Monday, 8 October 2012

Surplus Crusaders


These stalwarts are Gripping Beast Normans or First Crusaders, and I'm parting with them as part of my plan to focus on the armies and enemies of Rome.  

There are based on 60x60mm card, with magnetic sheet underneath.  They could be easily removed (I'd be happy to do this for you) and rebased for Saga, etc.  I'm looking for £30 plus postage at cost.  My other for sale items are here.

Friday, 5 October 2012

Coh. V Dalmatorum


This is the last cohort of Romans I'll produce for a while; they are an auxiliary cohort I started just before Partizan, that I wanted to wrap up.  They are a bog-standard unit of auxiliaries of Dalmatian origin, all Black Tree miniatures, and, for once, almost exclusively* painted by me!  This is one of my favourite LBMS auxiliary shield designs.  As ever, pics are fully clickable.

They are my 15th auxiliary infantry unit and I now, albeit temporarily, have more auxiliaries than legionaries (something that very few wargamers can say!).  Once I have based one final auxiliary cavalry unit, I'll have hit my resolution target of 60 double elements of auxiliaries (414 minis), and I'll be able to move on to expand the legions.  I do prefer to paint auxiliaries to legionaries, though, I find them more varied and interesting.



*Three of Legatus Hedlius command figures crept in

Thursday, 4 October 2012

Surplus Vikings

8 Gripping Beast Vikings, ready for war.  They are magnetically based on card on a 15mm frontage.  Pics are clickable.




I'm looking for £3.50 per mini which comes to £28 plus postage; am also open to swaps.  You can post here in comments, or email me at the address on the front page.

This link is to my other for sale items.

Cheers, Simon

Wednesday, 3 October 2012

Ala Gallorum Petriana, and 400K!

This is my second Ala of Auxiliary cavalry; the Petrian Gallic wing.  These were probably raised at the beginning of the first century, and served on the Vitellian side, under Caecina, in the 69AD war. After the war they came to Britain and were stationed in Northumberland and Cumbria for the next hundred years or so.


These were painted for me by Dr. Simon's excellent mystery painter, but I did quite a bit of highlighting on them, too, varnished and based.  Pics are clickable.  All the miniatures are Black Tree.  At 24 men, it is the right size for a Quingenary Ala, but as a wargames unit, it is a little unwieldy, and I shall probably make future units a little smaller at 18 figures, and consider them to be understrength.


In other news, the tracker ticked past 400K visits today!  Thanks very much for all your visits, so far, and onwards and upwards to the half million!

Tuesday, 2 October 2012

Some Ancient Vikings for Sale!

I'm making some space in my War Cabinet for new projects by selling a couple of armies I'm less passionate about.  These Vikings are a mixture of the early Wargames Foundry range, with some Citadel and, I believe, a couple of Old Glory.   They were re-painted and based around 5 years ago, to a good tabletop standard. They are magnetically based on card on a 20mm frontage.  Pics are clickable.



I'm looking for around £3 per mini which comes to £72 plus postage; am also open to swaps.  You can post here in comments, or email me at the address on the front page.

This link is to my other for sale items.

Cheers, Simon

Monday, 1 October 2012

Traffic Jam

The painting tray is overflowing with chariots.  My plan is for a first wave of 9, but I want to go to eventually muster 20 or so.  Most of the crews have gone off to Nick to be painted (he'll do a far better job with plaid than could I).


In the foreground are the chariot horses, which I hope will be fairly quick to paint...  and I need to finish basing the cohort of Dalmatians on the front left, to clear a bit of space!

Saturday, 29 September 2012

Relic Miniatures Gallic Chariot

I mentioned in yesterday's post that, along with all the wheels, Mike from Relic Miniatures kindly sent me a sample of one of his chariots, which I'll briefly review here.


Above is the chariot, straight out of the bag.  The figures are very nice true 28mm, but I won't focus on those, as my current interest is much more in the vehicle and steeds.  

You'll see how lovely and slender the chariot pole is, and the frames on the cab.   The wheels I frothed over in my earlier post.  The whole piece appears to be cast in a strong pewter, which helps give strength to the slender pole.  There was no flash, but there were a number of small vents to clip and file away; however this didn't take long.


Above, I quickly assembled the piece, which fitted together very nicely.  The photo isn't great but you might be able to make out the crisp detail underneath, such as the ropes.


Above is the assembled Relic chariot, and below is one of my "Frankenstein" chariots, for comparison.  I think you'll see that the Relic chariot is rather more elegant, in a number of areas.  Firstly, the very nice Relic horses above are much more animated than the Newlines I will mainly be using.  A very minor observation is that, as this is a Gallic chariot, these are small horses, rather than the ponies that would likely have been used in backward Britain and Caledonia.  The chariot frame is very detailed with ropes and one of the more svelte frames I've seen, and the chariot pole is lovely and slender.


You'll have gathered that I'm quite a fan of the Relic model, and will certainly add more to my fleet when time and funds permit.  Thanks Mike!