"Would You Use Incorrect Historical Figures?" Topic

Imagine that you've just acquired a new Ancients army. On further inspection, you find that the figures were designed based on outmoded ideas about ancient armies – ideas which are no longer considered to be accurate. (Wrong uniforms, equipment from the wrong period, or other visible mistakes.)

Would you still use the figures on the wargaming table?

No. In fact, I have encountered this very issue in the past, and preferred to reboot the army than use what I would consider inaccurate figures…

Damon.

Yes, though maybe gradually add in correct figures

You mean like and ancient Egyptian with an UZI

Yes. I pride myself on doing so.

Yes. The game's the thing! Bring on the Romans with Greek helmets.

So there is a reasonable argument that the overhand attacking position for Greeks is wrong. It isn't proven by any stretch of the imagination. However there are not many people that make Greeks with the underarm position.

Would you replace all of your Greek models because the position of the spear is wrong? Or could be? Let us say you really buy this argument.

Do you start from scratch with a Greek army? What if there were too few figures to make an army with the underarm pose?

Do you commission new sculpts or not play Greeks?

Yes but I would switch them out in time

No and I wouldn't play an army it couldn't have either. It's the way I roll – usually badly.

I might attempt to correct the errors, but basically, no.

If we rejected every figure based on "outmoded ideas about Ancient armies" we would probably find ourselves needing to replace armies every couple of years. Archaeologists are constantly finding new evidence and, more significantly perhaps, reinterpreting old evidence. I use 10mm and 15mm figures for Ancients; I cheerfully " morph" figures from one army into figures for another ( My 6th century Arthurian cavalry have just done valiant service as 13th century Kurdish cavalry!) if I come across an opponent who is so much of a button counter as to quibble then it will be the first and last game I play with him/ her.

Yes

I would only do it if the new "updated" figures came with a guarantee that their use would make my dice roll better!

The game's the thing.

martin

Of course I'll use them.

If we can dispel belief far enough that 3 figures can stand in for 1000 men,4 trees means a forest and a 2" blue strip is a river seems a bit silly getting hung up on whether a sword's slung on the right side or plumes are wrong.

Well it really depends just how "wrong" they are. With ancient armies views on weapons, armour and costume is often more guesswork than factual and views change over time due to our own changes in attitudes and new discoveries.

Late Roman Imperial leather armour for legionaries is poo-poo'ed at the moment with the modern interpretation that they should be in mail. Fifteen or so years ago leather armour the mainstream notion. Who is to say with certainty what is correct? In the end it hardly matters so long as YOU are happy with using them.

As to the overarm spear thrust- it looks impressive but try stabbing someone that way and as soon as you move your arm forward the spear tilts downwards. Maybe the ancients had more joints in thier arms or something….

I have bought figures and on closer inspection decided not to use them.
There are times where I have bought the closest thing available at the time but replaced them when something better has come along.

So those Persians and Greeks from the first Osprey are wrong? ;) my armies won't fight correctly because of that? All my hard work is for nought? OK I'd be depressed if I really was one of those a-al types but lucky me, my Persians with turbans and Greeks with violin shields just look cool :) plus if all the older stalwarts of the hobby played with such inaccuracies why not me.
Not saying modern interpretations are wrong just different and I'm on board with that. BTW Pictors this thing with the spear underarm with Hoplites how true and fast is that? I'm looking to build an Ionian army soon and it'd be nice to have them doing that for the font rank at least.
Cheers and above all folks happy gaming and be blessed with good fun opponents too.

I have a Tang Dynasty army that I acquired back in the 70's, never primed or painted. The research has been outdated. That and the rather crude look of the figures stops me from painting them now. If they were already painted I'd keep using them. Since they aren't painted, they might as well be paperweights.

I happily use minis that can fill in for a number of different armies. For example, I have this huge ore of "barbarian" troops. The minis cover probably 1500 years of Celtic/Germanic history, but when on the table, the "mass effect" usually hides any historical inaccuracies.

Plus, I have chariots whch I use for earlier and Briton armies, and then swap all or most of them out for cavalry for other armies, etc.

In addition, this also allows me to expand the Roman armies for a large period of time. I will also mix Marian/Caesarian troops with EIR type for around a 100-150 year period. I don't believe that the switch from hamata to segmentata was quick or even widespread, and that some theaters/legions had more of one style than the other, and also had units with squamata mixed in. Sothis also gives me flexibility in designing scenarios and ensuring I have sufficient troops to hand.

In a perfect world, I'd have enough money to build time/area/unit specific armies for every game. But I don't have either the time, nor funds to do so, so I use a little artistic license" to make ends meet.

BTW: The over-reaching insistence on exact uniforms/equipment for specific battles and campaigns by a certain proportion of our hobby is why I left Napoleonic gaming some years back.

Please don't take this subject to the Napoleonic enthusiasts board, we've been quite civil so far but those fellows…

Are we talking about the Ral Partha and Minifigs "Zulu Hoplites" in their Carthaginian ranges?
I rember turning up my nose at the Garrison Carthaginian Heavy Infantry because they did not match the WRG book. They did have a lovely Zulu Hoplite figure though.

No. I never replaced them.

Does this mean I can't use Huns as Tartars?

yes

Until someone invents a time machine, close enough is good enough.

A big fat yes!

"Would You Use Incorrect Historical Figures?"

Depends how "incorrect" they are and whether I would notice from a range of 3 feet …

Yes. In the example, the only thing that would stop me is if the look of the troop types made it harder to play the game (because they might influence me or my opponents to make the wrong decisions).

Depends how close they are, but there are very few figures I won't use, especially if I've painted them. I drew the line at the Atlantic 'hoplite cavalry', but that is it really.

From 2' away they are all just blokes with pointy sticks anyway.

Way back in the before time, when "The Sword and the Flame" first came out, my Zulus were Airfix Ancient Britons and my British were Airfix WWI Germans.

It worked just fine.

Like TKindred I have a barbarian army that gets used for various nations.

I game solo using 2mm so this topic has never been a problem.

Option C = I prefer to use a lot of the 'outdated' figures, especially when they erred on the side of fashion style that stands out on the tabletop.

Carolingian guards — give me the flared helmets (as shown in the historical paintings) over a generic lumpen-spear look.

Napoleonics — give me dress uniforms and flags for cavalry; if I wanted to field horse and gun armies in drab campaign coats I would have gone for ACW instead.

Pharaoh — give me the warbonnet even though that's now outmoded. Actually, I have an Essex figure of Pharoah (with warbonnet) riding on a mule, and I don't think there was ever a shred of evidence of any sort to support making that sculpt. I'm painting one of those right now. The General's stand will be easy to distinguish on the table ^,^

Let's see, I recently ran a game of the 1880 battle of Tacna. 1870 french stood in for Chileans, 1866 Austrians for Bolivians and Confederate troops for Peruvians. Does that answer the question?

I also have at least 4 Napoleonic armies and have been known to make substitutions in that period too.

Well, let's put it this way … Yesterday one of our game group was explaining some things to a new player (new to tabletop wargaming) and referenced with praise our Cinco de Marso game of a few months ago. Cinco de Marso is the Battle of Puebla in the French Intervention played with John Carter or Mars type figures because I gave away my old Mexicans and hadn't received my new ones yet and my hill with forts Loredo and Guadalupe got destroyed in our move. I'll leave it to the reader to suss out what I would and wouldn't field.

Yes. Of course, my Ancients are Imagi-nations, so they're not REALLY incorrect.

Paint wristwatches on all of them and say they're extras in a movie.

I doubt that I would know the difference.

I bought 'em, I'm using 'em. I don't see myself being bothered in the slightest.

Not knowingly. Has anyone faced that scenario? I bought a die-cast German Panther and it came painted in desert colors. Later someone told me there were never any Panthers in North Africa. Tigers in Tunisia yes, but Panthers no. I have never used it. But maybe for Italy?

Not "would I" but "do I". Yes!

Our Napoleonic Austrians are fielded as 60-figure battalions. I do not have enough of the that I can afford to leave the castings in helmets off the table for 1813-1814 scenarioes. Nor do I worry much about whether my French infantry have short or long-tailed coats. When we started as a group, we also were using Airfix plastic civil war figures as stand-ins for the castings we needed.

Rick

Once played against a fellow that used Imperial Romans for Republican Romans (Punic Wars vintage) and Saxon foot for Celts … all because he liked the Republican Roman list and rules. Made me want to puke …

Mike B

Absolutely. Heck, you lot should be thankful I don't show up with ww2 figures for that Ancients game ;-)

Joking aside, if it looks close enough, it's good to game with.

No never…otherwise it is heresy!

I try to stay in period where possible.

However, a few years back I got a GREAT deal on some Foundry Greeks, which I've recently started painting up for DBA. The figures are a mixture of 6th and 5th century, but I plan to use them for both Persian and Peloponnesian wars.

Most of my Spartans will have anachronistic lambdas on their shields, and will be wearing Pilos helmets instead of Corinthian hemlets when fighting off the Persians. I hang my head in shame.

To compound my heresy, I'm using Kite Shields for some early Medieval Spanish (almost "Late Visigothic" really) who should probably be using round shields. I'm doing this because the figures I have have their shields molded on, and have Frankish helmets to boot.

I know the Wargaming Gods will not smile upon my battles because of my wanton ways.

My Darkest Africa forces include a small unit of Foundry Zulus with assault rifles -makes short work of all those Ruga Ruga types…

I will be using my Marian Romans as Polybians although the Triarii will be the the proper figs as they might as well be, what with the spears and all and I'm afraid I will need to field Persians with violin shaped shield, bows and spears in among all the sparabara stuff because it's too deeply ingrained in my psyche.

When I started up Ancient wargaming and build up the poster boys of the ancient world 1st century Romans,I was quite shocked on how little primary source there is(after doing Napoleonics).
There are a lot of speculation with the little there is,but no one can say for certain what colour was a legionary shield or the colour of the auxiliary tunic.
As for armies with even less primary sources there will be even more speculations, it's only an opinion and not fact.

I'm far more concerned about the quality of the sculpt and paint job than I am with exacting accuracy of the models themselves. I have replaced armies that were made up of older, more crude sculpts before. I no longer have any 28mm armies that still contain Hinchcliffe or first generation Minifigs for example. Likewise, I have been known to change out or replace figures that have some of my older, uglier, paint jobs on them. But I don't think I would ever replace units or armies just because of a change in the general opinion of historians.

Late Roman Imperial leather armour for legionaries is poo-poo'ed at the moment with the modern interpretation that they should be in mail. Fifteen or so years ago leather armour the mainstream notion. Who is to say with certainty what is correct? In the end it hardly matters so long as YOU are happy with using them.

This was the exact issue I thought of when I saw this topic.
I'm in the planning stages of building a new Late Roman army (for use with Kings of War of all things), and I recently asked in another thread about the current availability of 28mm Late Roman Legionaries in leather armour. Yes, the chances are that leather armour is not correct. But I don't really care. I just prefer that look to mail clad figures. I want my Legionaries to look like Romans rather than just generic Dark Age troops. Likewise, I "grew up" with that look for Late Romans. So it's almost a tradition thing with me. Other's millage will no doubt vary….

And some off topic fun stuff…

As to the overarm spear thrust- it looks impressive but try stabbing someone that way and as soon as you move your arm forward the spear tilts downwards. Maybe the ancients had more joints in thier arms or something

It depends on the length and weight of the spear in my experience. With a short spear of around 5" or less I prefer an over-hand grip. I find I get more control and power with it held in that manner, and (providing the rules set I'm fighting under allows it) it's easier to transition to a throw that way as well. With a longer spear I agree fully that overhand is awkward and uncomfortable.

Now that all assumes a spear used one handed. With two hands, the longer spears are perfectly usable overhand. In fact when fighting from the back ranks of a formation, it's arguably the best way to utilize a long polearm.

Interesting discussion. The main point for me is that both players can easily identify what the opposing trooper is equpped with and thus what protection and fighting factor he will have. If your opponent fields caparisoned cavalry as knights on unarmoured horses it is all too easy to forget during the game and end up taking a wrong decision because you think thay are better than they are. As for old figures I have some 1/72 Persian immortals in long robes and its very unlikely that they fought in those. in real life. Similarly with Romans in leather armour, as the rest of the figure is right and it makes no difference to their game classification then I just treat it as a charming bit of history.
However, on Greek hoplites, this was debated years ago in Slingshot , the journal of the Society of Ancients and the broad conclusion that was reached was that overarm was the most likely standard useage. We have a good source that the greeks edged to the right to get cover from the shield of the man next to them. If you do this with a shield three feet wide you just cannot use a spear underarm. That does not mean that one cannot hold the spear underarm in single combat, but once in a close formation it has to be wielded over the shield. Analysis of wounds on skeletons is misleading because most men get their eeath wounds on the ground, whilst lying on their backs and that likely means an underarm thrust to get under the horizontally held shield. He 'd be on his back because he has been pushed over by the advancing wAll of shields. It might be harder to hold a spear overarm , but if the shields are overlapped its the only way. AFAIK the only representation of shields in line shows an overarm stance.

I'm inconstant. If a shield design of a hoplite or an Aztec is apocryphal, I won't use it. On the other hand, my 1717 Spanish marines do not have cockades because they look intolerably silly.