Merry Xmas everyone

Happily, no time for painting at the moment - the tree is right in front of my painting area...

Cyrus the Great army update

Lot's of individual units so far, seems about time to do an update on the army.

Most units have been seen before. These archers are from Harry's collection and haven't been altered by me other than rebasing.

These are one of my conversions - PE4 with the bowcase removed and shield replaced by a Rose violin shaped one. One of the nicer aspects of these armies is the sheer number of conversions in them - seems to add to the satisfaction somehow.

One day finding myself sitting in a room in a community centre for 3 hours (waiting for a student I assumed wasn't coming  in advance) I spent part of the time drawing up and cutting out cabs for a few chariots and a couple of war wagons. One General's chariot and two warwagons well on the way to completion, couple more scythed chariots will follow. That should then just about complete this army. Probably.

Cyrus the Great's Guard

Trouble with this time of year, distractions...

So, done some Immortals but can't really call them that because it might be a bit early. 'Guard' should fit the bill.

I've gone for the 'blue' look - lots of my various Immortal units, both Garrison and Minifigs, seem to be blue. The colour just seems to suite them. I've also paid a bit more attention to the quivers - decorated rather than plain.

Cyrus the Great's Medes

Continuing the build of units specifically for the Cyrus the Great army, these being the Medes.

This shot shows the current setup with one of the 'later' 8Bw elements acting as a marker for the Guard.

And this is the Mede Regiment.

I've left the bowcase plain - not sure if that's a good thing or not.

Cyrus the Great's Persians

Getting round to doing some 3 x 8Bw units for the Early Persians. I'm allocating these to the DBA army of Cyrus the Great - the single elements in my other early army are fine and includes things like Scythians that weren't part of the Empire in the time of Cyrus.

One thing I decided to do - change the basic shield design.  Again the idea is to give each army it's distinct character.

Next unit is the Medes, already started. I'm doing them dark green - thought about using a lighter base colour but decided to do them all with darker outfits to add to the continuity of the army. After that I'll do an 'Immortal' unit in a darker blue - no idea when the Immortals first appeared and doubt whether Cyrus did have such a unit, but just as 'Guards' or 'Elite' would do. Perhaps as a 'noble' outfit...

Garrison Persian cataphracts

Last post included the comment 'God this takes me back to my Persian army. What a wonderful sight.You've got to 'do' some cilibanarii from Garrison. Probably never fought for Cyrus but what did we know back then.' from Robbie Rodiss.

Well, I use the cataphract horses for other purposes and give the figures unarmoured horses - as per Herodotus. On the other hand, I have quite a few from the Charles Grant collection (some are on page 15 of The Ancient Wargame) so...

The collection I got was supposed to include 31 cataphracts, I seem to have gotten 39...

I think these are the page 15 survivors. The list  of figures included the comment 'Only a small element of the original Grant 20mm Persian army remained in his son's possession. The rest was sold off by Nell Grant via Ray McGarry - a Coven member - in the 1980s.' So I only got 93 cavalry and 51 infantry of these. Would be nice to know where the rest are.

DBA I/60(b) The army of Cyrus the Great

An unexpected 'free' day meant being able to finish the warwagon. So, seemed churlish to hold back on the army photos.

For the photos I've just used units from my main Persian rather than painted 'new' units. The only new ones are the scythed chariot and warwagon, though 3 of the sparabara elements are from the 'base' I/60 army.

Finished warwagon. Think I'll do 2 others.

In theory the camels should be 3Cm but I could only get 2 on a base... and somehow this figure seems to fit the army better than my standard 3Cm units.

Nearly finished

The first warwagon that is.

Crude design but looking quite good.

Making the warwagon

Well, started on the warwagon, could possibly make 2 or even 3? - not sure yet.

The 'original' Cyrus version should be drawn by oxen, but Garrison don't make oxen so I'm using cataphract horses instead. Also, not as many animals - the thing has to fit on a 25mm DBX base.

Another card superstructure, this time on an upside down Assyrian chariot body. For wheels I'm going with Assyrian chariot wheels - had thought about using crude plank-style wagon wheels but think the Assyrian ones will look better.

More chariots - Cyrus v Lydia

Cyrus the Great founded the Persian Empire by conquering the Medes, the Lydians and the Babylonians. During his war with the Lydians he is supposed to have mounted his cavalry on camels to beat the superior Lydian cavalry, used large mobile war wagons as stroingpoints and also had scythed chariots. I've already got Garrison camels, intend to have a go at the war wagons, and this lot are the scythed chariots.

The chariots have a Garrison 25mm Persian chariot chassis with a card cabin. To sort the 'yoke' a length of thin dowel was placed over the backs of the horses, blob of glue in the centre and chariot pole simply dropped on top of it. Chariot horses are my 20mm ones, wheels are from the Assyrian chariot.

Finished models made with different crews - one Persian, one Mede.  Figures are robed spearmen conversions from the Persian officer, the Persian also having a head swap from Persian Guard cavalry figure.

Those Chinese trees look quite good in the background.

One Persian chariot...

One Mede...  which must have picked up some of the base material on the cab - have to clean that off!

Next, the war wagon and Cyrus's chariot...

Cheap and cheerful

In my job of teaching kids who are out of the school system for one reason or another I have to find different ways of motivating those kids. Over the years wargaming has proved quite useful at various times - I've even managed to get a kid an English GCSE by using wargaming for project work. My tealight ironclad was originally designed as a craft activity and has been used several times.

So after one set of sessions I found myself with a load of cheap Chinese figures. At 50p each for a tank or aircraft they make it easy to build up cheap  armies - and infantry figures... at 3-4p each... I decided on 2 toy soldier armies...

Mainly consisting of tanks, missiles and aircraft  there is an obvious lack of 'normal' artillery. Which comes under the heading 'so what?'

Wanting 2 different coloured armies and these figures all being one colour I've gone with simple sprayable colour scheme.

Likewise with the aircraft.

Still haven't finished the helicopters.

The men are...  cheap. I've limited my paintwork to adding flesh. These figures do come in 2 colours so there is a green force and a brown force - though I've used a sand colour for the vehicles.

I think the close up shows how cheap...

And these are the 'enemy'. Haven't decided yet on insignia for them.As I want quick paintjobs I'm not sure I want to bother with red stars.

Terrain to go with these is quite limited. Sadly, apart from the watch towers (see top picture - like them) I don't know anywhere to buy the trees and barbed wire fences separately - and I've got quite enough soldiers thank you. 

So, cheap and cheerful armies bought directly from China.

Reinforcing Sutekh and Ptah

First 2 new units now integrated, one each to the Sutekh and Ptah Divisions.

Apart from the extra infantry unit, Sutekh has had it's light infantry archers replaced by slingers, it's component of archers being transferred to Amun. Pre will then get some of the 'new' light archers to replace their lost slingers. I think Sutekh could also do with more archers and their own general.

 Ptah has just had the extra infantry unit added, no other changes.

 Meanwhile another unit of spears in Dettol (some new, others I already had lying around) together with 24 light archers.

Absorbing the Egyptians

Has now started.

The first 2 units of infantry have now been sorted. Grey wigs have been painted black, spears have been repainted, shields likewise and both units based. Also, the Pharaoh's chariot and 8 other chariots have been immersed in Dettol, together with quite a few horses.

 A final decision on which Divisions these will be posted to has yet to be made, but I expect that at least one unit will help to beef up the Ptah Division.