More Classical Indians

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Having painted enough Classical Indians to field a 130 point Monarchist army, it was time to start looking at what figures I needed to add in order to be able to field other armies from the Indian sub-continent.

First up was obviously to check that I could field the Republican variant of the classic Classical Indians. Hmmm…in order to do that, I needed to paint up another unit of horse.

These have sat, undercoated only, on my painting table for some time but, once I’d actually picked up a brush and got started, were actually quite fun to paint. It’s always that first brushstroke that’s the hardest!

These are more of the Museum Miniatures CAD-designed “Z Range”, and very lovely they are too. I particularly like the cataphract command figure in the middle: full of life and animation. Okay, so the guys with the swords don’t look too comfortable, but this is a Raw unit after all, and the spear-holding figures are nice.

Now on to see what I need to make my Classical Indians into Vedic or Tamil Indians, and then onto the Graeco-Indians after that!

Indians Hammered, and then Hammered Again!

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Another couple of games of To The Strongest, again on Zoom. This time it was to be my Classical Indians against the Marian Romans: a bit more of a challenge than the Achaemenid Persians!

As before, the set up was for my opponent to have a combination of a stationary overhead camera surveying the whole battlefield and a roving on-table ‘detail’ camera which could be moved to where the action was taking place.

I lost the scouting phase and, as can be seen in the picture above, ended up in a long line across the battlefield facing a Roman force who’s main contingent seemed to be skulking in one corner.

My plan was therefore to hold back my left wing and send forward my centre and right wings to destroy his two separated commands one by one, and then combine my forces again to attack his rather impressive looking camps. Hopefully my superior numbers and mass longbow fire would negate his heavily armoured veteran legionaries (gulp!).

Skulking, I tell you, skulking!

Brave, noble, well-painted!

As already mentioned, I had lost the scouting phase, so my opponent had the initiative and would move first. That should have got him a couple of squares forward, just out of longbow range, but perfectly in keeping with my plan.

Unfortunately not.

A combination of group moves, marches, good cards and, presumably, sheer Roman determination led to a line of annoyed looking Italians appearing right in front of me before my men had had a chance to even finish their breakfasts!

Two thirds of his legionaries are now in my face!

Worse, some of his hairy cavalry had got off the table to the left of my line and were threatening to re-appear and roll me up like a yoga mat!

Well, that was my plan out the window: time for a desperate scramble to retrieve the situation.

A desperate scramble

Most of my men are uninvolved!

The cards were not with me either: although my four-horse chariots managed to manoeuvre themselves into the right position for a flank charge (above left), there they halted to admire the scenery rather than getting stuck in; and my longbows seemed to be firing the wrong sort of arrows today: nerf guns would have been more effective!

Then it was the Romans to go again, and my left hand command just evaporated!

I’m sure I had a left flank around here somewhere!

The Romans were then able to “left turn” with their usual alacrity and, although I did manage to kill one unit of light cavalry, that was really that.

Well that was as comprehensive a mullering as I have ever had!

Game 2

The good news was, of course, that that left us time for a second game: every cloud, silver lining etc!

Things started well: I won the scouting phase this time and ended up in a much better position as the first card was about to be drawn.

Good, tight formation from the Indians this time!

A tough nut to crack!

A tough nut to crack!

The Roman commander looks down on my troops with disdain!

My plan was to quickly kill the cavalry in front of my right wing, then bring the chariots back into the centre for some flank attacks. Meanwhile, my other two commands would advance en masse and pepper his men with their longbows, weakening them in time for the elephants to go in from the front just as my heavy chariots hit them from the side.

Unfortunately, the Gods were against me again (despite me changing the pack of cards I was using in a desperate attempt to change my luck!) and my first turn ended with my men arrayed as shown in the picture above. Chariots: yes, good. Division One: yes, good. Division two…where on earth is Division Two!

If there was anything I’d learnt today about the Romans it’s that they can react really quickly to anything that happens and, sure enough, forward and sideways they came as they attempted to retrieve the situiation.

There was, however, an opportunity here. If I could get my chariots across the field and into the flank of the two legionary units in the centre of the table, then I reckon that I could hit one and then the other and roll them both up. After all, I’d have three attack cards on the first unit with a Hero and a General to get replays. That would put him a third of his main force down with no casualties to me:

I had, of course, neglected to factor in the fact that it was not my day!

Although my chariots flew across the field and got into a perfect charge position, they then stopped! I had had two chances to draw a seven or more (i.e. a 64% chance of success) and failed both times.

The Roman cavalry were thus able to come forward and hit my chariots in the flank (bye bye one unit of chariots and a general), then move the rest of their troops to begin rolling up my line.

Not as bad a mullering as last time, but definitely another hammering!

Aftermath

A couple of great games of TTS despite my ill-fortune. Some of you might be muttering that a good workman doesn’t blame his tools, but even my opponent agreed that it seemed as if every second card I drew was an Ace. For the final chariot combat, needing two 6’s for saves, I drew two Aces: a fitting end to the day!

Still, onwards and upwards, as they say: I’d like to fight the Marian Romans again, but might try one of the other Indian-style armies next time!

Classical Indian 2-Horse Chariots

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Regular visitors will know that one of my current projects is to build a Classical Indian army using the excellent 15mm CAD designed “Z” range from Museum Miniatures.

I already had enough figures to field a standard 130 point army for To The Strongest, which has already and quite successfully hit the tabletop a couple of time, but I wanted to add some units to increase it’s flexibility.

I say ‘increase its flexibility’ to mean two different things.

Firstly, I wanted to extend the figures’ use into other TTS armies, looking at the Vedic Indians as a starting point. This is an earlier army mainly consisting of chariots and javelinmen.

Secondly, I wanted to increase the tactical flexibility of the Classicial Indians. At the moment, I only have three commands, with my impact units being Elephants and Heavy 4-Horse Chariots. These are great, but risk being outflanked by armies with loads of lights. I therefore need more, slightly less powerful units as potential substitutes for the usual mighty, but inflexible, fist.

The lists all mention two-horse chariots as a slightly less powerful version of the heavy four-horse variety: less powerful so you get more of them. These would be ideal, except for the fact that Museum didn’t do them in their Z range.

Or at least they didn’t!

A quick e-mail to Dave, proprietor, with the request and justification, and within a couple of days (yes, days!) a two-horse chariot option hit the shop.

I bought nine!

These are, like the other figures in the range, lovely models and highly recommended. Great service from Museum as well. I feel ready for Alexander now!

TTS AAR: Classicial Indians and the Achaemenids

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Two remote games of To The Strongest played at the weekend: both featuring my newly painted Classical Indians against a cobbled together army of Achaemenid Persians.

I say cobbled together because I don’t have an Achaemenid Persian army, so what ended up on the tabletop were Assyrians as Persian cavalry, some Medes from an Alexandrian army, some Greek types as Ionians, some Scythian types as horse archers, then Sassanid Persian infantry as Sparabara and, embarrassingly and perhaps the most heinous crime, Greek Hoplites as the Immortals!

Due to lockdown, the game was played remotely i.e. the table and figures were set up at my house, with my opponent being able to see what was going on over Zoom from his house. After last week’s first attempt, I’d invested in a new webcam, so the picture was much improved:

I also bought a little tripod for my mobile ‘phone (you can see it in position, above) so it was also a lot easier to move the “battlefield reporter” camera around as well.

Game One

So a victory for the Indians: a couple of enemy units killed by missile fire, but the main damage was from the heavy chariots punching their way through the centre. After the game, Bevan mentioned that he wasn’t expecting to find “cavalry” in the centre of my line, and this discombobulated his battle plan!

I also feel honour bound to mention that the cards were most certainly not falling for the Achaemenids!

Game 2

So a second victory for the Persians, although things were a lot closer this time.

Massed longbow fire, and the elephants/heavy chariots at the schwerepunkt, proved a winning combination. Both sides had infantry with strong missile fire but weak melee skills supported by decent melee troops (his cavalry, my elephants and chariots) but I had the advantage in both areas: my longbows outranged his bows, and my elephants/chariots were a bit better than his cavalry. These two advantages gave me the win despite having less units (by one!) and less flexibility (three commands to his four).

Still, I suspect Bevan will have his revenge. Next encounter will see me fielding the Indians again, but against an Alexandrian army…gulp!

Slow Painting!

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I’ve finally got around to finishing another unit of javelinmen for my 15mm Classical Indian army: seems to have taken me ages!

I’m not sure why things have slowed down so much, but I suspect it’s something to do with playing three remote games over the last couple of weeks. I don’t know if this is something that happens to you, but I find that I am either painting or playing, but not both in the same phase, as it were. Weird, as you would have thought that playing would encourage you to paint.

I think what I really need is a new project.

I have got projects to finish - another legion of Romans, more Classical Indians, more ECW, more Hoplites, more Alexandrian pikemen - but am not enthusiastic about any of them at the moment…and there’s nothing worse that trying to paint a unit when you’re not enthused. I shall have to have a hunt around for something new to start…so feel free to make some suggestions. Must be 15mm though, as I only game in that scale (and to mix scales is, I feel, the road to madness and bankruptcy).

That said, I am going to try and run my first remote game on Sunday, so am busy working out how to get the best position for the camera, laptop etc. A report will follow the game, so watch this space!

My First Painting of 2021

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No games to be had due to COVID, so it was back to the painting table for the first weekend of the new year.

First finished was a unit of Indian javelinmen. I now have enough Classical Indians to field 130 points worth, but adding various other units to the collection will give me a bit of flexibility of army list and allow me to, at a stretch, field other Indian armies such as the Vedics and Tamils.

As with the rest of the collection, these are 15mm Museum Miniatures painted with GW Contrast Paints.

Next up are some odds and ends that I really painted to give myself a rest from the Classical Indians: some 15mm Essex Confederate infantry that I had half painted a number of years ago.

I’m a bit torn with these Rebs: I have about 120 infantry done painted in a very similar fashion to the above. The trouble is, I don’t like them very much! I like the officers that I’ve just finished off, above, using Contrast Paints, but the rank and file that were mostly done using standard acrylics, and mostly done quite badly quite a few years ago, just don’t appeal. Part of the problem is that I like my units looking neat and light, and these look a bit dark and gloomy.

So, what to do? Do I discard the 120 that are done and start again, painting at a better standard than I could manage then, or do I use them as a refresher between other jobs just to get the army done: after all, will I really notice when they are on the table?

Answers on a postcard to the usual e-mail address or as a comment on this post…

TTS AAR: Classical Indians versus Caesarian Romans

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After six weeks of hard painting, helped by Lockdown 2 and the Christmas holidays, the Classical Indians are ready to hit the tabletop, and what better occasion to test them out than what is almost certain to be the final battle of the year.

My usual wargaming opponents were again unavailable due to the lockdown (it’s about two degrees Centigrade, so a little cold to game outside) so I fell back on the ever-reliable Daughter #2. We decided to play a straight up, 130 points a side game of To The Strongest: I obviously wanted to play with my newly finished Indians, so she decided to fall back on her favourite Caesarian Romans, once again adopting the persona of the Beardless Proconsul.

So a loss for their first outing, but actually not as bad a loss as I had thought. My massed longbow fire did cause the Romans real problems in the initial stages of the battle, and had that unit of legionaries on my right not held out against overwhelming odds, then I think the day would have been mine.

Lots of lessons learnt: the most important one being to put a unit of elephants on the wing where the chariots aren’t: an elephants versus Gauls match up might well have gone my way as the Gallic horses don’t like pachyderms and suffer big penalties in combat.

Anyway, another cracking game of TTS, and a fitting end to a great year’s gaming.


Classical Indians: The Elephants

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An important part of any Classical Indian army are the elephants. They can form the spearhead of your attack: stomping any enemy units into submission. They are particularly useful against cavalry-based armies who haven’t encountered pachyderms before.

As with the rest of my Classical Indians , my elephants are from Museum Miniatures’ 15mm CAD-designed “Z” range, and very pretty they are too:

They were also very easy to paint: time-consuming, in that there’s a lot of elephant and crew to produce, but much easier to turn out than I had anticipated.

The elephants themselves are painted with a single coat of GW Contrast Basilicum Grey. Then each under-blanket is painted a dark colour, with the over-blanket a contrasting lighter colour. The rather natty designs on the over-blanket are actually WW2 tank decals (Soviet IIRC), and have turned out even better than I expected.

I painted the crew in situ but, if I have to paint any more, may consider painting them separately then mounting them. It’s 50/50: it’s fiddly to paint them in place, but quite difficult to get them mounted well, so you could ruin a paint job messing around trying to get completed crew figures in place.

Classical Indian Heroes

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Regular visitors will know that I am currently painting up a 15mm Classical Indian army using Museum Miniatures excellent “Z” range of CAD designed figures.

I had said that the next element to be worked on were the elephants: a massive task involving a mix of the elephants themselves (six of them) and their escorts (a load of light infantry types). I mounted the crew figures on their steeds, fixed them all to painting bases (a mixture of lolly sticks for the foot and bits of card for the nellies), sprayed them, and then wondered what I would do whilst I waited for them to dry. Gone are the days of sitting there with a hair dryer: with Tier 4 in full swing, I didn’t have any opponents anyway! I needed a quick painting fix, so decided to paint up the five “Heroes” that had sitting on the sidelines awaiting some attention.

Heroes need, in my opinion, to stand out from the crowd a bit, so what better figures to use than a selection from the “Indian or Arab Hordes” pack that Museum do. These are both striking and unusual, and suited what I wanted down to the ground:

I am loving these poses, and the way the figures are sculpted really allows the Contrast paint to do its work as well. The first two heroics - the chap kneeling down with a spear and the chap holding the two rocks - are some of my favourite casts ever. The close up shots reveal the sloppiness in my painting style, but they look really, really good when viewed at wargaming distance.

Highly recommended.

Enter the Heavy Chariots!

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No gaming at the moment as COVID restrictions are still in force, so it’s on with the painting: specifically adding units to my 15mm Classical Indian army.

The last week or so has been spent putting together and painting a couple of heavy chariot units:

These are figures from Museum Miniatures’ CAD designed “Z” range painted using mostly GW Contrast paints.

Just in case you’re after a bit of inspiration, here are a couple of notes:

  • The dark brown horses are painted using Cygor Brown diluted 50/50 with the Contrast thinner, then black manes, tails and lower legs.

  • The dun horses use Agresso Dunes as the skin colour, with black manes, tails and lower legs.

  • The grey coloured horses (a shade probably unknown to nature but looks good on a model!) are Space Marines grey with Basilicum grey manes, tails and lower legs.

  • The black horses are Templar Black Contrast for the skin, then a standard acrylic black for the mane and tail.

  • The crew skintone comes from a 50/50 mix of Cygor Brown and Fyreslayer Flesh

  • The chariot sides were painted Skeleton Horde, the black blobs in an approximate cow hide pattern, dark grey infill on the blobs, then stippled white in between.

  • The bases are Warbases large vehicle bases with GW basing material on top with a sprinkling of talus before it dried. That was then drybrushed in a bone colour and the edge painted as well. Then three types of shrubbery brush in clumps placed randomly. Then a sprinkle of mixed dark green and dark yellow basing fluff.

  • The whole lot then varnished in a matt anti-shine finish.

DSCN2099.JPG

  • The bright coloured shields are a bit fantastic (simple alternating stripes) but provide a nice contrast to the other colours

  • I decided to paint the chariot wheels and structure in the darker Contrast red for the same reason.

  • Finally, I didn’t touch up the figures after basing, especially the horses and lower parts of the chariots, as I felt that the models looked better with a bit of dirt and dust on the undercarriage!

Next up are the escorted elephants. That’s quite a big project, with each (deep) base containing two elephants-and-crew and eight escorts on foot. Three bases worth to do, so might take me a bit of time! Wish me luck…

Classical Indians: The Maiden Guard

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More Classical Indians rolling off the production line!

This time it’s the Maiden Guard:

As usual, these are from Museum Miniatures’ 15mm “Z” range of CAD designed figures painted mainly with GW Contrast Paints.

I know that the idea of the Maiden Guard in terms of being a battlefield fighting unit is somewhat, er, fictional, but the way I have constructed my TTS Classical Indian 130 point army list means that I only need one unit of Javelinmen, who can be Veteran, so I thought I’d just go for it and paint a unit of figures different from anything else I’m going to need. After five longbowmen units in a row, a change is as good as a rest!

And these figures are lovely. Rather than being your typical 15mm female warrior figures (basically men with two lumps of green stuff on the chest) these really are significantly different from the male figures in the range. They are slighter overall, with slightly emphasized hips, and breasts that actually look like the sort of breasts you might get on an athletic young lady rather than a couple of stray footballs!

As I hope you can see, they paint up very well too, and I would highly recommend them for anyone who needs Amazons or the like.

I’m moving on to the Classical Indian cavalry now, but here’s a couple of pics of the last on the longbowmen.

More Classical Indians

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I’ve had a chance to paint up another couple of longbow bases for the Classical Indians.

These are 15mm figures from Museum Miniatures “Z” range, and very nice they are too. I’ve painted them with GW Contrast Paints, and mounted them as elements of vehicle bases from Warbases. Most of the basing materials come from Boontown.

The fleshtone comes from a 50:50 mix of Cygor Brown and Fyreslayer Flesh. I’m getting more confident with mixing the Contrast paints now.

One more base of longbowmen to go, and then on to the Maiden Guard.

First of the Classical Indians

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Regular visitors will know that I consoled myself for the pain of the new lockdown (no training, no wargaming) with the purchase of new 15mm Ancients army to be used with To The Strongest.

The army I chose was Museum Miniatures relatively new “Z” range of Classical Indians: the “Z” means that they were CAD designed rather than being sculpted. I’ve been really happy with my “Z” Sumerians, really happy with the “Z” Greeks, so after painting a Baueda Marian Roman army, I was very much looking forward to the “Z” Indians.

And I was right to do so.

They are a dream to paint. The detail is excellent, and they take the paint really easily. These first two units, both of longbowmen, were each completed in a day (one Saturday, one Sunday) and I could have fitted a third in if I’d really tried.

I decided to break away from the way all my other Ancients armies are based (to the old Vis Bellica basing) and go with what had worked really well for my English Civil War armies: one element per unit on a nice big base.

I also decided to go a bit mad with the basing. I usually shove a layer of GW basing material on then dry brush a light shade on top, with flock or a tuft or two for decoration. Here, however, I went for it in a big way: same basing material and dry brush, but with patches of little stones pushed into the basing material before its dry (with watered down PVC on top to hold the stones in place). Then I added three different types of tuft, and two different type of flock roughly mixed together. I think it looks quite good.

To give you everything, these are 15mm Museum Miniatures Classical Indian longbowmen with infantry command. They are painted with GW Contrast Paints, with the excellent fleshtone achieved by with a 50/50 mix of Fyreslayer Flesh and Cygor Brown. The base is from Warbases (a vehicle base) with the flock etc from a variety of suppliers.

I’m quite happy with these, and looking forward to doing the rest.