Some more painting before🎄

Managing to keep up some productivity on the painting front.

Some dark age Celtic types, but I have left them as generic as possible so they could double up as any Celtic/Galatian Hill tribes I am sure some Greek hill tribes would have looked like this as well ?

Another Persian general (Foundry figure)

A solitary Greek/Macedonian Officer ( and I have noticed I haven’t put any tufts on the last two bases so I will sort that this evening)

A week to go so a couple more bits to get done before Christmas 🎅🏽

Battle for the Thymbris Plain : Blood in the Sand

Once more into the depths of history and a border conflict to the East of the known world. A time when land and expansion are on the minds of many of the ancient kingdoms rulers and tyrants. Reports have found there way back to King Nannacus II of Phrygia that his western borders have been raided by a force from Mysia. The enmity between the two kingdoms has existed for some time when the offer of marriage between the Kings sister had been rejected. Moving through the mountains this invasion is clearly intent on reaching the productive heartland of Phrygia so a sizeable force has been sent to meet the Mysians. Having manoeuvred for two days the armies have now faced off across the flat valley of the Thymbris River. There will be no subtly today both forces are intent on destroying the enemy and holding the ground for themselves.

The battlefield at dawn, although cut by the River Thymbris this will only slow any movement and is crossable it’s entire length

The Phrygian right flank a strong contingency of calm and horse archers

In their centre units of bowmen with large wicker shields two forest elephants and a single chariot

The Mysian left wing is predominantly infantry

The Phrygian line advances

....using its superiority in ranged weapons to weaken the Mysians

The Mysians are also advancing to try and get into combat

Inevitably the elephants from both sides start to push ahead

and are no close to clashing between the two armies

No one is sure if the blocks of infantry will be able to withstand the charge

Over the river Median spearmen are charging down the small incline

The chariot crashes home as well...

some time has elapsed here and the Phrygians are turning the Mysian left flank

The last elephant of the battlefield attempt to crush another unit

Mysian heavy cavalry has started to turn the Phrygian left flank and suddenly a lot of space has opened up

At this point the battle was drawing to a close the Phrygians have clearly dominated the right flank but have lost the left.

Our victory conditions were based on unit s which managed to get beyond half way, this proved to be the Mysians who when we added up had also lost slightly fewer units so a minor victory was awarded to the invading Mysians.

A trophy was duly set up on the battlefield by the Mysian General who also captured the two Royal princesses as part of the Phrygian camp. Clearly a rescue will be required and it is a long way home.

A fun game played over about 5 hours, we used slightly modified kings of war but added some complexity using bolt action dice for command, but not giving either side enough so difficult decisions needed to be made through out on where to focus effort. It worked pretty well but needed a little modification.

As I had them out I to9 a few photos 

The recently painted Phrygian/ Persian royal family

My current Persian army

A side shot of the Persians, I have plenty more to paint some skirmishers and immortals to start with

and a chance to put all my elephants in a line 😀 if nothing else it shows the size variations isn’t to bad all five were fighting in the battle.

Al Andalus archers and more !

Another busy week including my wife’s birthday, Battleground Wargame Show and a recreational trip to London.

First up the next unit of Al Andalus Archers, these are a mixture of Conquest Games Norman archers and some Gripping Beast archers, lots of head swops to give them a strong Arabic feel but they are better equipped than just a group of local levy 

We managed to get across to battleground show last Saturday, sadly I didn’t take many photos chatting and shopping too much, two games which caught my eye was this El Cid game

And this WW2 game with a live cinema in play (good effort)

I had a small list of things to buy ! But when I landed at the Bring and buy the guy putting on the El Cid game was selling off a stack off Al Andalus figures so i didn’t have an option than to buy them all, in essence a whole army ! Mainly Artizan and Gripping Beast figures a big smile on my face 😀😀😀

Also picked up this building second hand slight damage to the paving stones

and a mausoleum type building which I also hope to slip into an Iberian village or town.

In London this week, as well as catching some culture we visited the British museum, plenty of inspiration 

I have a unit of immortals to paint

Al Andalus

and the main reason for the BM to visit the current Troy exhibition which brings together a whole raft of antiquities based around the Troy myth and how it has been represented through to modern times.

A game planned this weekend so hopefully more soon 🙂

Raid at the City of Palma Córdoba : Al Andalus

Played a little while ago we had another small run out of my Al Andalus campaign. This battle saw a small raiding force from the neighboring city state of Seville, raiding the lands around the border city of Palma (later Palma del Rio) in Córdoba. Using Lion Rampant there were 6 different objectives to be captured and taken back to our respective baselines. The challenge being the actually value of each objectives between 1 and 3 being hidden until captured. The battle was quite frenetic so the few pictures I took will have to tell the story 🙂

The Seville force enters at the gallop, both taifa are Muslim at this point but have employed small numbers of mercenaries 

The objectives are arranged along the centre line in the dry wadi and represented by sheep or camels etc the city walls of Palma in the distance

In the initial phases the Córdoba force captures the objective on their right only to be beaten back by the enemy horse archers

An objective captured on the right but can they defend it against the enemy cavalry

Once captured of course the challenge is getting back to the baseline without being cut down

As always happens once a couple of objective are captured it becomes a real fight for the centre

Abd-al Qasim can be seen here galloping off to the right 

The mercenary cavalry is now in a position to control the centre....

But the Palma residents have already brought back one of the camels 

Some elite Sevillian guard have their eye on mutton for tea

Another objective brought back safely to the city walls

In the end is was a good victory to the men from Córdoba with the majority of the loot being rescued and brought back to the city.

An enjoyable battle, entertaining without being too complex. I need to write some more scenarios which can be upscaled to bigger battles.thanks for looking 👍

Some more painting 😀

Have been working away a bit over the past couple of weeks and with weekends away as well I have had little time to get stuck into painting. But I managed to complete these two Elephants !

Gripping Beast figures I believe, which I got as part of a job lot of Sassanids. Indian elephants, the crew are removable

I have given the drivers early Persian shields as that is where they are more likely to get used, they are slightly diminutive compared to other elephants but not so they won’t fit. I think I now have 5 elephants ! I feel the need to get them all on the table in one battle.

As part of my travels with work I have been in Leeds and managed an hour in The Armoury Museum.

A couple of my favourite displays

Plenty of armour

And a while since I’ve been and the new Agincourt model very nice 👍