Archive for March, 2015

New miniature house

In this beginning of the year something is changed. As I say before, I needed a new mobile, so these below are photos took with my Sony Z3c. No more blurred photos I hope. And now I can surf the web and use services by Android apps as public transports infos or To Do organisers. Glorious days with my Samsung Wave are ended. I bought it at the start of this blog and it was together with me in all the past events documented on these pages.

Another thing in my life is this new house where to put my miniatures. I bought it at the end of February and now I’m thinking how to refurbish it. So less time for miniature related things and a lot on home building problems.

I found wallpaper even in the kitchen and bathroom. As you can see, ghosts of lost pictures are on the walls.

In the corner even a ghost of a CRT television.

All structures are old, tubes are almost rotten, wallpaper smells of cigarette smoke. So I must demolish all, walls too, and start again with a modern house. However the terrace is open on a large square. On the left, behind trees, the Istituto Luce, headquarters of news services of the years before TV. At the end the volcanic hills where Latin started.

This is new step in my life. More news in the future.

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DBA 3.0

A taste of water about DBA 3.0. A couple of matches with our friend Attilio from Milan, the man who wrote our Italian commentaries about DBA 2.0. I found various improvements, more realistic troops behaviours, a less chess feel. Maybe some movements are too fast, but this topic have to be worth considering more. I think that there is a more direct approach and less space to tactics variations after the start of the play. Maybe too much. Is this new DBA release better than before? I don’t know. I can say that it is not a slight variation of original rules, it is a new set of rules, a new game. At the moment I’m too busy with other things, so I am not ready to play it in tournaments. Pity.

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Atlantic plastic Colosseum

When I was a child I didn’t know Airfix or other brands for plastic soldiers. I only knew Atlantic. English speaking people can read on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_%28company%29 a brief summary of what Atlantic meant.

Atlantic was producing its ranges in two scales. A that time I was collecting the range of ancient soldiers in the big format. They had got on the box an historical profile of the period. My mum bought them because they could develop an attention for history at school. A lot of years after I graduated at university in something as ancient history and culture, indeed. A gladiator miniature range was available by them too. Well, during those days a Colosseum was produced by Atlantic for 1:72 plastic miniatures. It was very expensive for my child finances, so I could watch it just on comic advisements. Now it is a luxury toy for adults that were children in ’70s. It is very beautiful, a model thought to be a real scaled Colosseum. You can view on this video as it is.

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School of Pompeii part 2

The new gladiatorial set by Kaustic Plastik. In the box one body, two helms, two shield and various weapons. So you can build one gladiator of a kind but you have pieces to build two more. You need another two bodies or you can change equipment to the present body when you want to do it. Quality is great and real metal is used for weapons and helms. Real metal is another thing rather than coloured plastic. My only concern are long necks, typical in 1/6 action figure to accommodate changing heads: helms are fitted too high so neck and shoulder protection is ineffective. However,… a must have! This Kaustic Plastik improves over time. Limited series, obviously.

Myrmillo

Thraex with sica supina

Thraex with spiculum. It isn’t an hoplomachus, but this is a common mistake. Hoplomachi are myrmillones with a more rhomboid shield and an helm with sides with a pronounced vertical shape.

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