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Miniatures Adventure => Age of Myths, Gods and Empires => Topic started by: skip on January 12, 2019, 09:00:46 PM

Title: roman auxiliary sheilds
Post by: skip on January 12, 2019, 09:00:46 PM
Hi, i have bought victrix auxiliary romans and wanted to make them into skirmishers with javelins, was wondering what sheilds to use, the oval sheilds supplied or round sheilds like the republican Romans

thanks

Brian
Title: Re: roman auxiliary sheilds
Post by: Arrigo on January 12, 2019, 09:24:22 PM
There were no skirmishers per se in the period like the velites, apart from tribal troops, certainly we do not have record of regular cohorts. Thus they would have been simply issued from the the cohort to operate in front of the battle line. Thus use the oval shields.
Title: Re: roman auxiliary sheilds
Post by: skip on January 13, 2019, 10:46:19 AM
There were no skirmishers per se in the period like the velites, apart from tribal troops, certainly we do not have record of regular cohorts. Thus they would have been simply issued from the the cohort to operate in front of the battle line. Thus use the oval shields.
ok thanks Arrigo, makes sense

Brian
Title: Re: roman auxiliary sheilds
Post by: Johnp4000 on January 13, 2019, 03:04:48 PM
Hi Brian,

I think you will find it is a feature of most rules that Auxiliary s can skirmish, for some reason current figure ranges only have the armoured variety rather than some helmeted unarmoured types to use as skirmishers. I doubt in reality that the Roman auxiliaries would be as uniform as displayed in most current ranges . I suppose a quick conversion would be to use Auxilia heads with some tribal troop types?
Title: Re: roman auxiliary sheilds
Post by: skip on January 13, 2019, 03:11:52 PM
Hi Brian,

I think you will find it is a feature of most rules that Auxiliary s can skirmish, for some reason current figure ranges only have the armoured variety rather than some helmeted unarmoured types to use as skirmishers. I doubt in reality that the Roman auxiliaries would be as uniform as displayed in most current ranges . I suppose a quick conversion would be to use Auxilia heads with some tribal troop types?
yes thats a possibility, the victrix Auxilia are only created as heavy spearmen but i was using javelin arms from the republican boxes with these troops plus wolf hides that they provide

Brian
Title: Re: roman auxiliary sheilds
Post by: Arrigo on January 13, 2019, 03:33:54 PM
Mhmm,

something seems off to me, I have the Victrix bag and they have skirmishing pose (javelin held in the shield hand), also the spear carried by the Auxilia, was called lancea, in Latin a term often denoting a dual use shafted weapon, as in the later lanciarii. And no, I do not think that the manufacturers do wrong in their representation. Us the the throwing arm (that is provided) and the shield arm with additional  lancea.  By the way, there are also wolf hides in the sprues... if you are so inclined. If there were specialized skirmisher, we would have epigraphic evidence, as we have for the later period of the lighter lanciarii . While it is right to assume that there were liberties and customization in personal equipment, basic equipment was standardized (produced by the government and its cost detracted from pay). Also the way auxilia are deployed and employed, based on a reasonable strong corpus of literary evidence, suggest a strong standardization of basic cohors.
Title: Re: roman auxiliary sheilds
Post by: Johnp4000 on January 13, 2019, 09:26:40 PM
Hi Brian,

I did see photo's of an exhibition at Kalkriese representing a Batavian cohort which shows them wearing a variety of animal furs over their helmets, I have seen a re-enactor's group called 1st cohort Batavorum which uses this theme, no idea how realistic it is or what it has been based on, but it will add variety to your units.

Auxiliaries from the evidence I have seen stated to be organised formally under Augustus, at first they are equipped in native style then gradually the standard heavy spearman type appears.I never said I thought there would be separate units of skirmishers, I see then more as detachments of the standard auxiliary unit. an auxiliary wearing chain mail and carrying that large oval shield seems rather over equipped to be an effective skirmisher.Although as Arrigo says that victrix set does give both weapon options.

In wargaming terms, I would check what system you use, as often you will find that Auxiliaries can be rather expensive points wise to use as skirmishers compared to lighter opposition.
Title: Re: roman auxiliary sheilds
Post by: FierceKitty on January 14, 2019, 11:02:13 AM
"chain"mail???? lol
Title: Re: roman auxiliary sheilds
Post by: skip on January 15, 2019, 06:14:21 PM
ok thanks for advice lads, appreciate it

Brian