Hypaspists, Psiloi and Persians WIPs

  These are some of the figures I've been working on. They are working in progress because Psiloi and Hypaspists have no washes as of yet and all the models including Persians need to get some greenery on to their bases.

Victrix Mercenary Hoplites painted as Hypaspistoi

 These two are my colourscheme test. I am not too happy with the linthorax, rather than having the whole thing purple I might have a white linthorax with purple and yellow accents.

 Shields meant to show Alexander the Great in Persian headgear. This would mean it is a relatively late shield so could represent Alexander's army during his later years or that of Diadochi.

 Perry's Sudanese Tribesmen painted as Psiloi

These guys are standard, I've only added hats from ImmortalMiniatures/Warlord's Classical hoplites sprues. No washes on those yet so they look a bit plain.

Wargames Factory's Late Achaemenid Persians 

 This is the first try I tried to give infantry bowstrings and it turned out to be really easy- take broom bristle, dap both ends of the bow in some superglue and stick the bristle on. When dry clip of the excess bristle and paint over the dry superglue (it usually turns white so you will need to go over it).

Size comparison 

     
  A quick size comparison with Perry, Victrix, Wargames Factory, Victrix and Warlord Games phalangite. As you can see those ranges work very well together and you should be able to create a huge chunk of your Macedonian and Persian army with those.

Another batch of phalangites

These are the four test minis I've done already:

And this is the batch I am in the middle of:

Wargames Factory Persians WIP

So with the crazy discounts on Persian sprues I started a Persian army which I am going to use as army of Darius to fight Alexander and possibly later as some levies for Diadochi armies too (I'm thinking Seleucid). So far I've put few archers together and greenstuffed the shoulders so there is no crack where the arms and heads are attached.

First four Macedonian Phalangites

    I have made attempts at plastic phalanx before but I in the 1/72 scale with Zvezda's Macedonian Phalanx. However the sarissa was too flimsy and I was somewhat discouraged. Then I discovered these in 28mm scale and I knew I had to get some!

  There are only four poses but really to represent the phalanx it is more than enough. However I was disappointed that there was no pose where the sarissa can be positioned parallel to the ground (ei. what the first rank would do). These are slightly chunkier than the hoplites I have been doing so far but I think that I can swap heads from both sets easily enough.

  Each sprue allows four of these to be built so this is a test sprue run. There is a selection of 6 helmets on each and 6 sarissa poses (the two additional not shown have the Macedonians hold the sarissa by the buttspike). With 40 total that gives 10 sprues plus transfers. I went with white colour-scheme for the armour, yellow for pteruges detail and red for clothing. Though metal parts are gold I went with bronze (Chalkaspides-Bronze shields) (Citadel's Brazen Brass) to give them the standard rank-n-file look rather than make them look lite the elite phalanx (such as argyraspides which Warlord Games has a separate metal set for).

  I plan to use them in multiple armies, from Alexander to Pyrrhus to Diadochi up to Seleucids. Overall I am very happy with the detail and sculpt of these guys. Once I get all of my hoplites and these guys out of the way I can start getting some cavalry!

Progress on the 'Immortal miniatures' hoplites

    This is the progress so far. There are 15 'classical' hoplites on the left (blue shields) from the 'classical hoplites' set set to represent Athenian forces of Peloponnesian War while the 25 hoplites on the right are meant to represent a  the '300' Spartans and 700 Thespians from Thermopolea.


Free-hand shield designs

    I really liked the transfers provided with these miniatures. However after applying them I found that they are quite shiny/reflect light unlike the normal paint. I am not sure if matt varnish would remove that shine but instead I decided to some free-hand designs. Here are two design from the Athenian hoplites.

Cloaks made from the 'Green-stuff'

    This was my first attempt at sculpting with the 'green-stuff'. It is not great but at least something to seperate this figure and add to variety in the phalanx. Below is my second attempt, this one a much shorter, I tried to go for a Thessalian type cloak.

The raised Corynthian helmet

     The Corynthian helmet hides the face of the hoplite so ideally the command figures could have the helmet resting on top of their head like the famous Pericles bust and in fact I set out to have a Pericles miniature that would lead the Athenian phalanx. This helmet option is not provided in the 'Immortal Miniatures' sets so I made my own version by cutting the top of the bare-headed head option and attaching the helmet on top, filling the gaps with green-stuff.

  Here are the results (I quite like the fact I did not use any metallic paints on the Pericles figure except for the spear points):

And another example on a different figure:

   These are just a few simple ideas to make the figures more unique.