There is a new Poll on Facebook about which "boring" existing ranges WGA should remade. One of the possible options on the List is "Caesarian Romans".
Marian (Caesarian) Romans, historical authentic with Helmets of the Montefortino and the Coolus/Hagenau Types (with and without forehead support). Those Warlord Games ones are too limited on options and have that strange sling option. WGA could just add seperate Balteus on the sprue and they can be used for Augustinian (Early Imperial) Romans (c. 30 BCE to 40 CE). With a seperate rectangular Scutum sprue and Weisenau Helmets, they can be used for Early Claudian Imperial Romans in Mail.
Nice would be also a seperate set with Scale Armour and options for Hellenistic Helmets for "Romans" in the East of that Period. There is a complete lack of Late Republican / Early Imperial Romans in Scale and with Hellenistic Helmets on the market. They didn't changed to Weisenau Helmets over night - especially in the Greek speaking East.
@Steffen Seitter
Glad you finally got this posted.
In before the "Oh Noes! Why not do new undone stuff!" crowd.
1. There's often room for improvement in the existing set. As @Steffen Seitter pointed out about the Warlord kit.
2. Half or a third of a big market is often bigger than ALL of a small market.
Link to poll:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/WargamesAtlanticLegion/permalink/1504197980059348/?app=fbl
@Steffen Seitter Something good about scale armor and hellenistic helmets is that they would be useful for modeling Etruscan command staff, and perhaps more affulent soldiers using thier own equipment during the period.
(The Etruscan communities had largely emerged unscathed from the Social War because they, along with the Umbrians sat on the fence until Roman sweetened the pot by giving them citizenship. So they would have had a healthy representation among the armies of the period due -if nothing else- to post war demographics.)
honestly early Imperial Romans wouldm't be a bad revist as well. the warlord ones are comically small (they could pass as halflings!) and whiel the Victrix ones are reasonable size (if a bit tall), they are very much designed more for skirmish or small unit type games where individual dynamic poses are desired, and ranking up is less so.
Victrix have two Sets for ther Imperial Legionaries, dynamic and rank and file poses.
The Victrix and Warlord "Early" Imperial Romans are more "Claudian Reform" Imperial Romans, for the High Imperial Period of the mid 1st to early 3rd Century CE, when the Weisenau was the most common Helmet (also for the Auxilliary) and the Lorica Segmentata was (possbile only) common in the West. There are no true "Early Imperial Period" Romans in plastic.
Too bad that Victrix are also follwing the "Hollywood Romans" clichee of all Legionaries with Weisenau (and only in Segmentata) and all Auxilliaries with Hagenau (which disappeared in the late 1st Century!).
The most Common Helmet in the 1st Century was still the Coolus/Hagenau Type, while the Weisenau starts to appear in the early 1st Century, mostly associated with the introduction of the Lorica Segmentata (dated arround 9 BCE to 9 CE, the 9 BCE theory is mostly obsolete, 4 CE is more realistic, also 9 CE - when the earliest Weisenau is dated). The Montefortino was still in use up to the mid 1st Century arround the Time of Claudius & Nero (c. 40 to 60 CE) before this Type disappeared completed after a very long time of use (possible of Etruscian origin, used trough the complete Republican Period!).#
Note that the "classic Auxilliaries" we know - with Hagenau Helmet and Oval Parma shield - appeared with Emperor Claudius Reforms around 42 CE. Earlier "Augustinian" Auxilliaries looked like the People from were they got recruited but commaned by roman Officers and particulary supplied with roman equipment like helmets and armour. Augustinian Auxilliary in the West would look mostly like Gauls and Germans while in the East they would looks more like Hellenistic Greek Thorakitai or Thureophoroi.
Looks like Vikings are at the top of the poll anyway (which I would personally say is pointless because Gripping Beast's Vikings are fine for the armoured troops and the Goths, the upcoming Germanic Army Builder and Gripping Beast's Dark Age Warriors are fine for Bondi) so this looks to be a moot thread.
I personally voted for Celts myself, not just because they're my favourite Ancients/Dark Ages faction but also because a Celtic army is one of the few that benefits particularly well from variety, meaning a variety of figures from different manufacturers would augment your army (as long as they aren't differing in scale like Victrix vs Warlord for example). WGA sits between these two other manufacturers in scale so a box of their Celts would be a great way to diversify the poses and appearance of either a Warlord or a Victrix Celtic army, especially as the Wargames Factory ones are now OOP.
In ancient times Northern people wear more or less the same outfits, tunics, long trousers and leather shoes, only the richest nobles and successful warriors could afford mail hauberks and heavy protections, so probabilly a viking warrior wasn't so different from a saxons' levy, from what I read most of the latters were equipped only with a spear and a wooden shield, swords were rare, Vikings' director said in an interview that the un-historical armours that had the Saxons (more Renaissance than Dark Ages'!) were intended to distinguish the combatants from each other, The Last Kingdom at least tried something different, also if the lack of helms probabilly was for showing actors' faces!
@Alessio De Carolis I agree that that was most likely the case - certainly Gripping Beast seemed to have had this mindset with their Dark Age Warriors box being usable for standard infantry in Saxon, Viking, Welsh and many other Dark Ages factions, and to be honest the WA Goths and the upcoming Germanic Warrior Army Builder will also be useful for any of those factions.
In the case of the Last Kingdom, the rectangular shields wielded by the Saxons and Britons were intended to be for the same purpose as the Saxon outfits in Vikings - simply a visual aid for the viewer to make it easier to tell one side from the other (though I prefer the way the Last Kingdom did it - just changing the shield sacrifices less historical accuracy).
Folks, please stay on topic.
