Checking off that list

Progress on the job list. Not all tasks are equal. 7 is a LOT, LOT bigger than5 for example. But just sticking things down in black and white has encouraged me to get some blooming things done.

About 3.9m. In my usual SYW scale that's about 11 miles. I wasn't happy with the edging but I couldn't get the clumps to stick so stuck with grass.

Not so many houses, or walls. A bit rough and ready but they'll do.

Nearly all the hoplites. I haven't got quite enough to finish off the 8th unit, but I'm looking at ways to bodge some conversions.

The Persian close order archers. About 190 in total.

They were originally based in uniform coloured units but they got jumbled up once prised off the old bases and I thought, varied colours in each unit looks better. If I had painted them from scratch I'd have done them in uniform colours.

Three down. 22.7 to go!

Tentative Order	Job
1	Finish river pieces
2	Check stock of magnetic paper and bases
4	Paint houses
3	Order storage boxes
5	Paint walls
6	Paint and base trees
7	Rebase Greeks and Persians 30%
8	Flag SYW figures (French priority)
9	Try Alala!
10	Try Siege Works rules
11	Paint wagons and gun teams
12	Decide what to do with SYW odds and sods
13	Paint petard crews etc
14	Prepare New Year Campaign
15	Paint sheep
16	Paint pack animals
17	Paint villagers (6 and 10mm)
18	Make fortress
19	Ottoman painting guide
20	Order Irregular Ottoman army
21	Paint Ottomans
22	Run ECW siege campaign
23	Make AWI boats
24	Maybe rebase some Romans
25	Build & paint sailing ships

Task List

In the last post I mentioned a burgeoning list of things to do if I'm not to have a pile of unused items build up. This is something I need to get on top of so I had a go at listing everything that needs doing.  There's probably more that hasn't come to mind, but will at some point. No doubt there's things that I've forgotten that I have bought. No doubt also that I'll change the order of some tasks and some jobs will split out into more sub-tasks. Some of the tasks listed are sub-tasks or at least linked to others, but I have deliberately avoided making this too ‘scientific’ as if it were a Real World programme.

Some of the tasks are quick wins (e.g. 15 and 16) whilst others are sizeable projects in their own right (I’m looking at you, number 18). Knocking off a few quick wins will help boost morale while the bigger jobs are pondered, analysed to death, planned and finally executed. Number 1 on the list is a reasonable sized ‘project’ (3.9 metres of river pieces) but one that pays big dividends (every period needs watercourses).

That all said, here is the first version of the list.

Tentative Order	Job
1	Finish river pieces
2	Check stock of magnetic paper and bases
4	Paint houses
3	Order storage boxes
5	Paint walls
6	Paint and base trees
7	Rebase Greeks and Persians
8	Flag SYW figures (French priority)
9	Try Alala!
10	Try Siege Works rules
11	Paint wagons and gun teams
12	Decide what to do with SYW odds and sods
13	Paint petard crews etc
14	Prepare New Year Campaign
15	Paint sheep
16	Paint pack animals
17	Paint villagers (6 and 10mm)
18	Make fortress
19	Ottoman painting guide
20	Order Irregular Ottoman army
21	Paint Ottomans
22	Run ECW siege campaign
23	Make AWI boats
24	Maybe rebase some Romans
25	Build & paint sailing ships

I should add in target dates for them all. Item 14 obviously has a time limit already, and going by that I need to get motoring.  Last time I made such a list (around 5 years ago) I did get through it in a reasonable time, so I'm confident I'll do it.

One final caveat or note: every time I used the words ‘need to’ above I really mean ‘want to’. I remind myself that nothing bad will happen if I don’t do any of the things listed.

How big is your to do list? Do you expect to complete it (ignoring any new things that come along of course!).

Non-Partizan English (and other) Republics

Friday saw another in-person meet up with 'the Ragged Soldier' (Dave B) at a National Army Museum talk on the English Republic. The speaker was Professor Alice Hunt of the University of Southampton.  In common with a lot of the NAM talks, it was a lot more engaging than expected. It can still be viewed online (link below). I know it's not directly related to the history of the civil wars, but there was a lot more going on in the country during that time than 'the Banning of Christmas', and a bit of reading/listening around a subject never did any harm.

https://www.nam.ac.uk/whats-on/republic-britains-revolutionary-decade-1649-60 

There were a couple of first edition near contemporary books on display at the talk.

Professor Hunt can also be heard talking on the same subject on the World Turned Upside Down podcast:

https://www.worldturnedupsidedown.co.uk/podcast/britains-astonishing-revolutionary-decade/

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It's always good to catch up with David and have a natter over lunch after the talk. He brought along a recent purchase to lend me, Peter Connolly's 'Greece and Rome at War'. This is really useful as it lays out the organisation and formations of both Greeks and Romans at different stages of their respective histories.

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Saturday saw the timely arrival of an order I placed with Pendraken for some more bases and dice holders. Whilst I was placing the order I thought I may as well make the most of the postage charge and ordered some 6mm flags for the French, Dutch and various Holy Roman Empire states. Whilst technically these are for the War of the Austrian Succession, I think they'll do at this scale for the Seven Years War and War of Austrian Succession. I've been meaning to get around to painting the flags on the French figures for a couple of years, without actually doing anything about it. Now it'll be a simple case of cut, snip and glue. I hope.

To return to the ECW, the Pendraken order also included a copy of the Battleground Series book on Naseby.

So quite a haul over Partizan weekend. Only I didn't go to the show.

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Now I have a big backlog of projects to be getting on with. Various unpainted figures (human and animal), buildings, rivers, walls, rebasing, re-flagging etc. I also have some trees and some other odd figures on order (for yet another project). I probably should create a list and challenge myself to get it done by a set date.

Re-basing commences

The decision taken on the hoplites I got to work. First step was to prise them off their original base. That wasn't too difficult.

Then I zhuzhed them up a bit with a little decoration of the shields. That done, I got them stuck down to the bases. The figures were in units of the same shield colour and initially I was thinking about mixing them up so there was no uniformity, but cutting the figures off the strips and glueing them individually would have been a task too far. So they're mostly in units with the same colour shield, just different patterns on them.

I'm waiting for the arrival of the dice trays so I won't texture the bases yet. I had a false start with a couple of bases when I realised that I hadn't left enough space for the dice trays.

Figures as they were once they were off the original bases

I wanted to re-base the figures because they were based one rank deep with a fair amount of space fore and aft, whilst I wanted to have denser formations. In addition I wanted to re-texture the bases in the house style, similar to the Punic Wars figures.

First stage: shields edged in gold (for 'bronze'), white, red or green. Second stage: dab on various 'patterns' in contrasting colours. Some were effectively just blobs and then I started to get a bit more adventurous.

Third stage: figures glued to their final bases. Not quite enough for 8 units.

Close up of the 'Blue Shields'

This unit includes some of the legendary Finnioi tribe.

Unit containing the Grimonids (front right), with their own distinctive alphabet letters displayed on their shields.

Good news story

About wargaming too.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c8d73e16qgno.amp

After 1100 years….

…..has England split or was it a myth that Athelstan united all England?

Or is it just a sign of declining proofreading standards at the Beeb?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cewnpjjlxx4o.amp

The Big Re-basing: Final Options

I've been going round and round in circles on this for nearly two weeks now. I need to make a decision. So here are the final options swirling around my head.

Option 1: Shallow bases each with 2 ranks.

• 1a: Alala! 2 bases deep. Each row made up of bases 60x15 and 30x15mm
• 1b: Basic Impetus: 1 base deep. 2 bases of 60x15mm.

Option 2: Deep bases each with 3 ranks.

• 2a: Alala! 1 base deep. One base 60x30 and one base 30x30mm
• 2b: Basic Impetus: 1 base deep. Two bases 60x30mm

Oh to clarify....I intend to use Alala! for inter-Greek battles and BI for everything else (Romans-Carthaginians; Romans-Greeks; Carthaginians-Greeks; Persians-Greeks).

Option 1a: Phalanx for Alala! Two shallow bases deep, 2 ranks per base. I might drop 1 or 2 files from this as they are too near the edges.

Option 1a: From above. I might open up a bit of a gap between the ranks on each base so they are equally spaced when they are placed two bases deep.

Option 1b: deployed as a 'unit' for Basic Impetus. 1 base deep. 'Spares' in the background will go towards other units.

Option 1a: Alalas phalanx from above showing how the losses can be taken off. This gives me up to 12 elements so lots of flexibility.

Option 2a (right): 3 ranks per base, 1 base deep. Against 1a. Alala phalanxes. As with Option 1, I'll drop a couple of files off to make them easier to handle.

Option 2b: on the right: 3 ranks per base, 1 base deep. Unit for Basic Impetus.

Options 1b and 2b: Basic Impetus shown against a Roman Principes base. If I were to bring the 3-deep Greeks up against the Romans I'd probably have to beef up the Romans a bit from the odds and ends pile. The Hastati and Triarii (not shown) don't look as underpowered by comparison.

Options 1a and 2a together. To make 2b flexible enough I'd have to split the large base into smaller ones.

What the options mean for Alala!

• Option 1 would give me 7 or 8 units of c.60 for Alala! Roughly 1 figure:20 men.
• Option 2 units would be c.48 strong and I'd be able to make 9 units. 

A unit in Alala! is supposed to be around 1000-1200 hoplites. I suppose 3 or 4 units a side would be enough for battles between competing poleis.

What the options mean for Basic Impetus

• Option 1 units would be 40+ figures strong. Roughly 1 figure:30 men. I'd have enough for 10+units. Plenty.
• Option 2 units would be 60+ strong and I'd have 7 or 8. Probably enough.

This excludes all the Peltasts, psiloi and cavalry floating around that I haven't even got around to thinking about yet!

Post Script

I finally made a decision. Three ranks on 30mm deep bases. Two bases 60mm wide for Basic Impetus and one base 60x30 plus one 30x30mm for Alala! I like the look of 3 ranks best.  A total of 60 figures for BI and 45 for Alala! I'll tackle the weedy looking Roman units at a later date.

I played around with different ideas on how to take casualties from a phalanx. Having more smaller bases didn't really look right because in order to avoid handling damage I'd need to have small gaps around the side, and this led to gaps in the wall of shields. 

I asked myself what other way could I track strength without hordes of casualty figures and the answer was in front of my eyes - use tiny dice in dice holders on the base. I do this anyway for BI. A standard Alala unit is 24 figures, or 6 elements of 4. The 30x30mm base, 1/3 of a unit, would therefore be two elements. So once 8 pips had been built up on the D sixes, the small base could be removed. A total of 16 pips would mean the removal of the large base instead. Sorted!

So an order was duly placed for more bases from Pendraken, plus a few other bits and pieces not necessarily related to the Ancients project.