactica (Yes, I'm still a little pissed off) I had to cancel my plan for doing an Impetus sized (and styled) base for lack of miniatures. Instead I decided to go for a larger round base and maybe use it later as some kind of rally point or opportunity marker. For the standard I originally planed to use a more stylish one. It was attached to the pole already, weathered and battle worn but due to some nasty incident including glue and me being all fingers and thumbs I had to switch to this one.

Thanks for viewing and I hope you enjoyed!

Late Roman Cavalry & Archers - 9th Painting Challenge Entry

One of my goals for the challenge was to paint up the Late Roman figures I have in my lead pile. As the end of the challenge grows closer I'm slowly running out of time for this. So here are two heavy cavalry and two archers from Musketeer Miniatures.