"I have unburied my old school ancients" Topic

I have pulled out of storage my large piles of old school ancients figures. I am attempting to resurrect these guys. I have not used them in battle since about 1982. I am posting some images of my initial work with them and comments are welcome. They were poorly block painted and I have done some shading and am basing them for Sword and Spear, Impetus or Rally round the king.
First some Hoplites.

Rear view

TMP link
"
So does the base look ok? I am really unsure about whether I should bother adding some grass or bushes.
Finally some peltasts


They will be receiving the same base treatment as the hoplites.
My construction/Archeological dig site/disaster zone.
http://theminiaturespage.com/

I have enough stuff to where I am planning Republican Romans versus Greeks, this is fortunate as these Ral Partha ancients do not scale well with the newer stuff available. Pyrrhus rides again. I will post pics when I am done.

Looks good so far!

There's nothing at all wrong with the old school minis, as when they are based en masse, any lack of detail, or "softness" of the sculpts seems hidden by all the numbers of them. That's a good thing.

In addition, that old-style block painting is perfect for use with "the dip" method of shading. personally, I paint it on (and use an acrylic wood stain, rather than an oil-based one) after thinning it down slightly. You can easily clean up any of the block painting ahead of time if there are nicks, dings, scratches, etc, but overall, just dusting them off and giving them "the dip" treatment will do wonders for their appearance, and save you a ton of time.

The basing looks good, and, after all, it's YOUR army, so if YOU are pleased with it, then that's all that really matters.

best of luck with this project. It looks like you're off to a great start.

I agree, those look great. Wish mine looked as good.

They look terrific. My only suggestions, is that the Hoplites should be closer together, they look too spread out.

Those look great! You work area is also far cleaner compared to mine.

Wow, great looking figures.
Base them up grass rocks, bushes, do the whole gambit. They will look fantastic!

My gaming partner wanted to give Black Powder Napoleonics a try, but lacking 28mm armies and the time to paint them, I returned to my 1980's 25mm armies, rebased & shaded them. In less than a month I had 4 infantry-brigades & 1 cav + artillery ready. Still over 8000 figures to go, but I think I will switch to my ancients for a "Hail Caesar" tryout soon. Never sell painted armies, you might still need them in the future!

Those look really good. Old school minis can look great, I love what Simon MadDowall does with his, for example. You should hit the bases with tufts, rocks etc. though, they will look twice as good!

Best, Simon

Base them up grass rocks, bushes, do the whole gambit.

Noooo – the walking diorama look may look OK on current figures but the older figures (hopefully with every figure in the unit in same pose apart from "specials") look much better on a plain base.

And do you really want to repaint or even "improve" them? I wouldn't, they are part of your wargame history.

Doug

They look great, but I'd go with modern style bases (grass clumps etc).

Retro plain green bases only really look good with toy soldier style figures, which those certainly aren't.

I breathed life back into an old Republican Roman army using modern bases and shield transfers from LIttle Big Men.

If you could paint over the rest of the actual figure bases to match the element base, then dry brush with a dark sand/yellow-brown it would be an easy way to 'lift' the look of the base, which would in turn 'lift' the look of the figures. Then just finish it off with a few patches of grass and the odd small rock.

I'm intrigued by your work area!

I would suggest having the 'close order' figures closer together at the centre of the base.

I have never stoped usin such figures, but then again I am a wargamer and not much of a painter

Here's my Old School Ancients:

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