Republican roman skirmishers

A solid weekends painting saw 4 units of skirmishes finished.

Hopefully by the end of next week I'll have the 4 allied skirmisher units done as well.

In the background you can also see some command stands that I'm working on.

What did everybody else get done over the weekend?

BASING FUN

So last night I just wasn't in the mood for painting so after giving our new house site a check as I do a couple of times a week to see how the build slowly progresses I decided that I'd do some basing and work out a final scheme that I can carry out across my whole army.

The unit bases come from battle kiwi and were custom sized for me. Oliver the owner of Battle kiwi is quick to respond to messages of Facebook and email and the pricing is excellent. If you are looking for movement trays, bases or tokens or some scenery check out Battle kiwi. Www.battlekiwi.com.

Now into the unit trays. I assembled the tray with a bit of superglue (I was too impatient to wait for PVA to dry.  Have it a spray of black paint and then applied my base goop as I've come to call it. As soon as that was dry I applied my static grass mixture.

My bases were done the same way but after the static grass went down I applied some Army Painter lowland tufts and some flower tufts to make it look like my Romans are walking through some ancient grassy paddocks.  I like how they have turned out and think the whole army done the same way should look pretty good on the table.  The plan for the rest of the weeks painting is to do up 6 more exactly the same to cover all the units I've currently painted as well as trying to finish off a couple more Italian units.

Shield fun.

So I spent the weekend relaxing watching blue rays and working on my Italian allies. Was having a pike of fun working on the shields for the first of my Italian allies for the Romans.  I think they certainly look the part. The combination of mixed shield designs and the different tunic colours definitely make the allied units stand out from the Roman Maniples.

First games of Hail Caesar

So on Saturday I finally got to play my first game of Hail Caesar ever though I've had the rules and figures since the rules first came out!

I played 2 games.

The first was against Rob and his Greeks. It was a nail bighter till the very last dice throw. The phalanx rule is just nasty. I keep winning the fights but only by 1 or 2 points which ment everything kept ending in ties.

Game 2 was against Cavins Samurais. This was a very interesting game as almost every unit in his army could shoot bows at long range as well as still put up a good fight. Unfortunately for Cavin I got across the board very fast with triple moves for both my divisions. This meant he got one turn of shooting before I charged him in the second turn. Although he put up a bit of a fight the Romans are certainly tougher than the Samurai in a stand up fight. The dice averaged out and the Romans came out in top by the end of turn 3.

Both very fun games and I can't wait till the next game. Meanwhile I managed to assemble more Itallian allies.   

Done

First 300 points done. Now to start the Italian allies.

Republican Romans

So after a very long break I'm back painting again. If you follow me on Facebook you will see that I painted up a 1000 points of Concord troops for gates of Antares and have been busily working on 300 points of troops for Hail Caesar.  Here's a picture of a Roman unit that just needs basing.  

Mid Republican Romans W.I.P

So its been a while since I’ve got around to posting. Works been full on and i went and brought a new car and lost all interest in painting for the last few weeks. I was getting a bit worried that my painting mojo was gone but now I’m on holiday for 2 weeks the painting mojo seems to have returned.

So many more to go but happy with the result.  I cant add the shields until I buy some transfers and decide exactly how i will finish them. More pics to follow as i get more work done.

Keen for feedback on these so let me know what you think.  I spent ages trying to decide on what colour to do the clothing. Still not sure i should have done Red. I personally think White was more likely to be what they were historically wearing in the 3rd century B.C but red just looks good.

Victrix Mid Republican Romans have arrived!!!!

Yes what a great day off. I got a good sleep in to 7.30am (normally I’m up at 5.30am for work) and within a few hours of being up i had two packages arrive – one from Warlord games and the other from Victrix.

As you can imagine i had the packages open within a minute.

I’m going to be busy!!
I intend to do a review of my thoughts on Hail Caesar once i read the rules fully but for now onto the models.
First up I’ve only opened up the two boxes of the legionaries in chain mail so my review will be based on them. The quality of the sprue’s is top notch. The mould lines are very small and were very easy to clean up. The miniatures details are very crisp. The detail on the faces is very good although perhaps a tad cartoony a little like Warlord games bolt action figures. (although i like that as it gives them some character)


 
As i said the mould lines are very small and you could almost get away without removing the lines on many of the figures. My OCD would never let me do that though.
Here are some shots of one of the miniatures which had some of the lines that could be seen. A sharp knife and about 15-20 seconds and it was perfect for painting.

The figures thankfully come in very few pieces. The legs and torso are all one piece as is the left arm that holds the shield. The head, right arm and the shield is separate. Although the poses are slightly different the poses are all of standing legionaries designed to rank up. The arms allow the choice of Pilum for the Hastatus or Princeps  as well as spears for the Triarius.
I brought two boxes of the Chainmail legionaries which allows me to make 5 units 16 strong each. 2 Units of Triarii and 3 units of Principes. The third box will allow me to do two units of Hastati with the pectoral chest plate.  It is worth noting that there are a choice of several different helmet designs including the odd one often seen in illustrations which looks like it is worn like a Corinthian helm and often shown worn by Triarii. There are enough of this design to give one unit of 16 per box. I think it will help mark out the Triarii units as different (yes i know the spears will do that as well).
Here’s a pic of my clean up progress so far.
 
Now i haven’t touched on the light troops that you also get in each box. A rather large number of 18 figures per box .  I haven’t actually looked at those figures yet so i will review them in another post.
So what do i think over all – I give them a 9 out of 10. I think there are well proportioned miniatures and the detail on them is excellent. If you are on the lookout for a Mid Republic Roman army then i personally don’t think you could find a better option.