MDS Sassanid Spearmen
Yesterday I had my first ever disaster with Dull Cote. I had almost completed the job, and I sprayed the fronts of the shields (fortunately, as it turned out, not yet glued to the figures) with Dull Cote. Five minutes later, they had 'crazed' and looked like a 500-year-old oil painting - UGH! So they had to be stripped and redone... I'd hoped for a quiet evening, but stripping, cleaning, re-priming, re-painting and re-dipping took me most of the evening. This morning it was with a degree of trepidation that I got the can of Dull Cote out again. But this time all was well, and the figures turned out okay - phew! I don't really know what went wrong yesterday - but perhaps the 'Dip' wasn't quite dry enough.
So this morning, once the Dull Cote was dry, I added the blobs of flock and took a couple of photos, which you can see in the Sassanid Photo Album. I rather like the effect - suitably dusty, and looking a bit dishevelled and disorganised. Sassanid infantry weren't as bad as one (mis)translation would have us believe - they didn't have to have their ankles chained together to keep them from running away, but they weren't the greatest of troops either! They did, sometimes, give a decent account of themselves against Byzantine infantry, but up against earlier, and better, Romans, they seem to have struggled. Anyway, they've painted up well, and are nice models - I got them from Miniature Design Studio. £25 for fifty (yes, 50!) figures is an excellent deal nowadays. Of course, the unit above has only 36 figures in, and I also have some more A&A infantry - so expect to see at least one more unit, and I expect I shall mix the A&A and MDS figures together - though I do need to make a decision as to which shields I like best - I'm not sure they'd look good mixed in.
Next up, probably ought to be some Sassanid Savaran cavalry, or the Shahanshah's (Kings of Kings') elephant. But I actually fancy doing a unit of Roman archers. Seems my 1,000 point plan is in abeyance for the moment. My excuse is that I don't have quite the figures I want for the Savaran - I have ordered some more from A&A, but they haven't arrived yet. Same with the jumbo - I need a sheet of banners from Steve Hales at LBMS, which hasn't arrived yet either...