Wednesday, 17 August 2016

A Successor-ful Summer ... so far

My latest workbench picture shows what I've been up to the past few weeks...
Fancied doing something Ancient, and decided on a Macedonian Successor army.

Units at various stages of completion...


Not a bad output so far:
2 x 24 figure phalanxes
8 skirmish archers
8 skirmish javelinmen
and some command figures.
 
That's in just 4 weeks of very painless painting.
Next - a sort of elite-peltast/ thorakites type unit - is undercoated.
 
Figures will be based when I pick up the bases at Partizan this coming weekend. And I'll be further inspired when I see Simon Miller's Raphia game, I'm sure.

This is the 4th time I've "done" Successors/ Macedonians. I had a 15mm Seleucid army way back when my brother and I played WRG 5th edition. That army subsequently got sold off when I got out of 15s. I then had a couple of attempts (un-successor-ful attempts!) at building Macedonian armies for WAB a few years back.

This time, I'll be using War & Conquest (the successor to WAB, written and produced by Rob Broom, formerly of Wahammer Historical). There appears to be a good community of players, and the odd weekend to attend for some games, so that will be fun.


Having expressed this new interest to a fellow wargamer who I hadn't seen for a while, Steve Gill, he too decided to pick up the reins and dabble with some Parthian type chaps. We got together, over a very nice lunch at a convenient midpoint in The Cotswolds, and shared many ideas and plans. No promises, no great pressure - just for the fun of it.

That's all for now. For those who are taking the trip to Newark this coming weekend, see you at Partizan...




8 comments:

  1. Very nice Phil. Almost makes me regret selling off my Persian army. The issue I had was finding a set of rules that I liked and my fellow wargamers would use other than the pavlovian addiction they seem to have to Hail Caeser. good luck and looking forward to watching progress.

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  2. These look scrumptous, Phil! Can we even say that about wargame figures? Kidding aside, they call to mind a couple of Time-Life books my parents had around the house on the ancient world (Greece and Rome) when I was a small child way back in the early 70s. Both featured photo spreads of museum dioramas that featured a phalanx battling Persians on the one hand, and a legion laying siege to a Gallic fortress on the other. Fantastic stuff for a five or six year old boy to gaze at for hours on end. And dare I say? Your own figures are even more marvelous. Enjoy them!

    Best Regards,

    Stokes

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  3. Thanks Phil, Paul and Stokes.
    It's been enjoyable to have a fresh army to work on, as well as having my colonial and 18th century stuff bubbling away in the background.
    Your comments are appreciated.
    Phil

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  4. These figures are looking good, Phil.

    Ah, 5th edition & Seleucids...I enjoyed those days too.... my Seleucids were 25mm Minifigs! Then the games became increasingly stylised & too nit-picking & competitive, so I lost interest.

    I am tempted back to dabble in Ancients again by "War & Conquest", which seems to offer the style of game for me for this period. The second incentive is the brilliant plastics coming out from Victrix & others allowing reasonable sized armies at a reasonable price, and topping it all, the wonderful transfers from LBM.

    Enjoy your new project.

    Cheers, Rohan.

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  5. Phil! I'd got you down as a very focused, disciplined, project-planning type wargamer. Now you are turning into a butterfly and proving you are human after all! Good luck with this new army.
    Chris

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  6. Looking very good indeed Phil and I hear good things about the rules. We have been putting our toes into To The Strongest Ancient rules ourselves and enjoying it immensely. Good luck against those nasty Parthians!

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  7. Thanks for all th comments. There has been lots more progress on these ancients since the post.
    Basing is well underway, and that unit of elite peltasts/ hypaspists is finished.
    Next up, some Companion cavalry.
    Phil

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