DBA Fettling. New boxes and new army

I've been working on my latest acquisitions, but I needed to sort out the storage. I also needed to clear the decks as I have a Top Secret and Urgent painting job to do over the next fortnight. 

Prior to starting the "Invaders of Georgia" project I had five bespoke DBA armies (I can make up six or seven more at least from my 15mm ancient armies built for Armati and full sized wargame rules). They have a box, but nothing that really kept them properly organised. I needed to resolve that, so I upgraded their box file

The armies are in groups. The first pair I ever painted were Saxons ("Anglo Danish") and Normans to do a quick Hastings refight. My brother bought them for me from Museum Miniatures, and they were their (then new) DBA v1 army packs. The Anglo Danish selection of troops still works for DBA 3, but the Normans will only work up to DBA 2.2, if I fiddle around with what the figures represent. Not enough Knights/Cavalry for DBA 3, and several units left over (although it turns out some of the "spares" can be recycled into one of my new armies as an option, more or less). I then have the South East Asian project which I did back in the summer of 2017. There are three of them, with lots of elephants. 

The elephants mean I have to keep them in a deep file box. I've printed out inserts, and then glued in some foam board off cuts to keep them sort of in place. This isn't the most economic use of space, as I can no longer get the model of Ankgor Wat in the box. However I will need a new box for DBA "camps" shortly, so it can go in there. 

The first of my Caucasus Campaign armies to be done is the Armenians. I finished these yesterday. They have a box insert, but no box dividers yet.

These will shortly be having "4Cb" added, made up from the aforementioned Normans.

There's a tendency to paint this army with a lot of white, to make them look like crusaders. As I envisage them fighting on their home turf a bit more, I went for a variety of colours. This picture is a bit blurry, I'm afraid.

General (3Kn)

This wasn't going to be my original command combo, but I swapped some figures round after painting. The General figure has a crown added to his helmet with some wine-bottle cap. I have painted a few helmets in the army red, based on what I think I'm seeing in the manuscript evidence I put up a week or so ago. The shields use the "eternity" symbol, (nearest the camera), and the khachkar blooming cross. The eternity symbol spirals in the wrong direction because I'm left handed. The flags are the Armenian Red Lion and the Blooming Cross.

Armenian Nobles (3Kn)

These two bases were supposed to have the figures mixed up, but in the end I did an "Eastern" and "Western" style base. The hand painted heraldic lion doesn't look as bad as I thought it would. Alas the "Eastern" knights didn't have lances long enough for pennons.

Armenian Spearmen (4Sp)

You get six elements of Armenian foot, either 3Ax or 4Sp. I went for spears, as I prefer the look of the close order infantry. Having said that, the pose of the front rank isn't one of Essex's finest. I'd have preferred them all as per the rear rank, but that's what you get with packs of mixed poses. The overall look, with the coloured tunics and a variety of shield patterns, is one I'm pleased with. I'm also pleased with the pennons, which were a right fiddle to do.

Armenian archers (3Bw)

Oh dear. That's a fuzzy picture. You can opt for these to be Psiloi if you want, and I ordered enough figures for that option as well by mistake. Honestly, these are unremarkable.

Armenian Archers (Ps)

And by way of proof, here's a row of three Ps. Also fuzzy. I intend to use one of them in the army.

The other options for the 12th element in the army are either some Bedouin or Mongol looking light horse (LH), Crusaders (3Kn) or Frankish Crossbows (4Cb). As indicated above, the 4Cb are on their way shortly and the other armies will provide either more 3Kn or LH if required. 

Here they all are again, together with the "Khor Virap" resin model that passes muster as a camp for them. I've applied a bit of paint to it, without going mad.

One down, four to go.