Basing 6mm Romans Part 2

Thanks to Dr Mike's (aka Cranium27) suggestion I've added a third rank which really does make the unit look a whole lot better:









I was planning to add a black 10mm thick strip at the back for unit details somewhat like this.

I'll see if I can complete this base this week then I can see if it's a worthwhile project.

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Basing 6mm Romans

I've been playing around a bit with the basing for my 6mm Romans and came up with an idea that sort of shows a unit in motion (based on the fact that no straight line of men can stay straight as it moves cross country) and thought I'd blog some pictures of the mock up I've done to see what other people thought of the idea?

I'm afraid that you'll have to use your imagination somewhat as I haven't done anything to the base yet and I didn't have a spare Optio (the chap at the back with the yellow shield) available with the right shield colour:









My thinking is that Roman units wouldn't be solid ranks of men (except perhaps if attacked by cavalry) as the Roman historian Polybius (writing in the 2nd Century BC) tells us that a legionary occupies about 6' of space. Being primarily a swordsman a legionary would need this space to move around in to fight effectively. That's some of my reasoning anyway.

Each of these bases would represent a 480 man cohort, and there would be 10 per Legion (with the first cohort being 800 strong).

All figures are Baccus and are from pack AIR1. The mdf base is from Minibits.

Any comments positive or negative would be welcome.

Thanks

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Book Review: The Battle of Mons Aelian by Francis Hagan

This is a free* short story I picked up the other day on Amazon. It is an account of a fictional 5th Century Roman battle in North Africa. It is written from the point of view of a battlefield archaeologist as he discovers the site and pieces together the surviving evidence to try to work out what happened 1500 years before. I thought the authors choice to write from this perspective was an interesting one and made the novel itself more interesting that it may otherwise of been.

The battle described is something of a small one but would make for an interesting wargames scenario however I'm not 100% sure of the authenticity of the tactics the author uses for the Roman legion so I would recommend checking that out first before using it as a scenario. Most of my reading on the Romans has focused on the Republic and early Empire so I'd need to re-read a few of my other books on the later Empire to be sure if I was to recreate this scenario.

There were a few grammatical and spelling errors but as they aren't my strong points either I can't really complain too much. Overall its an interesting little story but wouldn't be something I'd actually want to pay for.

Full Title: The Battle of Mons Aelian
Author: Francis Hagan
Pages: roughly 21 (7,000 words)
Publisher: Francis Hagan (9 July 2013)
Language: English
Price: Free (Kindle)

*I can't find any evidence that it's been anything but free.

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Book Review: Rome and the Arabs Before the Rise of Islam

This is a kindle book I picked up on Amazon recently. Admittedly its not a very long book (138 pages) but it does give you a good overview of whats known about Arab relations with Rome from the 3rd Century through to the Islamic Conquest of the Roman East. It was interesting to read about how the administrative structures the Arabs developed because of this relationship may have aided the Islamic take over of these previously Roman or Roman influenced areas.
It was also interesting to read of the development of written Arabic and how that might of occurred (though, according to the book, there is no definitive proof for any theory) - poetry or the recording needed for administrating an area were suggested as quite plausible reasons for the development of a written form of Arabic.
For those interested in this period this is a book worth reading.
Full Title: Rome and the Arabs Before the Rise of Islam: A Brief Introduction
Author: Greg Fisher
Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform (3 Feb 2013)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1482311453
ISBN-13: 978-1482311457
Price: £3.34(Kindle ebook) or £7.38 ("real" book)
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1:1 Scale 6mm Romans

These haven't been finished that recently but I thought that I ought to put the pictures up on my blog as they do illustrate the really good mass effect you get from 6mm.

First up we have half of a Roman Cohort (3 Centuries - note that they are modelled understrength as most of the data we do have for Roman unit strength returns suggest that most units were understrength though cavalry Ala do seem to be an exception to that):




Next up we have a cavalry squadron (latin Turma), this unit is at full strength (32 figures). I deliberately based these to try and give them a sense of movement:


And finally here's a close up of the cavalry:


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Completed Gladiators

The Thraex and Secutor are now complete....


...and the next batch has been started:

These are from left to right a Laqueaius, a pair of Retiarii and another Laqueaius. These are all from pack ANG003.
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Gladiators WIP

These were actually painted during the summer (well what passed for a summer this year!) but I didn't get around to finishing off the bases to represent the sand covered arena so I thought it was about time I got them back out and did so:

The right hand gladiator is a Secutor (pack ANG002) and the left hand is a Thraex (pack ANG004) both from the gladiators range produced by Crusader Miniatures.
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