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Thursday, May 3, 2012

Pontic Phalangites in the battle of Chaeronea

White Shields:  Phalangites were the backbone of the Pontic army during the First Mithridatic war.  Plutarch reports that at the Battle of Chaeronea, Archelaus employed 15,000 freed Roman slaves in  phalanx.  The Romans jeered with rage when they realized they were facing former slaves and quickly waded in to get at the "real" soldiers on the battlefield. It was no easy task. The former slaves were boiling with hatred for the Romans and fought with tremendous courage.  The slaves knew they faced victory or crucifixion and they fought hard, forcing Sulla to reinforce Murena's position.  The Romans managed to get slingers and javelinmen into the rear of the phalangites.  They showered them with missile fire until they broke and ran.



Bronze Shields:  While the slave phalanx held up the Romans, Taxiles led his Chalkaspides or Bronze Shields against Sulla.  The Bronze Shields were the elite phalangites of the army but even they could not stem the Roman tide. Once the Pontic army started to rout, the Bronze Shields phalanx formation collapsed.  Spears and shields were discarded and once they turned their backs to run from the Romans, the slaughter began.  



After the First Mithridatic war, Mithridates recognized that his phalangites were outclassed by the Roman Legions and the Roman style of fighting.  He subsequently disbanded his phalangites and hired Roman officers and expats to train and rebuild his army to fight in the Roman style.  

These 48 Xyston figures painted up fairly well and quickly.  As much as I'd like to field a Pike army in Field of Glory Ancients, the thought of  painting 200+ of these fellows makes me weak in the knees.  I'll circle back and paint up another stand for each unit so I can deploy them as "Large Units" in Impetus.  

Sunday, April 29, 2012

The Black Army Stumbles

I'd planned to do loads of yardwork Saturday but rain and cold weather gave me an excuse to put off until tomorrow what I could have done today!  Then Brandt asked if I was up for a game of Field of Glory. Perfect! I was a bit down about missing Little Wars in Chicago this weekend due to family commitments. In the alternate, we did a Littlest Little Wars convention in my basement featuring Later Ottoman Turk vs. Later Hungarians.  My Turks and Hungarians haven't seen a tabletop in 2012 and this was a historical mash-up I've wanted to try for some time.

At the start of the game, I got initiative and Brandt got almost no helpful terrain to go with the Turks. Undaunted, he came out swinging.



Early action saw Brandt jamming me with his light horse and skirmishers.  Everything in the Turkish army can shoot and I was shedding bases to his bow fire.  My 2 units of Serbian Hussars each lost a base and went disrupted, limiting their effectiveness the rest of the game. The upside was that 3 battlegroups of his Akinjis  light horse got way out in front of his army with no clear retreat path.  If I could charge them quickly, they'd be forced to either stand in place and melee or evade through his supporting line and disrupt units. I was salivating at both prospects.

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Paphlagonian Foot and Arachosian Horse

Paphlagonian Foot:  The kingdom of Paphlagonia was situated on the Black Sea coast between Bithynia to the west and Pontus to the east.  The weakness of the kingdom drew the attention of her two neighbors.  Mithridates of Pontus allied with Nicomedes of Bithynia and the two agreed to invade their mutual neighbor.  This drew the attention of Rome, who ordered a withdraw and planted the seeds of the Mithradic War.   Mithradates occupied Paphlagonia until the end of the first First Mithradatic War, when he was force to give up his claim to the territory.

In Impetus, these Light Foot are part of the many javelinmen units that make up the Pontic army.  I took the liberty of replacing their wicker shields with Hellenistic ones.  I don't think this was much of a stretch as it was reported that Mithridates used his enormous wealth to kit his army out very, very well.  The stories of his wealth trickled back to Rome and helped incite a rush to be the first to invade and sack Pontus.

I'm quite pleased with the vertical basing!   The process of creating these hills is incredibly messy due to the DAS air drying modelling material I used. It stains your hands and any surface it touches terra cotta.  And I have to soak it a bit to get it malleable.  At the art supply store, I found racks and racks of oven curing clay but almost no air drying clay.  Desperate, I picked DAS, which turned out to be a dog.  If you're going to try  vertical basing, find a good quality air drying clay and then let me know the brand so I can throw my DAS away!

For the tufts and white flowers,  I used Silfor Prairie Tufts 4/6mm Summer and Late Summer blossum tufts from Scenery  Express.  It was a bit pricey initially as I bought 8 packs of various colors and heights but these tufts go pretty far in 15mm.  


Arachosian Horse:  I needed javelin-armed Light Cavalry for the Pontic army and given the wide mix of troops employed, I grabbed these figures from Xyston.  You could just as well use Thracian or Greek javelin armed Light Cavalry.  Being an ancients gamer and painter is quite liberating and I played it to full effect here!


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