1st Corps Horse Archers

I am pleased to report that the 1st Corps horse archers I received but hadn't seen yet, fit perfectly on their horses! I was very worried they wouldn't, given the previous form with some of my more recent purchases from 1st Corps such as the Spanish cavalry, Macedonian command and elephant crew. This is an example of a fully assembled figure who has also been undercoated:

He's a great looking miniature and is very well sculpted. The 'dip' technique should look great on him! This one did, however, require some time-consuming assembly.

The photo above represents the contents of one of 1st Corps' unit packs of Persian horse archers. You receive enough metal to make up 12 horse archers and enough variety of figure and horse to mean no one model is the same - a great idea in my books. There are a choice of 4 different horse poses and about 8 or so different riders. Some riders do, however, require some extensive assembly which I found to be very time-consuming and rather frustrating! Most require body and legs glueing together (this is to allow more variety of poses) and the quiver and bow and hand need glueing on in most cases. This is fairly straight forward but can get a bit fiddly. The riders do fit onto their mounts very well though, with minimal additional modeling required.

This is a size comparison shot of a 1st Corps horse archer (right) with a Foundry Thessalian cavalry man (left).

The horse archer model weight A LOT less than the Foundry model and as you can see, looks a little smaller than the Foundry.

This photo shows three of the horse archers I'll be painting over the next week or so (along with some spare Thessalian cavalry in the background - these will form the start of my second unit of shock cavalry for the 2000 point army I'm building). I have a lot of work on in the next few weeks or so so I'm not sure how much I will get done on either this project or my Roman project.

Spartan Command WIP

This is a WIP shot of my Spartan mercenary general. He'll be based on a circular base with two other figures who I've already finished and are at home, waiting to be based. He's far from finished but I thought you'd like to see what I'm currently working on in the world of the Greeks. I also dry-brushed his hair to make him look a little older and a little more experienced. You have to be a good general if you want to impress potential employers!

Peltasts!

Not quite the finished article yet but they're on their way. I spent an hour or so gluing spears and shields in place this morning and I tried to split them into those I would give coloured tunics and those I would give white (7 coloured, 9 white). I've also roughly arranged them on their bases (don't worry! I haven't glued them on) to see which figures go well together and how the spread of colours would look. I was a little worried whether it would look a bit stupid with the colours being different and standing out (I have to admit, I prefer uniformity!) but I think it'll turn out fine, and once the coloured tunics are shaded down, it will look a little more blended and together as a unit.

By this time, Peltasts tended to form up into units, acting more like infantry than skirmishers which I why i've decided to base them this way. I plan to base my Psiloi on four separate bases (each base forms a square the size of two of the smaller bases shown in the photo) to represent their loose skirmish formation.

I hope to finish this unit by Sunday evening and will post a photo or two when they are!

Spartans!

This is the first of my Spartan allies/mercenaries and to the right of him is the leader of the mercenary peltasts (he's blu tak'd to a base as I plan to base him and his unit on rectangular bases, four to a base). I painted these figures individually to get a feel for the figures before painting the rest of their units. I've used the Army Painter again and as you can see, it's given a great effect on the Spartan's cloak and tunic.

Both figures are from Wargames Foundry and the spear is Gripping Beast.

On the painting table

I've just returned to University after a weekend at home and I've brought up some more figures to paint since the unit of Romans I've been working on is virtually finished! These are Wargames Foundry figures. I took advantage of their Christmas Discount offer and bought a couple of regiment deals. I bought one of their skirmisher packs (Athenian Army Deal) and two Spartan Hoplite packs (Spartan Army Deal) for use as mercenaries or allies. I also bought a pack of Peltast characters and a Spartan Command blister. This should take me up to about 2000 points in the way of a Macedonian army for WAB.

I'm hoping to get these painting fairly quickly and to a high standard. The three characters in the bottom left of the photo (clickable) will be based on a 50mm circle base for use as a General command stand. The figure above them will be the leader of one of my units of Hoplites but I'm painting him first as an experiment for colours etc.