II/82a Western Patrician Roman v III/35b Feudal Spanish

A last chance to get my new armies on the table before the end of the year! I'm using a 1.2m square board. It's a broad valley, narrowing to a defile: featuring steep hills on three sides with low, wooded hills within the valley.

Romans roll defender and field a German-heavy option, and elect to keep an Ax back in their fort. With a feeling they ought to have opted for a Hun LH they have 3x4Wb, 1xBd, 2x4Ax, 2xPs, 1Cv, 2x3Kn, and a KnGen. 

Spanish roll aggressor and field the first or main of any option. This leaves them a core of 3x4Sp supported by fast Cb; two javelin toting Ps, one LH for annoying enemy deployment of light troops, one Cv for killing said light troops, and the real strength, 3Kn and a KnGen. 

The Spanish push lighter groups up near the limit of deployment. It's nice to have plenty of room!

Turn 1

PatRom PIP=1!

The mass of troops move forward at slowest pace, 2BW.

FeuSpa PIP=6!

Left flank LH+Ps race forward then split, the Ps ducking inward to ZOC PatRom right; LH stays clear ready to zip round further if the next roll is a 6. (Spoilers: it is not.)

Turn 2

PatRom PIP=3, and the warbands wheel up into the wooded hill cover. 

FeuSpa PIP=3, so playing safe, the Ps and LH pull back while the main mass of troops walk forward.

Turns 3 to 4:

Both sides use crafty maneuvers. PatRom Cv races in, is flanked by Ps before Wb can support; but it holds on long enough for the Wb to in turn trap the Ps. The FeuSpa LH races back to its own lines before it too can be trapped!

Turns 5 to 7

PatRoms decide to attack left while holding right. The Wb begin the slow process of getting across to mark the FeuSpa Sp, covered by their Cv, while the bulk of forces wheel left (below); in response the FeuSpa get their left flank wheeling forward and prep for their main advance by spreading out on their right (below).

These processes work best for the PatRom, though only by leaving their left flank horribly exposed:

And again, although the FeuSpa push their Cb into the wooded hill to match the Wb, their left flank Kn can't ever quite catch the other two Wb!

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Turns 8 to 10

The FeuSpa get a real roll on and attack all along the line! Their left Kn and right Cv slaughter a Ps and Wb!

With precious few PIPs to spend the PatRom KnGen commits himself right, and destroys one of the Kn! And in the woods, that audacious Sp element is made to pay: a Wb manages to front up and immediately destroys it!

But the shoe is on the other foot as the FeuSpa pounce on the isolated enemy general!

Turns 11 to 12

Draw! Draw! Draw! The melee continues around the two generals, more and more elements being sucked in. Meanwhile the FeuSpa Cv pounce on the seemingly-easy target, Ps.

The PatRom Ps score a 6:1 over the Cv! And with that, they have their 4 elements to 2 victory!

Both sides look great, and although it's a shame that the Feudal Spanish could not win, it's nice to have a Roman side that does not suck.

bench update 31 December 2022

Highlights! I begin with eyes and once I have those (not every mini rates eyes) skin is next, then light colors where relevant.

Then I move on to the horses, and they look a lot better than where they began!

With some misgivings I try a dark matt wash, and as you would expect given how dark these minis already were, the results are VERY dark.

I think remaining minis might be best just given amatt varnish...

Unearthed: West Frank motley

Today I opened my store-box of Viking + Carolingian. Sure enough, I had left the Carolingian foot and LH back there!

These are 2nd edition of course but I can see the dismounted Knights are going to be much easier to account for. In turn, that means having separate "all spear" and "all blade" foot will be highly doable. 

III/28 West Frank/Carolingian project begins

I'm vaguely sure I used to have a whole army to field, but, anyway, this is the rebase project kicking off.

Using the same approach as the wider Roman project just complete, OneNote allows me to write out the requirements and what is needed. 

I find that writing it out helps me track the army much better than just taking a picture of the army list.

In summary I have all but 3Bw, but I'm not entirely convinced about a lot of what I have. Many of the cavalry shields are tiny. Foot shields are too flat. I have visualized how I can make shields, but do I want to put in that much effort?

Anyway... trimming out has begun, my blade broke and the stub cut my thumb. Progress will be slow. It may be better to focus on repaint work.

Romans all back in boxes

I thought I should set this down as a marker before going on to the next bench project. These boxes exclude all Germanic elements except for Saxon Wb for Sub-romans.

Last night I found those missing heavy, part-armored mounts. I sure picked a weird place to hide them! Had I found them back at the beginning of my planning, the end result would look quite different!

Anyway, for the record I still have plenty of cataphractarii mounts, but not so many riders. In terms of Cv the problem is worse, as only two remaining minis might count as Cv.

If I decide to creep forward to the book iii armies, things are a bit better. Ostrogoths can be made up from Germanic elements, and Belisarius' or Narses armies can add Huns. I do have enough LH roman minis still on sprees for 4 elements, but only enough mounts for 2 elements.

bench update 15 December 2022

A wet day, perfect! Got the cavalry finished! I think, once they are flocked and all of the various combos are matt-sprayed, this will do. In theory I could need more 4Kn and 3Kn but it's hard to imagine a board where mid or late Roman armies can go crazy with mounted. Yeah I'll change my mind when I acquire Sassanid minis..

bench update 10 December 2022

Despite good painting weather I could not get into the cavalry very far. Still, some basics are done:

bench update 03 December 2022

After a week of dithering and procrastination...

Two heavies for the 3KnGen, and two lights for the sub-Roman LH. For the latter, after reviewing other II/81 armies images, I decided I could just suit myself. So I've followed the same general theme as my Medieval Irish LH, with a gentry mini wearing a spangenhelm and lorica, accompanied by an unarmored mini (the very last of the el Cid lights) wielding hurling darts. His boss wields a spear - a long one like a cut-down kontos - and dart.