Wednesday, 22 February 2023

Salute Phalanx IV; the Silver Shields

 
Here is a work-in-progress shot of the new phalanx. These are two thirds of the silver shields that will constitute the two right hand units of the ten unit "Great Phalanx." I finished the rear rank elements earlier, and this week got the middle ranks mostly based- they just need their bases dry brushing and flocking by chum Ian. I've just started work on highlighting and basing the 48 front rankers (painted by Shaun McTague last year)- they are perhaps a week away from basing. In terms of the project as a whole, the last of the required minis being painted this week. I'm:
  • 55% done with finishing/basing the rear ranks
  • 95% done with finishing/basing the middle ranks
  • 0% done with finishing/basing the front ranks

So almost half way. However, I expect the lowered pikes of the front ranks to be particularly challenging to base. Still, though, I should be just about OK to get them all finished in time.

In other news, I'm finalising the next release of the TtS! Medieval Army List eBook- due out on the 28th. There will be two new lists and some more background material. One of the new lists will cover the peasants for the German Peasants' War- I've been hugely enjoying the Helion on the Swabian Wars and am struggling to resist ordering the pretty new Steel Fist minis. :-)

Tuesday, 14 February 2023

Salute Phalanx III


Here is a work in progress shot of the mostly new "Great" phalanx I'm building for Salute. These are the middle ranks (3rd and 4th) for eight out of the ten projected blocks, the other two being purple-clad guards. When deployed in line, these will be 160cm wide. They are all Wargames Foundry models, painted by Shaun McTague and Craig Davey with a little finishing by me. They weigh a ton! I'm now 1/3 of the way to getting the phalanx finished and based, perhaps a little behind target. There will be a brief hiatus, because I've run out of painted pikes!

Monday, 6 February 2023

Salute Phalanx II


I've made a fair amount of progress in the last ten days. There are more minis than before, although rather less than half are completely finished and inked. I'm hoping that the indefatigable Shaun McTague will help with these...  At least they all have shields attached, and almost half have pikes fitted. Still 44 more required, but they are in hand. 


I've also made up a load of bases for them, a mix of 60x40mm, 120x40mm and whopping great 120x120mm bases for the front rank elements that will have lowered pikes. Since the minis and pikes are pretty heavy, and I want them to hold securely, I fitted extra magnets where I felt there weren't sufficient. These bases are square, rather than my more usual wobbly-edged bases, because I had to match my existing Hellenistic units.

The next step will be to try to get some minis finished and on bases! I partly need to do this for purposes of my own morale, and partly because I've run out of storage space for the unbased minis.

Friday, 27 January 2023

New Year, new Phalanx


I've been working, in the background, on a new phalanx for my huge Ipsus game at Salute in April. This will consist of ten units, each 72 men-strong, drawn up in six ranks. Two of the units will be silver shields. Above are most of the new ones. There are roughly another 140 in progress, not shown above. Also not shown are 218 that are already finished and based. These can be seen below- the first two ranks with the angled pikes and roughly six ranks more of the ones behind them with vertical pikes in the further block.


I prepped all the minis and they are returning, painted, from painter chums. I'm fitting pikes and shields (where not already fitted). Next I'll need to do snagging, ink/varnish and assemble. Basing is going to be a bit of a nightmare, because of the sheer scale of the project, but I think it'll look imposing when complete. I should have enough time if I focus on the project.

The new pikemen will give me 4.8 linear metres of six-deep pike phalanx, which will be supported by a couple of metres-worth of six-deep hoplites.

I will need around a dozen players for the big Salute game, which I am confident will see the most pikemen ever deployed on a gaming table. If you are coming to Salute and can spare around 2 hours to play, please email me!

Thursday, 17 November 2022

The Battle of Ceresole 1544


I've long been a fan of Blaise de Monluc, an indefatigable Gascon who, as commander of the French enfants perdus, played a critical role in the Battle of Ceresole, 1544, a major engagement in the Italian Wars. His captivating account inspired me to research the battle, reviewing the various original accounts (some of which were kindly translated for me from French, Spanish and Castilian by my French friend Loic) and the surviving terrain features to (I believe) accurately place the battle in the countryside to the west of Ceresole d'Alba. I have come up with a reconstruction of the battle which differs in several respects to the well-known account by Oman in his "Art of War in the Sixteenth Century." 

When I heard that Massimo Predonzani was revising his 2012 book on the battle for publication by Helion, I got in contact to share my research. I was delighted when he invited me to rewrite the chapters relating directly to the battle, to include my theories and other information that I'd come across. I've written about the skirmish the day before the battle and extended the chapters that recount the battle itself. I've also designed four diagrams that show the deployment and manoeuvres of the two armies during the battle, and discuss the importance of artillery to the outcome of the battle.

Ceresole is a fascinating engagement that will transfer very well to the wargames table (I'm working on a TtS! scenario). The book has now been published and can be purchased at:

It's currently on promotion!

Tuesday, 1 November 2022

Second Mantinea at SELWG


The weekend before last I took the Second Battle of Mantinea (362 BCE) to SELWG, and I have finally found time to post the images! Above, that's me looming like mighty Zeus above the extra deep Theban phalanx. (All pictures are clickable).
       

Here's the deployment, with the Spartan/Mantinean/Athenian force (lower left), drawn up in front of the Pelagos Wood (where many of their soldiers were enjoying a late breakfast). The Thebans and Tegeans are at the top right. The battlefield is 3m wide.

Below is the deployment plan from my current scenario, which I will likely revise when I receive the Society of Ancients Battle Day pack for their event in March. It gives a super game!



Above is a photo of the Spartans, and below of some Thessalian cavalry from the Theban army.



Above are some peltasts (possibly ex Steve Jones?). It dawned on me, recently, that I don't have nearly enough peltasts, and I'm currently raising several more units. Few will be as nice as the above unit, though! Below is the rear of the extra-deep Theban phalanx (currently 6 ranks deep- I'd love to add another rank or two).



Here are a couple more shots of some of the Greek hoplites. These are mostly Foundry Athenians, lovely sculpts, beautifully painted by various people who are far more competent, than I. I'm planning to add another block this winter, from my "reserves" boxes. Below, the Spartans have been flanked and are in deep trouble!



I was always a bit doubtful whether hoplite battles would work well on a grid, but they certainly do! We enjoyed a couple of cracking games, both narrowly won by the Thebans, and each in under two hours.

Many thanks to Ian Notter (who took most of the above photos), Tim Thompson, Shaun McTague and David Millett who helped to run the game.


In other news, yesterday I published the latest quarterly release of the TtS! Ancient Army List eBook. This new release includes two new lists: Early Macedonian and Paeonian. I've also added historical backgrounds to the Illyrians, Huns and Gepid lists, and edited many of the other lists. There are now 160 army lists in the Ancient book, and 132 in the Medieval; when the next medieval release comes out, there might be as many as 300 lists in total.

Postscript- I've added a brief in-game video, here: 

Sunday, 18 September 2022

Chalgrove 2022

Here are a few (clickable) images from the games I played yesterday at the Chalgrove "Worlds" - apologies if you've seen some already on Facebook. Above is game 1 vs. Sid Bennett's newly painted and very pretty Samnites. Sid's javelin-chucking Samnites out all too many of my nellies, I think I had just two units left at the end- he was well ahead on points. Always great to play Sid, he's really knowledgeable about the rules.

A quick note on my Classical Indian army- my objective was to maximise the number of elephants on the table, so I picked eight small units and represented each with two models, for a total of 16 pachyderms. I suppose I could have fitted even more elephants in the baggage- perhaps an idea for a future outing!


Here's game two against Kurt from Belgium. Kurt had a splendid army of Teutonic knights, including militant nuns. I began the game supremely confident that my nellies would trample the knights, but it was not to be. Even though my save was excellent (in some cases 3+ vs mounted, on one occasion, when uphill, 2+ !!), on the rare occasions I failed a save, the subsequent rampages often killed several additional units. This army is very much a "glass hammer." Kurt was ahead on points at the end. Below is a shot of the "thin grey line" resisting the charges of the knights.



Here's the last photo I took, of Andy Powell and his Crusaders, mid-game. On the left I managed to squish the mounted Crusader knights. Eventually I took out most of the foot knights in the centre, too, but I lost a fair number of nellies along the way and failed to win outright.

Unfortunately I forgot to photograph my final game against Tony Horobin's (left, photo taken after the end of the game so unfortunately, none of his minis) Middle Imperial Romans, which is a great, pity as it was very a friendly game which I won, with seconds to spare, just before the end of the tournament.

The tournament was won by Peter Ryding (again!) with a Timurid army, very well done to him. He practices very hard for the tournament. I ended up right in the middle of the field. Unfortunately I don't have all the scores but I think Alex and Kurt from Belgium came second and third.

Steve Dover, with help from chums Simon Purchon, Peter Ryding and John (? sorry can't recall surname) did a fantastic job setting up and running the tournament, huge thanks to them. Below is a photo of all those participants who hadn't legged it by the time we got around to taking the group photo.


 Finally, we have two more tournament coming up later this year:

The first is the TtS! Opens, part of the BHGS Historical Teams event at the Lee Valley Leisure Centre in north London on Saturday 15th October. Like Chalgrove, there are four games in one day. You can use any army list from the Ancient Army List eBook. You can book this here. The ticket also gets you entry to SELWG which is in the same venue on the Sunday, a great show where I'll be running a participation game - Second Mantinea - which features Epaminondas and the Theban mega phalanx.

The last tournament will be at Warfare at the Farnborough International Exhibition & Conference Centre on Saturday 12th or Sunday 13th November (we haven't decided which day yet). If you think you'd like to come to this one, please email me and I'll forward to the organiser.

I hope to see you at one event or t'other!