For Sale: Warring States / Han Chinese

New Reduced Price £1250.00

You can contact me about these at smith(dt)paul18(a)sky(dt)com

I've decided that to make room for a new project my Warring States / Han Chinese army can go and do battle for a new general.

I painted the core of these back in 2011 for the Warhammer Ancient Battles Grand Tournament held in Stockport and have added extra figures and units since. They have been veterans of a good few battles of both Warhammer Ancients and Hail Caesar since then.

All the figures are magnetised as are the custom made movement trays that are also provided.

Every figure is from the Curteys Miniatures range.

Chariot mounted General

Two subordinate generals / army standard bearer

Musicians, a drum team any a symbol team

A scribe, or Sun Tzu himself if you prefer

Three heavy chariots, each with four horses and three crew

Twelve cavalry with swords and halberds

First unit of twenty-four spearmen

Second unit of twenty-four spearmen

Third unit of twenty-four spearmen

Fourth unit of twenty-four spearmen

Unit of twenty-four crossbowmen

Unit of twenty archers, these match the first spear unit so can be added to the rear ranks

Three units of twelve archers, these match the other three units of spearmen so can be added to the rear ranks.

Two units of twelve swordsmen.

Twenty-four Xiongnu Hu nomad horsemen

Large stone thrower with four crew

Twelve villagers

The entire force

Well, there you go, four heavy chariots, thirty-eight mounted troops, two-hundred and twenty two foot.

All this can be yours for £1250.00 plus postage at cost.

Hail Caesar on the far eastern frontier of Rome

Romans and Chinese line up for battle

It's about time I played Hail Caesar and I jumped at the opportunity to play a game against Richard yesterday evening.

We arranged to meet at the Polly yesterday evening, Richard would bring his Early Imperial Romans and I would bring my Qin / Han Chinese to the party. Richard suggested we have a look at how many points we could each field and drew a stop at about 500pts per side, that would be plenty!

I fielded Qin Chinese as the Han Chinese list in the supplement is broken and has not been 'patched' - somebody forgot the cavalry and chariot entries and then the proof reading miss that - doofus!

Wu Hu horse archers

My force comprised:
General (CV8) 4 x Veteran Heavy Infantry with Archers, 2 x Light Infantry with Crossbow
Commander (CV8) 4 x Heavy Infantry with Archers, 2 x Skirmishers with bow
Commander (CV8) 1 x Chariots, 3 x Wu Hu Horse Archers
Commander (CV8) 1 x Chariots, 2 x Medium Cavalry, 1 x Wu Hu Horse Archers

Richard fielded (if I recall correctly):
General (CV8) 1 x Praetorian Legion, 3 x Legions, 1 x Archer, 1 x Ballista
General (CV8) 5 x Legions, 1 x Skirmisher, 1 x Ballista

General (CV8) 1 x Heavy Auxillia, 3 x Auxillia, 1 x Ballista
General (CV8) 1 x Heavy Cavalry, 3 x Medium Cavalry

Solid Chinese battle line

So we settled down to battle, I took some initial hits from the Roman artillery, but soon my missles were soon coming into play, the vaunted Roman armour was looking very flimsy as Richard failed save after save. Of course it would not last and we were soon in combat. My medium cavalry supported by a unit of lights destroyed one unit of  Roman cavalry and shook another before becoming succumbing to a flank charge by Roman Legions.

The infantry lines clashed in the centre and despite initial Roman success my Chinese dice were on fire, I must have acquired one of those tacky lucky cats from somewhere. Although it was not so lucky for my Commander in Chief who was killed leading a charge.

Legions stretching as far as the eye can see

Soon the Roman line was wavering, I had lost my right flank cavalry division, but had taken out the Roman left flank infantry division and was exploiting the gap. However, before my infantry division could make hay, I spawned another flukey combat against the remaining Roman legions and broke that division too.

The Chinese had emerged victors mainly down to flukey dice rather than anything else.

A great game, although 500pts is probably a bit much to be using on a club night when playing with 120mm frontages as there was no flanks to exploit just a battering head to head slog!

A clash of civilisations

Trying to break through on my left flank

Skirmishers screen my left flank

Club night; more Warring States action

Following on from our last Warring States game John and I had another game of Hail Caesar using our Warring States armies at the White Hart.

Last time it was our first try so we used identical forces, this time we both picked a 300 point force from the Hail Caesar Army Lists Volume 1 - Biblical & Classical book Qin list.

My list was:

• General - CV8

• Sub Commander - CV8
• standard unit of Chariots
• standard unit of Medium Cavalry
• small unit of Hu Horse Archers
• small unit of Hu Horse Archers

• Sub Commander - CV8
• standard unit of Heavy Infantry spears
• standard unit of Heavy Infantry spears
• standard unit of Light Infantry crossbows
• standard unit of Light Infantry bows
• small unit of Skirmishers with javelins

• Sub Commander - CV8
• standard unit of Heavy Infantry spears
• standard unit of Heavy Infantry spears
• small unit of Light Infantry bows
• small unit of Light Infantry bows

Johns list was similar

• General - CV9

• Sub Commander - CV8
• standard unit of Chariots
• standard unit of Medium Cavalry
• small unit of Hu Horse Archers
• small unit of Hu Horse Archers

• Sub Commander - CV8
• standard unit of Heavy Infantry spears
• standard unit of Heavy Infantry spears
• standard unit of Light Infantry bows
• small unit of Fanatic swordsmen 

• Sub Commander - CV8
• standard unit of Heavy Infantry spears
• standard unit of Heavy Infantry spears
• standard unit of Light Infantry bows
• small unit of Fanatic swordsmen

My deployment from left to right was Hu, Hu, Bows, Crossbows, Spearmen, Spearmen, Spearmen, Spearmen, Skirmishers, Bows, Bows, Chariots, Cavalry

My deployment

John was deployed pretty much opposite me.

Johns cavalry and chariots were off on his left out of shot

We rolled off and I took the first turn. My two Hu horse archers rushed to engage Johns right flank and my small units of bowmen on my right advanced to engage his cavalry and chariots. Everything else elected to stand after my large infantry division in the center failed their order.

My Hu engage Johns left flank

John responded by charging at the Hu to clear them out of the way and his horse archers on the left flank moved to flank my bowmen. His large block of infantry in the center also advanced on the exposed bowmen. After some nifty shooting, both my small bow blocs were disordered and on two casualties each.

My advance guard of bow are soon under pressure

My infantry, cavalry and chariots moved up to support the exposed bowmen in the center and John responded with the first charge of the day, his two units of central spearmen were ordered to charge mine.

In a reversal of last months misfortune, the chargers lost the combat badly and failed their break test. First unit to my guys.

First charge and first blood of the day

John again charged the Hu with his left flank infantry and they retired off table. In my turn, the Hu returned to harass Johns left flank and I was able to get a charge in on the spearmen that had been supporting the broken unit. Alas, the odds are stacked in my favour but my dice are poor and I end up retreating from the combat.

My turn to charge

More super shooting by my small bow units, followed by some terrible dice on Johns part and he is removing his Crossbowmen.

I'm doing better now than in the entire last game, John is two units down and he did not lose a single one last time.

John charges a block of spearmen supported by his fanatic swordsmen into one of my small units of archers, this time there is no dice anomaly and I'm soon removing a unit along with the Sub-Commander who had been rallying them.

I'm not having it all my way, first blood to John

The game went on well from here, I advanced on Johns left flank, but he pushed me back to almost my table edge. In the center I broke Johns Infantry division and on the right destroyed both his chariots and medium cavalry. My center infantry was also broken.


By the end of the game we both had one infantry division and our cavalry divisions in play, but I still had my chariots and medium cavalry on the table so I think with a few more turns I could have mopped him up. Probably a winning draw to my faction.

A great game again.


More action from the game.

Hu harrasing Johns right flank

Johns left flank is pushed back

Despite being harrased by the Hu John pushes forwards on his left

My small bow units are under pressure

Sun Tzu works on his magnum opus while the battle rages around

My center advances on Johns left

Fighting in the center

The cavalry finally get engaged

Johns left flank pushes me back to my table edge