28mm Successors

 Last year at Warfare I turbocharged a rather slow-motion project to collect and paint a Successor army in 28mm by picking up a load of mostly-Victrix plastis figures to give me more than enough to cook up most Successor armies.

I'd already done a couple of test bases (elephants, some Thracians and a slinger unit) but with real life getting in the way for much of this year I'd really struggled to make time and desk space for painting and assembling the rest of the army... until quite recently when I made a stab at getting most of the lighter units ready to put on table. 

This meant some kitbashing with the plastic spares box, mostly working with one of the original Victrix boxes of Hellenistic Skirmishers - a 50+ body box with plenty of javelin and other light troops in it - together with having a bash at the couple of units of Galatians that every self-respecting Seleucid army needs to have in the middle of their line.

I decided to go for a "Contrast First" painting style for the army, starting with a matt white undercoat and then doing all of the flesh on these skirmishers and Thracians in Darkoath Flesh. 

This was almost good enough just for me to go with it for the army, but with the Galatians in particulat warranting a little more effort I then decided to add some rather rough and ready "impressionistic" musculature to the figures in an effort to see if I could do this to a decent enough standard that it wouldn't look totally rubbish!

This was the first real pass at it, using Vallejo Dark Flesh to pick out muscles on the figures. If you zoom in you can see its fairly basic stuff, but I did find these Victrix figures were ideally sculpted to help you identify which bits to pick out and highlight.

I then added a mix of mostly subdued colours to the skirmishers - the white is actually a Warlord Games paint called Holy White that seems to give a good effect without going "too" grey.

The Galatians got a bit more demarcation of their musculature as well at this stage, with some Sunny Skin Tone from Vallejo for additional highlights

After the usual rigmarole of white / gloss varnish / waterslide transfer / gloss varnish with a bit of Microsol and Microset thrown in for good measure the Galatian then had Battle Flag shield patterns too. 

These are the "Thracians" - they are Victrix Hellenistic Skirmisher bodies with added cloaks left over from various figures, some Gothic and Davian heads, and 2-part "falx's" made from the (over-) long curved sword blades from the Fireforge Arab Cavalry box glued onto one side of a figures fist, and a cut-off bit of spear (I think from the Gripping Beast Romans, as it looks pretty thick) glued to the other side. 

There are also plenty of javelinmen and archers - the guys with extra spears behind their shields are soaking up some of the excess javelins in the Victrix pack which have been snipped in half and glued either side of the fist holding the shield. 

The Galatians look particularly jolly with their shields all finished (with painted edges to match the transfer in most cases).  I just about managed to fit 7 on a standard 60x40 base, which gives a very dense formation feel IMO.

And here are the rest of the guys, with sand + woodstain basing, just now waiting for some touchups in bronze (post-matt varnishing) and for me to find and apply some static grass and grass tufts - which are somewhere in the house but are yet to be found! 

Once they are done I'll put some lightbox photos up of the finished articles 

  

 

   

Achilles & The Myrmidions in 15mm

 Having been reasonably succesful with a Mycenean army at Warfare in 2022, and then getting my hands on a proper Trojan Horse at the Alicante event some months later I am now of course tempted to wheel out the Myceneans again at a future event.

At Warfare one of the star units in my army was Achilles and his Myrmidions - but to be honest the figures were not especially "Myrmidion", being mostly these old-style Museum swordsmen sculpts with fairly generic shields.

 So, when Museum came out with a range of Myrmidions, and also Trojan hero figures in their new Z-Sculpts that suddenly seemed like a must-have addition to give me two new units of spiffy Myrmidions with very obvious Included Generals (aka Achilles) leading one of them. 

And here they are - most of the Heroes of the Trojan Age are clustered on the stand on the left, with standard Myrmidions on the right. 

The Heroes are slightly, but noticably bigger than the normal rather slim Myrmidions, and all have unique poses and equipment.

This front-on shot shows the size difference clearly. 

They are nice figures, but I did find them harder to paint than I had hoped as the detail on the figures is really very shallow, which makes spotting which areas to paint, and painting with washes and speedpaints much harder than it really should be.  

There are also some hard to understand elements in the design, especially the "woolly hats" which seem to have horns projecting though them - which to my mind would surely sit better on a metal helmet? 

Perhaps though I've not done enough research and the Myceneans actually had tea cosies over their helmets? 

Here they are from the rear - you can see where I have had to use layered shading to get some texture into the clothing as the figures didn't really do much for the Holy White ArmyPainter speedpaint on their own. 

So, all in all I think they have come out OK - but perhaps not as well as I initially hoped, partly as the detail on the figures isn't as deep as I would ideally have liked, and partly as I found that lack of detail frustrating and as such maybe didn't try as hard as I needed to to adopt the right painting approach for these guys. 

Having painted up a fair few of the Museum Z Sculpts in the last few years I am actually starting to look more critically at them in general, as my experience with these figures is starting to feel like a common thread across all of the others I've painted before now as well. 

Museums Z Ranges look great in the renders, they are nice poses, there's a whole lot to like about them, the price is good, the metal they use has a great pewter-like good quality too - but with so many of us increasingly relying on washes, Contrast and Speed paints to paint our figures, deeper slightly exaggerated details such as those seen on Xyston, or Forged in Battles' ranges are much easier to paint. Their deep details really do come up a treat - whereas some of the details on these Museum Z Sculpts almost seems to disappear even with just an undercoat. 

If only the raised details and undercuts on the figures could just somehow be (I guess digitally?) "dialled up" a little, and perhaps some of the spears thickened too then the Z Range would be as good after people like me have finished painting them as they look in the 3D renders on the Museum site ! 

Roman Clibanarii

At Warfare last year I accidentally placed in the 15mm ADLG competition, for which part of the prize package was a blister of Forged in Battle 15mm Roman cavalry.

These chaps were Clibanarii on half armoured horses and armed with Kontos, bow & shield, from the Early Imperial era - a troop type I rather unusually didn't really own (unless you count my repeated and shameless morphing of Early Byzantine cavalry to fulfil that role when and if they were called upon to do so!).

So, I decided to paint these guys up, and to do so with ADLG specifically in mind, as in I painted all 4 bases in slightly different liveries so they could be used as units that would be easy to tell apart if they were in different commands. 

With the EIR and LIR armies only having a couple of these in each list the round dozen were also slightly overkill, so I managed to find some spare unarmoured horses to make one base up without horse armour to play the role of an Average unit, two as standard half-armoured Clibanari and one as a half-armoured unit with a commander figure for an embedded General.  

FiD do seem to throw in extra figures to each pack so I also have 2 spares left over, which are being baked into a separate Commander's base as we speak. 

They were done mostly in Contrast paints on a white base, using Snakebite Leather for the really visible shoulder and skirt leather armour, and (of course) drybrushed Gunmetal on a black base for the actual armour. I spent extra time with a magnifying glass doing some of the detail on their straps and uniforms (if you note the reins for example, they even have two layered colours of leather brown on them for extra depth), which I think has paid off pretty well given it's a level of committment I rarely approach with 15mm figures !

These also look a little more spiffy than usual in these photos as I took the pictures before matt varnishing them, so they still quite literally have a little more sparkle. 

I'm really pleased as to how they have come out, as these FiB figures really do take paint extremely well. The shields are the only "meh" bit, as I was lacking in inspiration and they are so small that it seemed like it would be both too hard to put any design on them. I also feared that any design I did conjure up might just look odd at that small a scale and size anyway.

The set is listed on the FiB site as a Random mix of 12 cavalry, including command. Figure code WE-RM09 Roman Clibanarii, 3rd century

15mm Samurai Bowmen

ADLG v4 introduced some Light Infantry skirmishing archers to the Samurai lists, adding a much needed troop type to the Samurai roster - however the idea of adding in a few more figures to the only army I have ever had professionally painted was a bit of a challenge, as I'd need to paint them to sort of match the professional paint job on the rest of them!

Most of my Samurai army were also Old Glory figures which come in large bags, so even choosing a comptible range was a challenge - but eventually I settled on these really clean Ashigaru archers from Museum as being both the right height, and also simple enough to be easy to paint to a reasonably close standard to the rest of the army.

Being Ashigaru really reduced the level of detail needed

I also took an ADLG-specific approach to this set of 4 bases, choosing to paint them all in slightly different colours and uniforms to allow them to operate as single units of skirmishers in different commands. 

The pattern of 3 or 4 dots on their clohing fits in thematically with the rest of the army, and is a very simple way to generate a bit of a Japanese vibe (at a 3 foot range!) 

 I'll now have to look out for an event where they can be used!

And here's the army they will be playing as part of:

The Idlers of March : a new podcast episode lands!

After a lengthy hiatus (since November last year!!) the Madaxeman Podcast is back with a new daffodil-sprouting episode recorded earlier this week at the very start of March 2023. 

Despite the absence of any badger-related content, we do manage to cover shopping expeditions (online and in real life), take a diversion into discussing the merits of Siocast/Warlord Resin/"I Can't believe It's Not Called Airfix" plastic figures, get into a bit of Spartacan slap-chop via an azimuth spray disaster, go all Judge Dredd, barely mention cricket nets, explain to Adam what he's been missing all this time as a sidebar to the great "Amos vs Drummer - Who's The Expanse's Greatest Ever Character (and why it's obviously Drummer)" debate, talk about castles in Spain and why the second most successful Berber invasion of the Iberian Peninsula landed in Valencia instead of Alicante, have a peek at Andy's trophy haul and (eventually) learn how he ended up out of pocket after accidentally buying his own birthday presents from his wife.

There's also a return for Andy's Quiz, with a brand new Two Ronnies-style twist this week as we accidentally give you the answers to the questions from the episode before last.

The pod can be listened to on Podbean, or by searching for The Madaxeman Podcast on any of your usual podcast providers' platforms

The Army of Spartacus in 15mm

 A few years ago (2019 to be exact) I won an unpainted army in a raffle at the L'Art de la Guerre Worlds in Rome. The figures were from Italian manufacturer Strategia Nova, and the prize was actually an Arab army, however as I have Arab figures in abundance I asked the guy who'd provided them if I could swap for a different army. 

And, of the ones he had, the Slave Revolt army of Spartacus looked like the best bet!

I've now finally finished painting the army (almost 4 years later!), and have uploaded them all to my website in their full Cinemascope glory, complete with an added YouTube video so you can watch the pictures that are already on my website flash past you in a matter of minutes as well. 

Some highlights are:

Basing underway

The Slaves

The better armed slaves 

Slaves in captured Roman equipment 

Spartacus leading his Gladiators

Big Spartacus 

More poorly armed rebelllious slaves

The Work in Progress.

You can see more shots of the finished and part-painted army on my website via that link, or watch a YouTube video of them too. 

I'm Spartacus!

 I've finally given into the inevitable and started painting a Spartacus Slave Revolt army that I won (in a raffle) at a competition in Rome way back in the summer of 2019 

They are 15mm, mostly Strategia et Tactica figures from Italy supplemented by some Forged in Battle chaps and no doubt all sorts of odds and ends from the bits box too by the time the army is done.

My intention was to do mostof them with a black undercoat and then try a zenithal (ie from above) white spray to try and pick up highlights before actually painting. 

The zenithal spray didn't really work as planned, I suspect because a can of spray paint doesnt eject the paint fast enough to "miss" the undercuts. This meant that they ended up part highlighted and partly undercoated in grey - probably an airbrush would have been better.

To compensate I added a white drybrush to them to really pick up the highlights so I could then aim for a mostly Contrast Paints approach

This is the first test batch taken to completion - I think I have (at last!) managed to make a half-decent job of putting faces on the little blighters as well, with a Darkoath Flesh undercoat and picking out the noses, chins, cheekbones and brows of these well-cast figures with a normal Vallejo skin tone flesh paint.

There are however many more to do... so watch out for them over the next few weeks and months!

The Review of 2022

It's now very much 2023, but I've seen a number of "What did I get up to in 2022?" posts recently so thought I'd try and do the same before everyone has consigned 2022 to the dustbin of history.

So, in 2022 I manged to achieve the following:

Painting:

Most of the painting I've done has seemed to be bits and pieces to add into existing armies, with the most notable additions to the painted lead (and plastic) pile being:

• 10 1/700th ships for Black Sails
• A full 15mm Carolingian Frankish army for ADLG
• Some 15mm 3-D printed Etruscans, making up almost an armys worth 
• Quite a few 28mm Medieval Spanish, including some 3D printed infantry, Knights in both metal and plastic, and some Fireforge Almughavars too
• A 3D printed 28mm Macedonian elephant (so I do have to make and paint the rest of the army now!)
• A 3D printed 15mm fort 
• 3 Armoured Elephants in 15mm
• Some 15mm African Kingdoms cavalry, upcycling some Han chariot horses in the process
• Refurbishing, rebasing and adding to a large 15mm Hittite army    

Gaming

I also managed to fit in a few games - OK, more than "a few" perhaps! 

In fact, I played in..

• 14 L'Art de la Guerre competitions
• ..10 of which were in the UK, the others being in Spain, Germany, Portugal and Italy
• ..in total those events saw me playing 63 individual games
• ..using 13 different armies
• ..and playing against 51 different opponents throughout the year

The range of armies I used was eclectic to say the least - starting with the peasant rabble of the Peoples Crusade, contrasting with the small but tough mounted army of the Medieval Hungarians, the shooting power (and heavy metal armour) of the French Ordonnance, the inestimable Swiss doing what Swiss do best, a pseudo-Roman Palmyran army with bolt shooters and cataphracts, the endless shieldwall of the Dark Age Rus, some well-padded elephants and dangerously explosive artillery in the Delhi Sultanate,  a double-helping of Khurasanians (playing singles and doubles), the mounted archery, Immortals and hapless wallpapered battle towers of Cyrus' Achaemenids, their predecessors the Assyrians in 28mm falling like wolves upon the flock, the Rolls Royce-like combined arms spectacle and colour of the (28mm) Ghaznavids, the Homeric Heroics of the Myceneans and finally (and probably least succesfully!) the high Steppe fully armoured horsemanship of the Tibetans to round out the year.  

Outside of ADLG events, I've also played club and friendly games using O Group (in 10mm), Chain of Command (20mm), ADLG Renaissance, Cold War Commander (6mm), FoGR (15mm) and Blitzkreig Commander (10mm). 

 

Other Stuff 

2022 also saw the Madaxeman media empire churn out;

• 32 blog posts on this blog (aka new items on the front page of Madaxeman.com) 
• Half a dozen episodes of the Madaxeman Podcast, 
• The Podcast also saw 4,500 episodes downloaded during the year
• The most popular Podcast episode was one entitled "Oh My Aachen Nuts!" where we talked about a road trip to a competition in Germany. This was downloaded 477 times in the last 12 months.
• The Madaxeman YouTube Channel had 12,150 views in the last year, adding up to 1,600 hours of watch time (!!) 
• The most watched video of the year was a report of games at the Beachhead competition, which totted up some 1,675 views and over 300 hours of view time.
• I somehow also managed to send 994 Tweets from the Madaxeman Twitter account (!!)
• ..and make 56 posts on Facebook as well.

Not bad eh...?

Lets see what 2023 brings !