Hoplite Greek Army

I've made a blog entry on this one mainly for Steve'the Hat's benefit, as he has been painting up some Zvedza Greeks and their new Spartans.

In terms of the state of completion or otherwise of this army all I can say is WYSIWYG - what you see is what you get!

WSYWIYG!

The figures are all Atlantic figures, a very old range-from the '60s I understand-but nicely sculpted nevertheless. The figures have a variety of different helmet times, which once upon a time I knew something about, and some were associated I think with certain armies (eg. Corinithian), but to be honest my memory now is hazy.

As you can see I've replaced the weapons with which they are sculpted with wire long spears. A lot of have come off and need repair (for about the third or fourth time!). There are 21 DBA elements worth. This once completed would enough for a matched pair of standard 12 element DBA armies with psiloi etc., but a bit light for a 'Double-Based' DBA or 'Impetus' army.

There are also two element bases of cavalry and two of light horse painted up. The riders haven't been. I don't have any dedicated 'psiloi' for this army, but shouldn't have any problem finding some from elsewhere (eg. Roman or Carthaginan armies.

Horses painted, riders not...

In addition, I have a couple of dozen mounted on coins (had vaguely thought of some sort of skirmish game based on the Odyessy) and a couple of plastic bags of unpainted or unbased figures. Only three element base are anyway close to completion, and I stopped them because I wasn't happy with the shield design.

...Some of the better painted shields..

In fact, getting them out, I can see I seem to have had a hard time working out what to do with the shields. I have some hand painted, most rather unsatisfactorily. For some I've tried sticking on shield designs printed on paper-which looks better in the photos than real life! And I think this indecision on shields was a major sticking point in moving forward to complete these.

Stuck on paper designs..unfortunately peeling off!

The DBA army book has no less than 9 variant Early Hoplite Greek and also 9 Late Hoplite Greek. There are also other army lists for armies essentially based around Greek hoplites (eg. Syracusian). They have anywhere between 3 elements of 'Spear' ('periperphal states' like Phokian) to 11 elements (Spartan). The early lists typically include around 10 'Spear' elements, the later ones 8, including the general's element, which is normally 'spear'. Virtually all the other elements in the Early lists are either Cavalry or Psiloi. The Later one is more varied.

If Steve thinks he can put them to good use somehow, let me know any I'll move them up the 'paint queue....

Also some left unpainted or based in bags...

Finally here's a pic of the whole lot in a 'phalanx', which gives some idea of how impressive a 'Double based DBA army' (which would be twice the size) would look.