Are you not EntertAIned!?

I'm going through my blog post drafts, working on getting them published, this is a little one I started a while back when, longtime friend within the hobby, Dougie was having fun with AI backgrounds. He sent me some of my Iberians emerging from an ancient forest, intrigued I asked him if it could make an arena setting for the Newline Designs 20mm Gladiator conversions, and I was pleased with the result. I was meant to post these months ago (June I think) but as I have mentioned in a previous post general life has been too much all year and has been impacting hobby pursuits. I try to keep working on little bits here and there, floating between what I fancy, building miniatures, paper soldiers, research and rules writing. Sometimes just whatever I can manage, a look through a wargames book or magazine to keep or build interest. As of late it has impacted further and I've had almost no capacity for the hobby, my new hobby being, fending off "help" from various local services that lack awareness or training in the UK's Statutory Framework. This is why I have not really updated this blog for a while, all writing energy has been going into complaints and data rectification requests.

Back to hobby talk! AI seems to be regarded between a novelty and the devil incarnate, based on the things I've seen on social media. A fad will have a few moments of intense action, such as the AI images of imagined action figures or the bringing to life of wargames miniatures into an unsettling scene, reminiscent of the film Young Sherlock Holmes when inanimate sculptures come to life to attack people. Then there are reactionary responses that seek to ban their use in groups, and when its so overused, this is understandable, but for the fact that the gimmick soon wears off anyway, it seems heavy handed. There are the legitimate concerns of artists losing out and that creative work is being lost to AI, and it seems that technology continues its meteoric rise in replacing human labour in general. While this is clearly happening, commissioning an artist is out of reach for most people, personally I wouldn't buy cursed AI images over professional artists' prints, but one day we may not can tell the difference, however if you have a project in mind that needs some graphics resorting to AI generated images is an option.   

Ultimately, these LLM are currently out there and like all human inventions its how you choose to use them that counts, users need to be very discerning and be wary. In a wider context how societies will regulate their use will be vital. So far however I'm finding it a useful tool, especially for bouncing ideas off, brain storming, and looking for feedback and suggestions. With a bit of work it might be useful for solo gamers, probably not so much as an opponent directly but for suggesting general strategies you could enact on the table top, probably in a RPG style format, it has potential but will require thoughtful use. I'm interested in how others view them, and if they use any AIs and what for?    

Very Bad Day in Cisalpine Gaul

I made a couple of army lists for Strength and Honour, based loosely on the Battle of Trebia. I also wanted both armies to have a chance at winning so I used the points system to buy roughly equal amounts of troops. Also based on my Lost Battle refights of Trebia I wanted the Roman infantry to outclass the Punic while the Punic Cavalry would outclass the Romans. By the time I added the Generals the points cost was skewed towards the Carthaginians who ended up with 6 generalship points to Rome's 1.    

Both Armies advanced, the Carthaginian Infantry did so expecting to be pushed back, hoping the advance would give them space to fall back, they just needed to hold on enough for the cavalry to encircle to Roman lines. The legions advanced steadily confident in their superior combat abilities the cavalry just had to hold long enough to break the Punic lines. 

The cavalry wings advanced both Roman wings were out classed and the Roman left wing was set to be overwhelmed by flanking Numidians. However the Equites despite overwhelming odds and losing most combats held their nerve and kept in the fight even successfully defending against a Crunch. Mago had to use his generalship point to avoid losing an attack combat despite having the advantage. This prevented the Numidians from getting around the flanks, the Equites falling back frustrated the efforts of the flanking force. On the other flank the Gallic cavalry pushed back the Roman horse although it wasn't all plain sailing, a Grind result frustrated the Punic momentum on the flanks. Eventually the Romans were disordered and began to retire they were on the brink of being destroyed!

As the cavalry wings of the Romans were being pushed back towards their rear, the legions marched fourth Sempronious' emphasis on attack proved to be the true Roman way. Attack after attack went Romes way, the Carthaginians burned through Defence points in rerolling terrible Discipline rolls. The Romans called a Homunculous Est! Hannibal used a generalship point to remove a card before the reveal. Despite this the Carthaginian army became fatigued and that would make the results of bad rolls worse. Eventually the terrible Discipline rolls with no options for rerolls lead the various infantry units to become disordered units began to retire, and another Homuculous Est! was called but Hannibal burned a Generalship Point to cancel it, merely delaying the inevitable. After another round of combats Punic infantry contingents went from retiring to routing with 3 units routing 1 retiring and another disordered Sempronius' victory was complete and it was a victory worthy of a triumph! A whopping 42 for the Carthaginians after so many disasters and the Romans save for a crumbling but hobbling on right flank and 6 legions losing their velites were still only sat on 13 break points.

With Hannibal a fugitive in Cisalpine Gaul would it be a matter of time before a Gallic tribe hand him over to Sempronius for leniency. Those that were waiting to see what happed after the battle would undoubtedly stop sharpening their spears and send gifts of thanks for repelling the invader from Cisalpine Gaul.     

Thorakitai Advance

In the dark days before discovering Newline (a long time ago now) I was hunting for thureophoroi, I grabbed a few Hat Thracians that had suitable figures and to get them in strength would leave lots of spares, I needed to secure a source of dedicated thureophoroi. I got hold of some Xyston thureophoroi, sold as 15mm they seemed about 18mm, I contemplated using some creative basing to incorporate them or to simply change to a more common scale of ancients as I  really liked the Xyston miniatures. I then came across the Newline with their comprehensive selection and would be a closer match to the plastics I already had so the Xyston's ended up in a drawer.

What I loved about Xyston's figures was the helmets which were interesting and varied, I thought the size of their heads were roughly the same as Newlines so I thought while I was doing head swap conversions I could create a unique unit of Thorakitai using the Xyston heads and the Newline Designs 20mm African Veterans advancing. I missed the faces on the Newline figures but those heads were used on the Cretan Archers and now I have spares for future conversion ideas. The command figures remained unchanged.

I experimented a bit with the painting, I dry/over brushed the helmets with Vallejo Silver and used Agoras Dunes Contrast paint to give them a bronze tinge this was also applied to the greaves. Its an effective way todo metallics and something to consider for future projects. I also applied Contrasts to the shields again more of an experiment but I'm pleased with their turn out.

I got the railway background out to do some photos so I redid the last thorakitai conversions and attached below. I also got some pictures of  the Moria Goblins finally so that will be a post at some point. I've also had a bit of solo gaming in so once written up there will be some posts on Strength & Honour, Dominion of the Spear and Lost Battles. On the miniatures front I'm preparing some Celtiberians for now but time at the desk is very sporadic and progress slow. I could also pick up some plastic sets that are part built but I'm into ancients currently. I'm wanting to pursue Punic wars campaign so expanding armies for that is a goal as well as expanding armies for Hellenistic states namely Ptolemiac troops for Raphia.     

African Armoured Spearmen

These 20mm African veterans standing from Newline Designs were painted at the same time as the last post featuring the converted versions of these. These are tweaked slightly in that the spears have been cut away and replaced by bristle spears and this also allowed a small variation in the positions of the spears. The paint scheme was pretty straightforward and the shields have custom decals on with the command shields having had theirs painted over.

I've made good progress on the next batch of converted Newlines next being Africans advancing with spears but they now have various Hellenistic heads from Xyston. After that it's back to choosing the next batch to prep (Celtiberians and Italians maybe but could do with expanding Hellenistic pike blocks). I veering towards the Punic War theme as I've been making progress on a 2nd Punic war campaign setting to play out Strength & Honour battles. Other than that I can pick up one of the 28mm plastic sets that need assembled!

 

Thorakitai

 

I'm pleased to get this unit done representing Thorakitai, armoured Thureophoroi essentially, they were a labour love being a head swap conversions. Note if there were to be a dedicated set of 20mm Thorakitai made I would still certainly get them! The Command is the standard Macedonian command figures from Newline Designs 20mm Macedonian range, they just have shields from the Maccabean range. The rank and file troops are the African Veterans standing from the Carthaginian line. I snipped off the metal spears and drilled out the hands, filed the parts that the spear connected to on the tunics to add a replacement bristle spear. This allowed a small bit of variety as the spears can be held at slightly different angles and more bend resistant. The main conversion was the head swap. The heads were procured from the Greek range from mainly the old style Thureophoroi sculpts with clean shaven faces (I believe they have been re-sculpted with beards going off later purchases) also some heads from the newer Hellenistic infantry code. The heads were placed in various positions to give natural variation.

It was a tedious task but I was pleased with the conversion, they didn't have the smoothest joins but I tried to make out they were the sort of scarves ancient warriors might use to protect their necks from armour rubbing against it. Again the shields are the ones from the Maccabean line. I went for a blue theme with the unit and spent a bit more time highlighting the tunics.

I'll post up the African veterans soon, I've been distracted this week working again on a campaign setting for the 2nd Punic War. As with other campaign rules and rules is general they begin to get more complex so I'm trying to keep them as simple as possible with some flavour. I've settled on Strength & Honour for tactical settings and I have a map made so I'm working on getting it functioning but there's still lots of decisions to make with army lists and victory points.    

Numidian Skirmishers

Again I've been finding time and energy to write blog posts difficult to acquire. These 20mm Newline Designs Numidians have been complete for some time. It didn't take a great deal of time to paint up by keeping the colour scheme simple and they are based individually to act as skirmishers markers. I have made more than needed no doubt but they can be used as a unit in their own right for gridded games. 

They're for Strength & Honour ready for the new Conquest: Alexander & Hannibal Supplement. I treat myself to the PDF as I've been looking forward to this booklet! The supplement provides more army lists and with them more unit characteristics, for example, Phalanxes in these earlier armies can be classified as "Professional Phalanxes" making them a bit more formidable. The legions are not as tough as the professional legionaries of the later republic and I'm looking forward to testing the classic legion vs phalanx match up. Before tackling the scenarios I think I'll do a few basic set ups to try out the various traits, especially since I don't often get a chance to play. Hopefully things will settle after Christmas and I'll have some time to get to know the rules better as I still hope to play campaigns. I will also make another custom movement dice as now troops can be classed as "hesitant" meaning they will be a little less likely to advance.

The Moria Goblins are finished also they are just waiting for their photo shoot! I've made a start on some more armoured Hellenistic and African infantry. For some reason also my eye has turned east, I'm not sure why, but it might be a combination of watching Onimusha Netflix and the new Wargames Atlantic Grand Scale Samurai and Ashigaru sets caught my eye. After some inner struggle I resisted the urge to embark on a new scale thanks to a stash of 1/72 Samurai of which I did a few of test figures a couple of years back.