Painting the Painted People

 

The extra Pictish figures arrived from Essex Miniatures in double quick time, so I now have six packs of medium spears, two packs of Attacotti fanatics, a chariot and some command figures to paint up. The tricky bit will be matching these with my painted figures, especially the spearmen who will be intermixed with the old figures to make up the units. I'm going to keep it simple, with a limited range of shades and a basic ink wash, so that the paint finish is a close enough match. The figures are nice to paint, so I'll get started as soon as the half term holidays are over 

Strength and Honour Ancient British Army

 

I enjoyed painting my Parthian and Imperial Roman armies for Strength and Honour last year, even though I haven't actually used them yet, so thought I'd have a go at painting a cheap and cheerful Ancient British army at some point this year. I have some leftover skirmish and cavalry blocks to to use, so only ordered the chariots and warband castings from Warbases to make up the core units for the army. I'm going to have to squeeze this project into a long weekend at some point but not for the moment, as I have a big box full of 15mm Picts to paint and base on the workbench already. 

Holiday Reading

 

I'm on holiday this week so brought along my hardback copy of Cromwell's Wars at Sea by John Barratt, with the Mad for War project firmly in mind. I've dipped into this book before but haven't read it properly, cover to cover, so I'm going to spend a few days reading it in depth. It's not it a subject I know that much about, so I'm looking forward to learning a lot more and hopefully picking up some inspiration and ideas for the forthcoming project.

Esci RFC Nieuport 17 Duo

The Airfix/ Heller Roland CII models are almost finished, with only the decals left to apply, so it's on to the two old Esci Nieuport 17"s which I'm building as RFC scouts to match my completed one. I have about a week in which to get these tucked away but, based on previous experience, it's a quick and rewarding kit to put together, especially as it's also a simple paint scheme of all over silver dope. 

Red Actions Reading

 

This is something I know very little about, so this Osprey looks like a very good way to brush up my basic background knowledge of the subject, in advance of the Red Actions Freikorps project. The Osprey series can be a little hit and miss but reviews of this one are generally complementary, so I thought it was worth getting a copy, if only for the colour plates. 

Airfix Roland CII Update

 

The Airfix/ Heller Rolands are almost ready for their decals, with only the crew and rear guns having to be painted and attached for the job to be done. It's taken longer than I expected to get them to this stage but work has been a bugger recently, so I have had limited time to spend at the workbench. Now that these are nearly finished I'm hoping to get a couple of Esci Nieuport 17's glued together and painted for the club game the week after next.

Spear and Sword Picts Project

 

I've decided to go with the Picts as my initial Spear and Sword army, using my old Essex Miniatures figures for the bulk of the units, adding some additional new figures to make up the numbers. The rebasing is now underway, starting with the light cavalry which were based on plastic card for Impetus but will now be unglued and stuck down on MDF bases instead. This has been less traumatic than I expected, with the first two units done in half an hour or so. These figures were painted in 1990, or thereabouts, using Humbrol enamels but have been given a wash and a coat of matt varnish to update them a bit. Not too bad for a thirty year old paint job, if I say so myself? This rebasing and additional painting will bump my Red Actions Freikorps project down the road but that will definitely be going ahead in a month or so.

Peter Pig Parthians

 

The other option I'm looking at for Sword and Spear ancients, is a Parthian army using the Peter Pig range. This would be one third cataphract heavy cavalry and two thirds light horse archers, so lots of mounted units, with a few support units of archers or allied infantry. The cost for this is quite high but I'd break it down into affordable stages, probably doing the heavy cavalry first with three or four figures per base. The Parthian figures are very nice and an army would have the advantage of fitting in with other players forces, most of which are classical rather than early Middle Ages.  I just need to decide if it's the Picts or Parthians first?!

Pictish Rebasing Plan

 

Here's my Pictish army based for Impetus that I'm thinking of rebasing for Sword and Spear. This lot works out at four units of medium spears, three units of light cavalry, two units of chariots, two units of bows and two units of javelin armed skirmishers, for a total of just under two hundred points. As expected, there would also some leftover figures that I can reuse as a starting point.

I've calculated that I will need to spend about sixty quid to bring the army up to three hundred points or thereabouts, by adding four more medium spear units, a single chariot unit and two units of Attacotti warriors, some of which can be seeded from leftover painted figures This is quite a big outlay and a bit too much of a stretch at the moment but not unreasonable in the longer term...

...time for a think?

Sword and Spear Game

 

I had a very good introductory game of Sword and Spear at the club last night, taking a command of the left wing of a Syracusan Hoplite army against an Ancient Indian army. The game ticked along really quickly and ended in a minor victory for the Indians, although both sides were still very much in action right up to the end. I enjoyed the game a lot, so have decided to re-base (again) my old 15mm Pictish army for Sword and Spear, probably adding a number of additional units in order to bring it up to at least 300 points.