Vile Kush DBA I/46

One of my options when I didn't have a melting pot was to revisit 'old' figures and start putting together DBA armies from them. One army is the Kushites. Again, I have made up complete units rather than just those needed for the DBA army.

If nothing else, I had a lot of Garrison conversions and Nubians lying around, mostly painted but unused - one of the partially finished armies of a couple of years ago. A few additions and I'm getting there.

These are the units the army is based on without the cavalry and 'Egyptian' units.

The general's chariot is one of my 'standard' card models, chariot pole and yoke coming from one of the old Garrison 'Ancient Ships' Range. General and charioteer are early conversions of mine.

The chariot was originally part of my Garrison Egyptian army - it was a resurrected Rose model. Garrison horses, again some of my early conversions.

Standard Garrison PEA5 Nubian Auxiliary with spear and shield unarmoured act as both the Sp and Ax elements. It is assumed that the leopard markings and tail are prints, etc, rather than actual leopard skins!

Didn't have enough archers with ostrich feathers for the army, so the Bw and Ps elements will probably be replaced at some time with figures properly dressed in leopard skins and ostrich feathers. The figures used were mostly already painted.

No idea why there are slingers in the army. An early set of army lists had slingers as mandatory in a Kushite army so I naturally felt that I had to make and use some.

The 'Egyptian' component of the army has two possibilities, both lifted  straight from my normal Garrison army. One option is simply 'white' versions of the Kushites, the other uses PEA1 Egyptian Auxiliary half armour, spear and shield plus standard archer with an 'Egyptian' headdress. Both options just need work done on the bases.

The last elements are the Cv elements. For these, I'm using REC5, African Auxiliary cavalrymen with javelin and shield unarmoured. However, they didn't work as they stood and I've got to file the shield emblems down before they're ready.

Figures update:

Still working on a General's chariot for Late Achaemenids. Kushites as just stated. Figures cast and painting started for Late Spartan and Theban armies - Spartans nearly finished painting. In both cases I will need more than the standard 6 element units, so will also do 4 element units to act as Hippeis and Sacred Band.These may be based on the infantry version of GC3, Cavalryman half armour, Boetian helmet and shield rather than the GC5 conversion. Also, nearly finished painting a random unit of Persian infantry based on PEC4 - the Garrison cavalry convert nicely to infantry! This unit had already been undercoated and was started during the 'no casting' period.

So, I'm curently working on 4 different DBA armies plus 1 random unit. Which just about sums me up really.

The melting pot.

Although both my non-functioning melting pots were badged as Tirantis, they are actually Sebas. Further, if needed, the original Sebas cost less.

So, on Monday I phoned Seba up and was told they have a repair service (to be fair, I knew that)... sent one of the pots off... it came back today fixed...

Haven't tested it yet, meanwhile I've sent the other one off as well. Total cost of repairing both roughly a quarter the cost of buying one new!

Haven't had a chance to test it yet - probably won't for a week or so - but when I do there's a lot of time (and figures) to make up.

RE6A, Roman Legionary, marching, half armour pilum and shield

This is the figure I always wanted to use as the basis of any Garrison Roman army. Problem was, no moulds and only 1 broken master...

Which was repaired and put on one of my last set of moulds. At some stage I'll try and get a number of these done and put on a mould for 'production' purposes. Hopefully, more on the personal production side tomorrow...

Clearchus and his friends

Well, finished the direct cavalry conversions.

Nothing else to say, just that it seems to have worked OK with one proviso. I should have used thicker card - a couple of them had a tendency to fall over a bit. Think it worked out in the end though.

Solving the Hoplite problem

OK, need to sort out how to get another unit of Greek hoplites for Cyrus.

Without having casting facilities at the moment  I needed to look for an alternative source - happily found one.

The original hoplites are simple conversions of a cavalry figure - feet bent forward and put on a base. So I started looking for cavalry figures and found enough so that I can create the unit...

Problem solved.

Cyrus and the Greeks, DBA II/7

The March of the 10,000 has always been one of my favourite stories, the Battle of Cunaxa one of my favourite battles. Even did a series of 3 articles on it for Slingshot sometime in the 90's (gave it it's more correct name of Kounaxa then.) Plus a version of it in the 2012 Garrison Journal.

So it's hardly a surprise that I'm including a Late Achaemenid Persian army in my current DBA army building programme.

Only troops missing are Ps and/or scythed chariot. For a standard army I would include the chariot, for Cyrus I'll miss it out.

This is Cyrus and his bodyguard. Greek GC4 on the cataphract horse. Cyrus himself is the Greek general figure. Greeks to Persians proved a diffficult conversion - I painted trousers on them. The unit itself was painted a few years ago then put to one side. The standard bearer had an accident so isn't here, likewise a few of the others - actually, 11 survivors out of the original 15.

 

For the Greek infantry component I have converted GC5 to an infantry figure by twisting the feet forward and putting them on a base. The figure casts quite well and the intention was to initially produce 2 units of 24 - one to have red tunics as part of Cyrus's army, the other in white to act in every other late Persian army. Didn't quite work out, so Cyrus is stuck with figures wearing the colours of his brother. (Xenophon said that these were the colours given to each army)

Hoplites tend to get colourful shields so I thought I'd show them in more detail. 

 

 The front cavalry figures are some early conversions I made before I got Garrison - removed shields and javelins, replaced weapons.  The Scythians were painted to allow the ones that had been transferred from the 'main' army to go back to their unit. In use with Cyrus they will be replaced by more Western cavalry.

The Ps elements will vary depending on the army depicted. For Artaxerxes, these would be archers, for Cyrus javelins. Likewise, the 4 x 4Sp or 3Ax are Greek hoplite 4Sp for Cyrus, Artaxerxes probably gets 2 x 4Sp (Carian, Egyptian) and 2 x 3Ax (infantry brought by Tissaphernes to the battle.)

Now, reason why I haven't sorted that second unit of hoplites for Cyrus.

When I first set up I acquired 2 second hand melting pots. The first one gave up the ghost a few years ago, the second one has also 'died'. So I'm stuck with repairs or renewal. Repairs don't seem to be an effective answer. Let's face, between them they gave 10 years service and were second hand then...  So... new? but bit shy of £600?... could do it. Might. Certainly not worth it though...