6mm Hittite DBA Army

Looking through my (ahem, those started but not finished) collections and projects for 2019 (yes I know it is now nearly 2021) and I came across my "starter" DBA 3 ancients (and in this case I really mean ancient) project (see below, small but perfectly formed, the coin in the background is a 5 pence piece): 

Now for 15mm scale armies you have just a few figures per stand, but in 6mm you can proportionally expand by a factor of four to fill out the base with figures (see below, 2Ps comes to eight figures, 3Pk means twelve, the army has a certain mass): 

The idea being that the density of troops gives the impression of capability, a thin line of skirmishers protect the thicker formation of Pikemen (see below, note in DBA 3 these early Pike are Fast not Solid, solid Pike would be sixteen and really crammed on the base): 

Below is an example of a Hoard (7Hd which equals twenty eight figures so this is a Solid formation) but the irregular variety of  weapons shows them to be of relatively poor quality (see below, they move awkwardly and fight poor but they have their uses, so rather than rushing to the rule book the look of the troops should indicated their strengths and weaknesses): 

The New Kingdom Egyptians are sorely needed as adversaries! When the armies are placed against each other it will be interesting to see if the combat factors make sense just by their appearance of the match-ups. Watch this space, but I need to paint another army first ;) 

"Call it Qids" or should that be "Qids in" SOA Kadesh Battle Game

It may not map directly onto my DBA Biblical Armies Project but under the recommendation of Trebian I purchased the "Call it Qids" board game from the venerable Society of Ancients (SOA, by Ian Russell Lowell). Looks and interesting little zip-lock (see below, if I want to convert it from counter to figure I may have to get more chariots):

An interesting booklet, a decorative laser cut piece of MDF with hieroglyphs, a map and some counters. All I need now is a cold beer, a quiet spot in the garden and some time to immerse myself in some reading!

New Project 6mm DBA (Version 3) Biblical Armies for Kadesh

First yea seek inspiration (see below, Osprey Kadesh [Qadesh] Campaign book and The Penguin Atlas of Ancient History - Hittite v Egyptian):

Find yea a source of synergy, the 'new' DBA Version 3.0 rule-set (see below, something I have already played with - following the lineage of Version 1 [a great new idea in wargaming], Version 2 [expansion and the increasing sad rules lawyer interpretation of cheesy whims and wins (competition wargamers)] to Version 3 [which seems to be a strong shot of antibiotics killing most of the "cheese culture" that formed around DBA] IMHO - and I can be as wrong as much as the next man):

Use the unintentionally(?) acquired 'new' [for me at least] 6mm Ancient Biblical [again a new buzz] armies. These were sensibly bought as a 'pair' of antagonists from Rapier Miniatures. These small 'army pack' were densely packed into a (re-utilised) Business Card container fot for a small Warmaster OoB which is more than adequate for the required DBA armies (see below, historical "pairs" come highly recommended in the preface and notes in the body of the rules):

In addition, seeing as this was my second "comprehensive read" through of the rules I tried a first stab at XCON'ing (aka .. expert content - Att/Def v Foot/Mounted, Move Good=Rough/Bad and 'Specials' such as any 'quick kill' situations) for each troop's characteristics on its base. This is the basis for a specific Hittite QRS [Quick Reference Sheet] (see below, note I used the larger 60mm base width usually associated with 25/28mm figures so I could put more representative quantity on each base, Psiloi will look thin while 'solid' bodies of troops had more depth to them):

The secret key to success is to keep doing a little bit at a time and before you know it your first 6mm DBA Army has been painted (see below, in haste I chose to glue the small figures to a base and paint around them. The up side of this it made the terrain basing easier [PVA-Glue, Sand, base wash in Anita's Acrylic Artist paint watered down then highlighted using Games Workshop's special gel dry-brushing (white) paint]):

I seemed to get away with this as the Hittite army (apart from one base of Hoard [7Hd] is a "fast" army in that the Pike [3Pk] and Auxilia [3Ax] are 'gappy'. In short I got away with it, the New Kingdom Egyptian on the other hand are more "dense" (in the formation sense of the word - aka in DBA 3 language are "solid"). Basing wise I decided to (roughly) use the following formula: 15mm or 28mm number of figures [as per the rulebook] "times by four" (barring the Chariots where "what would fit on the base" dictated the number). For the Imperial Hittites this gave me:

• 2Ps: Psiloi = 8 Figures
• 3Ax: Fast Auxilia = 12 Figures
• 3Pk: Fast Pike = 12 Figures
• 7Hd: Solid Hoard = 28 Figures
• LCh: Light Chariot = 2 Chariots [2 Men in Each]
• HCh: Heavy Chariot = 3 Chariots [3 Men in Each] 
• Cmp: Camp = 8 Figures
• Gar: Garrison = 8 Figures

The hope was to be much more suggestive of what the troops were capable of. It therefore comes as no surprise that Psiloi "look weak" and would be likely to run away from the likes of 'Spear' and 'Pike' - who in turn would could not catch them, being slower moving all their "mass". The plan is to keep this consistent with the New Kingdom Egyptians barring a few officers marshalling their serried ranks if "bows".

Notes: Interesting Links -
http://www.camrea.org/tag/kadesh/