15mm Indian allied contingent for ADLG

Having flirted with the idea of actually using my Classical Era Greek Successor States armies on many occasions, and now discovering that the Indians (in their Kushan incarnation) also work well with the Sassanids I decided to refurbish a Classical Indian allied contingent.

These are troops who had been languishing in a drawer for many years, so they were delighted to be brought out into the light and converted into L'Art de la Guerre DBE double based elements to make up an allied contingent with essentially all of the useful options.

You can see the finished collection here

The Sassanids are almost here..!

A Bank holiday weekend and a mixed forecast meant I accelerated the basing and finishing of the Sassanid ADLG army in order to take advantage of the warm dry weather for dullcote-ing the troops.

Normally I like to add the static grass before matt varnishing, but in this case the weather was just too good to miss, so here are the "before" and "after" dullcote shots for your delectation.

 The whole lot...

Essex Ghaznavid infantry stand in - as I am sure they do for many wargamers - as Dailami infantry. I have added a couple of random arab-looking archers to the 40x40 base so they can have integral support (a nice-to-have in ADLG if you have spare points).

 The Legio Heroica infantry command with Irregular mounted command. The shield ended up a bit 'FC Barcelona', but that's still pretty cool, right?

 The Donnington elephants tower over the rest of the men

Very simple sun-themed banners. No LBMS transfers for me today, more's the pity!

I have used some new colour palettes for these troops, in particular Vallejo ESMERALDA (071) and MAGENTA (042) together with Army Painter Hydra Turquoise. I've never used such vibrant colours before but for this army they do sort of work.

I went with different schemes on all of the Clibanarii - they are nobles after all.

The still-shiny levy spear in serried ranks...

I might go back later and add more design to the Generals horse barding.

Banners and pennants are another thing I'm still considering...probably out of metal foil.

Each of the three elephants has a consistent colour scheme

Two types of LH from 2 manufacturers - Legio Heroica and Irregular. The Irregular ones can be javelin or bow armed as they have both.

Plenty of blue Lightbulb hats on display

This is the whole thing - add in a couple of Cataphracts from another army and maybe some slingers and I'm good to go  

Being able to do the photography in full sunlight is a nice bonus

The static grass and some drybrushing of the bases is all that is left...

The Sassanids are coming...slowly..

With the 28mm Goths mostly out of the way now (apart from two dozen cavalry...oops!) these 15mm Sassanid Persians have made it to the top of the pile again after a bit of a hiatus.

The 9 bases of Clibanarii are now all painted and varnished, just needing to be based and the elephants are on their way too.

Most Legio Heroica figures.

The Levy spearmen/horde/mob are going to be in 3 ranks so they can appear either as Mediocre Spear or as a Mob. Donnington elephants in the background - Irregular Levy.

After some dithering I based the Generals on 40mm round bases - they won't be used for other armies and it's a cool look. Not sure I'd be keen enough to rebase any others but for new stuff it makes a nice change. These are Irregular mounted and Legio Heroica foot

The Clibanarii have a bit of a blue/purple theme going on

4 elements of LH and 3 of LH bowmen round out the army - I have the cataphracts already

Copplestone Barbarians sneak into the battle line...

Having acquired a pack of Copplestone Barbarian Heroes earlier this year in a complex shipping and exchange rate transaction involving a man known by many as the scourge of TMP, and which, fortunately, has yet to be drawn into the "Car Wash" scandal engulfing much of Brazil, I have finally gotten round to painting the figures and sneaking them into various 'proper' barbarian battle lines.

Here are the guys - proper 18mm Heroic 15mm scale, on the painting table

Three of them now form part of the front line of my enough for an ADLG army's worth of double-based DBx units of generic Barbarian Gauls and Germans

Two more are faster moving, even with such huge swords, and fight alongside the loose formation Gauls and Britons, again already DBE'ed for ADLG

Were you ever to wish for a mid 80's German Hair Metal band in 15mm, these figures might also make good starting points for a conversion ...  

Two more now fight alongside the Vikings and Rus, as legendary "Northmen" - my theory being that what we recreate on the tabletop is as much based on first hand reports turned into the stuff of legend by retelling over the years - and we're also recreating cool films too - so why not!

And the one axeman in the pack is suitably mad, appearing with some Two Dragons Beserkers

Isn't that a Massive Chopper?

Ready to create legends...  Follow the painting progress of the main batch which these were siphoned from here on the Lead Doesn't Bleed blog

With a spare 28mm figure or two....

.. from my Gripping Beast Plastic Late Romans still lying around, I decided it was a good time to add a 25mm "Heroic" Commander to my Late Roman 15mm armies... and here's the evidence.

This is the in-box Gripping Beast plastic commander figure, together with a standard bearer on a 40mm round base to act as an L'Art de la Guerre General

The standard bearer looks especially glum today for some reason...

He is clearly somewhat lacking the exuberance of his boss.. but he does have an LBMS transfer for his flag, so it's not all bad.

Usual Army Painter technique with matt varnish to finish and a very light pale drybrush.

Here they are with some Later Roman/Byzantine infantry from Strategia et Tactica

Leading from the back in textbook style

Or from the front, making the standard bearer even more unhappy... and showing off the LBMS transfer on his bosses shield as well.

(unusually, these pictures are all clickable and give you a much bigger version)

Double the Roman Trouble in Wales..?

Another year, another Doubles L'Art de la Guerre outing as ADLG became the biggest game in town at the traditional UK Wargaming season curtain-raiser, the Godendingdangdag Doubles in in Sunny Wales.

This year saw the event move out of Usk and into the rather spiffing purpose-built venue at Firestorm Games in Cardiff.

This did mean that most of the games appears to be played on the surface of a battle-blasted alien planet (note to self, bring cloth next time) but other than that it was regarded as a great improvement by everyone who joined in.

But, did the new venue prove a happy hunting ground for our Roman and Judean combination?

Read these 4 map-heavy match reports and see how the Early Imperial Roman & Judean did against the Chinese Northern Dynasties & Chi'ang, the Ostrogoths and Gepids, the Greco-Indians and Kushans and finally Don Alexander the Great and the Classical Indians.

If you ever wanted to know just what the Romans Ever Did For Us, the answer is surely hidden in these 4 reports!

No More Turkey - it's time for Chinese!

Appearing shortly after the festive break, the perfect antidote to too much turkey, stuffing and the inevitable but somehow unwanted cheese course are these FIVE battle reports from Warfare 2016, featuring a Spring and Autumn Chinese army in brutal combat against a range of Biblical-era foes...

Watch in amazement as an order of L'Art de la Guerre appears on the table in Reading for the very first time, and a long-unused biblical era chariot force is taken out of the deep freeze to rumble across the battlefield and poke it's chopsticks at the enemy from close range.

The Chinese take on the Babylonians, Assyrians, Omanis, Carthaginians and the always difficult to spell Aechemenid Persians in 5 brutal tabletop conflicts, all of which have been certified MSG-free, (but which may contain nuts).

The reports are then wrapped up in lettuce leaves and dipped in some classical analysis from Hannibal to counteract the Communist speechifying and propaganda of the Chinese General... so dig in, as you know you'll want some more in half an hour anyway.

Aaah-oooh - it's the Dacians of London Again..!

Fresh from drinking a pina colada at Trader Vics, those barbarian scallywags from the land of Dracula, the Dacians, touch down in Central London for 3 games of Roman-period themed L'Art de la Guerre goodness.

Marvel at how this usually somewhat underpowered army performs against Mithradates, Rome and the Germanic Tribes in three punchy and to the point match reports, complete with the usual smattering of captions and other tosh.

Be warned though, it's not going to be subtle... !

Post Industrial Decay & Fruit Based Drinks – Madaxeman.com plays ADLG at The 2016 Worlds

“The Worlds” – not the one in Derby, but the global historical multi-ruleset gaming tournament that traces its’ lineage back over a decade and which now was occurring up in its’ most glamorous location ever – Charleroi in Belgium.

This year an intrepid team of Central Londoners made the hazardous journey into post-Brexit Europe by trains, planes and automobiles to take on the world in the biggest and most multi-national competition at this year’s event – L’Art de la Guerre, featuring almost 50 players drawn from France, Belgium, Spain, Italy, the USA (and us...).

In 6 lavishly (or should that be laddishly?) illustrated match reports you can be astounded by the local architecture, amazed by the quality of painting of the opposition’s troops, puzzled by the near-complete absence of success for the 15mm Condotta army list that did do well in their previous 25mm outing at Devizes, and enlightened by the usual flurry of ADLG hints, rules explanations and insights.

With over 10,000 words, and opponents ranging from as far afield as Han China to as close as a Condotta civil war, these 6 perfectly formed match reports make compelling and convincing reading for anyone considering ADLG, especially those looking for evidence that a game with around 35 DBx bases per side has enough variety in list composition, tactics and general play style to offer repeated playability.

At the end of each report Hannibal is quite rude about my tactics (as usual), a few of the speech bubbles have swearing in them as well (which always goes down well on Frothers), and there is even multimedia accompaniment in the form of a post-event Madaxeman.com Podcast for you to download and listen to whilst painting your next army!

Read on to see how the Condotta did in teeny tiny 15mm scale playing The Worlds Most Popular Competition-grade Ancients Ruleset - ADLG at The Worlds 2016.