Romano-British Cavalry Ride Out To Their Doom!

It's been two months since my last completed unit, but I'm back with some major progress. Eight Romano-British cavalry from Footsore to bolster my forces.

They'll serve as Hearthguard for SAGA, Noble/Ordinary cavalry for Dux Bellorum and mounted Men of the North for Dux Britanniarum. The latter role inspired me to draw on the early medieval Welsh poem Y Gododdin by Aneirin for inspiration for the colour scheme of the riders and their horses.

These are the first cavalry I've painted since some Gary Morley Silver Helms way back in 1998 - 21 years! :D

Back to history. There is a wealth of guidance for painters in the text of Y Gododdin which I've compiled below in case anyone is interested.

Y Gododdin

Costume Notes
Numbers in parentheses refer to stanza followed by line.

Broad lightweight shield (1:5)
Gold-bordered garments (1:8 )
Betorqued (many)
Mail-coat (3:7)
Lime-white shields (11:6)
Blaen took delight in gold and purple (16:6)
Gold-fretted shield (29:3)
Swift steeds and dark-blue war-gear and shields (33:2)
One who wore purple (67:4)
Ice-bright shields (71:13)

Horses

Roan (26:8 )
A trim long-legged grey (50:4)
Darker (brown) his saddle (50:6)
Grey steeds (58:11)
Red steeds (61:7)
White horses (74:5)
Dapple-grey steed (77:5)

What I finally settled on was a mashup of qualities drawn from the poem and Late Roman equipment. The "lime-white shields" were a must.

I had to make sure they didn't look too bright, flat or bland. I used a base coat of Foundry Quagmire B (a brown grey) and several thin coats of Canvas C (an off white). I tried to approach them as if I was painting lime onto leather-faced shields.

To give them more depth I weathered them with a drybrush of Quagmire B and Rawhide A. Tried a couple of shield cuts but my brush hand wasn't steady enough to get really thin straight lines done so well.

I also incorporated some "gold-bordered garments".

To give them some elite flavour I pimped up their spears with the stripes that seem to be a Late Roman thing (anyone know the source of these?).

Part of the painting challenge here was to produce sufficient variety in the colour schemes so that multiples of the same model looked different. Among the eight figures there are only six different riders and three different horses. Luckily, the notes from the poem really gave me an excuse to crack open many of the pots in Foundry's Horse Paint set.

I'd only painted dapple greys and whites before this so it was a nice challenge to attempt blacks, chestnuts, bays and a roan. The roan is the toughest to pull off since they have equal amounts of interspersed white and coloured hairs, something which you can only impart impressionistically in paint. While blacks aren't mentioned specifically in Y Gododdin, other Welsh literature mentions Arthur riding a black mare so I wanted to get some practice in before I painted the dux bellorum.

EDIT: I found that different painting techniques worked better for different horse colours, from normal layering (for the bays and lighter browns) to drybrushing (for the blacks) to zenithal for the greys.

Next up on the workbench is Arthur himself with the costume colours drawn from a mix of Bernard Cornwell's trilogy and the Mabinogion. The latter provides some names of Arthur's arms. I'm still trying to figure out what motif to place on his shield which was called Wynebgwrthucher (face of the evening). Perhaps a Celtic moon or star.

The Levy Assemble & Merlin Grumbles

I am pleased to announce the completion of my 18 Levy for my Dux Britanniarum Romano-British starter force.

This was a quick and dirty paint job as they were Saxon Miniatures (now Warlord) figures I was lukewarm about. They are originally Viking Bondi but have the advantage of a fairly generic Dark Age warrior look, especially if one is representing Germanic troops or foederati.

They were primed white then washed in a bright primary colour - blue, green, madder red, lemon yellow. This produced a natural shade in the folds, an effect I accentuated whenever the component pigments of certain paints separated, as was especially the case with the Army Painter blue. I would soak up the darker pigment and wash it into the folds.

For the lighter tones I used a standard brown wash for more detail. The hair was treated the same.

More care was applied to the shields where I went for LBMS transfers and full three-stage highlights on the back boards. For ancients infantry the old wisdom really rings true: focus on the face, the weapon and the shields and you'll be fine. A bit of care was also taken with the bases. Maybe they could use another highlight, but there was a battle to fight the next day.

Their previous outing without finished shields didn't end so well. The nasty Saxon cattle rustlers stayed out of reach despite Merlin's exhortations.

Merlin himself has now been finished.

Inspired by Bernard Cornwell, I painted him as a grubby druid, with a sun-bleached bearskin cape and a dirty robe. People say he looks like Old Luke from the Last Jedi. I've left a bit of a gap on his base for a future decoration such as some toadstools or a skull when I have time to sculpt or mould them.

I umm'd and ahh'd about how to paint the bear fur cloak but in the end I just went with a base of Vallejo G Camo Black-Brown and applied the triads from Foundry's Bay Brown and Chestnut, about six layers in all, with a final extreme highlight of Vallejo Dark Sand to establish contrast and mimic some bleaching/weathering. It looks a bit harsh in the photo due to the lighting. I am still on the lookout for a good method to paint bear fur as well as timber wolf fur (for the champion Raedwald's coat).

This leaves only the champion and Lancelot's shield to receive their final highlights. But I'm already hankering to start painting some cavalry as I've been reading Y Gododdin to get into the mood.

I also finished work on another four warriors for a total of 16 warriors to make my warband SAGA ready.

Once again, the shields were hand-painted. I experimented with patterning the highlights on the white area. Unlike the Saxon Miniatures figures above these Footsore troops were a delight to paint. The faces especially were packed with detail, rewarding the time taken to paint in the eyes. They even sculpt the eyebags!

Arthur and his Knights Assemble

Arthur and his knights rally around their banner.

After months of painting my Elites and Arthur are done. I even managed to do my first tin foil banner with a transfer from LBMS. It was well worth it, especially after stabbing myself on its spear multiple times throughout this project!

The figures are all Saxon Miniatures (now Warlord-owned), apart from Footsore's Lancelot on the far right. He's awaiting inspiration for a suitable shield design. I'd like to use a large oval shield for him but it's a tight fit compared to a medium round shield.

More pictures of the team below. The Saxon Miniatures are from the Winter King range sculpted by Colin Patten, providing lots of choices for Knights of the Round Table. I like their poses and kit. My only complaint would be about the casting quality of their faces. The detail isn't as crisp as Footsore's faces. However, I'm very happy with their Arthur as Footsore lacks a suitably heroic Arthur on foot.

Being influenced by the Bernard Cornwell books I was all set to make my Arthur pagan. But a desire to wrap up this lot (batch painted in a group of 21 minis) led me to use a transfer from LBMS. I thought it'd be a nice tribute to Geoffrey of Monmouth's description of Arthur's shield bearing the Virgin Mary. He still bears the white cloak from Cornwell, though I couldn't settle on a better colour than black for his helmet plume. I'm open to suggestions (I did consider ochre).

I painted this group in common colours, mainly red, white and blue, varying the location to give them both uniformity and individuality. The white and blues would tie them together with the previously painted Warriors, whilst the red - especially the cloaks - would set them apart.

Arthur and Lancelet, being Lords, had purple mixed into their scheme and used grey-white rather than canvas white for elements of their costume.

I also finished up my archers. I may add patches later or leave them as poor, unadorned British archers.

Next steps are to finish painting my Merlin and champion, which had a different colour scheme to the rest. Though currently, I'm completing a manuballista and its crew, plus four more hand-painted shields to make this bunch SAGA-ready.

Exculcatores Iuniores Britanniciani - COMPLETE

After a month long painting rut I am happy to report a burst of activity that culminated in the completion of two units of Warriors for my Dux Brit Late Romans, my first fully finished figures for this project. I even gave them my first freehand shields, and what an enjoyable process that was.

Here are the desperate dozen ready to face the long war of attrition with the invading Saxons.

For future reference, here are the colours I used, mostly Foundry and a few Vallejo:

British Warriors (Footsore Late Romans)
Armour & Weapons - Gunmetal Grey, Oily Steel, Silver
Hair - Black
Moustache & Beard - Deep Brown Leather
Belt and Pouches - Deep Brown Leather, Quagmire
Scabbards & Straps - Wine Stain Red, Black / Deep Brown Leather, Chestnut
Scabbard Tips & Sword Hilt/Butt + Buckles - Bronze
Shoes - Tan
Trousers - Union Trouser Blue / Moss Green / Forest Green
Puttees - Buff Leather
Flesh - Foundry Flesh Triad
Tunics - Canvas with Bright Red stripe or Border and circles
Neckerchief - Bright Red
Cloaks - Ochre
Spears - Spearshaft
Leather Armour - Deep Brown Leather

THE SHIELDS

The shield designs are derived from the Notitia Dignitatum which lists the Exculcatores iuniores Britanniciani, though not specifically as a unit within the Comes Britanniae. I can't understate the value of Luke Ueda-Sarsson's site on the Notitia.

However, this particular shield design met my desire to have an historically plausible motif that featured white and red, reflecting what I understand were the common colours of that period. Epics such as Y Goddodin mention white shields. The WAB supplement Age of Arthur recommended red and white themes.

I nearly went the route of using LBMS transfers, but I wasn't keen on the red and white Chi-Ro designs on offer. After reading Bernard Cornwell's Warlord Trilogy I was keen on a less obviously Christian theme, though I won't exclude it entirely in the final force.

As it turned out I really enjoyed painting the design myself. Since the designs in the Notitia are depicted for round shields I had to adapt it somewhat for an oval shield.

The advantage of commercial shield transfers is uniformity, so I attempted to compensate by making a stencil from thin card. I should note here that there is speculation that the actual design may have been yellow and purple with a red border, but the Oxford version of the Notitia renders it as yellow and white with a red border. That suits me fine so I went with it.

I used the stencil to mark out the outline of the twin-headed zoomorphic creature with a micro-pen. I then blocked this in with Foundry Ochre Yellow for a warm yellow that would complement the cloaks on some of the figures that were also painted in the same colour. 

I skipped a three-tone painting approach and just went for two tones. Since yellows are pigment weak I found it more effective to basecoat in yellow and wash selectively with the orangey shade tone to suggest texture and depth. For the white surrounding I based with Foundry Arctic Grey shade then outlined it with pure white.

The result was okay, but I decided to add more interest by painting white radiating marks around the yellow design to make it pop out more.

The shield rears are wood and were painted up in a three tone style with Vallejo analogues to Foundry Spearshaft with a wash of Vallejo German Camo Black Brown after the basecoat. I was more sparing with the highlights towards the bottom of the shield.

The red edging was done with Vallejo Black Red followed by Foundry Bright Red shade with less of the brighter tone applied towards the bottom. The nail holes in the leather were picked out with my homemade black wash based off Les's Washes. The central grip was my usual steel mix.

Mounting the shields on double-sided tape on top of card made them very easy to handle and paint the designs. However, once the time came to paint the rears it became rather fiddly because the handling and accidental scraping led to the paint on the front coming off or adhering to the card.

So I had to work quickly and carefully and I chose to varnish them with gloss then matte as quickly as I could. I may return at a later date to add more highlights on the rim but they look pretty good as is.

In truth, I was too impatient to glue them to the figures and finish off the bases with tufts and declare these two units of six done.

I'm pretty happy with them though I feel the black edging of the central design could be softer as it seems too harsh to my eyes, but it does match the design in the Oxford Notitia.

For my future batch of Late Romans I'll probably use the red and white emblem of the Cornuti since I already have the transfers and it thematically echoes the design of the Exculcatores.

Side note: The Exculcatores were probably light infantry scouts according to this, but I'm using them on heavy infantry. The specific colour combination trumps history here.

I have to say that despite the time invested in hand painting the shields it was so much more satisfying and enjoyable than applying transfers. And fun is what this hobby is about. I wonder what my next freehand shields will be.

Dux Britanniarum Learning Game

Over the weekend we had our first go at the Dux Brit rules. It shares the virtues and vices common with other Too Fat Lardies rules. The overall system is intuitive and models a good feel for the period.

However, the rules suffer from poor organisation, it's a nightmare finding things during the thick of battle. Important information is buried in wordy paragraphs when a simple list or table would suffice for easy reference and there are many situations where one just has to apply common sense to address gaps in the rules. We have similar frustrations with Chain of Command but I love the depth of that ruleset.

We played a Village Raid scenario where the Saxons have to loot said village and get away with it before the British stop them. With the Saxons have a generous four turns to saunter into the village before the game started this game was shaping up to be like cops (the British) besieging a bank heist.

I brought my Romano-Brits, which I've nearly finished painting. The prospect of this game was a good impetus to at least block in the base colours on all the figures.

I knocked up some simple magnetic movement bases since I use metal washers to base my minis. I glued magnetic sheet to 6cm wide by 5cm deep MDF. It made for a tight fit. I'm considering making bigger bases to offer more to grip on but 6cm works well for Dux Bellorum and doubling up for Impetus, so I may just keep them and dress up the exposed areas with a bit of grit and flock.

The A Strong Arm card is great! Masses and masses of shock. The Saxons broke not long after.

Them breaking Saxons by the time we called an end to the game.

Dux Britanniarum!

Distraction strikes once again in the land of wargaming. I have been sidetracked from my ancients project with the prospect of Dark Age gaming, specifically the Arthurian age of Late Antiquity.

Since its always more rewarding to paint for a game where there are ready players I've let myself get talked into playing Romano-Britons versus an existing army of Saxons held by gamesmaster Damon using the Two Fat Lardies' Dux Britanniarum rules.

Here are the fruits of some sporadic painting over the last few months.

First up, a near complete two groups of Roman spearmen, figures by Footsore Miniatures.

Near complete as the shields and bases aren't done yet. I'm mainly undecided on the shields. For reasons I detail below.

Part of the process of psyching myself up for this project has been consuming literature related to Arthur and the Saxon conquest/migration.

One key text has been the fantastic Age of Arthur supplement for Warhammer Ancient Battles, now out of print and rather rare or exorbitantly expensive on the second hand market. Thanks to a Facebook group I was lucky enough to contact one of the authors, James Morris, and purchased a spare copy directly from him.

(James was also kind enough to dig up a spare unpainted and out of production La Dama De Elche from Gripping Beast for my Iberian project.)

The other inspiring text has been Bernard Cromwell's smashing Arthur trilogy, the Warlord Chronicles. This series presents a largely pagan or agnostic Arthur, although in all probability whoever may have been the historical Arthur would likely have been Christian whether he was Roman or Briton.

Still, I rather fancy a pagan Arthur for my campaign, or one not so obviously Christian. This meant scrapping my original plan for a red and white shield theme based on Little Big Man Studio's Chi-Ro transfers. In any case, the design below is somewhat speculative, not being in the Notitia Dignitatum.

I did purchase the decals below, but since they are for auxilia (the Cornuti) I wanted an historical scheme that could have been used in Britain in that period.

After a bit of research on Luke Ueda-Sarsson's excellent site on the Notitia I thought I might adapt the design of the Exculcatores Iuniores Britanniciani, part of the Comes Britanniae. It is somewhat similar to the Cornuti design above with a twin-headed element, especially the - likely erroneous - Oxford variant on the left below.

Since no version of this design is available as a transfer I'm going to try my luck freehanding it. I can't go too wrong if I broadly follow the contours of the Cornuti design.

Lake Trasimene - Order of Battle

The battle of Lake Trasimene 217 B.C. was Hannibal's second major battle in Italy but took the form of an ambush rather than a pitched battle. The army of Flaminius was ambushed on the shores of Lake Trasimene. The Romans were caught in march order and slaughter ensued with many thousands being driven to their doom in the lake. Following this, Hannibal's African troops were able to upgrade their arms to the best of the Roman ones.


CARTHAGINIANS

Hannibal's army strength is unknown but it would not be much less than the 40,000 he had at Trebia where he had few casualties and those mostly from the Celts. I assume he was able to resupply from the Celts after such a handsome victory against their Roman oppressors.

We can re-use the Carthaginian order of battle from Trebia minus the elephants. What attrition amongst the men that may have occurred during the winter can be considered inconsequential for our units which are only approximations.

The troop ratio here is 150. While a ratio of 1:75 would work for the Romans and provide an army big enough for an 8 foot-wide table, this would be far too large for the Carthaginian forces to scale up to a 16 foot deployment.

Heavy Infantry - 9 units
4 standard African units (64)
2 standard Celt warbands (40)
3 standard Iberian units (48)

Light Infantry - 6 units
1 standard Ligurian unit (16)
2 African small units, skirmishers (16)
1 Moorish small unit, skirmishers (8)
1 Iberian small unit (8)
1 Balearic small unit, skirmishers (8)

Cavalry - 9 units
3 standard Celt units (36)
4 small Numidian units (24)
2 standard Iberian units (24)

24 units - 565 points


ROMANS

Lazenby argues that Flaminius would have found it hard to fit more than 25,000 men in the confines of the terrain at Trasimene. He assumes that there was a normal consular army of two legions plus allies.

The paper strength of a Republican legion was 4,200.

Total army strength was around 25,000 (Fabius Pictor):

Roman Legion I    4,200
Roman Legion III 4,200
Cavalry                 not fewer than 4,000 (Polybius)
Allies                    ~ 6,300 per wing

Employing a ratio of 1:150 to get us to one small unit of 8 models as the minimum infantry unit size means that :

Roman Legion I & III - 7 units
2 velites (16)
2 hastati (16)
2 principes (16)
1 triarii (8)

Ala Dextra & Ala Sinistra - 11 units
2 velites
6 hastati
2 principes
1 triarii

Cavalry - 4 units
1 Roman equites
3 Allied equites

22 units - 442 points

Since most of the Roman units are small this makes for a tough fight where they are vastly outnumbered, but due to the non-linear scaling of points to unit size in Hail Caesar the Roman force is only 78% of the points of the Carthaginians, provided the units are fielded with the typical stats rather than with the reduced stats suggested for Trebia on account of army fatigue and lack of brekkie.

This may make for a more competitive game rather than a simple exercise in sweeping Roman units into a watery end in Trasimene's waters.

Collecting an Army: how many units is enough? - Part 2

It's not strictly necessary to calculate troop to figure ratios in order to have a good game. But, for a scenario to broadly conform to historical conditions, for opposing armies to be appropriately scaled to each other, and for that scale to fit to your playing area, it helps to work out troop ratios based on historical accounts.

Working troop ratios and dimensions is also helpful for planning your purchases. In my case, a lack of clear planning of unit dimensions led me to collect too many figures. Luckily with a Carthaginian army the component nationalities are readily used for other army projects.

Below is an example based from the Second Punic War.

CARTHAGINIANS

The battle of the Trebia, 218 B.C. offers a good starting point for building a Hannibalic Army for the Second Punic War. It also offers roughly equal sizes for the Carthaginian and Roman forces, around 40,000 troops each.

Following the all cavalry clash of the Ticinus, the engagement at Trebia was the first pitched battle between the Carthaginians and Romans after Hannibal crossed the Alps.

After the arduous Alps crossing, Polybius (III.56) says that Hannibal's army contained 12,000 African and 8,000 Iberian infantry, with not more than 6,000 cavalry. After the victory at the Ticinus, the Celts joined in large numbers.

By the time of Trebia Hannibal's troops numbered 20,000 heavy infantry (Africans, Iberians, and Celts), 8,000 light infantry (mostly African and Iberian, including Balearic slingers) and over 10,000 cavalry. In addition, his brother Mago commanded an ambush force of 1,000 Numidian cavalry and 1,000 picked infantry.

The additional 9,000 infantry at Trebia beyond the 20,000 combined heavy and lights just after the Alps must be credited to the Celts, as must 5,000 horse. It is likely that the Celts had few skirmishers.

This gives a total at Trebia of 29,000 foot and over 11,000 horse.

Borrowing from the analysis of Trebia in Lost Battles, with some modifications to reconcile the totals listed after the Alps and at Trebia, this breaks down into:

21,000 Heavy Infantry
9,000 African
6,000 Celts
6,000 Iberian

8,000 Light Infantry
3,000 Celts (including Ligurians)
2,000 African (Libyan)
1,000 Moors
1,250 Iberian
750 Balearic

11,000 Cavalry
5,000 Celt
3,000 Numidian (light)
3,000 Iberian

~30 Elephants

In order to translate this to the tabletop for practical play we apply a scaling factor to the above numbers to get a reasonable headcount for the number of figures needed for an eight foot-wide game.

Following Hail Caesar's recommended unit sizes I am using 16 man standard units, 8 man small units (typically skirmishers and lights) and 12 man standard cavalry and 6 man small cavalry. Celt warbands and the like are 20 men strong.

Employing a ratio of 1 figure to 150 historical troops, with some rounding off involved, breaks the above numbers down into (number of models in brackets):

Heavy Infantry - 9 units
4 standard African units (64)
2 standard Celt warbands (40)
3 standard Iberian units (48)

Light Infantry - 6 units
1 standard Ligurian unit (16)
2 African small units, skirmishers (16)
1 Moorish small unit, skirmishers (8)
1 Iberian small unit (8)
1 Balearic small unit, skirmishers (8)

Cavalry - 9 units
3 standard Celt units (36)
4 small Numidian units (24)
2 standard Iberian units (24)

2 Elephants

26 units = 42.3% infantry, 15.4% skirmishers, 34.6% cavalry, 7.7% elephants

611 points (with a Ld 9 General)

Elephant numbers were determined by allowing one for every ten units in the army.

This produces a battle line of 9 heavy infantry with 3 cavalry wide on each flank. (Skirmishers and lights are arrayed in front of the heavy infantry line). A total of 15 base widths (160mm each), or 2400mm, just short of 8 feet.

A 6 foot-wide game could be accommodated by trimming the cavalry down to 1 base width per flank, to fit within 11 base widths.

I initially planned for a ratio of 1:80 but this produced a battle line that was too big, around 10' 6" wide, which would be okay for a very wide game, but would require a special gaming venue.

This actually makes my initial project much more manageable. I bought too many figures!

A quick comparison between the list derived above from a single historical battle and the generic Carthaginian 3rd Century B.C. list in Hail Caesar Army Lists: Biblical & Classical shows quite different troop ratios.

The HC army list recommends that 66+% of an army's units should be infantry, excluding skirmishers (which can be up to 50% of the units), up to 25% cavalry, and up to 10% elephants.

Hannibal's actual army at Trebia was more cavalry-heavy, which is what allowed them to sweep away the Roman cavalry from the flanks in this and future battles. Even from the raw troop numbers cavalry amounted to 27.5% of the army, meaning that the Carthaginian army list in HC needs some revision for more historical play. I have one in the works and I'll get round to posting it later.

While an army list can be helpful for a generic game or figuring what types of units are in an army, as well as their game abilities, the army list cannot adequately replace an order of battle (ORBAT) derived from an actual historical encounter.


ROMANS

Polybius (III.72) claimed Sempronius's forces comprised:

16,000 Romans
20,000 Allies
4,000 Cavalry

Using a 1:150 ratio, the standard proportions of the manipular legion's components (a 1,200:1,200:1,200:600 ratio for velites:hastati:principes:triarii), and assigning the surplus numbers amongst the Allies to the hastati and principes, we get:

Roman Legions - 14 units
4 small velites (32)
4 small hastati (32)
4 small principes (32)
2 small triarii (16)

Italian Allies - 16 units
4 small velites (32)
5 small hastati (40)
5 small principes (40)
2 small triarii (16)

Cavalry - 4 units
3 small Allied cavalry (18)
1 small Roman cavalry (6)

34 units = 88.2% infantry, 11.8% cavalry

707 points (Ld 8 general)

If deployed in a checkerboard triplex acies this works out to an infantry battle line of 9 standard base widths plus cavalry wings 2 base widths wide. A total of 11 base widths.

Sabin has voiced some skepticism about Livy's claim that the Cenomani Gauls served as Roman allies, but they can be accommodated by broadening the battle line to 12 base widths, still shorter than the Carthaginian one.

A note for Hail Caesar: there's been lots of debate about whether small unit Republican Romans are overpowered compared to standard units. This is apparent from the points value (HC assigns one point per stat value; higher points, higher stats). The ORBAT above can always be modified to feature standard infantry units.

Roman Legions - 9 units
4 small velites (32)
2 standard hastati (32)
2 standard principes (32)
1 standard triarii (16)

Italian Allies - 10 units
4 small velites (32)
3 standard hastati (48)
2 standard principes (32)
1 standard triarii (16)

Cavalry - 4 units
3 small Allied cavalry (18)
1 small Roman cavalry (6)

23 units

552 points (Ld 8 general)
(versus 611 points for the Carthaginian list above)

If you want to retain small unit manoeuvrability then a more elegant solution that Rick Priestley once recommended to me is to tweak the stats. The points difference between the small unit and standard unit Romans above are due to the fact that while unit frontage halves the unit stats decrease by only 18% (including the scaled cost for pila and Drilled).

In that case, downgrading the stats of the Republican Roman small units from heavy to medium infantry, from light infantry velites to skirmishers, as per the manipular legion under the Camillan Roman list from the Army book, produces an army of 637 points to the Carthaginian's 611.

For Trebia and most of the Italian Campaign the Roman troops arguably should not be more powerful than the Carthaginians. They could on occasion be penalised with a Ld 7 Consul. For a Trebia scenario one could consider further downgrades or penalties - such as a 1 point reduction to stamina - to represent the weaker morale of the Romans who failed to eat the most important meal of the day: breakfast.

Roman Legions - 14 units
4 small velites skirmishers (32)
4 small hastati medium infantry (32)
4 small principes medium infantry (32)
2 small triarii heavy infantry (16)

Italian Allies - 16 units
4 small velites skirmishers (32)
5 small hastati medium infantry (40)
5 small principes medium infantry (40)
2 small triarii heavy infantry (16)

Cavalry - 4 units
3 small Allied cavalry (18)
1 small Roman cavalry (6)

Stats based on the Camillan Roman list in the Biblical & Classical Armies book. All units have a -1 to stamina to reflect their fatigue from crossing the icy Trebia river and skipping breakfast.

603 points

Republican Roman Army Roster

Detail from the Ahenobarbus relief showing (centre-right) two Roman foot-soldiers ca. 122 BC. Note the Montefortino-style helmets with horsehair plume, chain mail cuirasses with shoulder reinforcement, oval shields with calfskin covers, gladius and pilum.

Here's the roster for my planned Roman purchases. It represents a consular army under the control of a Roman consul, four legions in total comprised of two pairs of Roman and Allied legions. Any additional troops can be added to the ranks of the Allies. If there's need for it to represent a larger force, such as the four legions at Cannae, each unit can just stand in for double scale. One can't really go much smaller than this.

The force below can be built out of four or so boxes of Victrix legionnaires. I'd use one box of chainmail armoured legionnaires for the triarii, a box of pectoral armour soldiers for the Roman hastati and principes, and two boxes of the Allied Italian legionnaires.

The cavalry would be best supplied by Aventine Miniatures' Republican Roman range (with the Late Etruscan cavalry suitable as Allied horse) as they are designed to be cross-compatible. Aventine even resculpted their horses to suit Victrix. Nice of them.

Republican Romans (Unit size in brackets) [Points cost] #bases

8 figures per manipulus

LEGIO ROMANA I - 7 units [171 points]

2 x Velites (8) [26] 4

2 x Hastati (8) [46] 2

2 x Principes (8) [46] 2

1 x Triarii (8) [28] 2 x 80mmx25mm

1 x CONSUL (General) [25] c100

LEGIO ROMANA III - 7 units [146 points]

2 x Velites (8) [26] 4

2 x Hastati (8) [46] 2

2 x Principes (8) [46] 2

1 x Triarii (8) [28] 2 x 80mmx25mm

1 x Commander c80

ALA LATINA DEXTRA - 8 units + 1 skirmisher [178 points]

2 x Velites (8) [26] 4

2 x Hastati (8) [46] 2

2 x Principes (8) [46] 2

1 x Triarii (8) [28] 2 x 80mmx25mm

1 x Roman medium cavalry (6) [19] 1

1 x Cretan archer skirmishers [13] 2

1 x Commander c80

ALA LATINA SINISTRA - 10 units [203 points]

2 x Velites (8) [26]

2 x Hastati (8) [46]

2 x Principes (8) [46]

1 x Triarii (8) [28] 2 x 80mmx25mm

3 x Allied medium cavalry (6) [57] 3

1 x Commander c80

32 units + 1 skirmisher = 33 total + 4 leaders [698 points]

Reserves

2 x Tarentine light cavalry (6) [20] 4 

Various additional Italians - to be built out of the smart Aventine Late Etruscan and Italian Hill tribes ranges.

DELENDA EST... CARTHAGO!

DELENDA EST ROMA! - My 'Enemies of Rome' project

This blog is to act as a record of my progress - or lack thereof - in completing an 'Enemies of Rome' wargaming project in 28mm miniatures.

Hannibal.
1st Century BC-Head and shoulders bust sculpture.
Naples Museum. 

Background

(Wargamers looking for the miniatures bit can skip to the Project Outline at the bottom).

As a one time student of colonialism and empire in the modern period, I discovered the literature and thought of ancient Greece and Rome in the course of exploring the intellectual referents of the Bush-era neoconservatives. These architects of the 'New American Century' and the Iraq War were rather fond of Thucydides' account of the Peloponnesian War, also an influential book in the 'glass half empty' corner of contemporary international relations theory.

I wanted to understand what made contemporary Western imperialists tick. So, I started reading Thucydides and related material in the period, availing myself of the nicely illustrated Landmark series. While Thucydides remains amongst my least favourite writers of this period, I found the overall tale of imperial conflict between Athens and Sparta to be quite fascinating.

I also rediscovered miniature wargaming around this period after a brief reacquaintance with Warhammer Fantasy Battles. The High Elf army I was playing with leant itself to 'combined arms' action in the manner of Alexander of Makedon, whereby shock cavalry would complement a solid infantry phalanx. At least, this is what was successfully argued by Seredain the Cavalry Prince, the nom de guerre of a High Elf player on the Ulthuan forums.

This was entirely appropriate considering that most of the Warhammer armies had their roots in real life sources from classical antiquity. The High Elf army blended in Greek, Persian, and medieval European influences. The tactical advice was sound. In the relatively short run that I was once again active in Warhammer I didn't lose a single battle, mainly because I had a tactical plan that fit my army and my opponents often did not. Work and real life caught up, Warhammer started to drift towards a place I didn't enjoy, so I migrated to ancients with the release of the Hail Caesar ruleset.

This sparked a far longer interest in tactics and generalship in the ancient period. An interest that now finds me building up the army of Hannibal and Rome's other enemies.

Given Rome's substantial influence on modern Western imperialism, fighting Rome in the ancient world, by mustering armies of the people eventually conquered by them, offered some outlet for proxy aggression after all my immersion in anti-colonial studies. Perhaps I should have called this blog 'Beautiful Losers'.

Scale Shift

When I first considered this project four years ago I had initially opted for the 15mm scale due to budget constraints. It proved rather hard for me to find a manufacturer that produced Carthaginian and Republican Roman ranges that I was aesthetically happy with. Scale creep was a particular problem for 15mm. Basing was likely to end up a concession to DBx players, the majority of the local ancients scene, though I had no intention of going down that route.

I eventually plumped for Corvus Belli's Carthaginian range, which had fairly complete Iberian, Celtic and Numidian lines that fit. I was enthralled with projects by glorious mad buggers such as Olicanalad who had played out a Hannibal: Rome v Carthage campaign using Commands & Colors for the battles.

(For those interested, here's an alt-map of the game board by Mark Mahaffey).

I ordered most of what I needed from Corvus Belli before I got sidetracked by work for a few years, during which time CB shut down its ancients lines and went all out for Infinity.

When my ancients bug bit again (as an afterthought to the discovery of the free RPG Mazes & Minotaurs; what if D&D had been based on Greek roots instead of a European hodge-podge?), I looked at getting some Romans to face my Punic forces.

Sadly, the Republican Romans I was holding out for were by Warmodelling/Fantassin, which has suffered some financial troubles and, last I checked, were out of production.

Fortunately, two historical occurrences led me to 28mm. First, was the discovery that Victrix had churned out a fairly extensive line of Republican Romans and Hannibalic forces in plastic, bringing the price point to that of 15mm. The second factor was Brexit, which lowered the sterling enough to make it attractive to go all in.

Perhaps it was the early years with Warhammer that made 28mm seem like a 'natural' scale to me. Perhaps it's failing eyesight and the detailed sculpts of today that also have a strong appeal. I had also picked up some 28mm Greek hoplites before my hiatus. There was unfinished business at this scale.

I bought a box of Victrix Athenian hoplites from my local FLGS to assess their quality. I was satisfied and punched in an order before the pound recovered any further.


PROJECT OUTLINE

Here is a broad outline of the project.

Victrix Carthaginians (from their website)

Step One: Build up a sizable Hannibalic force comprising:

• Africans (Carthaginians, Libyans, Numidians)
• Iberians (Iberians and Celtiberians)
• Celts
• Italians (non-Romans from the South and North: Samnites, Brutii, Lucanians, Etruscans)

These would be the main troops to fight Rome in scenarios derived from the Second Punic War. Each nationality could also be expanded for battles before and after the Punic Wars. Hamilcar's conquest of Spain, the Numantine Wars, the Social Wars, the Samnite Wars.

These along with my Greek hoplites could be used as the basis of a Syracusan army in a pinch. There is a lot of diversity and flexibility in this period provided one is willing to take on a relatively large army project. The benefit is that parts of your Punic army can war against each other during different periods, though this veers into poorly documented and hypothetical territory. But this is what standard scenarios and pickup games are for. Until I acquire the Romans these are the kind of small scale games I could play. There's the 'Eagle Rampant' variant of Lion Rampant skirmish rules that could serve if my forces are particularly small.

Later on, many of the above nationalities can be parts of Roman armies against the Hellenistic kingdoms, another culture and region that interests me. That Pyrrhic line from Aventine is so tempting.

Victrix Republican Romans (from their website)

Step Two: Build up a four legion Republican Roman army.

• Two Roman legions (Velites, Hastati, Principes, Triarii)
• Two Allied alae (ditto)
• Plus cavalry wings

This would represent a fairly standard two consul republican army. It could be expanded to suit with some of the Italian allies of the Punic army, who would mainly bolster the ranks of the hastati.

Side project: I mentioned earlier that there's unfinished business on the Greek front. I also have plans to build up an army that could represent the forces of Spartan king Agesilaus II, friend of Xenophon, who led a dogs of war force on an imperial expedition in Asia. I've long loved the aesthetics of the bronze Corinthian helm and am rather fond of Xenophon's escapades and work.

I may get rather bored of assembling and painting 12 phalanxes of hoplites, but the task will be made easier by three of those units being the lovely Steve Saleh Spartans from Gorgon Studios plus a whimsical single unit of his naked Spartans from Foundry. I've got some weedier Warlord/Immortal Spartan and Classical Greek hoplites that would serve as neodamodeis, perioikoi and Peloponnesian levy allies. The beefier Victrix hoplites could serve as mercenary remnants from Xenophon's 10,000.

Plus, there may even be some games involved as at least one local player is willing to deploy Persians if I make good on my hoplites and there's some owners of the Victrix kits lurking out there.


Rulesets

I'm fairly agnostic on rulesets provided they meet my criteria. I like those that lend themselves to fairly fast play, minimal geometry, historical scenario battles, and avoid tournament-oriented min/maxing. This rules out most of the DBx family and derivative rulesets such as Impetus. It also rules out WAB though the rules structure is eminently familiar to me. I'm just no fan of individual model removal.

The rulesets I'm gearing towards are Hail Caesar for the casual scenario group play, Lost Battles to scratch the simulationist itch, Commands & Colors: Ancients in miniature for one-on-one fast play, and possibly the intriguing grid-based To the Strongest! by BigRedBat who runs an inspiring blog for the 28mm ancients miniature enthusiast.

Enough writing for now. Onward with assembly!

DELENDA EST ROMA!