As promised, just a quick shot of the French First Division. I think I may just have got a way with my decision to go for an all-fusilier battalion.
Needless to say, I couldn't resist finding out what a really big 36-figure battalion might look like:
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| From Left to Right: DK 9s, FN 5s and DK 8s |
Needless to say, I couldn't resist finding out what a really big 36-figure battalion might look like:
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| The Big Battalion |
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| As Peter Gilder might have done it |
It's probably just as well that it's virtually impossible to get enough figures to do whole armies this way...
WM
Stunning sight Matt, the 24 figure battalions are impressive enough.
ReplyDeleteI always wondered what this would look like, 'Lee. Thank goodness it's impossible to do. I'd have given up in despair years ago.
ReplyDeleteStunning is the right word. Just the thing to get my mind going here at 5:20am Wednesday morning.
ReplyDeleteBest Regards,
Stokes
I have triple-strength coffee for that Stokes.
DeleteI don't know where you find the endless patience for your Charge!-scale regiments.
You could go the full hog and combine 2 24 figure units into an even larger 48 figure unit. Cavalry in 24s.
ReplyDeleteI'd end up with too many flags if I did that Mark. Seriously though, I used to think that 24-figure units looked a but puny and that 32 to 36 was really the ideal. The complete impracticality of trying to do this, however, soon became clear. Almost everybody was doing 24s back in the earlies and so that was all you can get nowadays too.
DeleteHmmm, 36 figure battalions, now you've got me thinking - only joking! A most impressive division.
ReplyDeleteIt takes up an awful lot of table space, Ian.
DeleteThe DKs look terribly weedy next to the Hinton Hunts. I will definitely need to segregate them at some point.
Lovely. They are no longer available commercially? Would it be possible to create a mold and cast them?
ReplyDeleteJudging by the number of pirates, I'd say it's definitely possible Paul. I'll drop you a line about this by email.
DeleteI like big battalions but somehow it lost some of the old school feel with 36 figures. I also quite like the variety provided by the with and with elite company variants. But I still think a greatcoat battalion would look good.
ReplyDeleteYou've identified the main source of my unease about this experiment, Rob. They have a sort of industrial quality when seen en masse like that, don't they. I think it must be the cheerleader effect - all the old school individuality gets ironed out.
DeleteI have precisely three greatcoated Frenchmen, so they'd be a bit outnumbered....
I agree, the charm of these figures gets a bit lost en-masse. 24 seems just about right to look like a unit but not so many that you can't see the trees for the wood.
DeleteThey look splendid...
ReplyDeleteI like the extra colour of the flank companies but the all fusilier battalion doers have a certain ‘professional ‘ quality about it.
All the best. Aly
Thank you Aly. Yes, they are rather business like. I hope they fight like that. Nothing flash, but effective....
DeleteMost impressive Matt, quite a sight.
ReplyDeleteCheers James. I feel entitled to some really flashy guardsmen now.
DeleteEr actually guys 36 for French and 48 for Austrians, 40 for Brits is Old School. Mind you those were the days of big tables, sonetimes big sand tables and guys who played in tweed jackets and cravats. I suspect there was a substantially different Old School experience between those who were say 35-50 years old in 1970 and those who were 16 to 20, not least because it was quite an expensive hobby if you were putting hundreds of troops on a table, hence the widespread pirating. As I recall it the representation of all units as being the same size is quite a modern device, originally they were to be structured by companies. on a 1/20 scale and thus different nationalities had different battalion sizes. That does not matter too much in a big game, but in something on a six foot table it makes a real difference.
ReplyDeleteHello LG. I concluded long ago that it was impossible to accurately simulate Napoleonic drill and fire tactics. This was one of the many reasons why I like Stryker's highly stylised version so much. There speak to at least one of the old-school traditions that was always more about practicality, playability and aesthetics rather than baroque game mechanics. I had a go at some of the latter sort when I was young, but gave up when I realised that they weren't really all that flash at simulating battles.
DeleteI must salute your solution to the great "elites or not elites" debate, WM. you put the fusilier-only battalion between two elite-rich battalions. That is a proper public service response.
ReplyDelete*Laughter*
DeleteI was waiting for somebody to spot that, Archduke.
Great looking figures, like the photo with 3 x 24 figs but the 36 fig unit looks great.
ReplyDeletePaul
Cheers Paul!
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