Saturday 5 December 2015

On the Painting Tray: December 2015

Romans, of course:

Finishing off another Caesarean legion. Figures mainly by Foundry, I think.

This legion is mostly completed. They have embossed shields, and originally I was going to paint these with red designs on yellow backgrounds, but they didn't stand out well enough. So I changed my mind and went for black on yellow. I have managed to be a bit quicker with this legion because they were already mostly painted, and quite well too. These were among the large batch Roy gave me when I arrived in Cheltenham, and I am hoping to do them justice.

I am also intending to take them to Bletchley for the Pharsalus Battle Day in April. I have another mostly completed legion coming down from Glasgow when we move house in a couple of weeks' time, and I also have another two legions' worth of smaller figures from Roy. I think they are Essex and are meant to be Early Imperial, but they are all in lorica hamata so I have ordered some Gripping Beast oval scuta to turn them into Caesarean/Early Principate types. They already have a basic paintjob, so it won't take much to finish them off: some inks and touching-up along with the shields should do the job. If they stand alone as legions they should fit in okay. I may well mount them on slightly thicker bases to help the illusion.

Added to the six legions I already have finished, that will give me ten 80-figure legions quite soon; I reckon I should be able to get at least another couple done before April, giving me something like 1,000 legionaries. I reckon that lot should look the part. The plan at this point is, hopefully, to link up for Bletchley with Simon of the Big Red Bat fame for a large game using his To The Strongest Rules.

12 comments:

  1. Very nice job on these Romans!

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    1. Thanks, Phil. I must admit, I'm looking forward to moving on to something else!

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  2. The figures are real beauties! Will you also field auxiliaries of any kind? Cavalry?

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    1. I have some Roman cavalry already, but there not much in the way of auxiliaries, yet. There seems to be some confusion about exactly which kinds of non-Roman troops were present at this battle, and even if they were, whether or not they took part. I'll maybe see what Simon comes up with for the scenario. I do, though, have an entire legion's worth painted with plaid cloaks as Gallic auxiliaries with Roman equipment. They'll also do for Legio V Alaudae.

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  3. I like the yellow/black shield motiff. Perhaps their sting in battle will follow their yellow jacket theme.

    Pharsalus at Battle Day? Is this the Battle Day sponsored by SoA? If so, I hope to see your game in a future edition of Slingshot.

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    1. Hi Jonathan, your guess is spot on - next year's Society Battle Day is Pharsalus. I'm really looking forward to making it to Bletchley. It looks as though we will be able to put on quite a large game. I'll then write it up for Slingshot, unless Simon wants to do it.

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  4. You are painting away at industrial rates! I've not yet started my own Roman expansion, except that I have bought 300 or so painted legionaries that need to be re-based. I plan to base pikes until the New Year and legionaries, thereafter! I think we'll have well north of 2K legionaries.

    Best, Simon

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    1. Oh, that does sound good. It will be interesting to see what you think should be the order of battle,and how you want to play different legionary qualities. Looking forward to it!

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  5. I'm jealous of the size of your armies and that I live on the wrong side of the ocean to attend that Pharsalus replay. I will have to content myself with reading the AARs and gazing at pics on the various blogs.

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    1. Thanks Joseph, it's good to hear from you!

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  6. Apologies for missing this post when it came out, but these are beautiful. The yellow shields particularly eye-catching.

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    1. Thanks, Dean, it's good to hear from you. I'm hoping to post some photos of this lot now that they are completed, as well as various other things that have been going on. probably in the next week or so...

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