Standalone Quests for Warriors of Athena

I've enjoyed several of Joe McCullough's previous games, most notably Ghost Archipelago and Stargrave, so when I heard he was coming out with a new game, Warriors of Athena, based on Greek myth and legend, I ended up picking up the rulebooks. I haven't gotten any figures painted up yet, but I've done a bit of inspirational reading to get in the mood, including some of Stephen Fry's Mythos cycle. While reading through these, it struck me that there are a few recurring encounter types that show up in a number of myths and legends which might make good scenarios for Warriors of Athena. Likewise, while reading through the Quests book for WoA, I found myself wishing for some simple scenarios that were a little more terrain- and miniatures-agnostic than the ones included. Put those together, and here we are:

DBA/Hordes of the Things: Dwarves

It's been a slow year so far for painting and gaming, but last month I capped off another set of DBA armies in fantasy guise - this time, dwarves. My dwarves have shown up here once or twice before, I finally decided to expand them into a full-sized army. I started by looking through the DBA army lists to see if there was a historical army that:

1. Could incorporate the figures I had available (heavy infantry and a cannon) AND
2. Didn't rely on any cavalry, since I didn't anticipate finding or building any compatible with my 20mm dwarves.

Oddly enough, I found an ideal candidate in list IV/83b, the Rebel Army of Henry Tudor. It would require some archers, crossbows, and handgunners, which led me to tracking down the out-of-production Caesar Dwarves in addition to Alliance set 1 and set 2.

Of course, this left me with quite a few surplus dwarves, and it seemed a shame to waste them all, so I decided to branch out with options for a couple of other historical armies. The III/40b Vikings seemed an obvious candidate, just requiring a couple more solid blades and a warband. And once I had gone that far, why not add one or two more blades to permit me to field III/59 Toltec? (DBA 3.0 allows them a monotype army of twelve solid blades.)

All in all, I ended up with (as pictured from left to right):

2x Psiloi

1x Artillery

12x Solid Blades (including a general option)

1x Command Post (in DBA) or Hero (in HotT)

2x Fast Warband or Fast Auxilia

2x Solid Bow

They've even managed to get out for a game or two (both times getting drubbed by the Orcs, alas...)

DBA/Hordes of the Things: Medieval Humans

 

For years my maps for potential fantasy campaigns have had a placeholder country for "generic medieval people" tucked away somewhere, under the assumption that I could piece some sort of army together if necessary. But about this time last year, I started thinking that maybe it was time to paint up some of the figures I had stashed away and expand the handful of units I had into a real force.

As usual, this got a little out of hand.

I figured I would use one of the DBA army lists as a model but not worry too much about the exact figures or the descriptions in the list. I could just about piece together what I needed for a medieval French army with what I had on hand, mostly the old Accurate Hundred Years War Knights and Men-at-Arms. But then I needed a few more crossbowmen, so I got a box of the Italeri French Knights and Foot Soldiers. And then I ran across some of the English Knights and Archers at a flea market... and you know, wouldn't it be nice to have a matched pair of armies?

What I finally settled on was a sort of conjoined-twin pair of armies: two lists with a reasonable amount of overlap that can also serve as historical opponents for each other. (For the DBA aficionados, these were IV/64b Medieval French and IV/74 Free Company & Armagnac. All the dedicated English lists needed more longbows than I had even after my flea market acquisition.) So here at last are the armies of Florlys (blue and yellow) and Brimarth (red and white): 

Mounted general (3Kn)

Mounted knights (3Kn)

Dismounted knight generals (4Bd) - here there is some duplication so that I can play the two halves against each other. Also, I actually painted up some pavilions to represent camps for the two sides!

Dismounted knights (4Bd)

Spears and other polearms (Sp)

Crossbowmen (4Cb)

Brigans or men-at-arms (3Bd)

Longbowmen (4Bd)

Additional longbowmen as mounted infantry (Mtd-4Lb)

Skirmishing bowmen (Ps) - some ubiquitous Airfix Robin Hood figures here, representing something close to their native time and place for once, not converted into ancient Canaanites or Mesoamericans.

Peasant levy (7Hd) - more of the Merry Men here.

Painting time remains easier to find than gaming time, but I do hope to try out these armies against each other in the not-too-distant future. (The Florlys contingent has had some fantasy adventures already, facing off against orcs and the undead...)

New toys for orc armies

As a little side project, I have been working on new units for some of my old Hordes of the Things armies in order to field them under various aliases for DBA. (Not the first time this has happened!) This time the orcs have been the primary beneficiaries - the last time they got an expansion was a few years ago now when I painted up a shaman for Orctober. Now they are adding a couple of chariots and some goblin... allies? subjects? cannon fodder?

The orcs are from the original Caesar set, with some minor conversion work. The chariots are spares from the HaT "Gallic Chariot with Warrior Queen" set - turns out I didn't really need all those Boudicas, but I've found a variety of uses for the figures over the years.

The goblins are also from Caesar - it took me a while to find any and then I ended up with multiple boxes somehow! Some got painted up as massed Hordes, and a few more got picked out to be skirmishing Psiloi (or perhaps Lurkers for HotT.)

Between all these and the Orcs I already have, I can now field a version of the DBA II/53 Ancient British army - albeit looking a little green rather than blue.

The other army to get a small add-on was my Byzantines. (I'm pretty sure when I was working on them a decade ago I had some notion of fielding them for DBA, but now for the life of me I can't figure out what army list I expected to use.) Anyway, they also got some Psiloi - not particularly historical, but I drafted some good old Airfix Robin Hood archers to fill the gap.

Next step... finally turning my handful of generic medieval troops into a coherent army? We shall see...

DBA/Hordes of the Things - Mummies and Undead

I've been on a bit of a DBA kick for the past three years or so, but before that I used to play a lot more of the related fantasy rules, Hordes of the Things. With Dark Alliance having put out a set of Mummies a few years ago, it had always been at the back of my mind to pick some up and fit them in as a fantasy complement or opponent for my historical Egyptians. However, I wasn't quite sure I wanted to build the whole army out of mummies, and my first thought was to fill them out with some of the Caesar Undead. Sadly, these are long out of production and I have been unable to turn up any at a reasonable price. 

However, earlier this summer, I had a little brainstorm while looking through my collection of unpainted figures. I have a large stash of Atlantic Egyptians that was gifted to me some years ago; I haven't painted many of them because they're a little tall and thin compared to the Caesar figures that make up most of my armies. However, looking at their thin, almost gaunt features and slightly odd postures, I wondered: could I just paint them as zombies of some kind? Turns out, yes, I could.

The next issue was army composition. I decided that I wanted to base it on a DBA army so that I could use it for either set of rules. The question was, who is:

1. An enemy of the ancient Egyptians
2. Not an army I already have available
3. Matches the available figures as far as troop types and weapons

In the end I settled on the I/17a Early Hyksos list as the best fit for my criteria. Their army has a core of fast Blades and a Light Chariot general, with some lighter supporting infantry.

The LCh general. In Hordes of the Things, he might be a Rider or Knight, but likely a Hero General. The chariot and horses are from the venerable Atlantic Egyptian Cavalry set; lacking mummified or skeletal horses of the proper size I attempted to paint these as recently reanimated. The charioteer and his two followers are Dark Alliance figures; one has been converted into a standard bearer.

Four units of mummy warriors as 3Bd (probably still Blades in the HotT version).

Three units of Dark Alliance Anubis Army warriors as 3Ax. These end up being rather imposing; about 7 feet tall compared to regular humans, so to class them as mere Auxilia seems perhaps a little dismissive. In HotT they'll probably be Warbands instead.

Two stands of bow-armed mummies as Psiloi - probably Lurkers rather than Shooters in HotT.

One stand of zombie infantry as 4Ax. In HotT they might get played as Spears instead.

A solid Horde (7Hd) or another psiloi (Ps) round out the army. In HotT these will be a Horde and another Lurker respectively. 

I had originally hoped to have these done by Halloween (for which they might seem a more appropriate subject than Christmas) but better late than never! There still might be a few more HotT unit options waiting in the wings, but at least the DBA version of the army is ready to take the field - perhaps in the new year once my usual opponents return from the holidays!

Getting adventurous

This is the second half of my post-Mycenaean painting spree; as mentioned in my previous post I got some work done on my Proxian 19th-century Imagi-nations armies, but I also had some fantasy odds and ends that I wanted to work on. In particular, I thought it was time to re-visit the Caesar Adventurers set. I've painted a number of the figures over the years, but I still had a few tucked away. 

First up, I selected a trio to base together as a stereotypical D&D adventuring party, with a fighter, a magic-user, and a rogue. I expect the three of them will feature in Hordes of the Things games as a Hero unit. (The fighter's coat of arms is actually an allusion to a long-running D&D game I'm in, where our guild's symbol is a phoenix.)

I've also been plotting to add a few fantasy elements to my Bronze Age Egyptians, to allow them to play as a HotT army as well. One of the female magic-users from the Adventurers set looked like she could serve as a priestess; I gave her a couple of retainers from the old Atlantic Pharaoh's Court set. This unit will probably be either a Cleric or Magician as required.

As another HotT element for the Egyptians, I had a couple of crocodiles to serve as Water Lurkers. These are from HaT's "Jungle Adventures" re-issue of the Airfix Tarzan set.

This next one is bit of an oddball; some years ago I picked up several boxes of MiniArt Germanic Warriors at a convention flea market, thinking I would use them as Riders of Rohan. Well, I got as far as painting one stand of them, then kind of lost interest. I sold off the bulk of them to a friend of mine, but I still had another unit that had started prepping. Well, I finally got around to painting that unit, so perhaps now they'll see some action in a future game of N.U.R.D, or as a little mercenary contingent in a HotT campaign.

Moving over to the 28mm side of things, I also got a few more Reaper Bones figures painted. This one is a Psychic from their Pathfinder range. I actually painted a version of this figure in a speed-painting contest at Gen Con a couple of years ago and I liked it enough to get a plastic Bones version when it became available.

Finally, I painted up a gang of lizardfolk to match some I did a couple of years back. They might see action as primitives in Stargrave, or if we return to the Ghost Archipelago some day.

Next up, it will be the Bronze Age once more... perhaps for the last time! (Though I've said that before, haven't I?)

The dwarves are for the dwarves!

I mentioned at the end of my last post that I was thinking about what I would need to put on a version of the Battle of Five Armies from The Hobbit. This notion was sparked in part by running across a couple of dozen dwarves in my stash of unpainted miniatures (two sprues of the Light Alliance Dwarves Set 1) and wondering what I could do with those. This month, I decided to go ahead and paint them up, as a little contingent to use in Hordes of the Things or other fantasy rules.

After some consideration, I decided to kit them out in a lot of reds, yellows, and oranges, with browns and grays for some variety. I had a few spare shields leftover from the Assyrians, so I gave these to a couple of the figures that didn't have one. For shield designs I tried a few geological motifs, but others ended up with more general geometric designs or ones based on tools. 

The dwarven contingent all together.

The dwarven commander - or perhaps a Hero for HotT?

A few different views of the dwarven infantry.

I decided to try something a little different with the bases - a lot of my existing 20mm fantasy infantry are based six or eight to a 60x40mm base, but for these I decided to try base them in groups of four on a 60x20 base. This way I can arrange them two ranks deep to match my older units, but it also gives me a little more flexibility to split them up if that would be useful at some point. (Also - I had a whole bunch of spare 60x20 bases and not so many 60x40s...)

Having finished these, I must say I am not inclined to expand them to a whole army. While the figures looked OK on the sprue, I found painting them to be a bit of a chore - many of the poses are kind of flat and the sculpting is a little chunky. Nevertheless, now I have some dwarves finished, and I expect they will be more or less stalwart allies for some of my other armies down the road.