Fife and Drum Web Store is back on line

 

General von Zeiten hands his Christmas list to one of his aides.

The Fife and Drum Miniatures web site has been repaired and works again.

Previously, customers reported that they could not put items in the shopping cart. 

My help assistance tells me that the problem is fixed now. To hopefully make up for the inconvenience, Santa Claus is giving everyone a Christmas/Holiday Season gift as described below:

Click the link to the store, below and enter the coupon code to receive a 20% discount on your order. This applies to all orders over $50.00 and the discount starts today and ends on Christmas Eve December 24, 2024

Fife and Drum Miniatures web store

Enter the coupon code "Christmas2024" (without the quotation marks) to receive a 20% discount when you check out with your shopping cart.

 

A Smoking Cap and a Place to Relax

 

Come on there. You know that you want one. a traditional men's smoking cap. You will have to supply your own smoking jacket, brandy and cigars.

I found an advertisement for this item in my email in box and I knew immediately that I would have to share it with my blog readers. Here is the link below:

Peter Christian menswear store

I have bought clothing items from Peter Christian in the past and so I can vouch for their product quality and good customer service.

And now you need somewhere to wear your new smoking cap. This looks like quite the place to have some "Me Time". Alas, it is not in my house.

It doesn't look like I will reach my annual goal of posting at least 100 posts on my blog. I am not going to try and pad the post count with a lot of fluff posts (I've been known to do that in the past). I have kept busy throughout the year so it is not like I am suffering for content ideas. However, for the past couple of months that old Black Dog of seasonal depression has taken a good hold on me and thus I haven't been able to get up the gumption to do a lot of blogging. Whenever we have a time change (Daylight Savings Time etc.) I find that I am affected to some degree.

I didn't even realize that I was in a bout with the BD until two different people told me that I seemed disinterested in things. When I hear that my ears perk up and I know that is the warning sign that I am in a depression. It's been hard to pick up my paint brushes and work on figures - that usually gets me back on to Happy Road.

I don't hide the fact that I have depression, but rather, I think that it is a good thing to talk about it out in the open. There's no shame to it. The more that people develop an awareness of depression around them then they are in a position to recognize the signs both in themselves or in others. Don't be afraid to seek out help or talk about it with your spouse or partner. And if you see the signs in someone you love, then don't be afraid to seek them out and talk about it and listen.

So I am taking longer walks outdoors with the dogs and just being outside of the house is often a good antidote for depression. I started on the Christmas decorations this week and that usually helps too. Painting war game figures helps unless you can't get yourself to sit at the painting table for an hour. Still, it is a fight to get back to my mental health base line, but I assure you that I will prevail.

Fritz

Happy Leuthen Day

 

Not quite the Leuthen Choral. German flats representing Prinz Leopold von Anhalt-Dessau
prior to the battle of Kesselsdorf in 1745.

The picture above was pinched from another blog, link below:

Mike's Dreispitz Blog

December 5, 1757 marks the Battle of Leuthen fought between the Prussian army of Frederick the Great and the Austrian army of Charles of Lorraine. The battle resulted in a Prussian victory and saved (temporarily ) the Kingdom of Prussia from defeat at the outset of the Seven Years War. The battle is notable for Frederick's use of the Oblique Order and is probably the only time that the maneuver was perfectly executed on the battlefield. Outnumbered three to one, the Prussians caught the larger Austrian army off guard and they defeated the Austrians.

Roman Marching Encampment in 1/32 Scale

 

1/32 scale (54mm) Roman marching encampment.
The manufacturer is TSSD (Toy Soldiers of San Diego)

I want to have a Roman marching camp fort in my Historicon game in 2025. One of the games might feature a Roman assault on a Carthaginian city. The Romans would typically construct a fortress made of dirt and timber where ever they made an encampment while on the march. I wasn't looking forward to making my own camp walls out of pink insulation foam board and the one made by John Jenkins Designs is prohibitively expensive. I was pleased to find this fort model from Toy Soldiers of San Diego (TSSD) for a reasonable cost, relative to the other options. The model pieces come preprinted, but I think that they might need a different color of paint plus some dry brushing to finish it off.

The following two pictures provide a view of the interior of the camp:

My plan is to set the fort up on the back edge of the table and only represent the front and sides of the fort. The interior will have some Roman camp tents and vignettes and, of course, some soldiers to man the walls of the fort. The idea is that some of the game players will be attacking the Carthaginian city on one table while others are involved in attacking the Roman camp (which comes under attack from a Carthaginian relief force.

Both the Carthaginians and Romans set up walled camps while on the march so each side could have a fort on their back table. They march out of the camp and then deploy for battle. I will run multiple convention games at Little Wars and Historicon, so one day might have an assault on the city walls game, an assault on a marching camp, or some conventional set piece battles. Then, a second game on the day will have the reverse of the morning game, i.e. a set piece battle in the evening and a city assault in the morning game. Rinse and repeat for Friday and Saturday.

The front gate of the walled camp

Some of the soldiers' tents inside the camp.

Roman engineers use a groma device to survey the ground so that they can set up 
the location of the tents. These figures are from John Jenkins Designs.

I have a 32-figure unit of Celts/Gauls on the painting table right now and hope to have these finished within the next week. Hopefully the Thanksgiving holiday will give me some spare time to devote to figure painting.

Roman Quincunx

Roman 54mm Project Update

Three 54mm Roman legions formed up in the Quincunx formation

I have been busy basing a lot of the 54mm Punic Wars figures that I painted so that I would not face the day when I would have to base hundreds of figures. In other words, it was time to stop putting off the unpleasant part of painting and assembling war game armies: the basing of figures. Doing a few at a time is no big deal, but when I let the number of unbased figures accumulate, then an easy task turns into drudgery. Yuck!

So I have painted three Republican Roman legions so far. I finished the third legion last week. My legions consists of 32-figure Hastatii, Princeps, Triarii and 16-figure Velites (light skirmishers). That adds up to 112 figures per legion and they all needed to be based. I put the figures on 40mm round bases and then use movement trays from Litko (4 figures wide by 2 rows deep = 8 figures per stand). Four movement trays of 8 figures equal the 32 figures in the principal units in the legion.

The Romans would often deploy their maniples into staggered formations of three battle lines. I do not subdivide my units into maniples because this is too granular for the type of game and rules that I intend to use in my convention games next year. The Velites (light troops) would be out in front of the main mass of formed units with Hastatii in the front row, the Princeps in the second row, and the veteran Triarii forming the third and final row in the formation.

Apparently this formation must have worked for the Romans, but it seems that the open lanes in the battle lines would be a major weakness as it would allow enemy troops to move into the gaps of the battle line. I suppose that the Velites would retire through the gaps and maybe the Hastatii, etc would close ranks to form a continuous battle line. In a war game, I would not want to leave gaps in my battle line. My version of the Quincunx formation is depicted below:

Velites in front on the left, Hastatii in the second row, Princeps in the third line, and Triarii in the last line (shown on the left center of this picture next to the command tent).

Here are some pictures of the Princeps figures that I finished two weeks ago

Princeps troops

Hastatii troops in the mid-ground and some Velites in the foreground.

Triarii wearing chain mail.

I also painted 16 more Roman cavalry figures, bringing their contingent up to 32 Roman and 32 Italian allies cavalry figures, or 64 total figures. My Carthaginian army has 96 cavalry, half of which are Numidian light cavalry.

Roman cavalry organized into two 16-figure units:

I am slowly catching up on my figure basing. I have all of the Velites to base and 16 Celt-Iberians in the Carthaginian army.

Next up on the painting table: 16 Celt-Iberians and 32 Celts.

After all of that it will be time to start making Roman buildings for my town. One of my convention game scenarios will feature a Roman assault on a Carthaginian fortified city.

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Carthaginian Army in 54mm - Progress So Far

A portion of my 54mm Carthaginian army shown above.

Click on pictures to enlarge

Well now that I seem to have jumped into the Second Punic War Project with both feet, I thought that it might be time to post some pictures of my 54mm Carthaginian army. If you follow me on Facebook or are a member of The Virtual Wargames Club then you have probably seen these pictures, but for everyone else, here is a preview of what I have.

Note that I commenced painting 54mm Romans and Carthaginians back in September 2022 with the plan to run a Hannibal game at Historicon in 2024. However, a side trip to Gettysburg on the way home sidetracked this project as I shifted my focus to the ACW and Pickett's Charge game for 2024. Now that all of that is in the rear view mirror I am refocused on the 54mm Hannibal project.

Hannibal's army of the Second Punic War was largely of a mercenary nature comprised of "allies" from Gaul (Celts), Spain (Celt-Iberians), Numidians and Lybo-Phoenicians (Lybians). There were very few actual Carthaginian citizens in any Carthaginian army.

Hannibal army commander command stand.

John Jenkins Designs 60mm Hannibal and Carthaginian infantry.

My Hasdrubal command stand. The two figures on the stand indicate that
he is one command level below the army commander.

The Celts

I use infantry units of 32 figures and cavalry units of 16 figures in my armies. All of the figures are plastic figures made by HaT Industries ("HaT"). I copied some of the shield patterns off of pictures that I found on Pinterest.

Celtic infantry

Celtic cavalry

The Spanish

My Spanish contingent consists of two infantry units of medium/unarmored troops and some heavier Celt-Iberians wearing chain mail.

Celt-Iberian heavy infantry

Spanish infantry - Caetratii with small round sheilds.

Spanish Scutarii

Balearic slingers. These are metal figures made by HaT

Spanish Cavalry. These figures are out of production and very hard to find, but
I was able to find another box of 8 cavalry on eBay from a seller in Australia.

Libo-Phoenicians (Libyans or Africans)

The heavy infantry core of Hannibal's army came from the countryside around the City of Carthage. While they were not deemed to be citizens, they had a close connection to Carthage and I would not rate them as "mercenary troops." 

African infantry in Hannibal's army.

African heavy infantry - the backbone of the army.

HaT also makes figures that it calls "Carthaginian Cavalry", but I don't know what their origin would be, but they appear to be small in numbers in the various subjective orders of battle that I have seen for Hannibal's army.

HaT Carthaginian Cavalry. I bought these painted figures on eBay. Decently painted
and look better once they are based (see the second rank).

Libyan light infantry

Numidian Cavalry

These light cavalrymen from North Africa were perhaps the finest cavalry in Hannibal's army. They also defected during the final Zama campaign, which tipped the scales in the Roman army of Scipio's favor. Had they all stayed with Hannibal, then he might well have won the battle of Zama.

Elephants

The elephant contingent in Hannibal's army. Each elephant also has one stand of light infantry.

A pair of war elephants and their supporting light infantry. The infantry
serve to protect the elephants from Roman Velites (light infantry).
All figures shown above are 54mm HaT plastic figures.

So there you have it, all of the components of my 54mm Carthaginian army. Most of the figures were painted two years ago. Recently I added a 32-figure unit of Celt-Iberian infantry and five elephants.

My plan is to add two more Celtic/Gallic infantry units and another Celt-Iberian heavy infantry unit. I will also add another African heavy infantry unit. The idea is that each player will have four elements of foot or cavalry or elephants to command in the game.

More on the Romans at a later day.

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More Carthaginian Elephants

 

HaT 54mm Carthaginian war elephants

Click the pictures to enlarge

The past couple of days have seen me working on repainting a pair of HaT 1/32 scale (54mm) Carthaginian war elephants and getting them based. I also assembled three more elephants that are still on the painting table.

The following two pictures provide close ups of the individual elephants after they have been based on MDF board. Note the Carthaginian light infantry skirmishers protecting the elephants from attack by the Roman light Velites.

Roman elite plans on chucking a spear into the hyde of the elephant.
Some Carthaginian skirmishers have a different idea. The elephant and Romans
are HaT figures and the two Carthaginian soldiers are from John Jenkins Designs.

Close up view of the elephant being defended on the ground and from
the howdah (the wooden tower) where the soldier has a very long spear
that is capable of reaching any Romans on the ground level.

There is nothing like a bunch of elephants that identifies a war game as one from the Punic Wars of Rome versus Carthage. The beasts are fun to paint, add some color to the overall look of the game, and I imagine that they will cause a lot of interesting situations and tales on the war game table top.

I will have five elephants once I finish the remaining ones on my painting table, however, I would imagine that four would be enough in a game.

Does anyone care to share some rules ideas on how to use elephants in an Ancients game? I'd appreciate some input because I have no idea of how to write rules ideas for them. I plan on writing my own rules for my Punic Wars Project, something along the lines of what I used in my Khartoum game for hand to hand combat. The rules have to be easy to learn so that they can be used in a convention setting.

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Whoa Nellie!

 

HaT plastic 54mm Carthaginian war elephant and Roman Elite. The Carthaginian 
figures are 60mm metal John Jenkins Designs figures.

Click on the pictures to enlarge

I had purchased three already-painted Punic Wars elephants on eBay back in 2022 and I decided that it was finally time to repaint them and add them to my 54mm Carthaginian army. These figures are fun to paint, so much so that I assembled and primed two more new elephants, from the box, and will be working on them this week. This will give me a total of five elephants which should be enough relative to the size of my planned Carthaginian army. I have a sixth elephant that I could paint and add to the armada of elephants. I am thinking of "brigading" two elephants together plus twelve light skirmishers into one game "command" for one player. But for now, I think that four elephants is sufficient.

One of the weaknesses of elephants is that they are vulnerable to attack by light infantry skirmishers who are nimble enough to "hit and run" attack the beasts. As a counter-measure, the Carthaginians would usually surround their elephants with their own light skirmishers who would engage the Roman infantry, thereby enabling the elephant to advance into the formations of heavier Roman infantry.

The elephants proved to be rather ineffective because once the Romans got over their initial fear of the elephants, they were able to develop tactics that effectively neutralized the elephants as a threat. These included attacking the elephant with light infantry rather than waiting for the elephant to close with the regular infantry, and opening up gaps or lanes between the Roman cohorts and herd them through the Roman line where they could be eliminated by the regular soldiers. Also, in some cases, the Romans were able to panic the elephants and cause them to run amok in every direction.

Hannibal brought something like 30 elephants with him from Spain, but all but one elephant died while crossing the Alps. Elephants seem to have been used more often in the battles fought in Spain. Hannibal is reported to have had some 80 elephants at the battle of Zama, but these were largely untrained animals that were easily scared in battle and rendered ineffective by the Roman army.

Carthaginian light infantry protect the elephant from the attacking Roman
light infantry Velites.

Here is a "before" and "after" comparison of the elephants:

Elephants, as purchased on the left, and after repainting on the right.

The elephant, as purchased, had a basic war gaming standard paint job.

The same elephant after I repainted it.

I still have a little bit more work to do on the repainted elephant, namely painting a design on the red shield on the side of the tower and painting the metallic color on the chains that hold the howdah onto the back of the elephant.

I have two more "repaint" elephants on the painting table and two more new out of the box elephants are in primer and are ready to be painted. I am looking forward to getting all of the elephants painted and based. They should look spectacular.

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