Baby Steps

Just a brief check-in amidst the puppy chaos and pre-Christmas workload.

At last managing to get through some work on the shieldwall, although only by snatching 30 mins here and there so it's not speedy work!

The pics below show progress to date, the guys at the back (furthest from camera) are the elite troops (nobles) in white and red, with armour, the rest are the rank and file. I've tried to get a 'uniform' feel whilst having a mix of colours, hard to tell if it's worked until basing time, but fingers crossed!

Just helmets, shields, and final touch-up (my OCD won't allow me to skip that!) and then onto the javelin and archer support and standards.
Hopefully a fuller update soon...

Missing In Action

Just a quick post to report on, erm, negative progress.
Yes, the opposite of progress has occurred. Originally it was little to no progress, due to the arrival of a new dog in the house, Summer.
Painting time has temporarily given way to dog training time, so no progress was being made other than plans being formulated for future armies whilst engaged in various Summer related activities.

So things were proceeding slowly, or not at all, but I wasn't too unhappy until a Grendel type attack on my Shieldwall by the beast!

Before and after pictures of the unprovoked attack on my brave troops can be seen below...



The shieldwall awaiting further painting.

The aftermath of the attack...

The bodies you can see were the only ones I found, four of their comrades are still missing, presumed, erm, eaten...Where is Beowulf when you need him?!

The beast, dreaming of another attack...

The Dark Autumn

The day we watched the Roman column disappear into the mist was the last time I saw my father for the next six months. During his absence, life was chaotic; we seemed to be spending less and less time at our villa in the country and more and more time at the town house, where the dark, rainy, autumn afternoons edged slowly into winter, and were passed listening to my tutor’s tales of past Roman emperors, and suffering his rebukes at my constant failures with the Latin tongue.

I asked questions of my tutors, the servants, and the soldiers who seemed to fill the streets during those months, and managed to find out that my father was away visiting other leaders, trying to forge alliances and organise defence against the rumours of barbarian attacks.
 

The servants assured me that everything would continue as it had been before the Romans left, but the soldiers looked surly and edgy, and spent longer than usual on the practice grounds outside the crumbling town walls. I spent my  lonely hours watching them, and then practising my own clumsy uncoordinated thrusts and parries with the wooden sword and small shield father had given me last Christmas, under the affectionate guidance of my war tutor, Crixus.

It was in the third month of my father’s absence that the engineers arrived and the town guard, along with any man found idle, were put to work building and rebuilding the delapidated walls. A new gate was made and erected, solid oak twice as thick as the old gate, and a new, taller, watchtower was built looking out over the forests that protected us from the coast.



 

In the fourth month, any pretence that we still lived in the country villa was abandoned, along with my old life. I lived in the fortified town now, it felt safe here, where the villa had come to feel isolated and exposed. As I wandered through the streets during the late afternoons after my lessons I looked upon the grim faces of citizen and soldier alike, and I knew the truth.

War was coming.

More Progress

Rather than bore you with pics of undercoated infantry (don't worry, you'll be bored with pics of undercoated infantry in a future post) I thought I'd show you the cavalry arm of my first Dux Bellorum army, ready for undercoating!

As always, H&R figure codes shown below the pics, and notes regarding modifications and any other relevant comments. As with the infantry, these fellows are going to be densely based, except in the case of the mounted skirmishers, obviously.

Speaking of mounted skirmishers, some of you may have noticed my schoolboy error of having bow armed rather than javelin armed figures as per the army lists - in my defence, your honour, it's the Dark Ages, anything is possible...especially in this army!



Mounted Companions (MAR27)

...from the other side (MAR27)

Not 100% historically accurate, but if I field an Arthurian army, I'm going to have some KNIGHTS!

Ordinary Riders (MAR20)

...from the other side (MAR20)

Mounted Skirmishers (MAR24)



Noble Riders (MAR11)

With the exception of the companions, all of the cavalry have a random selection of crested and uncrested helmets (again, courtesy of myself and Stanley) to give a less uniformed and more 'Britannic' look to the army - hopefully this effect will be revealed in all it's glory upon painting completion!

OT, but this post was delayed by the ridiculous amount of tine it took me to get the captions, pictires and text in the right place - hence the still, to my mind. messy layout of this post...GRRR!!

If any other blogspotters have some advice for me it would be greatly appreciated!

Painting pics on their way - but don't hold your breath.

Have a good weekend, comrades!

Signs Of Progress

Ok, I haven't exactly started painting, but I have made some progress - honestly!

Since returning from Malta I've spent a happy hour or two (Ok, maybe three or four. Five, tops) clipping and converting and getting ready to undercoat. From talking to fellow Generals I often get the feeling I spend longer than 'normal' on this sort of thing for such small figures, but I figure they're going to be fighting for years so I'm happy to spend a few hours now getting them to look how I want - even if no-one else notices!

The troops are 'blu-tacked' to wooden sticks (huge bag of these sticks is only £2 from Hobbycraft, and they never wear out) and ready for spraying.

Close-ups and H&R figure codes shown below, including comments where I've modified units.

Command Figures (from MAR28)

These are actually the command figures from the light infantry pack, the heavy infantry come with standards but no specific command figures. I like the pose of these guys and fortunately I ended up with 4 of them so I can use one on each Shieldwall base. One of them lost his sword (careless) so I'm going to have to do something creative with him before painting!

Bowmen (MAR9)

Originally the bowmen had small plumes on their helmets, which Stanley and I removed, followed by some brief filing so hopefully they look less Roman and more Briton now!

Shieldwall 1 (MAR10)

These are the rank and file Shieldwall, spear armed infantry. As with the bowmen, I've removed helmet crests from most of these guys, and hopefully this gives them a more 'irregular' and less Roman look.

Shieldwall 1 (MAR10)

The standard version of the Shiledwall spearmen, helmets intact!

Shieldwall 2 (MAR13)

These lads are going to form the majority of the front row of the Shieldwall as they seem keen to confront the enemy (good lads!). Again, helmet crests removed to give the 'Briton look'.

Shieldwall 2 (MAR13)

I've left some helmets with crests, and I figure I'll dot these randomly along the front line and cluster them around the standard and command grouping on each Shieldwall base.

Skirmishers (MAR28)

Foot Skirmishers - nicely animated figures, although an extra pose or two would have been good.



Standards (4 per pack)

Standard bearers. 4 figures per infantry pack, nicely detailed. The standard bearers on the right are from the Light Infantry pack and are correspondingly less armoured - I'm probably going to use these for the Tribal Militia bases.

Shieldwall On Parade!

The shieldwall troops arrayed! Approximately 250 Heavy Infantry that are only going to make 4 units with the dense basing I plan to use, but just from this pic I'm confident that this is the way to go - even if it's trebled my painting time!

 

That's all for now - I'm off to spray! Have a good weekend!

Tribal Issues

I'm pretty sure I said something like 'minimal research required' because of the small number of units and existing army lists?
Hmmm....
First read through of Warlords has revealed a very tribal nature to post-Roman Britannia, which actually seems to be pretty much unchanged since the pre-invasion days.
So now I'm thinking my Romano British army needs at least one, maybe a couple, of what I'm going to call Tribal Militias. Using Dan's army lists I'm going to class them as 'Warrior' ally  units to reflect their un-reconstructed method of warband-style fighting.
Fortunately I happen to have some un-painted Gaulish infantry and cavalry (H&R MAF1 and MAF2) lying around the war room (who hasn't, right?) and a quick inspection of these boys suggests they'll be perfect for how I picture the tribal militia looking!

(A few members of the newly formed tribal militia - I'm going to paint something soon, honestly!)

On another subject, I've been looking for a map of Dark Age Britannia I can pin to the war room wall, but the only one of been able to find so far comes with TFL's Dux Britanniarium - I'm hoping to unearth another source, so any suggestions would be most welcome!

I'm off to Malta for a few days tomorrow, so the project is on very temporary hold, but hopefully I'll have lots of reading time while I'm away...

Really Vague Book Review

The books have arrived, the troops have arrived...and instead of starting work I've started reading.

You could call it poor prioritisation - but the first book I've started has really given me a feel for the post apocalyptic style desolation that was Dark Age Britannia following the departure of the empire.

 

Britain After Rome, by Robin Fleming, covers a massive 600 years of history, but the first three chapters have already got me hooked despite the non-military focus of the book. Robin Fleming really gives you the feel of a desolate and depressed world, the rapid decline of Roman civilisation, and the exodus from crumbling, villa based towns as people re-formed communities in old places of safety such as abandoned hill forts.

 

Not by any stretch of the imagination a military history, but I already feel like I know the dark ages and have a feel for it's atmosphere. More to follow when I've delved into the other two - Warlords by Stuart Laycock looks particularly promising.

 

Next up, thoughts on basing, and hopefully some close ups of the new recruits...

"We will build our own armies. We will fight the barbarians.”

In theory, right now I'd be waiting for my books to arrive, doing some research, checking figure catalogues etc.
In practice:
a) Dux Bellorum has army lists, there are only a few different troop types, and the armies are made up of anything from 8-12 units, so army design is pretty straightforward.
b) The choice of Heroics & Ros at 6mm is a no brainer for me (more on this in a future post) so minimal catalogue checking required.
c) I'm impatient to start!

My only decision then was which army to go for, and given that I found Dux Bellorum through researching Roman Britain it makes sense to start with either Romans or Romano British. Since the army lists are pretty similar, figures I use now can easily be morphed or borrowed from one army to the next, and as I've recently watched the entertaining but flawed 'King Arthur' on TV, I opted for Romano British.

After a bit of internet research, some number crunching, and basing thoughts, and a couple of emails to Andy at Heroics & Ros, my order was dispatched and in double quick time the jiffy bag containing my first army appeared in my post box!

First inspection confirms what I have come to expect from H&R: clean, crisp castings, realistically posed and animated figures, and enough detail to look like real men on a gaming table without going overboard and challenging my OCD to pick out every bit of unnecessary intricacy.

The excitement of opening a package of new troops never leaves me! (Close-ups and comments to follow, hopefully in my next post)

My Romano-British army is going to look like this (H&R Figure Codes and quantities in brackets):

1 Unit Companion Cavalry [5pts]        (MAR27 x 2)
1 Unit Noble Riders [5pts]                   (MAR11 x 1)
1 Unit Ordinary Riders [3pts]              (MAR20 x 1)
4 Units Shieldwall [12 pts]                  (MAR10 x 3 & MAR13 x2)
1 Unit Bowmen [3pts]                          (MAR 9 x 1)
1 Unit Mounted Skirmishers [2pts]      (MAR24 x 1)
2 Units Foot Skirmishers [2pts]           (MAR28 x 1)

Dux Bellorum author Daniel Mersey suggests that one 'base' represents a 50 man shieldwall, with other units having varyingly smaller numbers. The beauty of 6mm is that my shieldwall bases will actually contain 50 men! So, my 450 man army has arrived, and it's time to get busy...

What's This All About Then?

Welcome to what I hope will be an interesting and entertaining trip to Dark Age Brittania, and in particular my journey into the world of Dux Bellorum!

My love of 6mm wargames began when I realised that I could actually paint figures small enough to look like they were having real battles, not skirmishes with a handful of men per side. In fact, my ability to paint 6mm is now far better than my ability to paint anything larger, so there’s no going back!

MAE1 Class I Spearmen (Hoplites)

 

MAE4 Cavalry

 

MAE2 Class IV Spearmen (Auxiliaries)

 

MAE3 Javelins & Bows (Skirmishers)

 

The General leads a column of cavalry!

 

MAE6 Class II & III Spearmen

 

MAG11 (Converted) Light Cavalry

 

MAR16, 17, or 18 (!) Late Era Heavy Infantry

Heroics & Ros 6mm Etruscans

Having spent years fighting in mythical Etruscan civil wars, and later Celtic invasions of northern Italy, I fancied a change, and something closer to home.

Given that my home is less than two miles from the Lunt Fort, something involving the Roman presence in England seemed like a good idea. As is often the way, googling led from one thing to another, until I came across this, and I knew my search was over!

 

Beautifully produced rules with simple to follow mechanics and a wide array of interestingly different forces -  I really can’t wait to get started. It is at this point, however, that I realise how little I know about my new period, and so another ‘visit’ to Amazon is required…

Who Will Fight The Barbarians Now?

My father stood next to me as we watched the long column of Legionaries winding it’s way out of the mist shrouded valley below us, his leather and mail armour creaking and clinking every time he turned to follow the deserting troops with his eyes.

“Where are they going, father?” I asked, nervously. He didn’t like it when I asked too many questions.

His gloved hand rested heavily on my shoulder, the weight of his concern evident in his touch. “Away over the sea, back where they came from” his voice was heavy with either sadness or resignation, I wasn’t sure which.

Below us, the snaking column was slowly disappearing, the last outriders fading in and out of vision through the mists of the cold morning air.

“When will they back? Who will fight the barbarians now?”

“They won’t be back”, he sighed.

“But you said we need the Romans, father! What will we do?” I knew the fear in my voice was unbecoming of the warrior I wanted to be, but I couldn’t control it.

His hand gripped my bony shoulder “We don’t need the Romans. We will build our own armies. We will fight the barbarians.”

"Are we the last Romans now, father?" I felt alone, on the edge of an abyss.

"No. There are no more Romans. We are the first Britons, Artorius. We are the Britons!"