Sorry, still no photos... You'll have to wait until the 22nd, when it's my birthday (unless family are being cruel, in which case it'll be Christmas Day). Anyway, I've finished another unit for my 'Fire in the East' project. This time it's a unit of Sassanid cavalry. The easiest way to describe them is as being Savaran who've left their horse armour behind - so they're heavily armoured, but on unarmoured horses. There's some evidence for Savaran doing this, on occasion, and joining the light cavalry in harrassing Roman columns. There was a nice photo-article illustrating one such in a recent issue of Ancient Warfare (V-3), which was the inspiration for this unit. I'm quite pleased with the way they've turned out.
I'm fast running out of ideas for 'Fire in the East'! I could do a unit or two more of un-armoured Roman skirmishers (slingers or javelin-men), but I don't really 'need' them. I could do another jumbo for the Sassanids - an officers' one to lead the elephants - using the Aventine MIniatures king's elephant, a tower, and some A&A Miniatures Sassanid officers. Then my King's elephant can really take on the role of the army commander. Other than that, we're on to things that none of the manufacturers makes: Roman 'equites sagittari' (horse archers), dismounted Sassanid 'Savaran'. So it looks as though, reluctantly, I'm approaching the point where I'm going to have to leave this project behind - at least where painting more figures is concerned. It's been great fun. The games still are great fun - the two armies are very different, attractive-looking, and the differences make the games a challenge, whichever side one's playing.
So, then what? A Saxon warband for Saga is a must, and very soon. But other than that... Wars of the Roses? Late Romans - but which army to use for opposition? Early Saxons? Picts?
It's now 5th December, and I'm still no further forward - but I have finished my share of the Christmas shopping, found homes for a pile of stuff which has lived on the landing since August, and sacrificed an ancient laptop to the Recycling Gods, so I haven't done badly really, I suppose.
In the meantime, one of the Lardy gang, Sidney Roundwood (yes, that is a nom de plume!) has posted an interesting, and inspiring, list of 29 Ways to Stay Creative to stir you up and make the hobby more interesting. Clever bloke is Sid.
I had the good (?) fortune to see a copy of Warhammer Historical's 'Gladiator' a few days ago. It's very pretty - full of lovely pictures. There's some good stuff in there, but overall, I'm not that impressed. The game engine is GW's Lord of the Rings. In itself, that's a nice little system, but to my way of thinking it doesn't contain enough combat detail for a game which is, mainly, about single combats. I'm sure I could do better, without trying terribly hard. Heck, even the gladiator game we played thirty-odd years ago as schoolboys had more detail and 'flavour', although the mechanisms would probably seem like something out of the ark nowadays.
Right, I am going to go and ponder my next project now...