Okay, 

long long time I did not post anything here. Anyway back on Lead Adventure Forum there was a discussion about the new 3d Printed ancient range from Blitzkrieg Miniatures. Last year in December I got some troops from their Successors range. 8 Thureophoroi and 4 Seleucid phalangites. The latter were for a gift and now they are in the Republic of Korea, the former were for my own troops. 

They have all been painted so it is time to show them.

Here you can see six of them.

I really like them, they are clean and crisp resin prints sculpted in 3d. They come with almost all supports already removed, and with hands, if appropriate, already drilled to insert metal pikes or spears. Blitzkrieg also includes appropriate steel 'pins' for the purpose. I replaced the one in the Thureophoroi with North Star 50mm spears with leaf spearpoints, because the steel ones did not have spearpoints, and I do not like to work with steel...

Now the big question on Lead Adventure Forum was one of compatibility with existing ranges, mainly Victrix and Aventine so I took some pictures.

Six Blitzkrieg Thureophoroi and six Victrix Peltasts side by side. They aren't all that different in height but the Blitzkrieg are chunkier. Also their helmet's plumes are taller.

The following images are from my Saga Age of Hannibal Epirote Army. Beside the Blitzkrieg and Victrix  miniatures you can see Foundry and Aventine. The Elephant is from  Gripping Beast.

Roman Cavalry

 Benefit of being in red zone... you can paint a lot...

and bring yourself to finish things too...

anyway here is my first unit (or two...) of republican Roman cavalry in 28mm. They are Victrix miniatures plastic. First some photos...

Being plastic it means you must build them (some people do not like it... I like), but also that you can customize them to a certain extent. Victrix gives you 8 sprues in total, four of horses with four horses in each, and four of men, again 4 to the sprue. You have 16 cavalrymen in total, but 4 of them are officers, this is not a perfect choice in my opinion, but one that I can live on. The figures themselves have crisp detail and minimal mold lines, and are easy to assemble. As Ihave realized with Victrix you have to be careful with the assembly, it is not open as Warlord or Perry, but basically each figure + horse is an entity. Certainly you have less variation of poses than with Perry (were you can basically mix and match horses), but Victrix has a decent number of variation per figure. You can equip the line horsemen with standard spears as I did, javelins, or swords. You have also option for standard and trumpet (not used in this first half of the bag).  For once heads are plentiful (I was not overly happy with only 8 heads per sprue of 8 men in my Athenian hoplites) and you have choices between Beotian/Hellenistic helmets, or Italian Montefortino/Gallic Style (useful to extend the use of the set, my next unit, that I am painting now, will be equipped with later helmets to be used as far as the triumvirates). There are also some older heads that you can use to make them Etruscan (or early Roman/Latin) cavalry. All in all a good idea. 

Shields have received LBMS transfers, I really like them.

If the set has a negative point, is the officers. There are 4 and their variations are quite limited, but again, it is a an acceptable compromise. Now some words on size. Some people criticize Victrix cavalry as being too big. Well... I have already painted two boxes of Agema Romans and plan to use my Victrix together with them, so I took some pictures with a Victrix cavalryman, two Agema velites, and one Agema Hastatus. 

I do not see them out of place, actually they fit quite well. So happy with them and I hope some of the sterile polemics about Victrix size will be put to rest. 

Back from the dark... Early Seleucid Army

 Well, ladies and gentlemen...

It is almost one year I do not post anything... I am very bad. Let's say the world is not really helpful these months... still I am painting. Painting is one of the few things keeping me going forward these days. Hopefully the world will get back normal soon...

Anyway back to the subject of the post... lockdown has been useful in focusing me on finishing projects rather than aimless painting. One of these projects is a 15mm Early Seleucid Army, organized for Art De La Guerre. I like these rules because they keep some of the good feature of the DBx series, but avoid some of the more idiotic 'abstractions'. They also give you a decent size army, neither too big or too small. 

Back in time I had a surplus of Hellenistic period  troops from a work project. I started... slowly or better glacially... to paint them. I then lost focus.. switched to other things... improved my painting skills... and so on. Some of the original horrors were repainted, and then I was slowing pushing forward, until recently I finally got in stride and finished the project. Hurrah!!! 

It is a composite army, with figures from Gladiator, Essex, Old Glory and Museum. Once they are put together they look quite nice as you can see here...

The army arrayed for battle. The theme is the early period of the Kingdom, approximately  from the Diadochi Wars to the Elephant Victory over the Galatians.  If you are curious about the mat, it is from Wargame Print and printed by Pixartprinting.  Let's see the details of the army.

The Right Wing. there ate two elephants (Essex on your right, Old Glory on your left), Gladiator  guard cavalry, Museum Z scuplts Scythians and Old Glory  pletasts.

You cannot have a Hellenistic Army without phalanx... no? The Center is here. From right to left 8 stands of Gladiators, 8 of Old Glory and 8 of Essex (with silver shields, so Argyraspides). In front 4 bases of Essex skirmishers with bow. The General is on the back made with Old Glory miniatures.

The Left Wing. one unit of Magister Militum Thracians (forgot I have also these in the army!), one OG elephant, 2 Essex line cavalry and one Museum's Scythians base.  This is all.  I think the miniature mix well, even if the Gladiator cavalry (metal magic sculpts) are a tad smaller.  You can see more close shots below...

If you look at the general base on the background, two horsemen are OG, one is Essex.

And for today... I am signing off!

And in the sixth week....

of quarantine....

more odds and sods.

 Syrianf infantry in 6mm, the new H&R infantry castings, from their Soviet Range.

 Old H&R BMP-1 repainted and rebased. The camo scheme has been observed in Georgia in 2008.

Super close up.

Something new, the first bits of my new PLA force in 6mm. Type 99 tanks from H&R.

Still odds and sods... I am pushing forward with the Warlord box of Japanese Infantry and also retouching my older TAG Japanese.  18 Warlord guys are done, 12 to go.

Empress desert Italians with the sun hat. Keith gave me a pack of LMG gunners eons ago, time to get them painted and done. Two painted, two to go.

And another week has ended. Life continues...

And in the fifth week...

belated and delayed post... I am collapsing!  Thanks god Easter weekend allowed some rest...

anyway that is what I did last week... a bit of odds and sods...

Finished the Foundry blister of unarmored phalangites, one more Warlord Japanese, some more 6mm Syrians, two ancient ships, more mules/donkeys, a troop of 15mm Crusaders.

And in the fourth week of quarantine...

I am starting to feel the side effects of the situation... pressure, uncertain, and the like... also mail is getting slower, still waiting for my Vae Victis...  but I am still painting if not to avoid going crazy.

So, in the fourth week of quarantine I painted...

Ships, ships, ships.... I am done with the the IJN battleships box from Fujimi. All 12 beasts are painted. It was a pleasure! 

 Yamato, Musashi, Nagato and Mutsu.

The four Kongou class, WW1 battlecruisers upgraded to fast battleships. 

A final group shot!

Last week I hinted about some Sassanian infantry... here they are, 12 in total, from Aventine. I washed each sculpt to avoid the annoying primer flaking, and generally it worked. Funnily enough it was only an issue with the Aventine castings... mysteries... 

Last week I mumbled about lack of oval bases for cavalry, but also that they arrived... (with plenty of other MDF bases from warbases...) so Hetairoi number 3 from victrix, 6 unarmored Pezetairoi from Foundry (okay one of them was a test paint dome some weeks ago...)  and a Peltast I found lying with the Pezetairoi... still from Foundry. Like the Foundry Macedonian sculpted by Steve Saleh quite a lot.

Oh... change of period. Three plastic Japanese infantrymen from Warlord.

Finally some 1/300 HR syrians. Bmp-1 first.

 More BMP-1s and T-55 AMV. The T-55 AMVs are cracking sculpts. But I have to say that even the old BMP-1, repainted to be honest, are well cast and very nice.

And in the third week of quarantine....

I painted...

Two plastic 28mm Macedonian companions from Victrix. Should have been 3, but I was out of oval bases... resupply came today.

  Some Aventine  Sassanians for a friend... they were quite a nightmare especially because the black primer flkaed on horsemen and shields...

More Japanese 1/3000. Kaga, Hiryu, and four Shiratsuyu destroyers. All Navwar, carrier decks by flight deck decals.

 Two 15mm Crusader MK2 CS. Battlefront plastics.

Less than usual (some odds and sodds too, and the Sassanian infantry command for my levies... but because the unit will be done in a couple of days... next Quarantine post!) but the mounted were time consuming, especially the Persians.

Still alive, in what appears to be a ghost town if not for the postman and delivery services. What it is scary is the eerie silence, you rarely hear cars or van anymore, no motorbike... no even the idiot who run full speed over the railway crossing with the associated thomp-thomp... but hopefully it is working.

Thanks god mail still works so miniatures can be painted and books can be read, even if I am disappointed by the Book Depository... they claim our border are closed and cannot ship here... it is not true, even the Royal Mail simply says there will be delays due to few flights coming. But book depository simply spread fake news. They are behaving like terror groups...