Sunday, 28 March 2010

Boards on the Tabletop

I put four of the eight Zama boards on a table yesterday, and they joined up nicely.  I've still not finished the flocking, but I've done enough to know that it'll all work.  The boards are a little browner in real life than in the photo.


Yesterday I raided the local pound shop, and bought enough camping mats and doublesided tape to put a padded backing on each of the boards, as below.  I'm hoping that this will protect the surface of the boards when they are stacked up against each other, and protect my table top, too.  It only cost £1 GBP per board!


Saturday, 27 March 2010

Carthaginian Mounted General (B-20)

This represents the nameless commander of the Carthaginian right wing cavalry at Zama.  The general is a converted Aventine Pyrrhic mahout, and his standard bearer Crusader, with an Aventine standard.  Both horses are Foundry WotGs.  Very ably painted by Nick Speller, and based by yrs. truly.


In most of the playtest games, the horse he commands and their Roman opponents have pretty well wiped each other out.  The general has sometimes survived the slaughter and gone on to help lead the Carthaginian foot.

Friday, 26 March 2010

Scipio Africanus! (B-21)

Here's the first of four Command stands, painted by Nick Speller and based by me.  Scipio is the overall Roman commander, and an excellent tactician, who hammered the final nail into the coffin of Carthage at Zama.


Most of the figures are the excellent new Aventines, but the mounted General is a Crusader miniature. 


Scipio will sit on the Roman Baseline.  He's not going to get into any combats, in our game.


As here, I usually inscribe a name on the rear of the command stand. 

Only 3 more weeks to finish everything up!

Wednesday, 24 March 2010

Dead Nellie 6 (B-23)

This is the last of my Dead Nellie models; I call it "Scipio Triumphant", and it's  the one I'll be giving away when we swap Dead Nellies at Salute.  The figure is the Perry miniature from the Spartacus diorama.  I may stick a couple of broken standards on the base, later, if time permits.


23 days to Bletchley...  played another playtest last night.  I ran the Romans but the cards and dice were conspiculously not on my side!  "Scipio Triumphant" may be a bit optomistic...

Tuesday, 23 March 2010

Dead Nellie 5 (B-24)

I'm very pleased with this one (number 5 of 6).  It includes the only Aventine velite that I've managed to paint during this whole Zama project.  I do intend to paint plently, later on...


The poor chap held his shield slightly too high!


Its now only 24 painting days to Bletchley.  I'm still up to my elbows in flock; I think I've managed to find most of what I need, though.  I estimate I've spend rather more than £100 on flock, alone, for this project.

Monday, 22 March 2010

Test shots of Figures on Boards

I'veput some figures on the boards to show what I mean about the colour.  Essentially the base colour is a good match, but I'm certainly going to need to get some green vegetation on there!   Unhelpfully, there seems to be a UK-wide shortage of Silflor at the moment.  :-(


Below is a Dead Nellie, who probably tripped up in that drainage ditch!


I'm shortly going to raid Modelzone in search of vegetation ideas.

Sunday, 21 March 2010

Pictures of the Real Zama

I thought it might be useful to show some links to photos of Zama I found on the interweb, which explain why I've made the terrain colours a bit muted (some might say a bit grey!).  

Here's the approach to Zama at sunset:-

http://www.woodbrothers.tv/image.axd?picture=2009%2F11%2FWood+Brothers+-+Zama+sunset.jpg

And this picture, in particular, is very much what I'm trying to capture:-


http://www.woodbrothers.tv/image.axd?picture=2009%2F12%2FWood+Brothers+-+battlefield+of+Zama.jpg

The field is slightly browner than mine, but appears to be an umber-type shade.  I wanted to achieve a very dried out , dusty post-harvest look.  In hindsight, I could have bunged a bit of yellow ochre into the mix when highlighting, which I do with the mix I use for basing.  I'll need to work in some clumps of dark green vegetation.  If anyone could whip up some trees looking like those, that would be very helpful!

The below looks like it is taken much earlier in the year, as it is a lot greener, but appears to include an olive grove (I have one on order):-

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/23/95148729_137d2b6ba9.jpg