Atlantic THE EGYPTIAN ARMY Nexus Egyptian Infantry Set 1502 Biblical Era

Another great classic, the first kit that for nearly 30 years was the only one of its kind, the Atlantic Egyptian Army!!

This is how  the Atlantic box looked like;

And this is the reissued Nexus box;

As with all ancient Atlantic sets, the box art is a pic of the painted soldiers, with superb painting skills and a very good selection of colours.  The Nexus box just reuses the photo, using it horizontally as Italeri and other manufacturers do today.

This is what the figures look like;

(They are tan in Nexus reissue, and there is some other Atlantics set with a sort of tan-orangey colour. Probably there were made in  many other colours too)

SCULPTING - 7.8 out of 10

As with other Atlantic ancient sets, the level of sculpting is nice and high. Detail is sharp and they can be nicely painted, but the figures have some not every interesting poses (too many spearmen just carrying the spear without doing anything with it) and I am still trying to make out what the archer is doing holding the bow in that position at the same time as he carries an axe and having no quiver for his arrows. They also seem a bit skinny and tall, maybe they would be skinny in a bad year for crops, but probably not so tall. 

All the same, you get a good number of poses, and generally they are anatomically right (at least far more than brands like Strelets, or some Italeri sets with big heads).

HISTORICAL ACCURACY - 8.5 out of 10

 They are a sort of mish-mash remix of different eras, but  overall they are correct, and as the Egyptian empire spawns for 3 millennia I think you could find a spot where all men fit. In our days we would probably demand  3 sets for correctly covering the subject, but back in the 70s and until very recently, you wanted Egyptians and you didn't care about  anything more.

The worst figure arguably is the Pharaoh. At least this is what we deduct, as he carries the crown of the Lower Egypt. But he doesn't have any sort of armour or fancy clothes, he only carries a sort of sceptre (normally the Pharaoh would go to battle in chariot and he would use either a bow, or a more sophisticated type of weapon), and worst of all, a regular shield like the other infantry. 

The Pharaoh was quite an important person, and he had commodities such as shield-bearers to protect him, so this leaves this figure as simply a general or somebody of the royal family, who most probably didn't wear the crown (this is furtherly confirmed as Atlantic also made a Pharoah figure ), so you would have to cut his crown to be more historically accurate.

ARMY REPRESENTATION - 2.5

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

These figures have Egyptian written on their faces, and they can't be used for anything else really.  Some of the figures with a bit of modification could be made into Meroe and Aksum infantry, but not much more.

FUNNESS - 8.0

"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 so just boring. So I feel that this is an important consideration on deciding if you buy this set"

They are Egyptians! until the Caesar set, they were the only Egyptians you could buy, and from the late 80s until the Nexus reissue, even these were not available. How has mankind  survived the lack of 1/72 during so much time? I wonder. Just for being what they are their level of funness is huge. 




WARGAMING VALUE - 8.0

Except the lack of archers (which you can easily solve getting the Atlantic Egyptian Cavalry set)
this is a very good set for wargaming. For other unique characters you have the Atlantic At the Pharaohs Court set.


PRICE-VALUE RATIO - 10.0 

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



Nexus no longers reissues these figures, but all the same by eBay you easily can find the infantry, either the original or reissue, for a very good price, hence the 10.0 score. I bought mine for 9,99 € I think, which for Nexus reissue, that gives you 62 figures, is a great price. Just be alert, and you'll find a second hand lot for roughly 8 GBP shipped.




PAINTING AND GLUEING - 5.5

Both the Atlantic and Nexus are not very good to paint or to glue,being  flexible and slippery. Note that although they never had flash problems in this set, there is a bit of flash present in Nexus sets, so you will have to cut it, and it is not easy as the plastic is very elastic.


OVERALL VALORATION - 8.5

I had lived without any Egyptian miniatures for too long, and these were the answer to my miniature prayings. For me, not having Egyptians was like missing Greeks or Romans, and so I am bit biased in favour of this set, but I think even now, with good Zvezda and Caesar sets, they have a more "Egyptian" flavour in this set than in the others. So even now, I recommend this set over their competitors. Besides this, the other sets depict the later armies of the Egyptians, so for early Egyptians, this is still the one and only set.


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"

These figures have been painted by myself.

Thanks to Gabriel from http://1-72degabriel.blogspot.com/2010/02/infanteria-egipcia-2300-1500-ac.html for giving his permissionm to show his greatly painted Egyptians! ;

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

1/72 CAESAR - HITTITE WARRIORS ARMY - Battle of Qadesh, against Ramses of Egypt Miniatures Figures

Here we have another Caesar Miniatures review, some of the most relevant armies that Caesar have made. We are talking of the Hittites.


This is the box;

It is one of the most appalling box arts I've ever seen. I had to say to myself twice "forget the box art, the figures inside are fine". They seem a choir of renacentist women singing. Probably in my top ten of worst artboxes. Anything, just a transparent plastic would have been better.

Let's forget the box and see the figures;

SCULPTING - 7.0 out of 10

Normally Caesar Miniatures have wonderful, sharp and crisp sculpting, and yes, the detail in this set is fantastic. But for some reason, they don't have the right anatomical proportions that other Caesar sets have. The heads of some of the figures are very small, and nearly all figures have very big and disproportional hands. The closed fists of the leader is as big as his head! some of their feet are also too big. The spears are too thick, which could be understood, but also the spearheads are very big, not in proportion with other Caesar sets.

One of the spearmen has a very small stand which makes him unbalanced, but this is easily solved by glueing him into a bigger stand.


HISTORICAL ACCURACY - 8.0

We have a rather strange set to review today. The Hittites are still quite obscure and hard to research, but we do have some of the depictions the Egyptians made. Although they isn't anything very wrong, the combination and amount of the different characteristics are quite incorrect in my opinion. 


Too many soldiers don't wear helmets, and they have the "elf" style hairstyle, as though they have been  taken from a Osprey book, and in my humble opinion this  is too common among the soldiers. The archers with the boots just seem  wrong. Being bare-chested and wearing boots doesn't fit together very well. It is true that the Hittites used these characteristic boots, but again it was not a 100 % common characteristic. Some of the soldiers would use sandals or just go barefoot. 

And in some cases they seem that they are wearing clothes for winter in the Anatolian  mountains, not in the desert of Qadesh.

All shields have the same dimensions and shape, and this is not what we see in the Qadesh depictions of the Egyptians. Even if they are historically correct, not all the troops again would have used them.


ARMY REPRESENTATION - 3.0

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

 Having so many characteristic hairstyles, boots, armour, etc, they are not of much use besides being Hittites. Some of the archers with some conversion could be used as other Anatolian or a Middle East tribe, but they are of limited use.

FUNNESS - 6.5

"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"

I have mixed feelings here, with the fun of this set, and in general, with this set. They are different, they have good quantity of poses, two unique leaders, but they are not what I expected as Hittites. They lack some of the more typical depictions of them, you are given a leader which is not more than a man with sword, so we consider him as an officer, and a true king would have been much more appreciated. Also, the other unique figure has nearly the same pose as one of the normal types, which I feel is having lost a good chance to give a more different sort of figure. 

WARGAMING VALUE - 8.5

This is a very good set for wargaming. You are given all the different sorts of troops, and in good ratio (albeit if a bit too many armoured men without spears maybe, this seems to represent an  elite Hittite army), so it scores high here. Some sort of standard bearer and king is the only thing it lacks to be a ten.

PRICE-VALUE RATIO - 8

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

As with most Caesar Miniatures, you can find them for 8-9 GBP shipped, which is a fine price for detailed figures, numerous and obscure , such as these are.





PAINTING AND GLUEING - 8.5

As can be said for all Caesar models, the plastic is a sort of rubber that is rough and not slippery. Even if maybe a bit too dark , a lighter grey would have been better. They can be nicely glued. A bad thing is that they come many times with bent lances or bent bases,(which in theory  can be solved with hot water, although many return to their bad poses again.)

OVERALL VALORATION - 7.0
"A bit unfulfilling, but a must for any collector"

I feel that  this set could have been done a lot better, with just a bit better combination of the clothes, armour and hairstyles,and with a tiny bit better sculpturing, I was expecting a lot, something like the Trojans, where everything seems to fit perfectly, even if there is very little information.Here with more information, they seem too rigid in the interpretation of the figures.

All the same, we have to thank Caesar just for trying to make this set, because without the Hittites we would be lacking one of the most important empires and peoples of ancient history. 

And as it is quite improbable that we will get Hittites made in any other brand, we'll have to stick with these.

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"

Painted figures by myself;

Painted figures extracted from Caesar Miniatures official website;

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