As well as knocking out painting commissions at much greater speed than usual (keep your eyes on the post, guys), and undertaking a special project (all will be revealed in time), I'm finding time to play solo, read books, and even paint a few odds and ends - not to mention playing 10 - 20 games on World of Tanks Blitz every day (I'm not really a PC gamer but, blimey, I love that game).
On the downside, in my few moments of locked down frustration, I'm finding it very easy to spend more money than usual. I think it might be because I'm doing it all online and I don't have to physically open my wallet. The first part of my Napoleonic project (British & French) is the chief recipient of my hard earned. It's now just one order for five cavalry regiments from finished (for now at least), and I'll probably send that off to Front Rank next week.
In consequence, with shiny new units arriving, and in numbers, it's probably a good thing that I'm painting my own stuff again. Since lock down began three weeks ago (seems longer) I've added the following.
Buff facings and, strangely, a buff plume.
British LD are not my favourite figures in the Front Rank range but, they are nice enough.
A yellow faced regiment.
I've painted a lot of commissions of Napoleonic British infantry, from various manufacturers over the years, and I have to say, Front Rank are the easiest to paint that I've come across.
Flags are by Flags for the Lads.
Square bases are home cut, round bases are War Bases.
Old Hook Nose himself (far right), plus various staff members.
I decided to add the foot figure to increase the amount of 'British redness'.
I replaced the missing Portuguese officer with a newly pictured British officer in a red coat (not pictured). Previously it had two Portuguese officers and was far too blue and French looking.
The C-in-C figure, wearing glasses, is the Front Rank 'Davout' figure. I liked the glasses but, to make him less 'Davout', I added some Milliput hair - nice quiff Monsieur.
Having added a British officer on foot to the British command group, it is only fair the French should get one too.
My French army contains a couple of Nassau units and, having bought a couple of mounted officers on a whim, found the added colour works quite nicely here.
Nassau battalions are next on the French to do list, so this was an opportunity to get the right green mix sorted.
Figures are Front Rank, flags are GMB Designs.
What more needs to be said......
I also finally remembered to buy a couple of sappers, which helped to bulk out a reinforcement set up to two 24 figure (+4 skirmishers) units. A wrong size reinforcement set - Jeez, I'm an anything for a discount penny pincher.
Next up, two more units of British infantry (one Scots) and two Nassau battalions (2nd Regiment).
All figures are by Front Rank. All painted by yours truly.
Oh, BTW, I bought 120 odd 45 mm diameter bases to re-base all of my skirmish stands - for the third time. Got in just in time - War Bases is now closed for the duration of lock down.
I'm going to paint another eight units - the two Brits and two Nassau mentioned, two battalions of 4th Swiss and two battalions of British Guards (3rd FG and Coldstream) - before I do a spot of basing; I hate basing my own stuff.
After that, there will be just over two dozen units to do. Then the French and British will be done for now and I can get on with a largish twenty unit Spanish contingent, or thirty six unit Spanish army - to be decided.
Keep safe all.
23 comments:
You paint is really wonrfull but I don't understand why have paint in white all your officcer's pompon. Officer appointed in compagny wear the same shako with the same pompon than troop. Moreover, in each batailion, the two sappers are both assigned to compagny of grenadiers.
Hi French follower, my pompoms are white because of this source:
Osprey Men at Arms Vol 141: Napoleons Line Infantry, Haythornethwaite.
p. 13 The pre-1812 uniform, I quote:
"senior officers to wear plumes (white aigrette for colonel, red over white for major, red for Chef de bataillon) with white pompoms for other officers and staff NCOs, red for grenadiers, yellow for voltigeurs, and for the first to fourth fusilier companies...."
I positioned the sapeur in the centre because I've often seen others put them there - I have no idea where they actually stood, I only have info on their uniform.
A very nice post resplendent with exquisitely painted figures. Not my style of painting but outstanding in their own right.
I compliment you on the tightness of your figures i.e. elbow to elbow, which reflects the tactical dressing of the period (as do I).
Your figures are a joy to view. Thanks for posting them.
Rod
Superb units. Napoleonics is the deep bottomless pit of wargaming !!!!!!!
Simply wonderful!
Nice work as usual, and a good turnover rate too. Will hopefully finish the last unit of my Portuguese brigade this week.
Fantastically beautiful! Super!
Hi James Thank for your speed answer
Concerning color pompn of Senior officer and all other regimental staff (standart bearer ; adjudant NCO..), you're right, But the sloulder board on the right shoulder and the tin epaulet on the left shoulder suggests a junior officer ; because Chef de bataillon's épaulet was larger. (moreover senior officers were mounted). In french regiment, all junior officers were appointed to compagny so they should wear shako with compagny's color pompon.
Regarding the position of sapper you must consider two thing :
Fistly, : during the march grenadier compagny leads the column (during the battle it occupy the honor place on the rigth).
Secondly ; roads was primanly used by artillery train, engineer train, and all logistic wagons so infantry progress mainly across the field and sappers open the way through hedges and all other obstacles with prunnig hooks, saws and axes.
May I suggest you two blogs
one french about units and uniform of Waterloo figthers.
http://centjours.mont-saint-jean.com/
a other british about organisation of napoleonic army
http://www.napolun.com/mirror/napoleonistyka.atspace.com/
I'm sure you already know the last
Your peninsular war project is very inspiring for me. Have a good day and go on like this.
Sincerly your
The french follower
FF,
I've moved the sapeur. As you say, it seems they deployed at the head of the column or with the grenadiers.
I posed the question on LAF and Aly M posted the reference from one of his books. If I were buying the units again, I'd actually be tempted to buy one less skirmishing voltigeur and put the sappeur out in front with them, because as the unit went forward that seems the best place for him to be, chopping stuff down BEFORE the formed troops arrived.
Reading Aly's source, the decree of 1808 stipulated 4 sapeur per battalion so it's arguable if they should be represented at all - I always thought there were far more, and prior to 1808 there were 8 - 20 per battalion.
As for the pompom colour, though the reference I have simply states "other officers", you probably have better source material than I and at some point I'll change them.
Just looks fantastic James!!
Christopher
Sorry, you're right again, there are four sapper in each battalion, unlike I wrote early but contrary what is written in the blog
http://www.napolun.com/mirror/napoleonistyka.atspace.com/French_infantry.html#frenchsappers
you have only one corporal sapper for the whole regiment.
Today the foreign legion is alone unit to keep this tradition in the french army. Ordinary it finish the military parade of party by foot because it marchs slowly.
The sapper was chosen among grenadiers (carabinier in light infantry) because he must have been big and strong.
Exept the bearskin he wears exactly the same uniform than grenadier (red epaulet ; red collar without forget red grenade on the white back lapel). So it's better idea to substitute to one grenadier.
Voltigeur compagny gathers small and agile men, Sappers are too disimilar for work alongside dwarfs. It's not his place.
If you raise some new french battalion, your grenadier compagny is already ready.
Moreover with some french battalions, I can expect, impérial eagles will win lasly at Waterloo.
(Sorry for the joke, tipically french humour)
I didn't mean that the sapeurs would fight with the voltiguers, there job was different, I meant that they would be out in front chopping down barriers to the columns passage. I doubt that the column would march up to a hedge, stop, then order the sapeurs to deploy out of the grenadier company to demolish it, before the column proceeded again.
It would make much more sense if they were ordered to go out in front from the start (their position was to be at the head of the column), possibly operating just behind the voltigeur skirmish line, to demolish obstacles before the column arrived (to prevent delays). They would only need to know the immediate destination of the column to do this. Units usually marched from one easily identifiable land mark to another - it's how the company officers kept unit cohesion when marching cross-country.
On a wargames table, sapeurs out in front, might best be represented by putting the figure on a voltiguer stand.
I'm not going to do it, it was just an idea. I've bought all of my French infantry now - I have 26 battalions - which is more than enough for a table my size.
Looking good there, some mighty fine looking figures.
Cheers
Kevin
Beautiful stuff and LOTS of it! You're using the time well.
When I begin to play wargame, my two first rules have the same mistake. Both descibe French column of march with voltigeurs compagny in first position and grenadiers compagny in last position with the four fusiliers compagnies between elite compagnies
Well after, I discover that regulation (règlement sur l'infanterie in 1st august 1791 used until 1832), provides exactly the opposite. Grenadier compagny on the head, voltigeur at the tail of column.
When a column of march meets an obstacle, sappers open the way.
When this same column meets a rough terrain, (rock, swamp, village …) the voltigeur compagny comes up all the column in order to recce the country. At this moment sappers remain with grenadier compagny.
When battalion get in line, the grenadier compagny is located on the right side and the voltigeur are :either in line on the left side, either in front of the battalion in xkimish layout.
As you can see, never sappers and voltigeur are gathered
I believe, the lone moment when sappers and voltigeurs have a close location is during the attack in column (in french, column of division) because both elite compagnie lead the march, grenadier on the rignt, voltigeur on the left.followed by the four fusilier compagnies, two by two.
French Napoleonic Infantery Tactics N°159 in Elite serie by Osprey Publishing is very interesting but not so accurate regarding skimish tactics than british light infantry and rifle tactics of the napoleonic wars in Elite serie N°215. It's unfotunate.but I thing, the explanation is french army creates first voltigeur compagnies 22 ventose an XII (24 september 1803). So regulation of the 1st august 1791 says nothing about there.
Really nice additions to your collection. The discussion re Sappers is interesting too, I think I have one in my FRW collection!
Splendid looking chaps!
Great looking units, James. I was happy top see you gave your light Dragoons a flag; the British cavalry flags of thios era are to interesting to leave off, even if they were usally kept in depot.
Hi mate, love your painting style and the finished product :-)
I've always had trouble doing white on larger models .. I paint mostly smaller scales - if I can be a pain in the bum, please could you tell me the colours you use on the trousers of the French and British foot .. I've always stared with a light grey, but my whites then come out looking too "clean". Your help would be so much appreciated.
Cheers,
Robert
Hi James,
It’s not related to this post, but to Fleet of Battle. How do command rules work in the game? Distance from squadron flagships, squadron integrity, etc. does any of this apply?
Your comments appreciated.
Kind regards
Happy Wanderer
White: I do a basic colour of Humbrol 84 (mid stone, which is a mucky looking light grey, greeny, beige). Then that with white, then white. I always found a base light grey made the finished result too 'clean' and 'dead' looking for white cloth.
Only using enamels this might not be much use to acrylic users but, I hope it helps.
Happy Wanderer, you've posted two questions and I'll answer both here, if I may.
Rather than do different base dice for different training I did base dice only for ship class (trireme, quadreme, etc.) Crew training isn't a dice, it's merely a modifier in the key tables. E.g. A seasoned ship is ramming so it gets up 1 (for training) to it's ship factor, it is attacking a seasoned target ship so a down 1 (for target class) is applied.
Ship squadron cohesion is relatively unimportant in the game. The only advantage of keeping a squadron together comes with being able to choose which ship moves first when the squadron is activated - you'll find ships from different squadrons physically get in the way of each other if you mix them up too much. Having a flagship within 8" does give up 1 to 'officer check' (see Seamanship) so that usefully gives incentive to 'bunch' ships in squadrons.
If memory serves, my basic thought was that, in naval battles, real command lies with individual ship's captains rather than admirals: Even in the age of sail, admirals and squadron commanders only gave orders for initial dispositions, a general overview of the battle plan and general instructions as to how the battle plan was to be undertaken. Once battle commenced it generally came down to captains because of the difficulty of order transmission. In a sea battle, the voice does not carry; you can't send runners with detailed instructions; in ancient times, signal flags (at least all but the most basic prearranged signals, like 'Attack Now!') had not been invented.
Hi James,
Thanks for that comprehensive response - excellent. All points understood.
Your thoughts about per deployment being the critical part played by admirals and then becoming less seem well founded. Even a multi stage battle such as Ecnomus probably had mostly to do with pre battle planning rather than opportunistic actions by individual squadrons that brought Rome victory.
http://www.theartofbattle.com/battle-of-cape-ecnomus-256-bc/
I think perhaps a pre battle plan such as you hint at with the pre battle map deployment is probably a good idea to reflect the rigid nature of naval warfare in ancient times. You almost want something as restrictive as the Spearhead command arrows thing...but that moves the game into a slightly different direction and doesn’t allow for free wheeling “Captain’s Initiative” actions.
FYI - I just picked up the new book on the Peloponnessian War which looks like a nice read specifically on this theatre...a great interest of mine and for which FoB I will use.
I will pass on my Fleet of Battle TableTopSimulator module link when I get it done. It’s looking very nice. You can see a few screen shots here on the Perfect Captain FB if you have access to FB.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=2966676980091992&set=p.2966676980091992&type=3&theater
Thanks again for a great set of rules.
HW
PS - as FoB was available online for free can I include it in the module now that it’s no longer easily available online? It’d be hard for people to use your game without the article...10 years down the track it should be OK I’d think.
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