The Sassanids are Coming!

For what might well be the first time in almost a decade I've just ordered myself a whole "new" 15mm Ancients army - Sassanid Persian - for ADLG.

To be honest I thought for a short while about just getting some Levy Spearmen, as I have plenty of "Arab" cavalry who could do service as Clibanarii at a pinch, as well as generic Light Horse and Light Infantry, and even some elephants who could be re-crewed easily enough... but a combination of really, really wanting some figures in those a-historical lightbulb hats, and the fact you can cook up an ADLG army in far fewer figures than it takes for FoG made me decide that now was the time to add one of the few truly distinctive armies to the collection. Having said that, I'll be recycling my Greek/Makedonian Cataphracts, or possible the Tibetans ones and also some of the other LF with javelins from other armies. Why go too crazy...?

The shopping list I was working to was based on being able to copy the lists currently in the ADLG Wiki (plus a bit more), which came out as about 8 bases of Clibanarii, 3 Elephants, 4 bases of Levy (going with 7 figures to a base so they can be 2 ranks of spears or 1 of Mob),  a couple of bases each of LH with Bows and Javelins and 3 Generals. So, a whole new army in about 20 bases!

After a bit of searching I have decided to go with 3 main manufacturers:

• Legio Heroica for most of the Clibanarii, Generals, and some LH and LF
• Irregular Miniatures for the Levy, the LH with Javelins and some different Generals
• Donnington, for the Elephants

I did also toy with the idea of Lurkio and Eureka as well but that would have involved splitting the order into too many small chunks - and also there is a finite amount I'm prepared to pay for Levy Spearmen figures, which Eureka, nice as they are, somewhat exceeded!

The orders are now all in, and hopefully the figures will be back and ready for priming in early October (after Derby when I pick up the Elephants from Donnington).

Painting progress will be reported here...

The War Memorial of Korea Museum

I was recently fortunate enough to go to the very impressive Korean War Memorial Museum in Seoul, which has an unsurprisingly large amount of Korean War and post-war Korean stuff in it, as well as some pretty solid ancient history, with uniforms, artifacts, armour and some impressive paintings of the Goguryeo and Joseon eras.

These are the nearly 100 pictures I managed to take before my phone ran out of juice, starting in the grounds with Korean War and post war aircraft and AFVs, then moving inside to the uniforms and kit from the Goguryeo Korean and Joseon Korean Dynasties era.

Some of the Ancient photos can be clicked to give you a marginally bigger but higher resolution original image.

Here's just a taste of whats in store...

A West Country Monster! 25mm ADLG from Devizes

With the purchase and painting of far too many Perry 25/8mm medieval figures having been successfully concluded in less than a year - racing ahead of many other odds and sods on my painting table in the process - the time came to let the rabbit see the carrot and head down to the glorious West of England to take part in a hastily arranged but still over-subscribed 25mm ADLG competition at Devizes Attack! 2016.

The Perry figures were duly packed into the box and the car, and soon the 6x4 table was graced with the first ever Madaxeman.com 25mm ADLG competition army - an "all the toys" Condottieri affair.

The results were a visual feast as the 60mm x 60mm multiple-rank basing format (or 60mm x 40mm for some stuff) of L'Art de la Guerre appeared to work really well in giving a sensible balance between having enough moving pieces on table (around 20-odd), with enough figure density (2-4 ranks for everyone) but still leaving space for a degree of maneuver which prevented the games descending into the sort of head-on table-edge-to-table-edge slow motion crash that has bedevilled unit-based 25mm games in the past.

Glory at the eye candy, be mildly entertained by the usual crap captions and inane post-match analysis, and educate yourself with a host of rules hints, tips and explanations for the Most Popular Ancients Competition Ruleset In the World Right Now.... in full-on plastico-vision Big Toys widescreen !!

ADLG Army Lists from The Worlds 2016

After The Worlds this weekend, a number of the players have been kindly sending me their army lists for inclusion on the ADLG Wiki. Some who are even kinder have registered and added their list to the wiki themselves (!!) but even so, I now have a number of lists from the event available to see.

The lists I have so far are on the relevant wiki pages and are linked from these final standings for the ADLG event - hopefully its right, as I've had to guess some of the names from email addresses.

I'll update this post if / when I get more.

1 Tortosa Rafa Spain 503  - Yuan Chinese
2 Duthil Philippe France 456 - Communal Italian
3 Tahon Patrick France 442 - Han Chinese
4 Lopez Julian Spain 424 - Later Aechemenid
5 Crotteau Marc USA 419 - Normans in Sicily
6 Diaz Javier Spain 401 Late Aechemenid
7 Teulié Brice France 401 Koryo Korean
8 Tate Hugo Belgium 393 - Classical Indian
9 Lefevre Eudes France 391 - 100YW French
10 Roudil Cédric France 379 - Yuan Chinese
11 Gilles Jean-François France 366 - Burgundian Ordonnance
12 Bricault Mickael France 364 - Italian Condotta
13 Sciangula Christophe France 362 Ottoman Empire
14 Martellacci Massimiliano Italy 349 - Late Roman
15 Maistriaux Thomas Belgium 348 - Ottoman Empire
16 Hazelwood Dan USA 348 - Condotta
17 Lefebvre Patrick France 344 - Medieval German
18 Matagne Jean Belgium 344 Ottoman Empire
19 Maistriaux Jean-Louis Belgium 342 - Thematic Byzantine
20 Docremont Philippe France 341 - Classical Indian
21 Salvaderi Stefano Italy 337 - Italian Condotta
22 Piegle Olivier France 337 - Aztec
23 Martinez Lionel France 337 Italian Condotta
24 Berucci Francesco Italy 329 - Condotta Italian
25 Plouchart Stéphane France 328 Arabs in India
26 Allen David Uk 327  -100YW English
27 Abric Matthieu France 327 - Jurchen Chin
28 Webb Peter UK 301 - French Ordonnance
29 Villaescusa Frédéric France 290 Samurai
30 Gouret Corentin France 278 - Seleukid
31 Lo Moro Carmelo Andrea Italy 278 - Condotta
32 Misson Etienne Belgium 275 - Medieval Hungarian
33 Van Lersberghe Renaud Belgium 272 Warring Kingdoms
34 Sanders Dave UK 268 Condotta
35 Porter Tim UK 267- Condotta
36 Jamieson Gordon UK 263 Warring States
37 Dejoux Bruno France 262 French Ordonnance
38 Marlia Guglielmo Italy 260 Communal Italian
39 Zito Claudio Italy 250 - Warring States
40 D'addino Stefano Italy 240 Italian Condotta
41 Gomez Mattia Italy 238 - Medieval; Scots
42 Defour Florent France 232 Feudal French
43 Suárez Pablo Italy 205 - Nikephorian Byzantine
44 Impair Joueur Terre 188 - Pecheng
45 Morvan Lionel France 173 - Timurid
46 Germain Yvan France 108 - LIR

The registration code for the Wiki is "Alexander" if you want to add comments, or add an army list yourself. 

Here also are some pictures of the armies in action... 

Saumur - Taking bows and arrows to a tank fight...

As L'Art de la Guerre continues it's inexorable advance in popularity right across the world (it's set to be the biggest competition at the upcoming "The Worlds" in Belgium later this month, with almost 50% more players, drawn from more countries than any other ruleset on offer there), the opportunity to take part in an overseas holiday competition was inevitably going to come around sooner rather than later - and where better do do so than the home of the rules, France, and an event held in one of the most amazing wargaming spaces imaginable - the French Tank Museum in Saumur in the stunning Loire Valley.

I had chosen to take an Early Achaemenid Persian army, mainly on the rationale that I had a lot of Sparabara figures that hadn't seen light of day in years as well as some new cavalry from Xyston (very nice) and Forged in Battle (not quite as impressive). The competition mandated an allied contingent too, which for the Persians was an armoured hoplite Greek command.

After a "fantastique" drive down to Saumur (after getting around the brain-bender of crossing the channel and going into Europe the day after the Brexit vote..) the competition est arrive, giving me 5 games in which to see if my ADLG knowledge and skills stood up to the test of playing against French experts, in French.

The end result was plenty of good learning experiences as various French players gave my army some stiff lessons about new and different ways to play (yes, barbarian armies are more than viable in ADLG!), and the even more surprising appearance of the use of "tactics" and "maneuver" by my forces as we battled to hang on in there and not get crushed underfoot

See for yourself how the Persians did in these "incroyable" 5 fully-featured battle reports ...

Normandy Beaches - D-Day tour

Another summer trip, this time a guided tour of the Normandy beaches including a stopoff in Portsmouth to see Southwick House where the invasion was planned and where the decision to "go" was taken.

Here are the photos:

The invasion map at Southwick House - made by workers from a jigsaw making company in the Midlands

Pegasus Bridge - the new version (the old one was too small for modern traffic so has been replaced and is kept off to the right of this photo)

Cafe Gondrian. Painting tips if you have one yourself

The plastic chairs are not very WW2 vintage

 Looking back across the bridge to the 50mm gun position on the far side.

Not been repainted since the war...?

Sword Beach

Juno Beach

Omaha Beach

Omaha Beach

Sherman at Gold Beach. I think this is a Jumbo?

More Dead Mans hand....

Just a random game from the club - buying those buildings sure is addictive...

Don't forget, this site also has a Cowboy Name Generator so you can easily cook up your own gang...

RIAT 2016 - the RAF Fairford Airshow

In July I just happened to be on holiday and staying in Cheltenham when the RAF Fairford Royal International Air Tattoo took place... and so a visit to it somehow snuck onto the week's agenda...

Here are some of the photos and videos from Europe's (or possibly the worlds) best military Airshow.

F16 lineup with some Mirages too

The A400M is big...

 USMC V22 Osprey

Tigermeet F16

 A400M's ridiculous display

A line of multinational Typhoons

More Typhoons (well, the same lot from a different angle)

Subtle squadron mottos #134

Greece - still flying the F4

View from the top of the aircraft steps

Same, but seconds later...

Erm... probably a Typhoon?

Typhoon, F35 and the Red Arrows in formation

And slightly nearer...

And hen going away..

F35B in hover mode.  

 Hopefully a video /..

F35B

F35A

Both flavours together

The Red Arrows

Both F35's, B in the foreground

The Red Arrows.  All 10 of them....

F22 Raptors

F22's again.