Assembling Romans- from Henry Coll

Henry recently assembled a box of Romans and was good enough to put this description together to help the rest of us save some time.  Hope this helps.

"So I’ve assembled three cohorts of Romans and here is my two cents worth.

A note on clipping the spruces; I used a flush cutter (called “snipers” at Ac More $7.99) which produces a very clean and flat cut. I sorted all parts by figure type, which helped me keep my sanity during assembly, and definitely sped things up. Basic model glue works great setting fast but still giving you a little bit of work time to adjust the fit of pieces. Give yourself some time to dry fit pieces before gluing and once you find the right angle use an assembly line method.

The first thing that became apparent after much dry fitting of the various body options is that the figs are designed to face sideways even though their feet face mostly forward. There are essentially three poses; one standing with pilum at rest, one throwing pilum, and one crouching forward with drawn gladius.

Although there are various possible combinations available to make up these posses, here are the three that work best in my opinion:

The standing figure is composed of the straightest body and the right-angled pilum arm. If mounted so that the pilum is perfectly vertical then the bottom tip will pass beyond the base. A little trim with the flush cutter and all is well. The generic shield arm is the only option on the left but should be mounted fairly parallel to the body so that the shield will hang straight down. The head (there are two slightly different ones provided so choose as you like or not at all) looks best if facing to the left with a slight angle up so that the eyes can look over the top edge of the shield. When placed closely together the figures give a nice rendition of a shield wall at rest.

The crouching with gladius figure took some work but once you understand the pose being portrayed then it makes sense. The body is the one bent forward with legs apart. For the gladius arm use the one with the sharpest angle at the elbow and the wrist slightly bent back. The real adjustment is the placing of the arm on the body. It is a close fit across the chest and looks as if the fig is ready to slice his own throat. The blade should be about were the top of the mail shirt meets the neck. This will allow the fig to stab just over the top quadrant of the shield. Don’t forget to cut of the handle off the sword to provide an empty scabbard. The shield arm is again mounted parallel to the body and it slight bend will cause the shield to be angled slightly away from the head allowing the fig to look over the top of the shield. The head is mounted bent forward and angled up so that the neck guard is touching the back top of the mail shirt. This will allow the fig to peak around the edge of his shield with gladius ready to strike.

The throwing figure is simple to put together. The body is the one remaining one with a straight torso and wide spread legs. I found it easiest to mount the head first so that the pilum is not in the way. The head faces to the left and is sharply angled back to portray the fig tracking its target over the top on his shield. The pilum arm is the wide angled one and fits so that the pilum is even with the crest of the helmet in a throwing motion and matching the angle of the head. Finally, I placed the shield arm with a slight upward angle giving the shield a sweep to the figure’s left with the upper edge fitting just under the fig’s chin.

For the command figs, the trumpet fits best on the fig dressed in the bearskin. The mouth piece of the horn will come very close to the lips and using the open left hand allows the fig to grab the side of the horn; all in all a satisfying look. Unfortunately, the standard bearer (in the wolf skin) cannot be made to grasp the pole with both hands so the use of a regular shield arm might look best. The Optio has the fewest options with his sword drawn backwards or across his chest. The Centurion options are also quite limited but angling the head back and turning it to the side can give the fig some personality.

I found it useful to give some thought to the composition of the cohort and how it will be mounted on its stands. Decide if the command figs will be mounted in the front, back or both before assembling the figs as this will alter how many of each pose you will need if you are mixing poses within a cohort. I chose to make one cohort out of the standing figs while the other two each have a front rank of the crouching/stabbing figs with the rear rank made up of command and throwing figs. This required me to convert four throwing figs into stabbing figs. There are not enough of the tight angled sword arms to do this so I use the ninety-degree arms at an angle so that the fist rests on the right hip. I haven’t decided if I’ll distribute one of these conversions per base or just put them all one the same one.

The figs make a very believable shield wall when placed close together eight to the 60mm x 40mm base. If we go with the 24 fig cohorts this will give us a manageable three bases per cohort, 30 per legion." --Henry Coll