From AlanD - Long Overdue Roman Command (170 points)

In AHPC XI, Paul OG and I started our Roman Civil War project. This was originally aimed at playing Infamy! Infamy!, but what with Covid and all we lost all focus. However! The project has since burgeoned into a plan to build large-ish armies to pit Pompey (me) and Caesar against each other using To The Strongest! I'm at the stage of adding some eastern allies and command figures to Pompey's army.

First up, we have a unit of Thracian cavalry, using Relic Miniatures. I await the inevitable ribbing from Paul for using shield decals.

The command bases and the individually based heroes are all either from Foundry or Warlord. The Foundry figures in particular are lovely to paint. I think they were sculpted by Mark Copplestone? Pompey himself, here being saluted by some optimate flunky was painted in 2011, and now inevitably rebased.

The general with his arms crossed is my favourite. He has the air of someone watching the cavalry on his left flank victoriously charging off to do something heroic thus allowing his unit to become enveloped and massacred.

And finally, a scorpion from Warlord.

With nine cavalry, the scorpion and ten figures on foot, this should be worth 150 points, with another 20 for the Overdue bonus please Millsy!

From Millsy: I know these are long overdue Alan but you just can't rush quality and these are certainly top quality mate. Everything about them is so evocative of the period and the army right down to the basing. The metallics are especially good I have to say.

I agree that the general with the crossed arms is great pose but I also love the swords drawn chap with the billowing cloak. There's a real dynamism there which you've only added to with your colour choices.

Paul better look out. These guys are well worth 170 points!

From AlanD - Boring Skirmishers for To the Strongest! (100 points)

Phew! It is a relief to get some figures painted after a very busy few weeks in the 1:1 scale world!

Happy New Year to everyone, and it is a pleasure to be back in your company for another year. Special thanks to Curt, as always, and to the Antipodean master minion Millsy.

As the title says, I've started off with some somewhat dull bases of skirmishers to flesh out my Roman Republican army for To The Strongest! I have come to love these rules over the past year, as a way of getting lots of toys on the table andd have a very fun game in a reasonable amount of time. Most of my hobby focus in 2023 was painting an army for Pompey the Great, to be pitted against Paul's Caesarians. The legionaries have been done, so I'm just finishing up the army with some Hellenistic cavalry and light troops.

The skirmishers here are from Relic Miniatures. They are quite nice, but definitely a bit spindly and undernourished looking next to the likes of Warlord or Foundry. Anyway, I didn't feel inclined to lavish too much time on them by doing mad things like paint shield designs, but they are done.

They are a new acquisition to Pompey's army, I recently acquired them to paint, and TTS! has been a newly acquired hobby focus, so I'm claiming 20 bonus points along with the 80 for 16 x 28mm figures.

From Millsy: Great to see to the Strongest! getting some traction down under Alan! I have a Numidian army ready and waiting to face your Romans when you are up for a game.

Your skirmishers are anything but boring mate, especially with the wonderful basing and range of tunic colours lifting them up. Keep em coming, I am keen to see what comes next! 100 well earned points.

From MikeD: Cretan Archers (40pts)

Getting into the home stretch, and it's gonna be close. As I've said earlier, I front loaded my challenge to paint the time-consuming things earlier. I've got quite a few Foundry Hoplites sitting there just waiting for shield transfers, but other than that I've mostly things I can churn out quickly. Case in point are these Cretan Archers. They are Relic figures. As I've plowed through my Greek bin I'm reminded how badly I "over-buy". If an army list calls for 10 of something, I buy 20. I'm guessing I got these at a flea market or Ebay years ago.

So that's eight for 40 points. Now where did I put those Rhodian Slingers?

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Splendid job Mike, these certainly look the part and with another 40 points to your tally you are edging, ever closer, to your target score, come on Sir, you can do it!