15mm Macedonian Generals

Old Glory packages their mounted commanders along with foot command.  Since they don't give you enough foot command for the various infantry units, and they don't give you enough mounted command for three bases, I combined them for my commanders.

Here's Alex himself, flanked by two standards.

15mm Macedonian Light Cavalry

Here are the latest off the painting bench, a unit of light cavalry.  Old Glory only provides two poses, so these horsemen have a pretty uniform look.

15mm Macedonian Skirmishers

Here are the skirmishers for Alexander's army, one unit of javelinmen and one unit of slingers.  I went for earth tones with these.

15mm Macedonian Hypaspists

Here is the last of the close order infantry for my Macedonian army.  The hypaspists were Philip and Alexander's elite foot soldiers, always stationed on the right of the infantry line.  They seem to have been more mobile than the pikemen, fluid enough to cover the gap between infantry and cavalry.  Some rules treat them as medium infantry, but I have always seen them as heavy.  The evidence does indicate that they were armed and equipped as hoplites.

These are Old Glory figures.  They came with cast on long spears which I was certain would bend and break, so I cut them away, drilled out their hands, and used .020" piano wire for spears.

15mm Macedonian Phalangites

I finished painting these figures a couple of weeks ago, but I only finished their basing today.  Here are two units of phalangites, based on the 40mm by 15mm bases that are pretty standard for ancient armies.

The figures are all from Old Glory (19th Century Miniatures), and I like them a lot.  Old Glory provides piano wire for the pikes, which I cut down to about 50mm.  This does scale out to 18 feet, so these pike lengths are accurate for Alexander's army.

I don't yet know what rules I will be using, but I will probably start by trying Might of Arms.

Commands and Colors Tabletop Game

When Glenn came to town to pick up the armies, we were able to get in a game of Commands and Colors Ancients on the tabletop.

Glenn and Jon commanded the Carthagininas.  Matt (one of my school gaming club members) and I took the Romans.

Here were the initial dispositions.

Roman Left

Roman Center

Roman Right

Carthaginian Right

Carthaginian Center

Carthaginian Left -- Light Troops Galore!

Opening Moves

All the Roman cards were for the right, so we pushed our infantry forward.  Glenn and Jon had lots of light troop specific cards, so they were able to use their lighter forces to good effect.

Jon threw his Numidian cavalry around our flank, and the Romans began to lose units.

With the Roman light troops nearly wiped out, the hastati and principes moved forward to engage,

The Carthaginian light troops were able to evade and then return to the fight.  As we both ran out of cards for this sector, the fighting died down, but Carthage had caused much more damage than she had suffered.

The Romans next tried the other flank, but our cavalry was soundly trounced by the Gallic horse.  Our medium infantry could not make much progress.

The center saw a clash of heavy troops, as Carthaginian spearmen and elephants met medium and heavy Roman infantry.

The Carthaginian center finally broke under the pressure, and Roman units fanned out to the flanks.

 The table at the end of the game reflected the both the confusion of the battle and its seperation into three distinct fights.  Rome squeaked out a victory by one flag.