Review; Hat Roman Extra Heavy Legionnaries 1/72 Figures miniatures soldiers Trajan

More Romans with the Extra Heavy Legionaries for the Dacian campaigns, will they pass the cut?

              The Box 

Typical modern Hat box, just showing one man of the depicted set. I am not too fond of this style, for some subjects it is a good idea, and if well done can be as attractive as any other box. In this case, the result is medium low, you can hardly tell that the legionary is extra heavy, and it is rather standard.

  The Figures

HaT sets come in batches, depending on the sculptor apparently, and a bit on the materials. These came in the batch of a sculptor that made very sleek and thin figures, that once adapted and moulded, don't match the expectatives. The figures barely are 1/72, they should be labelled as 1/76.  Many have super thin arms, and all the swords in them are awfully done, they look like stupid short sticks. The pilums have nearly no detail at all. 

Continuing with the bad; the shields have a untolerable fit, they either fall, or the peg breaks, and most look bad, so you will have to cut the peg and glue them with Pattex, hot glue or something that bonds soldiers plastic which is tricky to find.

There is only 8 poses, 5 of them carrying the pilum. In this subject of Extra Heavy Legionnaries, made by Trajan to fight against the dreaded Dacians and their falx weapons who chopped off the legionnaries unprotected arms, it should be they other way round, 5 poses of hand to hand combat and maybe 3 with the pilum. There should be a extra heavy centurion. 

Also, speaking of the poses, two are almost identical, and all of them very flat and lifeless.
Besides this, there was other versions of super armoured legionnaries that would have been more interesting.
There is not much flash, but many figures, the two halfs don't match, so you get a distorted face.
And well, there is not much more to say. I will only add these even look bad, flimsy, puny and thin against the Hat set of Dacians (the Dacian figures without shirt look bigger and stronger).

The Verdict

This set was actually a gift for me, as I have many Roman soldiers and if there are available, I choose from other subjects, unless they are superb figures. The gift was welcome, but it could have been done so much better, being a interesting subject, that the impression maybe even worse. My recommendation is; wait until some manufacturer does a worthy version. 

Historical Accuracy; 10/10, Perfect.
Mould quality; 5/10, Unconvincing.
Fun level; 3/10, Boring.
Price/Quality; 4/10 Bad.

My version

I had these soldiers in a box and half of them had lost their shields, and the swords were ridicolous, so I considered a good subject to modify and then paint. I enlarged all swords, and made 4 armoured centurions modifying them. I also added some figures from other sets, and I painted them in 4 different colours, as different legions, for wargaming. The shields are printed with an inkjet printer in ordinary paper. These soldiers do need some work on them, and one must say they look much better and with their shields, I nearly forget how irritating they were before.

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HOW TO; CREATE A NEW TRIBE WITH 1/72 MINIATURES; THE VENETI (ancient celtic tribe)

Today we'll speak of something else than a review, we'll discuss about how to represent a specific sub-tribe or sub-people, that are usually over looked by manufacturers and englobed in generic titles such as "Celts", "Germanics" or even more vague ones as "Barbarians". 

When one starts to collect Ancient soldiers (Napoleonic and WW2 is another story), at least in my case, you hardly think about lesser tribes. You want to have romans, greeks, gauls, arabs, mongols, medieval christians, etc. But with the passing of time, and the increase in the collection, you start to find some gaps. "Those peoples were destroyed by those others, and I don't have them in soldiers". Or you start wondering yourself who habited that area in Roman times, or in Medieval times, or whatever.

And maybe what it triggers the "diversification" of soldiers is; this is my 4th set labelled as "Germanics", and some of them don't look like the same between themselves, and I already have too many of them to have a proportioned representation. Heck, the Romans will be outnumbered seven to one if they fight against all Celts/Gauls!!. 

So then, one of the solutions (besides selling off half of each set) is to separate into tribes and to modify some of the figures.

In my case, I started separing the "Medievals" into the different kingdoms, a so generic label as that is of little use besides fighting "Arabs". 

But let's return to the subject. We have thousands of Celts. The Celts were separated in hundreds of tribes, sometimes in war among themselves, others in peace. Actually many Celtic tribes decided to help the Romans and betray their fellow companions. Some acted as mercenaries for the Carthaginians. We need at least 3 different sorts of Gauls/Celts. So, as we're doing it, let's do it well.

THE METHOD

What I do to differentiate them, to easily recognize them, is give a basic colour to each tribe. As the can't wear any type of uniform neither shield pattern as some ancient peoples did, I generally try that each soldier has a bit of that main colour, like in some computer games like Rome Total War (not so blatantly obvious, like painting all trousers pink).

So, the first thing you should do is decide how many tribes you want to make. Once we have decided how many factions, we should assign a colour to each faction (in this case, I have assigned black to the Veneti). With some luck there is some historical basis, like some tribes wearing prominently blue tattoos. 

After we have to assign the number of forces. You can give a standard balance among themselves, to give a good level of variety, what you can also do is try to historically represent the amount and quantity of each type for each tribe.

For example, the Veneti were expert seafarers, so I give them less cavalry, just a symbolic quantity, and I give more skirmisher troops like archers. They weren't the richest of the Gaulish tribes, so less armoured men for them. 

One of the good things of merging a lot of sets together, is that you get a very nice "barbaric" feel, without the homogeneity that some sets give us (like the terrible Italeri Gaul Warriors set, with 9 figures with the same pose).

Finally, I choose a colour for the stands, and a different shade of brown or green for each tribe, this will help us to avoid confusion with other tribes when using them side by side in wargaming. 

Here are the pics of the final result;

This is the pic of the different sets used;

I'll explain a bit the choices of soldiers here; 

The first row are the Esci Barbarian Warriors, I've selected those that wear the celtic collar, that indicates that they are clearly not Germanic, and so they really don't fit with the other figures in the set, besides a bizarre Celtic-Germanic alliance or mixed tribes. I've painted tattoos on some of them, and I've modified all the leaders to make them more different and not so standard.

Then there is the Celtic Cavalry from Italeri, the Veneti basically enter in history for their combats in fortresses or at sea, but I considered that they needed a minimal representation.

Then comes the Revell Celts, which is a set that again merges Celts with Germanics, or early Vikings, so all those have been discarded. A small quantity of the Italeri Gaulish Warriors, which in small numbers look interesting.

I've also broken up the set of Carthaginian Allies, they add a nice variety. The Hat Celtic Command is a set that you must break up, as they are leaders and champions so their function is to represent the elite of a faction. 

The Airfix Britons are not the best Celts to use, but after purchasing some second hand lots, I have so many I need to make them fit everywhere I can :) . Note that I have changed the shields so they doesn't look so Briton.

And finally, one lonely HaT Celtic Cavalry to give more "colour" to the cavalry.

 That's all. In the future, I hope to make more proper tutorials, as how to paint big quantities of miniatures fastly, and making small houses and fortifications as scenario for wargaming or dioramas.

Thanks for reading!!!!

HaT EL CID SPANISH INFANTRY Medieval Warriors 1/72 figures miniatures 8176

Time for another HaT review, this time the recent El Cid Spanish Infantry;

Box;

 Standard HäT box, this time the quality of the drawing is quite low, it doesn't attract you very much to buy the product, and with a set with very different types of soldiers showing just one man is not a good idea. Fortunately, the figures inside are better than the box art.

The rear of the box shows you the poses, basically drawn. I prefer the Zvezda way of showing the painted figures, as sometimes the drawings suggests  better quality figures that you really get.

Sprues;

SCULPTING - 8.0 out of 10

Although the detail is not very crisp,( it is a bit faint everywhere), they are really nice figures, some of the best HäT has produced, in a style I would love to see HäT continuing to produce.

HäT has the particularity of being nearly the only brand that has very distinct styles of making their figures, not just between different periods,but even in the same period and at the same time.It is not a progressive evolution, just a random selection of sculptors with very different techniques. 

In this case, all "El Cid" miniatures have the same style. This is a style with diffuse detail, but good proportions and quite good poses. 

             HISTORICAL ACCURACY - 10 out of 10

The research has been well done - I don't see any historical error. What is best, the research has been properly applied, with this set being different to other Medieval Christian sets, having a distinct "flavour" and maintaining a good balance between spearmen, swordsmen, archers, etc.

The only curious thing is that everybody is wearing full clothes and seem to be fighting in winter, as it would be hard to continue wearing such garments in summer in Castille and in the center of the peninsula, so they should be named "El Cid Spanish Infantry in winter dress".

ARMY REPRESENTATION - 9.0

"The army representation score is the potential of the soldiers to be used for other purposes different to the one originally intended"

Except the slingers and the skirmishers, all these figures are perfect to represent a myriad of Middle Age factions. With their long robes, the first that comes to my mind would be doing the Medieval kingdoms of Denmark, Sweden, Poland, Hungary, etc. 

Being also one of the nicest Medieval sets around, this is  very recommended to make that regional kingdom that no brand has the guts to bring into the market.

Even two or three of the light infantry (specially the swordsman with round shield) could be very nicely used to represent any Barbarian/Germanic kingdom of the Dark Ages.

FUNNESS - 7.0

"I feel that many reviews are oblivious to this point - there are fantastic figures, which you can´t say anything against, but they are just too "correct", maybe too static, and just boring. So I feel that this is an important point when deciding if you buy this set"

It is a good set, but a bit too oriented to wargaming. Everything is a bit standard. You are given no leaders nor special men, but it is supposed that you have to buy the HaT El Cid Spanish Command to have them.

The most fun figures are the two bearded men, which have a lot of character. The Medieval sets that have been made, don't give you many bearded men, and much less warriors passing their 40's, so the bearded man in this set with the mail coat clearly being in his 50s is a great addition.

WARGAMING VALUE - 10

We are talking about pure wargaming here. They have very wargaming dimensions, you don't have to glue nor attach anything, nothing breaks easily, everybody has big bases, you get a perfect balance between the different types of troops, etc. The choice of 96 figures given is also a clear reference to their wargamingness.

The only but, is that you need to buy the El Cid Command, as they are absolutely needed to complement this set, as it will give you a musician, flagbearer, commanders, healers, etc.

PRICE-VALUE RATIO - 9.0 

"The price value ratio of this soldiers will vary between any shops you go to, and the best I can do is judge by their average price on eBay"

Is surprising in our days to have such a big number of figures given for a very reasonable price of 12 GBP shipped roughly. In retail stores it is usually more expensive, retailers seeing that they are giving too much for too little!

Some people who are not into wargaming, or just not happy wargaming with 48 figures or less, will perhaps find no use in 96 figures, and will find it too expensive. But with the possibilities of cutting them into different Spanish or medieval kingdoms, I find that 96 at this price is the best choice.



PAINTING AND GLUEING - 8.5

This is the new plastic HaT is using. It is sort of rubbery, it glues well, and is great for painting, as it is not slippery. The only bad thing is that it is not fully elastic, and if you bend a weapon too much   it will just break more easily than a more elastic plastic like Zvezda uses.



OVERALL VALORATION - 9.0

One of the (if not the) best miniatures HäT  has produced, filling a huge gap in history. Where before you had to buy French and English and modify them a bit, now this set will fill not just the intended Spanish kingdoms, but also many others. The reasonable price just adds more to this set that has to be a must for any Medieval collector.


PAINTED EXAMPLES
"Your figures could appear here if you want! just send me a email with the pictures to tam_cob@hotmail.com and I´ll gladly include them"

 Thanks to Miniaturas Aconcagua (http://miniaturasaconcagua.blogspot.com/) for giving permission to show his awesomely painted figures.

Thanks for reading, and see you in the next battle!