This was the second SE Asian army I purchased. Most of the figures are Falcon U.K. from my friend Kai Weaver of The Quartermaster. I did mix in a handful of Old Glory Indian spearmen into the warbands, to give them even more variety than they already came with (which was quite a bit!). I was very happy with them -- the various patterns and bright colors turned out well. I highly recommend Falcon's Java/Malay line!
I built this army to "double size," i.e., 24 elements. After using the Khmer army with good success, I was thinking that playing the Malays would be very similar. However, I found winning with these guys to be quite a bit more difficult, when I entered them in tournaments. Whereas with the Khmer, their foot are Auxilia, who glide along next to the Elephants at the same speed, the Malay warbands are slower. And it makes it that much more hard to use the warband double movement, when the elephants are causing command and control (Pip) problems. Eventually, I got the hang of them, but they are a challenging army to play.
From the folded arms to the umbrella, this is obviously the army general. I went for extra detail with the writing along the howdah and alternating colors on the umbrella. Surprisingly, the pole for the umbrella has held up well and not been bent through use. I wanted to replace it with sturdier brass wire. However, it looked like it'd be too "fiddly," to make the various necessary cuts. So, I crossed my fingers and used the lead pole it was cast with.
The interesting thing about Falcon's elephants for the Malays is that they are basically two different sizes. The outer ones in the picture above (yellow cloth and blue cloth) are noticeably larger than the middle two. As a matter of fact, their trunks and tusks extend past the edge of their 40mmx40mm stand, so you have to be careful when using them on the tabletop -- they don't always "match up" well against their opponents in frontal contact. The other two (General and purple cloth) are fine, though. All but the generals', though, feature the "fighting platform" rather than a howdah. The crew is squatting or crouched atop a wooden platform with no sides. It looks really cool, but if *I* were an elephant crewman, I'd want one of those fancy howdah's to protect my butt from arrows!
I'm very happy with how these painted up, and I think the decorative, colorful elephant cloths really makes them stand out on the tabletop.
Yes, there are more than six stands of troops pictured above. Remember, this was purchased and painted as a "double size" army, so each photo should show about twice as many troops as its supposed to. This photos shows one of the advantages of using the Falcon line of Malays -- there is a LOT of figure variety. I particularly like the swordsmen running forward with their wavy-bladed "kris" sword upraised. I did mix in some Old Glory Indian spearmen in this batch, as well as an occaisonal archer, rather than spear or swordsman. I thought the variety just helped with the overall look of these troops.
The turbans and colorful, patterned vests make these guys stand out in the army, too. I wish Falcon had more variety in pose, though, with their archers. It's amazing how "irregular" you can make stands look though with paint and spacing.
So, the psiloi are supposed to be armed with a blowgun. I looked and looked, but really couldn't figure out how that weapon they're holding is a blowgun. Then again, I never claimed to be an expert on Malay weaponry, so I took their word for it and did my best guessing what it would look like. The Light Horse, I'm sorry to say, is borrowed from another of Falcon's lines. When I purchased the army, they were temporarily out of stock of the Malay light horse pack. I've since bought it, but haven't gotten around to painting it up, so this guy will have to do!