Gratuitous Phalanx Photos

I don't have anything new But I decided that while I had a table and my newly marked out mat set up, that I'd set up my Hellenic troops for a photo shoot.

I wanted to see how they will work for To The Strongest as I really like the look of these rules and intend to get playing them as soon as possible.

Greeks first ~ After re-basing these guys I wasn't sure how big their phalanx is. It was good to set them out to see how they looked. I'm not sure I like the multitude of 20x40mm bases. I might glue some of them together to form 40x40's.

Spartans on the right as deep formations. Armoured hoplites in the center. Poorer hoplites (unarmoured) on the left. The armoured hoplites are also in deep formations but can be deployed as regular and the line extended. They also have Greek and Thracian peltasts and slingers. I can also add Cretan archers (see below). The cavalry element is pretty small. I have heavy Greek and Thessalonian light horse.

 "Spartans! Tonight we dine in Heck!!!"

 

The Macedonian phalanx in much larger because it also includes the armoured hoplites as Greek mercenaries (no Spartans though). I still need to finish one more syntagma of pike and maybe another one of agema pike.

The phalanx also has three units of theurophoroi in deep formation but if I mix some units I could have 4 of them as regular sized units. There are also two regular units of Thracian foot. I think I might add to these to make them deep warband units. The Greek mercenary hoplites are at the back. And of course, as should be expected in any Successor army there are a some elephants with light infantry support. I like more elephants.

For skirmishers I have light infantry with javelins, two units of Cretan archers, Macedonian archers, and, as above, the slingers and Thracian peltasts (this time as a deep unit).

Cavalry is much stronger with two units of companions, a unit that can double as Thessalonian light cav or Prodromoi. There's also the allied Greek cav.

Having set this up I can see I need more for generals and some individual figures to represent Heroes, etc... And again, I'm not keen on the multitude of 20x40mm bases.

 Agema.

 The LBM Studio decals really bring them to life.

 Theurophoroi

 Thracian's on the flank.

 Companion Cavalry and General.

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Well that it. There are a lot of them but, like any wargamer worth their salt, I want more. The Greeks are 99% AB miniatures and the Macedonians are 99% Xyston. The Greek shields are all hand painted and the Macedonian shields are decals from Little Big Man Studios.

The single figures will be used to represent markers and tokens. In To The Strongest you can attach Heroes to units for a one off re-roll so the fighty looking guys will represent those brave fellows.

The Dice are Cursed ~ Macedon v's Sparta

It's been a while since I last posted because I haven't done much worth noting (just finishing off odd bits and pieces for different things).

For the time being, I've shifted my focus to getting some more 15mm ancients finished. I was also lucky enough to get a game with them last night (Friday) at our club's new venue at House of War in Ringwood. HoW is a bricks and mortar store which is very well appointed. It's large, has plenty of space (and tables) for gaming, modeling and hanging out. But more on that later...

I introduced Lorne to a game of Sword & Spear. You may remember Lorne from my last post. He commanded the right of the enemy forces in my last post. Introduce I say... I hadn't played S&S for quite some time and had forgotten about 80% of the rules but I did remember the basics like the turn sequence & things like that. I also had two 400pt armies to pit against each other.

This was the first time I got my un-blooded Successor Macedonians/Antigonids onto the table and they faced off against a rebellious Sparta and her allies.

I won't go into details of the game because I forgot to take photo's toward the end of the game as my phalanx crumbled when the Spartans got into their flank and rear. But I will say that the "Dice" had decided who to favour (and it wasn't me).

I started with less dice in the bag - 15 to Lorne's 18 but that was no major issue. However, some outrageous Discipline Test die rolling by the Spartans saw the Macedonian advance stopped in it's tracks. Then the loss of one, then two then three light/skirmish units saw my dice pool shrink to 12 to 18 and I couldn't recover any initiative. And it just got worse from there. It also didn't help that it was at this point the dice decided that favouring my opponent wasn't enough. Now they decided to punish my own rolling just to rub salt into the wound/s.

O Fortuna, Alea iacta est...

Towards the end I managed to get my aegema into the action and they pummeled the Spartiotes. Only three of their hoplite units were actual Spartans - The rest were undrilled allies. Still strong heavy foot but less maneuverable. 

My elephants also got into action early on and a prolonged fight took place on my right flank. This was where the first Outrageous Discipline Test roll took place and the Spartans who should have been trampled into the dust withstood my mighty pachyderms. At least they stomped the allied Thracians flat.

Anyway, as Marty Di Bergi said: "Enough of my yakkin'." Here's some photo's.

 The phalanxes closing in...

The Cretan Archers who stopped my Companion Cavalry dead

with yet more Outrageous Discipline Test die rolling.

The Dead Pool.

More Ancient Stuff

I re-based some peltasts and some slingers to go with my ancient Greeks. The slingers should also work with my Macedonians but I doubt if the peltasts will (though I probably wont need them for that purpose).

I also came up with a simple solution for adding markers to our ancient naval games. A clear base with a brass rod for adding coloured beads. Although I could also add a rod to the actual base of the ship too.  For the purpose of scale; the brass rod is about 20mm tall.

To Re-Base or not to Re-Base?

Well, I decided to re-base my Ancient Greeks to bring them into line with most popular rules sets. I originally had them as 6 figures to a 40x40mm base. Even though this didn't look as compact as hoplite infantry should be, it did show off the paint work a bit better. But, after seeing my Macedonians in closer formation I thought my Greeks could benefit from re-basing too.

I also wanted to be able to use some of my hoplites as possible Greek Mercenaries along with my phalangites if needs be. So I thought it would be better to have them on similar bases. So I did this horrible time consuming and wasteful task.

Now I did have two armies - Athenian & Spartan, but after re-basing I lost about 25% of my units so I now have one large Greek phalanx. It looks like I'll have to add a few more tiny fellows to bring their numbers back up to scratch.

Another reason for re-basing them was so that I can use them for Mortem et Glorium which requires more bases for individual phalanx type units. But they can still be used for most other rules too.

Now I just have to re-base my light infantry. These should prove to be a lot easier and I'll end up with more units because I based them differently to most rules requirements. Should I also re-base my cavalry? The 40x40mm bases do look a bit too deep but if I do... That's for another day!

As is tradition: Spartans on the right...

... and the Athenians in the center and left.

Altogether and extra deep.

Now, with all of that said and done, I've also finished a couple of other things. Some Macedonian light infantry and a piece of scenery. The figures are once again from Xyston with shield transfers from Little Big Men Studios. The temple is from the Forged in Battle range.

My Antigonids Get Some Thracian Allies

I'm quite happy with the progress of my Antigonid Successor army. I started these guys at the start of November and in just one month they are starting to look like a viable force. I still have a way to go with them as I want a fairly large force of at least half a dozen pike units and as many thureophoroi and allies - Thracians/Galatians/and Thessalian horse. I don't really need a great deal of cavalry but I'll probably do more than I need. I can also co-opt my earlier Greek hippeis if I need to.

So, here are my newest additions: Another unit of pike and a unit of Thracian medium infantry with romphia.

This looked like an odd colour scheme as I was doing them. 

But I like the end result. Somewhat understated.

My whole phalanx as it stands at this point.