More progress with the ancient indian army

Painting has been a bit slower for me this month, but I’m still managing to move forward with the ancients project, and in particular the indian army with one more chariot, two more elephants and a couple of bases of cavalry added.

Although the Indian heavy chariots from Newline Designs come with three crew, I find it easier to fit just two figures on them. Good enough I think.

It looks like this will be the first collection to reach a playable size, and in fact is almost already big enough for a game using Neil Thomas’ Ancient and Medieval Wargaming. But, every wargaming army needs another army to fight of course, so I’ll need to crack on with the Macedonians before these Indian units can take to the tabletop. One unit of phalangites is done already, as well as a couple of bases of hypaspists, and the aim is to get plenty more done over the festive break. Hopefully I can get down to playing my first proper game of ancients with fully painted armies in the early part of next year. Rather than waiting that long though, I might well just use empty mdf bases to bulk out any unfinished units so that I can actually roll some dice and enjoy a bit of gaming sooner rather than later.

Another Indian elephant

 

A second elephant has made it off the painting desk and into the battleline of my ancient Indian army. It feels good to add another base to the steadily growing collection. This one didn’t take that long to do.

I have two more elephants and crew in the prep stage, and one more in the lead pile somewhere. I’m thinking somewhere between 4 and 6 elephants will be enough to give me a good starting army for most rule sets.

Speaking of rules, I’m currently enjoying another read through Simon Miller’s To The Strongest! For my 20mm collections, a grid size of 120 or 130mm boxes should work quite well, which keeps the table size within about 5’ x 3’, if I use the recommended 12 x 8 boxes. I like the relative simplicity of the rules and the fact that the mechanics should work well for solo gaming. Not sure how I feel about having playing cards on the table, so I might go with the option of using dice or numbered tokens instead.

The two finished elephants together. I like the thought of a long line of these on the tabletop! It’s certainly a motivation to keep the project rolling forward.

First of the Indian elephants

 

Another addition to my ancient Indian army, this time in the shape of an elephant, complete with general and parasol-bearer. It’s the first time I’ve painted an elephant in any miniature scale, and I wasn’t entirely sure how to tackle the skin colour, but I think it turned out ok. I went with a neutral gray, followed by a dark grey wash, then two light grey drybrush highights and a final stain of a very watered down yellowish colour just to warm everything up a bit.

I was initially unsure about what base width to choose for this, and in the end I opted for 40mm - the same as my infantry bases. I had thought about going for something wider and adding some skirmish figures to the base. This would have looked quite good, I think, but it would have meant a few more figures to paint, and I can always put skirmish bases beside it in future, if a game calls for it. On 40mm wide bases, two elephants together will look more impressive and will give the same unit width as the infantry.

It’s hard not to think about the suffering that these poor animals must have endured as war elephants. I’m sure they found the whole experience just as terrifying as their enemies did.

Some more progress with the ancient Indian army

I continued working on the classical Indian army this week and last, adding two more bases of swordsmen, two bases of skirmishers and the first of the chariots.

Again, I can’t say enough good things about these sculpts from Newline. I think they’re some of Sean’s best, and a real pleasure to paint. It should be a colourful army by the time it’s finished, especially once I add in more chariots and elephants.

Alongside the painting, I continue to read through various sets of ancients rules, which I seem to have quite a collection of now - even though I don’t (and have never had) enough ancients miniatures to game with! The only ancients gaming I’ve ever done has been with Commands & Colors, and converting that to miniatures is also a possibility.

Without going to my shelf to check, here’s what I can remember I have, in no particular order:

Ancient and Medieval Warfare (Neil Thomas)

Warhammer Ancient Battles

Clash of Empires

To the Strongest!

Pulse of Battle

DBA 3.0

L’art de la Guerre

Swordpoint 1st edition

Sword and Spear

Three Ages of Rome

Commands & Colors Ancients

I’m pretty sure I have the pdf version of Hail Caesar 1st edition as well, and an ebook version of Phil Sabin’s Lost Battles.

Too many rulesets by far, especially for an indecisive Libra like me, but it makes for interesting reading in the meantime. 

I’ll make a start on the Alexandrian Macedonians at some point soon, just for a change, but I do have the first two Indian elephants at the build/prep stage, so they’ll see they paint desk soon as well.

Here’s all the Indians that I’ve painted so far. Feels like a good start but still plenty to do.

Some more Indian archers

 

Two more bases done for the classical Indian army. These archers were a good way to get me back into the flow, being nice and straightforward to paint. I really should be knocking these out much more quickly than I do.

Two more bases gives me four in total. I think for some games the archers and swordsmen with be mixed together in units, but the archers on their own do look quite good as a single unit.

I’m sticking with the Indians for the moment, with several things in progress on the paint bench - more swordsmen and skirmishers, and the first of the chariots.

I also recently bought some Napoleonic Prussian Guard infantry that Sean from Newline Designs has newly released. I didn’t know these were in the pipeline, so it was a great surprise when I saw them on the website. My plan is to use them to represent grenadier battalions as well, which is something that’s been missing from my Prussian collection.

Speaking of Napoleonics, I enjoyed a few games earlier this year of Sam Mustafa’s Lasalle 2, played using my 20mm French and Prussians. It’s a great ruleset, and actually works quite well for solo play, so I really should get another game set up and do a battle report or two for the blog. It’s been too long since I rolled any dice!

So, hopefully more regular blog posts to come from me.
 

20mm Ancient Indian skirmishers

A small addition to my classical Indian army - two bases of javelin-armed skirmishers. Nice and easy to paint like the other figures from this range. Two figures to a base seems adequate for skirmishers.

I’ve no idea if their shields would have been painted like this, but I like the colours, so it works for me.

I swapped out the cast javelins for wire ones, so they should be more robust, although I may have cut them a smidge too long.

Not a lot of painting times this week or last, but I do have an Indian chariot all cleaned up and undercoated, ready to start at some point, hopefully soon, so that should be next.

20mm Ancient Indian swordsmen

 

Two bases of swordsmen now done for my classical Indian army. These will either form units of their own or could be mixed with the bases of bowmen. I decided to limit them to four figures per base since 5 or 6 just seemed too cramped. These lads must have needed a bit of space to wield those two-handed swords after all!

I'm quite pleased with how my bases are looking. I opted for Javis Desert Sand and Stone mix and Javis Light Green Fine Turf. In particular, the fine turf seems to stick to the sand and stone mix much better than static grass. I might go back at some point and add a few small tufts here and there, but they're fine for now.

Not sure yet what I'll paint next, but it'll probably be some Indian javelinemen, and then maybe a chariot or two after that, or an elephant. I've no definite plan on how big the final collection will be, either for this army or any of the other ones I’m working on. Progress will probably be slow and erratic sometimes, but hopefully without too many long gaps between painting. The main thing for me these days is just to enjoy a spot of painting whenever I have the time.

20mm Ancient Indian bowmen

 

Still aiming to keep things interesting for myself, I decided to pick a few packs of classical Indians from the lead pile to paint next. These are the first two bases of bowmen, including command. As with the other units I've finished so far, there will probably be four bases in total per unit, but I'm finding that painting just two bases at a time is better for keeping up the momentum.

These are some of the newest models from Newline Designs (although, not necessarily 'new' as such - a few years now, I think, since they were released), and I think they are some of the best sculpts I've painted so far. Really great figures, and very easy to paint.

I'll paint some Indian swordsmen next, which could form a mixed unit with the bowmen, and possibly some javelinmen and chariots after that, but it's tempting to skip across to the Alexandrian Macedonians to start on some phalangites. Summer always sees me outside a lot more in my free time, so I never get as much painting done this time of year, but if I can get two bases done every week or thereabouts, I'll be very happy with that, and the collections should make steady progress this year.