Persian Pajama Party + Scythe My Chariot

Assembled some new persian cavalry recently, nothing too special except to say that it looks good: I'm slowly coming to terms with the concept that you can have both patterning and shadows/highlights on the same miniature and just in time because Persians prefer patterns, yes, patterns and often pastels. Indeed, a lot of the depictions I've seen of Persians gives one the impression that they went to war in their pajamas. Anyway, here are some new, hot Persian light cavalry.

 AAAAAA Pajama Party! Happy with how these guys look and how they perform in Hail Caesar. Light cavalry with spears and bows is a fast and multifunctional unit. Of course, now they make every other figure in Persian dress look bad since those are old paint jobs from before I would even attempt patterns on clothing. There's always something else to paint.

Just from figs collected here-and-there I have a unit of heavy cavalry, armored helmed riders on steeds wearing scale barding. I don't have a clear idea whether I can rightfully put them into an Achaemenid Persian army. I know the Successors armored cav pretty heavily, and later dynasties of Persians like the Sassanids had cataphractesque units. But did Persians have any heavy cav in the era of Xerxes? Comment with links to peer reviewed academic journals.

Another problem: I threw a couple chariots into my army because Persians used em. I'm not crazy about chariots (although Hail Caesar likes them) so I just got a pack of British chariots, replaced the riders with more Persian looking models, and I was good to go. That is, until I started battling a guy whho is fielding appropriately British chariots with his British Celtic army. I can't handle that his chariots look indistinguishable from mine  (except from the crews' skin tones and clothing). So what did I do?

In a flash of megagenius, I remembered that artificial flowers have their petals held in place by a number of plastic, star-shaped braces. For the low, low price of one dollar (US) I was able to dismantle a bunch of fake flowers for their precious petal holders. Some of the leaves are also being used for a piece of an oasis scene, to be blogged later. Once this was done, it was no problem to select some fierce-looking petal holders, paint them a metallic gray, and glue them to the hubcaps of my chariots. Behold!

Deadly wheel-scythes!

Not to say that these are now authentic Persian chariots, but those scythes add an element that is a) quite distinct from those Celtic ponywagons and b) ferocious and barbaric as hell. Chop chop!