Monday, May 6, 2013

MayDay and 10mm Romans

This weekend EWG held our annual MayDay gaming convention which was a smashing success. I ran a War and Conquest El Cid game pitting the Christian Spanish attempting to recover stolen booty in a counterraid (Apellido) from Almoravid Muslims. I played the Almoravids with Dennis, while Scott and Jonathan played the Spanish

Game start

Spanish Caballeros

The Almoravid booty-laager

Jonathan thinking about his first move, either that or distracting by single-handedly running an 80+ participant game day...

Dennis, eyeing up a block of Christian Knight of Santiago who have breached the Almoravid line...

Dennis, not paying enough attention to said Santiago threat...

Scott, watching Dennis threaten the flank of his knights with Berber light horse, unfortunately at this point I stopped talking pictures and those white knights got a double turn, charged the black guard, broke them and pursued into the booty laager. Spanish win. 

My main score at the auction this year was a big lot of unpainted 10mm Old Glory Roman Imperials for a song. Like 10 bags of cavalry, legion and auxilia for $11!! Well, I already have Romans in 28mm, 1/72 and 15mm...so why not? I like the mass look of 10mm for big battles.

I painted up 6 strips of legion, they went very quickly and I think paint up very nicely. I am going to do them for Impetus, Hail Caesar or perhaps DBX.FOG. Of course, it means I need to buy an opponent, would like to get something not warband with a lot of cataphracts or other elements types (Parthians, Palmyrans, or maybe Pontic?).

My first quandry now is how to base them. I am considering either 80mm (3 strips) or 60mm (2 strips).

80mm is a nice size for Impetus or DBx (played at double 15mm scale) and nicely fits 3 strips. Pleasing symmetry with the command stand in the middle. Big bases are also appealing to play with.


60mm on the other hand, is a more conventional base size, also accomodates strips without having the cut them up, and means 50% more units for the same cost and effort compared to 80mm.

I can't decide which to go with. Any opinions out there?

7 comments:

  1. Unless the strips aren't the 40mm length I am used to, why not base them on 40mm length magnetized with larger metal bases. So then you have 40mm sub-units or 80mm units.

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  2. The nub of the problem is that they are 25 or so mm long.

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  3. Hi,

    Nice looking unit to start:-)
    I only play using 6mm and 10mm armies and to be honest I now go with basing all on 40x20 bases with this size I can play everything from DBA, through the likes of Impetus, Warmaster and up to full size Hail Caesar. I magna base them all and make magnetic movement trays to the size req'd. Heres the link to my Blog which shows the various basing Ive gone with over the years.

    http://grandscalewargaming.blogspot.co.uk/

    Hope it helps.

    Jason.

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  4. Thanks Jason, nice blog.

    I agree with the flexibility of 40mm, and I'm a big fan of magnetic basing, it's just that cutting the OG strips to make it work is too much hassle. I would rather hammer my toes flat.

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  5. Smart looking stuff Mr. Coltman.
    Go 60.

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  6. I'm leaning that way, the sagacity of an elder Teenage Visigoth helps.

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  7. Between 60mm and 80mm, I'd say 60mm. But if it were me, I'd go with 40mm...

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