Persian Hordes

A bit over  a year ago I mentioned that I'd painted up a unit of Hordes for my Persians but didn't get round to basing them. I thought that, perhaps, I would base them in the New Year. In a way I was wrong and have actually based them before the New Year. I just hadn't stipulated which New Year...

One shot wonders

Back in my wargames heyday one of the 'gimmic' armies were the Seleucids. If you look at the 1977 WRG Army Lists, Seleucid armies could field Asiatic archers, 'Irregular D' MI bow@1 point - 20 to 75. The same army list  Late Achaemenid Persian army could field Subject race archers 'Irregular D' LMI bow @ 1point - up to 50. Which meant you couldn't use the same unit in both armies - very unfair. Anyway, as Irregular units could be up to 50 strong, and as command points were 25 per unit, lots of armies had a 50 strong unit of cheap archers that would basically fire once but run away if challenged. They had their uses.

In the early days my levies were based on the S Range Mede archer - 50 of them, of course. However, I soon followed the trend, got rid of most of my S Range figures :( - a couple of hundred of the things overall - and replaced the levy with what was now becoming the 'standard' - PB24, Syrian Archer. I only bought 30 of them though and used them as MI in my Seleucid army - the Achaemenid force I fielded was early.

There must be thousands of these things out there and in recent years I've been quietly acquiring them - usually as part of other purchases. It then became possible to start thinking about the whole levy situation again - though of course I have done this at times in the past, for example.

So I've been putting all the 'near right' figures together, mainly painting hats, bows and quivers so they more or less look compatible, and put it together.

I'm ignoring the MI option, LMI/Irreg Bw are already complete. This leaves LI and Hordes. LI in a couple of lists are an option instead of LMI. I had already acquired a dozen; I decided to double this. Meanwhile, Hordes - can have up to 20 elements of these in DBX, 100 figures of which I already had 30/6 bases, so double this up and do another 6 bases - should do for now.

132 figures looks impressive but... WRG in those days would need to be 4 units, 100 points. Figures 1 point each, grand total 232 points - and a WRG army was between 900-1500 points! Cheap, but not very effective.

This shows the clear difference between the later version in front and the slimmer less detailed first version behind.

Stance is another difference - facing directly forward the later version is easier to put on bases compared to the shooting angle of the earlier one.

Meanwhile, still got some that have been stripped/are being stripped, no doubt I'll get more... at some stage may even get round to the MI option!

1 shot wonders - the Syrian archers

Every Seleucid army army in the 70s had them - Syrian archers in large numbers. At different times they would be MI (Medium Infantry) , LMI (Light Medium Infantry), LI (Light Infantry) or Hordes.

So naturally I had a load. Since then I seem to have acquired a few more here and there...

So starting to put them together - relatively smallish units of LI, LMI and Hordes , but still got more to base.

These are my own 70s 'originals'. I picked them up quite late - my first levies were a load of long-gone 'S' Range Medes. As such they are not the first production models  - see the more delicate bows and dagger on the belt. Not sure, but don't remember if I've every repainted them, think this is the original scheme.

 

The ones I've picked up  since seem to be mostly the first production figures - thicker, cruder bows. I've so far mounted six bases each of LI and LMI. They represent figures bought from two different sources - some have darker brown bows and more decorated bowcases, but they mix well together.

 

 

 

At the moment I'm not sure which set to build up with my remaining figures - I could make the LMI contingent up to 48 strong, that would probably be the best option, but both LI and MI are 'good' options as well.