From JezT: Gothic Wars Part 1 Romans (127 points)

Dear All

Really excited about this post which represents an expansion for me to be able to re-fight battles representing the Justinian Byzantine attempts to regain Ostrogothic Italy and also the recapture of North Africa from Vandals. "Gothic Wars" is a good general description as I am now able to recreate the armies from the Roman defeat by the Goths at the Battle of Adrianopole 378, through the campaigns of Alaric the Goth against the roman warlord Stilicho circa 410, and then the battles of
 Aeitus the Roman, most famously against the Huns, and now through to the battles of Belisarius.

During this period I think the Gothic troop style remains pretty much the same and just the mix of infantry and cavalry changes, but for the Romans the key new troops for these early 6 century campaigns was the rise of the Roman elite  mounted archer. Sounds like the perfect reason to paint up some new figures .....

The overview of the new cavalry are three new bases of mounted figures, based as medium cavalry.

All my existing figures were from Wargames Foundry so I wanted to keep with that manufacturer. Although they dont do a specific figure I found that using the Hun heavy cavalry figures seemed to fit perfectly, especially as they had the bow and quiver case already shown. Otherwise converting the late Roman range I used  Gripping Beast weapon packs to show the bow element. I especially tried to avoid any sculpts that I had  used for Goth cavalry. I wanted the medium cavalry to look menacing - in Impetus rules these elite cavalry have a strong fighting value.

Gave a consistent red shield look with a Chi Rho shield design, the bodyguard unit has the two armoured cavalry figures.

I already had the infantry but wanted to make one small conversion change to add in a new standard bearer with the larger banner. This is the new converted figure and the next picture shows how it looks in the existing unit. The design was copied from an illustration in an old MW magazine. Quite pleased as used miliputty to create the banner - OK left the face details off but on the tabletop it looks fine .....

Altogether that should be 12 cav @120 plus 5 for the banner bearer, so 125 points. Plus a new army for me to try out. Coming soon should be some extra Goths ........

Cheers Jez



A fine body of cavalry there, Jez - lovely stuff. I'm going to add a point for the conversion and another for the handpainted banner.

TamsinP