Napoleonic French cuirassiers

Painted almost an year ago. A classic. Not one of my best work. Yet, Napoleonic cavalry always rock!

 

Parthians - DBA II/37

Horses, many horses. It's what you need when you got a bit bored by blades, spears and warbands, in a word by all those foot units moving slowly on the battlefield (psiloi excluded). Parthians got to be the right choice and ended up rocking pretty well in war; I would say an effective combination of heavy and light cavalry. And the few fast foot units guarantee speed. Watch out artillery, though.

General and cataphracts (4Kn)

Horse archers (Lh)

Foot archers (3Bw)

Javelinmen (3Aux)

DBA Roman camp

After the Roman watchtower (https://flowersinyourcannons.blogspot.com/2018/05/wip-roman-watchtower.html), here comes my second camp for my DBA Roman armies. It is also intended to be a first piece of a modular Roman fort. Never used a BUA in my battles: I need one.

Below, how I built it, step by step.

9x9cm base of balsa wood, a piece of insulation foam carved 

to the purpose. The front wall made with a ball pen.

cotton candy stick for the palisade

 coffee wood stir stick used for the terrace

 oil colors used for painting the palisade, as they better penetrate
the wood. Then dry brush with acrylics (ochre first, then bone white).
Wood filler mixed with sand for the soil, also dry-brushed
with bone white.

A touch of static grass. Game over.

Now painting few Roman auxiliaries to bring a bit of action
to this mini-dio.

L'empereur et ses chasseurs à cheval

I posted some time ago on my mounted Napoleon from the Italery French command set https://flowersinyourcannons.blogspot.com/2018/05/lempereur.html. I now provided the emperor with a couple of guys from his chasseurs à cheval bodyguards, from the same Italeri set. I am veeeeeeeery happy with this trio!

Theban army - DBA II/5c

After the Athenians, here come the Thebans.  I always been fascinated by the story of the sacred band of Thebe. That's the reason why I decided to the have a Theban army in my collection. Hat figures may be not as good as the Zvezda ones I used for the Athenians, but I am sure those two elements of 8Sp will rock in battle.

 The sacred band (including Gn 8Sp)

 Hoplites (Sp)

Cavalry (Cv)

Javelinmen and slingers (Ps)

Athenian army - DBA II/5b

Finally found time to take some pictures of the DBA armies I painted this year. Let's start with the Athenians. I used two Zvezda sets: 8005 Greek infantry and 8068 Spartans. Cv and Lh are by Newline Design. Never played them yet. I really look forward to seeing that array of shields lined up on the battlefields.

General (Sp)

Cavalry (Cv) and light cavalry (Lh)

Hoplites (Sp)

Archers (3Bw)

Javelinmen (Ps)

WIP Roman watchtower - Update #2

26 June 2018

I am now painting some sentinels to put here and there on the tower, using Roman auxiliaries from the Strelets Set M033 "Roman Auxiliaries Before Battle". It comes with interesting poses for a watchtower. A first attempt here below. Shield yet to finish

25 June 2018

Watchtower is 95% completed. I am really happy with result! Finally, may DBA Roman armies have a camp. I painted the tower with oil paints, as I read somewhere that it better penetrates the wood. It is true. I made a test with both oil and acrylic, and the oil is far better (after you find the right dilution with turpentine :-P). Only it takes long to dry up, more than two days on the shelf (maybe if I put outside, it would have taken less. Who knows?). After that a quick dry (very dry!) brush with Vallejo Game Color Bonewhite made the job.

31 May 2018

It's moving, slowly. Time for ladders.

 And then I got the idea of a modular Roman fort, which friends at the Benno's Figures Forum support. Let's see how it evolves.

16 May 2018

After so many battles with just a piece of paper 2BWx2BW to represent their camp, time came for my DBA Romans armies to have a proper camp. Considering that most of the battles were fought on the limes, I thought that a watchtower would have been a nice addition to the usual palisade.

Inspiration came from some pictures I found online of the plastic Zvezda Roman fort, now out of production and out of stock almost everywhere. Good thing is that the pictures come with the size of the tower and its components, which made easier the design of my wood replica.

I used cotton candy sticks and coffee wood stir sticks, which I looted here and there in the city at no cost.

A razor for cutting, white glue for assembling. It is shaping up pretty well.