Macedonian Successors & Ancient Indians.
One client commissioned me to reinforce two of his existing armies, and antagonist ones. By one side, Macedonian successors, a term which can mean a lot of different kingdoms over a couple of centuries at least. By the other side, Ancient Indians, suitable to face Alexander The Great himself or one of his successor kingdoms.
All the batch is based in 1st Corps Miniatures, a brand with a wide range from Ancients to Sci-Fi, through Medieval or Second World war.
This have been my first time with ancients 28mm, and mixing feelings came in the end. Is not my best work, for sure, I’ve enjoyed some parts and not so much others, but at the end, the work is done at an acceptable quality, i hope.
To begin the show, some very nice beast of war, two war elephants, references EL, C. Indian Elephant and EL, D Indian Elephant as well as two dead elephants, reference EL,M. Dead Elephant with tower.
This elephants are all cast in resin, with some metal parts as fangs and trunk (except the dead elephant who haves it already cast in resin). Cast is very fine, no bubbles neither resin excess. To correctly fit trunks and fangs you will need some putty to fill gaps, but nothing specially hard. Crews used here are reference ELC07 Successor crew 5, this reference seems to be intended for larger towers, as it comes with five figures, one driver and 4 men for the tower, two armed with bow, and two armed with pike. In this case, as my client need all the crew to be removable, it means more flexibility, as he can aim them with 2 bows, 2 pikes or 1 & 1. Fit drivers in a right position was the harder task about these elephants. I made two putty cushions to solve this, as well as all the figures haves a neodymium magnet in the base, towers has a metal plate in the bottom, so all the figures you see in the pictures are easily removable or changeable to fit my client needs.
MACEDONIAN SUCCESSORS WAR ELEPHANTS
Although crew set comes with several small rounded shields, i used here spare parts from the Wargames Factory Amazon Warriors, and transfers by Vini Vidi Vinci Studios.
Continuing the show, two beautiful scythed chariots, reference MSS61 4 horse scythed chariot which is randomly supplied with two different drivers. They are beautiful pieces, i made an error putting the reins, as all left side ones must go to one side, and all the right ones, to the other, otherwise it should be impossible to govern these horses. The archers showed in pictures are from the elephants, i just put them there to avoid have them loose in the table. In this case, drivers are fixed. To complete this part, also two 2 Wrecked scythed chariot, reference MSS62, are showed here. This reference came in two parts (resin cast), plus some small parts cast in metal, but i build a single scenery piece for each.
I tried to give these horses a different appearance, and i think i achieved it.
SCYTHED CHARIOTS
The Indian army also haves his own chariots, in this case a unit pack reference INDU9 Light Chariots which includes three chariots and i aimed them with two crew each. These figures are removable, also haves a neodymium magnet in the base and chariot base haves a metal plate. With this condition, i didn’t find a way to put reins.
To decorate this chariots i tried a new (for me) technique, i printed some patterns and then paint over the pattern. Final result is not bad to my eyes, so i will try again this technique in the future if possible.
CLASSIC INDIAN LIGHT WAR CHARIOTS
Macedonian Successors still got some more reinforcements, now reference MSSU01 Thureophoros attacking overarm x 16
Standard is a Vini Vidi Vinci transfer. All decorations here are hand made.
THUREOPHOROS
Last for Macedonian, a Greek Oxybeles, reference GRK38.
GREEK OXYBELES
The Indian army still got a large batch of reinforcements, comprising the following references: INDU5 Cavalry x12, IND22 Forest Indians / bow, IND13 Maiden Guard command and INDU4 Longbow men x 40 and the pictures below are showed in the same order. Deal with skin tones was a real pain, and at the end, this is the part which makes me less happy in the project. All the standards are made of paper and hand painted.
ANCIENT INDIAN CAVALRY
FOREST INDIAN WITH BOW
MAIDEN GUARD COMMAND
ANCIENT INDIAN LONGBOW MEN
Most of these figures haves a separate hand, the one with the bow, which not always fit well, so some trim is need in a few of them. Many of them haves also quite visible mould lines. Fortunately white metal is very workable with a knife, although it means spent more time than you desire to clean figures. This, and the continuous change of colour to achieve variety made this batch the most tired to paint
A couple of family pictures to end.
Bases are mostly decorated with The Army Painter tufts, plus some natural small stones (re-painted) and leaves are by “Secret Weapons Miniatures”. Paints used includes Vallejo (Model Color & Game Color), Citadel (Old Range) and The Army Painter (mostly washes).