Two infantry units Late Roman 3

I finally found some time to do a bit of painting, here are two Late Roman infantry units, in chainmail mostly from Black Tree design but I don't think they do these anymore which is a pity as they're lovely figures.  I picked them up second hand at colours and then Salute some time ago , along with the chaps for my Picts, Irish and pagan Saxons and also with the Romano British infantry who are also in the paint queue currently. 

Hand painted designs again, one from the venerable osprey illustrated by Gerry Embleton The Roman army Trajan to Constantine, one of the first Ospreys I got. Nice to paint, more dark age types are fighting it out with Napoleonics on the painting tray, Napoleonics have been there longer but dark ages are faster! There has been some other painting going on, a pair of cut outs for our 25th Vegas wedding anniversary party as modeled by me and a nephew, of course these are 4' x 6' hardboard on 2"x 1" flat frame,I've kept the cut out, with a little bit of repair they could both be additonal gaming tables should the need arise!

 

All the best

 Iain 

Birthday Bolt Action and Armourers Hall

 My nephew Ben has now got a workshop/ office/gaming space at the end of his garden. For his birthday he had a day of gaming, I missed the first half as I was still working on the flat , three of them had some games of dead mans hand, I brought along bolt action figures, terrain and the 6' x 4' gaming board I built during lockdown. As I keep my boards hung from the ceiling I'd decided it was too heavy and have replaced it with a lighter hardboard and 2" x 1" framed board, it was nice for it to find a new home. We ended up setting up with Ben's paras and Dan's Canadians  at one end of the table and Des's Germans and my winter Germans at the other end with the objective of being in occupation of the church ( more or less in the middle) at the end of turn four. 

The black foamboard buildings have mostly moved on a bit, I'm pretty happy with them, we had an entertaining tussle with losses on both sides, Des as almost always lost his Panther early, I ended up trying to drive a Tiger tank into the church twice,unsuccessfully! The unit I did get in there was anhihilated so in the last turn it was the para spotter in the bell tower who with the last roll of the dice was hit by our sniper but failed to wound so Ben and Dan won, I guess it was Ben's birthday!  What it has done is make me enthusiastic about Stalingrad or the fall of Berlin or both, I  really like the picture of the greatcoated troops making their way through the ruins and a  table of those would be great I thought? I've got a factory and will use the black foamboard buildings once they're complete, so Pavlovs house and a ruined theatre/cinema ? More earlier Wehrmacht and vehicles, I've got the earlier Soviet armour at Partizan so all good there, talking of armour.

I was lucky enough to go for a lunch in the armourers hall in the city of London recently, I got there early and thought these photos might be of interest. 

Mostly seventeenth century although there was a fair bit of Elizabethan armour               ( including Elizabeth's champions armour) , a nice demilancers armour and some gendarmes armour and dopplesoldier swords, the food was nice too which was a bonus! Anyway back again, flat's done, I've actually started painting figures again which is great as I've missed it. I will try and  catch up on everyone's blogs as soon as I  can.Next up ? Late Romans, Napoleonics or terrain but stuff is getting finished again! 

All the best 

Iain 

A present from Osaka Castle

 While at a family wedding in Bolton recently, a grand nephew's, I saw my sister and brother in law freshly back from Japan tracking down where that branch of the family is from, that part of Yokahama was mostly destroyed in the earthquake in 1929 and anything left got flattened by US bombers in WW2 and although my great grandmother and the one remaining great aunt stayed their extended family moved to another treaty port, Nagasaki. My dad was in the invasion fleet in Sydney in 1945 and would have been in the first wave had we not dropped both bombs, so I feel a little ambiguous about the  bombing but that's not the point of this post!

 I got a present from Osaka Castle. 

My wife said at the  dining table in the hotel when I  got the book ( so I have witnesses)

 " why don't you paint a samurai army as it's part of your heritage " well with such an unusual intervention from my wife what can I do but acquiesce? It won't be immediate but I'm thinking of the battle of Sekigahara in 1600 between Tokugawa Ieyasu and Ishida Mitsunari so another pike and shot army or two, I've been put off Warlords plastic range by Ray's mate Steve who told me how hard he was finding it when I  saw him at Partizan!  So maybe it's going to be a metal Perry army? Obviously I'll have to do a bit more research but this will be a long term one, after Montrose's army and two hundred years war armies and my early Imperial Romans otherwise I'm pretty good with Napoleonics ( although I can't stop painting them?!) Great Italian wars are back on the agenda for some reinforcements and the  late Romans and dark ages are bumping along nicely so obviously all I bought at Partizan was WW2 Soviets! I also chatted to Andy from the friends of general Haig and they're really nice 1691 pike and shot battle, even if it wasn't in 28mm! 

KV1/2 warlord T34/76 Rubicon, tank crew and tank riders from bad Squiddo.  I'm currently up to my eyes in a flat refurbishment with an imminent deadline so I apologise if I'm not commenting on your blogs and probably won't be posting until next month, partizan was my only day off for the foreseeable future, added to 14 hour days doesn't leave a lot of time for a hobby!

All the best 

Iain