AHPC XIII Post 5: Attacotti

 

Hey look Curt I used the watered down white glue to stick down my scree before photos this time! 

This week I have a unit of 12 Attacotti fanatics as foes for my Late Romans in Britain.  The Attacotti are a shadowy Celtic people who were most likely based in the Western Isles of Scotland.  The historian Ammianus says that they took part in the Barbarian Conspiracy of 367 (along with Picts, Scots-Irish, Saxons, Franks and Roman deserters).  Later the Notitia Dignitatum lists Attacotti Auxilia Palatina units among both the Eastern and Western Empire armies and there is a funeral dedication in Illyricum to one of these Auxiliaria soldiers.  The writings of St Jerome mention Attacotti, who are at one point he describes as being cannibals. 

Tail end Diarmaid in the blue hood turned out to be a bit needy.  His shield arm kept requiring regaling, including just before photo time.  

In war-gaming terms, the Attacotti are typically lumped in as an option for fanatical war bands in the Scots-Irish list. I've modelled them mainly using Gripping Beast plastic Picts with add ons from GB Irish and Victrix Late Romans sets.  Gripping Beast put out plastic box sets for Irish, Picts and Welsh which all have a common set of torsos with differing heads, weapons and shields.  For instance the Picts get Emperor Palpatine hoods, crossbows and oddly shaped shields.  The Irish get bare heads and round shields and I don't what the Leek lovers get as I haven't bought a box!  A couple of figures have wrap around cloaks from the Victrix Romans.  There are also two metal Gripping Beast figures, the horn blower and standard bearer.

I will add unit tables across the back of the bases shortly.  Still tinkering with font and colour options.

Most of my Scots-Irish have beigish tunics to represent plain wool, but I've painted my Attacotti in an indigo blue for easy identification (they're in blue they must be fanatics).  I've no historical basis for this, but the seam of historical ore that I am mining is pretty thin at best.  This summer I read a novel by Adrian Goldsworthy (better know as a very good Roman historian) about the Usipi .  These were Germanic auxilaries in the Flavian era who revolted and turned cannibal and pirate in the Irish Sea.  Goldsmith has them wearing black, which I lightened to being an indigo.

There's some pretty good motion in some of the plastic figures and lots of head and arm combinations to add variety.

I had some fun trying out plaids and stripes on the cloaks and added freehand shields and a flag.  I am a little annoyed with myself on the flag as I had to a point that I was happy with it and decided to add a wash for texture.  Unfortunately I rushed the timing and the design bled a bit under the wash.

Seamus on the right has one of the Victrix cloaks round his torso, as does Feargal in the middle of the left base..

As Challenge veterans will remember (and Curt will remind them).I am firmly in the free hand shields over transfers camp.  Some folks seem to get truly wonderful results from transfers (BenF) but I can't put a sticky label on a freezer container or a name badge to save my life.  And a reply enjoy researching and painting the shields.  I timed myself this week and it took me 45 minutes to go from beige base coat and plain paper to 11 shields plus the flag, including some time searching Google images.  It is not a matter of a fine eye as my handwriting's unreadable and I can't draw worth beans.  Simple geometric designs and focusing on getting the overall feel right are way more important than precision.  In my younger days I would paint a variety of shield backgrounds for each unit, but I've long since changed to a uniform background so as to identify units with varied designs.

No theme points for me this time, but 12 28mm foot figures should be good for 60 points which also count for the Carausius Emperor of Britain Side duel.

AHPC XIII Post 4 : Roman Lanciarii

 

Second post for me this week, a group of 6 Lanciariiiii for my Late Romans.  These are 28mm plastics, mostly from the fairly new Victrix boxed set plus a few add ons from Gripping Beast plastic Romans (shields and a head or too).

Lanciarii were detachments of Legionaries or Auxiliaries told off to form a skirmish line much like the Napoleonic Light companies.  The name references the use of the lancea, a light throwing spear.    I've also thrown in a couple with plumbata, essentially militarized lawn darts with a lead weight added for extra distance and punch.  I again painted shields to match up with Legio Secunda Britannica.

I am normally late to the game on new figure releases, but when Victrix released Unarmoured Roman Infantry this year I was pretty quick on the PayPal switch.  They make an interest contrast to the Gripping Beast Plastic Roman Infantry.  Comparisons are summarized below.

• Gripping Beast are better value, 40 figures for 24 quid vs 36 figures for 34 quid.
• The GB box includes torsos for armoured spear/swordsmen, unarmoured spear/swordsmen and archers while the Victrix has no archers and they are mostly unarmoured.  Consequently there's less variety of poses to form a single unit using the GB figures, but this gives them, a more "regular" appearance.
• Both kits come with lots of possible head and arm/weapon combos.   The GB he's are all "roman" and include some in Pannonian caps which Victrix lacks.  Victrix does both Roman and Barbarian heads.  So far it appears that heads and arms can be swapped about between ranges.
• The GB torsos have the sleeve and should decoration carved in, while these have to be painted on the Victrix figures.  Therefore GB make good Romans or deserters, while Victrix figures can double as Germanic tribes. 
• I think both boxes are good and useful, and I'll like buy more of each.

The 30 points will count for two Side Duels (Carausius Emperor of Britain and SPQR) and I'll fill in the requisite forms once they go live.

AHPC XIII Post 3: Built Like A Hick Brit's House (20 points)

 

A terrain post for me in the form of three British Roundhouses.  This is a set of three houses sold by Sarissa as Irish houses but would work for many Celtic and similar Northern Europeans in the Ancient and Early medieval period.  They will also fit well in a TTG in my Beowulf DnD Campaign. 

The larger decogonal house.

One of the smaller octagonal houses.  I didn't paint the interiors except to blacken the floor her the door.

With the roofs removed, keen eyes will see that the houses are in fact not round but actually polygonal.  The two small ones are Octagonal and the larger Chief's house is a decagon.  Sarissa may have found that the regular polygons were easier to design and construct or they may have been attempting to estimate Pi by the Ancient technique of inscribing polygonal within a circle.

I had a hard time photographing these buildings and they look much less crappy in person.  I do need to give the roofs a trim obviously

As with all Sarissa kits, they went together easily and painted up nicely.  I added a bit of groundwork, Faux Fur thatching (narrowly avoiding having my wife add googly eyes to the unpainted fur) and smoke.  

According to the formula in text I am using for my MATH110 class they take up about a single terrain cube.  Math is as follows

I painted them in a variety of colours based on the photos from the Butser Hill Experimental Farm.  I have actually been to Butser Hill but it was long enough ago that it was showing off current technology.  I varried the terrascaping a bit for each house.  I figured that the head man's larger hut might be better tended and without weeds around it.

I realize that the attempted play on words may be lost on those who are not survivors of the 1970s.  However, in 1970s teenage lad speak the term "built like a brick sh*t house" was used to describe the figure of a young lady whose curves you admired.  Doesn't make much sense but neither do teenage lads or the 1970s for that matter.  The term hit its Cultural Zenith in giving the Commodores the inspiration for this classic bit of over top top 70s funk (note Lionel Ritchie sporting the Fro and blowing Sax in the horn line).  This video may give rise to many questions (particularly after the 3:00 mark), for which the universal answer is that it was 1978.

Link here in case Blogger doesn't like my insert.

No side duels or Theme Bonus on this, just 20 points straight up

AHPCXIII Post 2 :Pict Hunters (30 Points)

  I have a small unit of Pict Hunters with bows.

Figures came from a bag of (IIRC) Old Glory 28mm Welsh Archers that I acquired 15-20 years ago.  While packaged as Welsh I figure that they are hairy, badly dressed and generically Celtic enough to work as Picts.  Being Old Glory, posing and anatomy is um... interesting at times.  Also it wasn't until I had these guys primed and ready to paint that I realized that two were wearing the Late Antiquity version of Ray's Budgie Smugglers.

According to Ancient Wargamer cannon (book of WRG) Picts differed from other hairy barbarians by using longer spears and more bows (including Crossbows).  It's all pretty circumstantial based mainly on 1500 year old rock carvings, but it means that a Pict war band has a different feel than a Scot-Irish warband or Saxon raiders.

I tried free handing plaids on a couple of figures but gave it up as a bad job after the first two.  I've left a clear space at the back of the bases for unit tables but I'm still playing around with the fonts that I want to use for Picts.

In terraforming my bases I tried to make these look like rougher terrain than typical with lots of rocks and low bushes. In his comments on my Intro post, Martijn noted that I had primed these figures on their bases and asked if it was something I often did.  It was a short lived experiment and after a single session they were pried off, put onto pennies for painting and then returned to their bases when ready.

Points wise I make this 6 28mm figures for 30 points and and no theme bonus.  But I can apply the points to the Carausius Emperor of Britain side Duel.

AHPC XIII Post 1: Late Roman Cheiroballistrae For 80s Retro (60 Points)

 

It always takes a while for me together my first post on the Challenge no matter how small I make it.  My last uni exam was written on December 22nd and by the time I had it marked it was late on the 23rd and then there's Christmas, etc. whine.....

Anyway I have two Late Roman cheiroballistrae (sp?)with crews for my first post.  I am not intending to focus too much on the Studio map but will take the theme lot points when and where these are available so I will count this as 80s Retro.  Back in 1980 Halifax, 18 year old me took a windy route home from my first year Philosophy Class (Death and the Mind) to stop in at a new Hobby Shop.  Turned out that this was run by Ross MacFarlane of gameofmonth a regular gaming partner for the next 18 years before I moved very far west.  One of the games were played back in the 80s was WRG Ancients 6th Edition using Ross' Late Romans and then later Greeks and Persians.

The models are 28mm Gripping Beast metals.  The ballistas went together easily enough once I downloaded the picture from the GB website and the crews were nicely cast.  I like the age old trope of the grunts doing the heavy work on the coffee grinder winches while the officers kneel around and look important.  I free handed shields to match two of my infantry units.  The bolt shooters themselves would be more use against elephants or cataphracts than against unarmored Celts, but do give a longer range and with some punching power.

Exculcatores Iunores Britanniciani

Legio Secunda Britannica

I also found six members of my first ever 25mm ancients unit.  Greek slingers for my Spartan army of Agesilaus II in Asia Minor.  Slingers are Ral Partha, the flautist is a Minifig. They were painted 42 years ago but have seen action on table in the last 10 years.

Points wise I make it 

• two crew served weapons @10=20
• 4 foot figures @5=20
• 1 theme lot @20
• Total =60 points

The non-theme points will go against the SPQR and Carausius Emperor of Britain side duels.

AHPC XIII Intro Post

I have re-upped for the Painting Challenge run by regular gaming buddy Curt.  I've had several post up but neglected to put them on my own blog, so I am starting to catch up here.

For the first post, Curt asked us to introduce ourselves before the madness began.  Here's my Intro.

I’m PeterD and I am one of Curt’s regular gaming buddies.  Outside of Gaming I’m a University Instructor in Actuarial Science, which is a pretty sweet gig.  The Oldometer clocked 60 this year but my doctor tells me I’ve never been healthier and keep doing what I’m doing, which is good as my DC pension plan assets tell me not to retire anytime too soon!

Typical action shot, me reading rules while Stacy points.  Curt's man shed and table top with my toys.

The SSOD tells me that this is my 10th Challenge and I am once again a Minion this year.  I run a blog called the Single-Handed Admiral.  The name is a reference to Nelson and also to the fact that I was a solo gamer with interests in Naval Gaming when I set it up in 2011.  Since then, I have used the power of the internet to link up with gamers who live within 2 km of me and pretty much written off Naval Gaming as an epic fail on my part.

I’ve been gaming since about 1974, cutting my teeth on Featherstone rules and Airfix Waterloo sets before moving on to WRG ancients, scratch-built balsa wood pre-dreadnoughts  and 15mm Nappys.  I am pretty much a historical gamer with very occasional forays into Fantasy.  I don’t do much GW stuff as I don’t like their figures, setting, rules or prices.  But mostly historical research has always been the biggest draw for me so Spoon feeding from a Codex doesn’t hold much interest.

This year I am focusing on 28mm Ancients from Late Roman Britain, Romans and barbarians plus appropriate terrain bits. I also have some fantasy bits for my Beowulf DnD campaign and  some 10mm Nine Years War figures which I might get to.

As much as my downstairs workspace as I'm prepared to show.  Various bits and bobs in varrying states of completion or prep.

My tools of the trade in carrier

Mysterious MDFs projects set to be painted

I don’t have a permanent painting desk due a lack of space which isn’t taken up by too much stuff that we need to downsize.  I have some table space downstairs for figure prep and I set up for painting in the living room so as to spend time with family and watch TV etc.