So between posting the projects I was doing with late Hundred Years War and Kickstarter, I ended up playing a game of SPQR, or rather, a bit of it while it was on demonstration. They've really revised the rules, so the game is better than before. It's not as deep as the rank and file battles (literally and figuratively), but it was enough to make me further want to get back into my old ancients, so I dug them out again.
A few years ago in the Lead Adventure Forums I started this blog and now wish to continue it. For what I have now is as follows for the Hail Caesar! set up:
2 units of Italian warriors
1 small unit of allied Triarii
1 small unit of light italian infantry.
various commanders, though I think since I am starting a new, I am going to also paint new ones.
This is enough for one division of Hail Caesar. I also have a single unit of Hastati and Velites as well as an elephant Numidian crew that survived the damaging child attack a couple years back, but I think those will be extras for other games or I'll lend them to new wargamers that want to try Hail Caesar while I repaint everything.
For this existing Triarii Unit, I think I'll keep them with the "Samnites" seen here instead of putting them in with the Roman stylized legions. Hail Caesar! is pretty much a sandbox, so I can easily list the troops as a small unit of hoplites or still operate like Triarii do, without following the roman system. Let's just call them defectors, or allies.. they're either allied Socii or traitors to the Roman cause instead of proper Roman citizens.
I'll have to make more light infantry and skirmish units as well. They're very useful for screening and acting as javelin men or forming up and charging flanks where required.
At the end, the new commander. He will have a Hoplon and be featured in the next Kickstarter project I am sharing with my own vector traced decal, which I think is medieval but will probably still fit for this era. More on that in another forum post at a later date.
I've got a bit better with eyes since I painted my last Italians and Started adding stubble to the mini's faces. In my opinion it brings out the models much better in the face, though at a distance nobody would notice these sorts of things. I've also started using more Vallejo colors, so that adds a whole ton more possibilities for more colors on these Italians.
I'm also considering revarnishing most of these mini's armor pieces and metal bits on the weapons. I used Vallejo Matte Spray on them all and it really matted down everything - including the armour. Some places are even a bit cloudy. I stopped using spray primer since then and found that Vallejo paint on matt is great for armor (since its not truly matt, and leaves enough shine) while AK Ultra Matte varnish does wonders for skin and clothing, and things not supposed to shine while it keeps the finished product and removes any weird shine washes cause. I also want to not wash my whites anymore (something I learned while painting Afghanistan tribal warriors for an afghan-anglo project is that whites don't need to be washed and, in my opinion, look more natural!) and try not to wash the skin as well to see if blending works better.
Finally, I want to attempt to make better "Mediterranean" bases. I have a new style of basing I've been using for my French Knights in the HYW but I think I can get a bit more reds in the earth and different styles of stones in the to give them a more suitable base for what stereotypical mediterranean land would be. If it doesn't work out, generic grasslands is still fine!
In any case, I am excited to get back to this project. My further plan is to first work on two more units of the Italian infantry similar to the ones I shared in the photo. When that's done I'll either do a whack ton of Italian Cavalry that I have or start my Roman Legions over again. This time the plan is to do not one, but two full divisions of "Roman" Hastati, principles and triarii, as well as two full divisions of "Allied italian" Hastati, principles, etc... as well as some mounted Cavalry from Aventine. It's going to be a very large, epic force and allow for some big battles. I have some fun painting schemes for these new divisions and have inspiration from new sources that I think will make the units look a lot more interesting that my previous versions.
Finally, I will still be working on my Hundred Years war stuff! I just need to finish another unit of mounted knights and I can play the bare minimum of Lions rampant as planned, but after that I'll have lots of infantry to do up. And I still have plans to paint a whole whack of Celts and germanic barbarian forces to put in for the Punic Wars to represent cisalpine Gaul.. ah, there's a lot of things and I am so happy to be able to paint them all!