The tale of 5.5 gamers was to begin in earnest in August. I had 2 chariots and about 70 guys painted. Most of the painted figs were redoubt and I had most of the heroes painted up already. But I still wanted to paint up 500 points per month like everyone else.
Figuring out my army list and what I needed for figs has turned out to be much more complex that I had anticipated. Although I had a bunch of painted figs, I had no “units” per say for WAB. I had a bunch of random figs that I would need to add to get “units”. So although I will be painting 500 points per month, the army I will field will not be made up of the figs I just painted but a mix of newly painted and previously painted figs.
That solved I got to tackle the next complication. I had a few unpainted redoubt and Foundry Greeks I had bought years ago. I painted those up quick and fell in love with the Foundry figs. They are just fantastic. I had plotted and planned what I wanted to buy, but when I compared Foundry figs with the price of Old Glory there was a huge difference. I could get 5 Old Glory figs for every 1 Foundry figure. Tom and I looked at the pictures online and talked about my options. Late July I put in an order for about 15 packs of Old Glory figs. It took about two weeks for them to arrive, so it was almost mid August. I broke out the figs and started to work on them at a fevered pace. Unfortunately, the more I worked on them the more unsatisfied I was with the quality of the figs. Now anyone who has Old Glory figs knows that some of their lines and very nice (AWI for one). On the other had some of their lines and not well done. One of those lines is their Trojan War line. After working on the figures, it looks to me like someone sculpted them and then later on “added” extra muscles to make them look more heroic. Not good. The more I worked o them the more unhappy I was. With the clock ticking, this was turning out to be a disaster. Finally, I decided to bite the bullet and live with them.
The next day Foundry announced their 20% British bank holiday sale. Could this get more complicated? Tom (being as cheap as I, who better to seek advice from) and I talked some more about my dilemma. Seth added his two cents. I decided to go with Foundry. I took a day or two to decide what to get. I decide to order 3 Trojan Warriors hordes, 1 Sea Peoples horde and 1 Bronze Age European horde. I decided I would use my WAB army as a basis for a big Trojan War convention game. The Sea Peoples and Bronze Age Europeans I would use as Trojan Allies.
Two days later while doing some research on the Trojan War I found out that modern archeological evidence points to the fact the Troy was in Anatolia and was within the Hittite sphere of influence and was probably a loyal ally of the Hittites. Further more, the actual city is laid out like a Hittite City and the Trojans spoke Luwian a language in the same family as the Hittite language. In fact it appears that the only thing they had in common with Bronze Age Greece was trade. Into my mind prodded the idea that I could use Hittites as Trojans and really give my con game a different look. I went on the Foundry website and proceeded to spend more money I did not have and buy the 1200pt. Hittite WAB army. I spend way too much money.
It took about 10 days to get my order from Foundry. AT last I could actually start working on my 500 point army! As usual Foundry did not disappoint. By this time Tom and I had talk about delaying the start of the tale of 5.5 gamers. Robin had not gotten his figs until the end of August (about the same time I got mine) and Adam still did not have his figs. It was clear that hardly anyone would have 500 points ready for 9/1. We decided to shoot for 10/1.
After looking at Chariot Wars this is the 500 point army I think I will field;
1 x hero in chariot 89 points
2 x chariots 78 points
1 x 20 man spear unit with bowmen intermixed 140 points
1 x 18 man unit of swordsmen 141 points
1 x 8 Javelinmen 48 points
A total of 496 points. I am working on another heavy spear unit with archers intermixed and might replace with the sword unit with a second spear unit.
I’ll give an update on my next 550 points in October.
-Chad
