On the workbench-Serbian Knights

Monday was a great day for me.  I came home from work and found 2 Field of Glory related packages in the mail...kind of like Christmas in September!  The first package was my Essex Hungarian army. I got an email on Saturday confirming the Hungarians were shipping and Monday, they were in! That's amazing since Tennessee and Minnesota are more than 1,000 miles apart.  I'm thrilled with the fast shipping and great price of  Wargames.  I'm going to go back to their website and scour for more medieval troops.  If I'm lucky, maybe I can find enough figures to pull together another Medieval army.

I've never painted anything but Old Glory so I was fretting over whether Essex would be of equal quality.  It turns out that these figures are very well molded and loaded with detail.   The horses have a very nice size and shape compared to Old Glory.  Side by side, the Old Glory horse looks very thin.  I haven't even painted a single figure and already, I'm a fan of Essex!    

Last week, to prep for painting 40+ Hungarian knights, I dug out the last of my unpainted Old Glory Knights that I used for my Serbian Nobles battlegroup.  When I painted the Serbs last spring, I primed them with white primer, drybrushed sliver, washed with Badab Black and then over that with a bright silver.  I don't routinely drybrush 15mm figures but with chainmail and some barding, the technique works. 

I don't know but I've been told, Knights primed white shine like gold. 

This time around, I decided to change things up.  I primed the remaining Knights black, drybrushed them with a dark silver, then a black wash and then a bright sliver.  Comparing the two, the difference is very subtle. Priming white will give you a slightly brighter silver and shinier knight.   I think I'll stick with black primer for my Hungarian Knights for a slightly darker result. That's fitting since they will be a part of the Black Army.  

Drybrushed.

Stained and then painted a bright silver. 

Serbia scores 6 more Knights.

These 6 Serbians were a nice warmup for the Hungarian project.  On a critical note, I'd like to get better at painting shields.  I confess I see shields as a chore and it shows through in my work.  I'm going to have to fix that because there are an awful lot of shields in this army! I probably could use some Medieval reference books before I really dig in, so,  its time to go to Amazon and see what I can scrounge up.

And in case you were wondering what the 2nd Field of Glory package was on Monday?  More hills, trees and stone walls for enclosed fields. In for a penny, in for a pound.  

Off the Workbench-Heavy Chariots

I finished up 4 more bases of Carthaginian Heavy Chariots...just in time to be temporarily retired with the rest of my Carthaginian army.  The Old Glory chariots are good with a few caveats: 

1.  You'll need a pin drill to drill out the hole where the axle goes into the wheel. Try to force a wheel on and  you'll bend the tiny axle back and maybe even let out a swear or two.
2.  Don't glue the wheels on until AFTER you've painted and detailed the chariot. Obvious to most people but I overlooked it with the first batch I painted.
3.  These chariots come with a grooved diamond pattern in them.  You'll want to create a paint scheme based on this pattern or risk poor results. I tried putting a stripe across one but the paint bled under the tape due to the grooves.  D'oh!

With the difficulties I had in coming up with a snazzy scheme for the chariot frames, I spent extra time on the wheels.  The trick that worked for me was to paint them black and then add contrasting colors that popped against the black.  I like the way the wheels turned out but I'm less happy with the chariots themselves. 

Now that summer is over, it's time to start a new army.  I've been eyeing Xyston Miniatures but almost anything I paint of theirs would duplicate an army that someone in our club already has.  A number of players run Medieval armies and with my ancient armies, I rarely get to play them.  I decided to focus on the Medieval era. After reading about Matthias Corvinus and his Black Army of Hungary, I settled on a Later Hungarian army.  Later Hungarians have an interesting and colorful mix of units.  Plus the Hungarians make a great tabletop opponent for my Ottoman Turks.

The last hurdle was to find miniatures.  Unfortunately, Old Glory doesn't have an Eastern European Medieval line.  I tried to scratch up units that could stand in for Later Hungarian but it was difficult.  Then I stumbled across a US distributor of Essex clearing their figures out at 50% off.  While their Medieval lineup has been well looted at this price, I did find enough Hungarians to build a Later Hungarian army.  Figures shipped today...I can't wait to get started!

Onward Carthaginian Soldier

Saturday's game featured a Carthaginian versus Roman showdown with each of the 4 players fielding a 650 point army. Battle was fought on a 9' x 4' field.  The terrain set up turned out poorly for the Romans, with their center attracting a gully, open field, village and a plantation. The upside was the Roman village did look awfully nice!

I ran a Later Carthaginian army, loaded with elephants.  My teammate Klay ran Early Carthaginian, loaded with heavy chariots and the Sacred Band. We concentrated our African Spear in the center of the table with orders to hold in place. On our right flank, I planned to push forward and meet the Romans head on. On our left, Klay aimed to swing wide around the Roman flank and bend their line back, hoping to create gaps and opportunities for flank attacks.  The battle was shaping up to be another demonstration of Roman quality versus Carthaginian quantity. 

The early game progressed well for Carthage, with our right and left flanks advancing sharply.   In the center, Mark struggled to move his legions and medium archers up due to the village and gully.  The wall of Carthaginian chariots and cavalry presented the Romans with a challenge. What would they do in the face of Klay's flanking movement?

Two units of my Numidian light horse caught and ran down Roman slingers.  During the pursuit, my Numidians Light Horse discovered Lanciarii in ambush in a plantation.  The Lanciarii charged and succeeded in running down one of my light horse from behind.  In pursuing the broken horse, they  forced my 2nd battlegroup of light horse to evade through my elephants, disrupting them! 

Luck was with me on this day because my Elephants managed to fight the Lanciarii to a draw and then subsequently rally out of disorder.  The Elephants proceeded to win in subsequent turns and broke the Lanciarii, sending them back to join the routed Roman slingers.  While the Lanciarii and Elephants battled it out, two legions advanced into what would turn out to be a trap.  

The Scutarii trap is sprung.  Elephants moving up on the right, Scutarii in the center and just out of sight, another unit of Scutarii coming up on the left.  With only 2 legions to face down enemies on three sides, this did not end well for the Romans.  

Meanwhile, Mark's Romans advanced relentlessly on our wall of African Spear in the center, disregarding our superior numbers.  And for good reason, apparently, as one unit of Spear broke from bowfire alone!  In melee, a legion broke a second unit of Spear and just like that, our center was crumbling and now in doubt. 

On the Carthaginian left flank, nothing went quite like it should have.  Brandt skillfully deployed his legions and countered Klay's every threat. By game's end, my partner had failed to eliminate a single Roman base or break any units. His chariot charges failed as did a charge and melee by the Sacred Band!

At the finish, we scored the Carthaginians as up on the right flank, Romans up in the center and Carthaginians neutralized on the left flank.  The 6 bases of elephants were key on my front.  They are faster than heavy foot and in melee, they neutralized the Roman advantage in armor and superior sword skill.  Then again, its easy to shine when you have the rare fortune of catching your opponent in the flank.  

This is as good a point as any to rest my Carthaginian army. I have 3 other armies to play, one of which has never seen the tabletop. I'm planning to fast forward 1700 years and run my Later Ottoman Turks at our next meet.  After getting slapped around by Roman Medium bowmen, I'm looking forward to running my Janissary Medium bowmen.