Egypt Arise! (well, "rebase" actually..)

After a rather salutary outing with the Myceneans last weekend, and rather than focusing on painting new stuff I took it upon myself this week to rebase a 15mm New Kingdom Egyptian army that I've not used all that much in recent years.

The rebasing now puts them onto ADLG 40x40 bases in the main, using MDF from Warbases. Most of the figures are Gladiator Miniatures, a range which has just been bought by Ian from Fighting 15's  with a few Essex and even Irregular Miniatures thrown in for added variety.

The basing is done with sand, glue, Rustins Wood Stain and some drybrushing - the technique is show in this YouTube video I made a few years ago with the same technique for Saga miniatures.

They may not fight any better, but at least they are now consistently based to match my other "Biblical" armies like the Myceneans

28mm Norman-era spearmen & knights

I picked up some great value Saga Norman/Crusader figures at a Bring and Buy a while ago, and have been working out ways of using them also for L'Art de la Guerre.

For the Knights the answer has been to buy a few more mounted figures, based them up on 60x60's to create some extra bases, each with a single figure and two metal-shod strips either side of them. The Saga-based knights can then magnetize onto theses bases, meaning that I get a 3-knight base for the "cost" of just one extra figure.

I'm not planning on using a full Norman army in ADLG (just yet...) but these guys will be a nice Christian Spanish allied contingent for the 28mm Arabs I'm planning on painting sometime next year.

That allied contingent will probably need a couple of bases of Crusader / Spanish spearmen units, so I did pick up 2 packs of Crusader Miniatures Normans who painted up very easily and quickly.

The men are all undercoated in black then quickly painted in a simple uniform colour, which barely shows as there is chainmail covering most of them anyway. The shields are intended to look "Spanish".

These are the Saga spearmen I picked up in the Bring & Buy - their basing is just too big to work using sabots to turn them into close-formation ADLG spears, hence the need for extra figures, but the shield patterns gave me a good key for the rest of the men I painted up to match them.

Some nice and simple figures, and a quick paint job making a ready made allied contingent. 

The TYW in the Kings Country

After a long hiatus, the 28mm mostly Warlord Games plastic and metal figures have crawled blinking into the light again for a 3-game 1-day competition held in glorious rural Oxfordshire, on the edges of the King's Civil War Capital.

The TYW Germans - chosen because they have the nicest flags, as well as some little gunnes - take on the Swedes, the New Model Army and the French in three large format, widescreen big battle reports under FoG:R rules.

Be amazed how efficiently they progress through good planning and superior technology, and puzzle as to how Wallenstein and Tilly both end up on the same side in the same army as I deploy simply the nicest figures I can find and try and pretend there is a plan behind it.

There are three reports, complete with the full gamut of Germanic expressions of amazement and horror, lots of photos, ridiculous captions and a full set of post-game analyses from Renaissance Hannibal himself.

Get back to the 16th Century today with these 3 FoGR reports!

28mm Assyrian Generals for ADLG

Whilst an Assyrian ADLG army still sits in it's original shipping box almost a year after buying it in the Museum Miniatures January sale, I have been occasionally browsing eBay and other sites for some 28mm Assyrian Generals to use as commanders with the 15mm army.

And now I've found some - and even better, they are Foundry figures!

ASS005 - "Heavy Infantry Command 1" on their website, picked up off eBay for a snip and now all set to lead the Assyrians to victory (I hope...).

My painting doesn't sadly match that of Foundry's professionals, but I did attempt to use the same sort of colour scheme, which will no doubt become a reference for the rest of the army once it's done.

I also normally only put one figure on a base for these commanders, but with a blister pack with musicians and standard bearers who otherwise won't get used, and also realising that 15mm Chariots will never fit on a 40mm round base I just went for it and added all the figures to 3 Commander bases.

This link will take you to a listing of 28mm Assyrians on your local eBay

In places their eyes are a little "fried egg" - egg-specially when viewed close up - and I might go back and touch them up if I have the inclination, even though at gaming distances they are perfectly OK

This link will take you to a listing of 28mm Assyrians on your local eBay

War & Empire Sassanid cataphracts

As well as picking up some Numidians at Britcon from West Wind's war & Empire range I also added a set of 12 of their Sassanid cataphracts to my collection.

OK, I do have lots of cataphracts already, but none which were overtly Sassanid - so a blister pack of a dozen seemed like a good chance to add 3 units to my mostly Legio Heroica ADLG army, and to get some size comparison photos of the W&E cavalry as well.

Here are the full dozen from the blister pack. The pack has (well, mine did have) more riders than horses, with a few officers and standard bearers to include if you want - which of course I chose to do.

Cataphracts are a decent host for a Sub General in ADLG, so the standard and sword-waving chaps in the middle may well be an embedded Sub General with some regularity.

Here are 8 of the W&E guys, with a textbook Essex cataphract unit in the middle of the line.

The proportions are a tad different, with the Essex ones looking bulkier and having stumpier horses but bigger bodies for the men, but they are basically the same height at the end of the day.

This shot has the Legio Heroica Sassanid Asarvan cavalry in the line. Again, not a great match in terms of stature but a decent one in terms of overall height.

The W&E Cataphracts are from their first range of releases, which seem to have fairly slight and short cavalry riders so perhaps later ranges will be a bit chunkier.

Here's the General and standard bearer. I wanted a fairly colourful mix of figures with different types of barding to match the look and feel of my existing Asarvan.

From the rear you can also see they have a fair selection of cloaks, allowing a more irregular look as well.

The size comparison shots for the Numidian foot can be seen here