Elements of my French Napoleonics (so far)

I don't know why, but the lighting at the community center in which the local convention, and indeed all the Trumpeter club meetings ( link ) are held, provides excellent lighting for camera work.  So I like taking my camera along to try (I am only a point-and-shoot operator) to get some in-focus shots.

Plastic Perry Cavalry. My line lancers conversions using their dragoon and hussar parts as detailed in previous posts.

Perry metal artillery.  Very little plastic artillery available and no French.

Perry line horse artillery.  Aiming the piece.

Perry French [6th] Hussars lovely in red.

The Battle/game of LaRothiere

My friend Seth made the trek north over the border to our local convention with his Austrian and Bavarian hordes to give battle to me and my French; finally placing on the table much of the figures we have spent the last 5 months (and many in the last 6 weeks) to get ready for the convention game.  That while developing a completely new set of rules to have the type of game we want.

And to our surprise, it all worked! It was indeed 2 1/2 hours into the game before the first complaint about the rules was lodged!  Legitimately I must add, as Seth and I had kinda ignored the issue, not knowing how to deal with realism vs the game/rules on the table.  Won't bore you with the particulars however the rest when well and the players seemed OK with all and we were happy with the game.

The complete French army at LaRothiere. What, you can't see all 45.000 of them?  (we are dealing with large ratios here - more a 6mm game with 28mm miniatures)  Still a nice looking wargame if I may say.

The scale is such that elements combat upon contact. Only artillery conduct ranged fire and that up to a mere 16".   Kiss'em to kill'em.  

While we had the table for the two game sessions (9 hours), with a long dinner break, we actually had two complete games (or would have if Seth and I were not chatting, talking to others and bagged from the day)
The first had five players and was to a conclusion - the Allies depleted having banged themselves against the French elites, the second just Seth and myself working on the rules commanding up to 50+ elements but having the turns move at about 10 minutes a turn regardless.   Once we finalize the concepts, and all the players have a couple of turns to get the factors in their heads I believe it is possible that Borodino could be fought to a conclusion in 8 hours or less.  My French Imperial Guard upsets the numbers somewhat by staying around longer, be most elements have a "shelve life" of 4 turns or so.   The players ability to judge when to bring in the reserves is the real part of the game, the combat itself a simple process.  That is what 'scale of command' we wanted to achieve.

Marching to "battle" (going to the Con)

Well, the annual local convention is due to start tomorrow and I am taking a break from the preparations  -- heck I still have tomorrow morning to work on things, right?
And like true Generals we wargamers think logistics when getting ready for our tabletop battles -- did I remember everything? Dice, terrain...oh bugger forgot the trees... measuring sticks (now where did I put them?), the figures - where are the Light Horse??!  Well you get the picture.

Now to box up everything and transport across town.

One year I forgot to bring my rules [they were still sitting on the nightstand having a late review]  I wonder what I will forget this year?

 Yes, I DID make a list, but still......

My French masses march to defend La Rothiere

Wargamer Quote of the Week

Asked on TMP:

Which should come first after choosing a gaming period:
a. painting and basing figures?
b. choosing rules and appropriate accessories for them?
c. Acquiring / building the game table?
d. Getting terrain for the game table?
e. a beverage of your choosing?
Curiously,
Mike

response by fellow local wargamer in Seattle   Mserafin
 "Definitely the beverage. Only alcohol fuzzes up reality enough for me to commit to yet another period."


good one Mark!  Happened to me.
...DougH

"Villages"

The great debates in wargaming (well, among the many...) is the problem of scale.    It is not the 15mm vs 28mm debate and which is the 'true' version, or even that 28mm is a measurement and not an indication of scale argument, but the vertical vs horizontal debate.
We have a miniature representing X number of troops. Fine. But how large an area does this number of troops occupy on the battlefield we are trying to respresent?  If the battlefield is X yards to the centimeter (or to the inch if you want) then how many miniatures can occupy that space?  If a to-the-miniatures 'scale' building is added, how large an area does it occupy?  3 or 4 hectares? Many acres? Huh?!  If a very nice two story historic farm building with the appropriate scaled doors so a 28mm figure could enter, would have of the horizontal footprint of the Airbus factory how is that on our tabletop vis-a-vis our field scale?

So how does one work around this?  Most wargamers downsize the models; use 15mm buildings for 28mm games. Some make them correct size vertically but severely shortened horizontally so the buildings are very tall but extremely thin.


OK for single buildings but whole villages?  I went the way of many, and went with the single building approach on a somewhat larger base.  This should work even if one of our elements (the size of which you can see in the pieces of wood in the photo below)

I guess I am thinking in the future with my age and all I will be unable to lug around the 40 kilos of lead and terrain like I have done in the past, so again for the weight consideration, I have made the 'villages' from some old card building prints I had stocked away (I have no idea when or how I acquired these but I suspect from my mother-in-law...) I had copies made varying the tint each print so each would look somewhat different.

28mm Perry cavalry charge past the village

Anyway the price was right at only a dollar a building and with a bit of paint touch up to eliminate the card stock white edges and darken the chimneys and such; and with the ground work and shrubbery attached to the lightweight foamcore base, they should do the part until something better comes along.

The mini trees are merely twigs jammed into the foamcore and topped with some green foam bits.  The brick wall is a strip of foamcore covered in a brick print.  Very light weight!  I glued some fine grit sandpaper to the bottom to grip the mat and prevent movement during a game.

French line cav plastics

I'll start this rather tardy post with the conversions I made to create elements of French line cavalry.  I am in the process of 'mixing and matching' creating the different French cavalry formations which, while readily available in metal, are...well...metal and thus heavy.  I like the plastic sculpts and transporting is lighter.

My Line Lanciers (above photo) are hussar horses, dragoon bodies, dragoon helmets with carabinier crests attached and dismounted dragoon arms with the carbine removed and lance added. This dragoon model has the heavy gloves close in the body which would be difficult to remove as well as its heavy boots, but illustrations I have seen (also noted in the Osprey book of the topic) has found them with such apparel and blackened.

My Chasseurs a Cheval (French light horse) are hussar horses, dragoon trumpeter torsos (minus the lace which I scraped off), hussar legs and infantry forage caps!

The above unit is rather unique.  With the quick transition from the Restoration back to the rule of Napoleon, many units took the expedient route and quickly removed any royalist markings. The 1st Chasseurs, being the first and given the Roi title were given special helmets by the King.  While they removed the "RO" they apparently left the I (the 1st) and did not change this headgear which they used in the 100 days (Waterloo) Campaign.
My unit is again scraped off lace work of the trumpeter upper torso (the Perrys thoughtfully offered two upper torsos) attached to hussar legs and given Carabiniers helmets with a different paint job.

My units are only three strong (elements) so not much work and fun to do.

100 Days campaign (Waterloo) - the Big Project

Been awhile as I have been very busy painting and if not that, conducting normal life.  Boring stuff like grocery shopping, work, exercise, etc.

However, as my friends point out, I am a hard core wargamer.  So I spend more time than what might be considered mentally healthy, thinking about my hobby. One such aspect is the ever growing 100 Days Napoleonic campaign of 1815 (aka Waterloo).  It has sprung from a drunken discussion for doing Leipzig in a big way, to doing a more moderate 1813 battle (Hanau) with my friend Seth, to doing a later battle in 1814 with a very similar OOB (Montmirail) for myself, to doing a even later larger campaign (Waterloo). 
The jump of logic to Waterloo should be explained.  Montmirail had both Prussians and many more Russians fighting Napoleon but I had way over-bought Prussians for the ratio I was working with (I get so excited with good sale prices. Sigh)  that I needed to find another battle to work towards with many more Prussians in it. Yes, I could have sold the extras but were is the fun in that?
Well, the Waterloo campaign which I have always been into since I started the hobby as one of my first wargame books was on the subject and on finding an old AH small boardgame with the formation chits matching perfectly with my unit ratios, that I now have switched gears toward this new project. And it is a biggie!

How big? Well, as a long-time wargamer I really should not do this I know, but I calculated that it will be just over 1,000 28mm miniatures.  Oh, and to have painted and based and ready by, of course, June 2015.....

But calculation was very much need as I did not want to over-buy once again and so took the time to get the units proportioned out just right. 
I have now assigned each formation the specific units to be painted.  I started with even a tighter ratio but reality kicked in (!!) and I reduced my element numbers, with a combined arms totals, to approximately 2,500 troops per element

Showing ~10,000, a large Division or so. Yup, doing a 6mm basing style with 28mm. However looks good on the table and with the right rule set, will be a fine game

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The French will have 49 total elements, the Allied Army 35, and the Prussians 46.  As a quarter of the elements are horse at only 3 figures per element and infantry at only 8 to 12 per, and artillery at only 1 model, each unit is not that many to paint. Keep chanting that, I say to myself... 
I have always loved the period and the campaign, it has lots of inspiration, and with a high figure ratio, I get to pick a choose which units out of a division I would like to paint, for me it has a lot going for it...except my over-doing it of course!

Thus my musings to add to the other hundreds of other wargamers doing the same campaign/battles/scenarios for Waterloo and the 100 Days Campaign. Crazy loves company....

Painting, but nothing to show

I have been painting alot these days, but really nothing to show.  Unfortunately I am having "technical" difficulties uploading photos and have not had the time to get a new 'uploader' thingy.  (yes I am a technophobe!) I believe this is the problem but I ain't no expert....

I am still going strong in my wargaming preparing for a large Napoleonic game at the local convention on the first weekend in April. Very stoked about this and thus purchasing and prepping (gluing mostly plastics) like a madman. (usual condition by the way!)  However I have a few friends who are also looking for me to get some figures painted for them and so I have been extremely busy with all this lately. 

Thus essentially nothing to comment on.  Sorry but there it is. 

Terrain is just as important....

While it is getting a little better these days, what with the internet to show beautiful miniatures, and of course the glossy wargame magazines to illustrate the best examples of the sculpting and painting art; but perhaps we put in too much time into the look of the miniatures and not in the setting in which we display them on the tabletop. Consider a beautifully chair sitting in an unfinished garage. 

But many times we see, and have done ourselves no doubt, putting nicely painted, well done, realistically based figures on a plain green cloth with a few haphazard trees on felt with a brown cardboard road.  Blech.

I am trying to look less at the lead-bin bargains and trying more at the terraining aspects these days and spending the money and time to build up the tabletop terrain.

I have recently bought ready made plastic trees (I will go with the less expensive make-your-own variety in the future but wanted to know if this is the direction of the 'forest' type I wanted).

I cut out random shapes out of hardboard glued the trees upon and did my usual terrain/basing technique.  Not much undergrowth so to allow troops to move through if required and the subtle outline will allow the large stand to work as only 'decoration'.  Better than just plain felt.  Storage is more difficult but sacrifices are sometimes required!

Now back to painting minis..... ;-)

On the Road to Paris

Nansouty's big bad 6's Guard Horse

In 1815 after his abdication and exile to the island of Elba, Napoleon returned to France, challenged the King's force meant to stop him,  which promptly returned to his command. The Bourbon King then fled .
But what if the ex-Imperial army did not come back to Napoleon, and indeed did try to stop Napoleon and his small army of Guardsmen from moving to Paris? And if Napoleon pulls his "And France is me!!" stunt, would it work or the be the death of him?    This what-if scenario pits Frenchman vs Frenchman in this Napoleonic battle. 

Not a bad what-if battle..... considering I only have French painted at this time!  Hey, if King Louis XVII had any backbone....

So I hauled the figures to, for me is a rare club GameNight and had a few of the usuals want to command.  I took some time explaining the rationalization of these rules.  For the most part they got it but it is funny how some of the 'traditional wargaming concepts' still come out. 

Bonapartists on the left, Royalist on the right.  The nice 'village' model I took some time during the week to terrain was never seriously attacked...sigh. 

For some of the players the big advantage of the Guard morale/combat effectiveness was highly discouraging.  "Look at the math, I have not chance of hurting that element.  I will lose all the time!!"  But, I say, have you even tried to wear him down? You have more units, hit him in the flank.  Hmmpf, the player shrugs, not with the pips I am getting, he says.  Well, thems the break.

However on the other flank, with the much abler Andrew handling his forces  more adroitly, the weaker Royalists, managed to wear down the Bonapartist Guard units, blocking others with well placed cavalry, and eventually making hors-de-combat two Guard infantry elements ( their only losses however. The Royalists lost 11 !)

A change in the game occurred as, Jim, the player with Napoleon, really, really, wanted to test my, only for this scenario, "And France is Me!" rule.

-->

Premise: Napoleon held great sway with the ex-imperial troops and so if an Royalist unit is in combat with a Guard unit with which Napoleon is attached may be called to return to the Emperor during the battle.

The “Napoleon” player may then call “And France is me!” He then rolls 1d6 and consults the following chart:

roll results

5 or 6 = The Royalist unit collapses in jubilation and cries of “Vive le Empereur!” throwing down their weapons to cheers. The unit is hors-de-combat for the remainder of the game.

4 = the Royalist unit is overawed by the Emperor and takes a -2 combat modifier this turn

3 = Napoleon is unhorsed and his health is unknown. The Guard unit takes a -2 modifier this turn

2 = Napoleon is wounded, the Guard unit angered by this injury to their Emperor receives a +2 combat modifier for the remainder of the close combat with this Royalist unit(s).

1 = Napoleon falls to a bullet and is killed. His dreams and the battle are done.

Thus he managed to roll for this most every turn! He actually never had old Nappy killed but one of the rolls was a 3 -- Napoleon was 'unhorsed and health unknown'. So I stated to all the players around the table that the rumor spread quickly through the army and hearts sank at the Emperor perhaps dead.  Thus I decreased all the Guard MP values by half.  The Royalists players, now seeing the odds a little more even, regained their own morale and in some instances, even went into the attack!  But like I said eventually lost 2-11.

The rules worked fairly well.  Many of the changes necessary were for the 'what you could or could not do' variety.  The MP values became very important (as they should be). Good troops will kick lesser troops butt most of the time.
Attrition seemed to be very important and the only way for lesser troops to deal with the Guard is to be a 'speed bump' after 'speed bump' until the Guard was 'slowed down'.  The players did use the General's "Rally Points" to influence some element's effectiveness but that was kinda the theory, so that worked. As they only have a small number of them, their use should be limited and have only local influence.  Again, like history, the timing will be the key.

Obviously, just in real military history, but not necessarily wargames, reserves are very important.  Fresh troops, with high MP factors, could certainly turn the tide of a battle, which is why the better commanders would keep them uncommitted for as long as possible.  Wargame players, not caring about strategic objectives or fight-another-day ideals, knowing that in 1 hour and 12 minutes the game will end because Fred needs to get up to get to work at 6am... will commit all and at once for the big victory.  For wargames defeat is only met with a small ribbing by the others and glib comments so battles are never done to their conclusions or retreats are conducted.
So unlike most wargames however I believe these rules could work into campaign games very well because of the swift and dramatic attrition in battle and will try to get some gamers to participate -- once I get enough miniatures painted that is!


Surprisingly the one issue which they did not comment upon was the use of only one move distance regardless of troop type, horse, infantry or artillery as all moved the same distance.  Good news that. No justifications required!   I made lengths of wood sticks for the purpose and for ranged fire and they were well used.

The "Royalist" array.  One can note all the bags etc on the table as we only used a 6 by 4' mat and had lots of maneuver space.  At only 6" a move, one can have a very tight battle even with the 28mm miniatures I used.      Obviously photographed early in the battle as only two eliminated Royalist elements are in the background.  The number of them did grow!

 One pleasing aspect was the compliments about the overall look of the bases and the elements.  The small number of figures on each did not seem to be an issue and many observers commented favorably on the effect.

Andrew used 'wave attacks' with one element replacing the previous to wear down the very stubborn Guard units.  One will need alot (!) of lesser troops to do the job.  One now can understand the battles of 1813 and 1814 as battles of attrition with more appreciation.

Napoleonic Playtest

Continuing to work on our joint venture to put on the Battle of Hanau (October 30th, 1813), Seth came up last weekend to playtest the new rules I have been developing.
Because of our use of very large base sizing, the type of grand tactical game we have envisioned, and the requirement to keep the game rules as simple as possible for the convention but still be Napoleonic in style, we felt a whole new concept is required.

The lone picture (we both had technical difficulties with our cameras!) shows to good effect the look of the game.  One should ignore the uncompleted bases and rudimentary terrain as this was a private game we did much to hammer out the concepts.  Of course this was between two like minds; once played by the convention player, the rules will surely fall apart <grin>

But the game did keep us stoked about the whole project.

I now understand the popularity of the Austrians.  Very effective looking on the tabletop.  Easy to paint (white primer, a touch of flesh, browns and facing colors, a quick wash and taa daa) and the white wave of their infantry crashes upon the enemy. 

(please note that the rules will not be published and are strictly a private venture and perhaps, after the convention, thrown away!)

'Hanau' French completed

I have happily met my obligations to paint up the French troops for the Battle of Hanau ( October 1813) with the completion of the Imperial Guard Chasseurs a Cheval.  These are in their campaign dress - so no plumes, no pelisse, no colpack bags blowing in the wind....  Rather boring in their green uniform actually. 

My original intent was to do the 1814 Campaign for France which was fought in the winter and a wet spring; so conceptually I wanted most units in their practical campaign dress.   Not very colorful but realistic. Thus my newly painted Young Guard are thus attired with mud encrusted hems of their overcoats and loose march order showing their fatigue in fighting for Napoleon's glory.

The figures are Victrix Chasseurs of the Guard with an assortment of miscellaneous Perry heads. I did not add some backpacks and thus added the crossbelts on the back to further give a ragtag feel.  I wanted a motley look  :-)

[ For those questioning: the dice are for 'hits' and are in small divots in the terrain putty mud.  The blank sections at the rear of the stands make for easy placement of the formation's or commanding General's information card.
Yes the stands are very thick but this to to encourage the use of the stand not the handling of the figures by players.  The flocking blends the stands into the table quite well however ]

Plastic and sun

Oh yeah, clipping plastic bits off of sprues is fun in the sun.  The sun finally makes an appearance after many weeks of hiding under clouds and rain.  So to take advantage of the light and, frankly, its morale lifting effect, I have set up a table in my south-facing office room and listened to podcasts while clipping and gluing at least a few of the many boxes of plastic Napoleonics I have acquired recently.
The largest advantage the plastics is weight; the lack thereof. However, aslo the Perrys are VERY nice sculpts.  While yes, I could get the horse in the required groups of three as sold by the Perrys, and for which I have bought many different packs already; the plastics offer modelling possiblities which are not available or would be difficult to do in metal.
 For example the 1st CaC of the Waterloo campaign were the ex-"Roi Chasseurs a Cheval" of the Restoration which did not, in the mere three months of the change back to Napoleon, manage or perhaps want to, part with their distinctive headdress.  Thus they wore, what to me looked very similar in shape to the carabineer helmet of which I had extras from the Perry Heavy horse box. The dragoon box has the upper torso for the trumpeter which I scraped off the lace - easy(ish) to do with plastic, much more problematic with metal - and used extra French hussar legs to complete the unit!  Now the unique 1st CaC will represent Pire's Light Cavalry Division of Reille's Corps of which it was one of the units. 

Anyway, sitting in the sun I can listen to podcasts and of the many various editions one had a Canadian military historian give a lecture about the logistic buildup for the Canadian attack on Vimy Ridge during WW1. (podcast) It is quite apparent that armchair generals speak of tactics (such as ourselves - luckily we wargamers do not need to feed and supply OUR troops)   Real generals speak of logistics.  One of the many aspects which lead the commander Gen. Currie to victory in spite of huge problems to overcome. 

But right now my main problem is not to get any more glue on top of this miniature's torso I am struggling to put together......

Again in the Russian steppes

A Monday night game at Francis' which unfortunately for me is a bit of rarity these days.  While they are building planes for the latest 'Dave Craze' (1:72 scale WW1 planes for Canvas Eagles) the boys are playing a lot of WW2 15mm. Both Francis and Dave have big collections.

I joined Kev for a German attack upon a Russian strongpoint. I will not bore you will a blow by blow, but let it be said that the Russian dice were not very good and with the poor Russian 'training' and the Battlefront rules which hamper ill-trained troops, the battle was one-sided even though technically, with no time left in the night, the Germans had not penetrated the Russian defenses. (more a fault of the scenario (distance) than casualties or such)
 For a rare time, I seemed to have the best of the dice, with at least five T-34's destroyed by time end....and one plane!

The Russian defenses

my force of Germans

The results of the Russian surprise flank attack. I seemed to roll particularly well during the game!

The Russians bring up the reserves.  Dave believes we probably have a Tiger off table. I say, "No, Dave we do not have a Tiger coming on... (he now thinks "more than one?!") But no, it is but a lone Elefant!

Francis (left) hopes that this roll will not be another 1, but Dave does not seem that convinced

Part of Kev's force of elites.  SS in peadot, painted by me for Francis an few years ago.  The over sized dots on these 15mm show up better at distance so more identifiable on the table.

Oh and that plane I mentioned I had shot down, by a tank no less?  And thankful I did too as Dave forgot to bring the proper model (and it was the "special thing" of the scenario!)  so substituted this white 'object' unpainted upon the table!  Shame, shame!

More French additions

It is horrible how the Holiday season can interrupt routines.  But nevertheless it can allow for some good quality painting time so I have created a few additions to my now completely insane Napoleonics project.  As usual it has expanded beyond my originally sizable limits to now doing the whole Hundred Days campaign, albeit at a 1 element to 2,000 infantrymen ratio.  Still nuts though.

Some of the units so far are noted below. 

Perry metal French Imperial Guard 2nd (Red) Lanciers

Some of the cavalry will be in metal, some in plastic depending upon availability for the most part.  And while the Perrys do create the required types, I will mix and match parts and do much modelling to create what I can in plastic for mainly the weight issue.

Perry French Line Horse Artillery

Most of the artillery will be, by necessity metal as only Victrix with their British Artillery box set, has created any in plastic.  The Perrys are good, well posed with each figure 'playing' its part.  For example the gun-layer of the above set of French Line Horse Artillery is so matched to the gun model that for gluing down the figure, the gun model did not require any glue to fully secure it to the base!

The infantry are again plastics and are in marching pose for the most part which is fine with me.  Most will be this way as can be seen in the above photo of the over-coated French masses.  The Perry versions are the unit to the right, while the two following units are Essex.  These I picked up from a sale very inexpensively but some of which were from the Revolutionary era; so it was off with their heads to be replaced with spare Perry heads.  They are a tad smaller than the more modern sculpts but this is not noticeable from above and so added another four elements to the French.

While most are in march pose, the Victrix Guard boxes had a couple of poses which were not 'moving' and so were destined to be in the 'firing line'.   With these I created two elements of the Young Guard Tirailleurs.
This first one I added a spare limber (Prussian) to add some space and drama to the vignette (and I was a couple guys short!).

While I would love to take credit and say I conceived of the action and glued the arms, made adjustments and sculpted them; I merely grabbed arms out of the trays and glued them on to the torso in almost random fashion.  Only after painting did I then take the time to position each according to what they appeared to be doing.  For example the figure in the middle behind the limber appears to be adjusting the firing lock on his musket (or some such).  Have no idea what the original arm positions were intended but I only made sure a right arm was on a right side of the body. Funny how the positions kinda make sense in context.


This is especially evident in the next photo of the second element as the you can almost hear the dialog of the middle two front figures.
"Mon deu, why does the musket not fire?!"
"I think your firing spring is broken.
"Where?"
"That thing there"

Trust me, while painting them I was wondering how the pointing guy was ever going to look good individually but together with that other mal-aligned pose, they seem to pull it off.
Mind you marching poses are way quicker to glue together and quicker to paint!  They better be...I have boxes of the buggers to do......

"Square" Markers

OK, here is one of those stories, dare I say typical (?) of the wargamer and his hobby.

For the new Napoleonics project,  units are on solid, one piece bases.  But Napoleonics are all about the 'square' formation, is it not?
Before this era, the SYW or AWI for example, do we have units going into square to beat off cavalry?  Nope.
After? in the Franco-Prussian War say. No again.

Even if the stand represents many individual units (the stand ratio 1 : 1,000 to 2,000 men). Tactics would suggest the square as a tactical option be available to the player. Rather than painting up an extra 100 or so miniatures for elements to be placed in pretty square shaped vignettes ( as nice as that would look!) is the need to have a marker to give the visual reminder to all the players that the unit may indeed get a modifier or some such.

Sooo, I need a marker.  And not some lame cardboard chit or colored fluff ball. Yuck.   With that in the back of my mind, I looked around the local dollar store and discovered blocks of wood.  Squares for, ahh, squares!

While quite large for the table at 5/8" or 15mm a side, I sought to minimize their obtrusive effect by painting them black and terrain the top side.  The effect can be make from the photo, whether it has been achieved.  Hopefully visible and yet not.

My French Marine Artillery formation 'in square' against Perry plastic French Cuirassiers.  (Obviously an internal dispute about the brandy rations or some such!)

Soldiering on

Reading the narratives of Napoleonic campaigns, one is struck by the endurance of the soldiers.  Sleeping what can only be a fitful sleep on soddened ground with only a dirty coat as warmth, with little or no food in the belly, only to woken before dawn to march another long march burdened by musket, pack and equipment.  Then to be thrown into a maelstrom of cannon and fire and slashing swords; of immediate death and panic, only to survive to see the horribly wounded and dying.  Yet to march off again wet and tired to fight the next day and go through the horror once again.
As I muse these thoughts to my wife early this Wednesday workday morning, her only comment:
"So it's like 9 to 5...."

French Line in overcoats

My latest painting are these Perry plastics.  I finding it amusing that in doing Napoleonics I choose the overcoat types over the regulation dress (the boys in the bright plumes and such).  In fact all the Perry 'Bardin' poses are still on the sprues!

Contrary to the brightly attired attraction of the Napoleonics in full dress uniforms I seem to be drawn to the covered-in-mud campaigns of 1814 France and the Hundred Days -  conducted in the rain for the most part.

Perhaps as we get older the attraction of fashionable but perhaps uncomfortable, or at least showy duds, leads to more practical clothing. Nothing more practical in the Napoleonic age than a greatcoat and waterproofed shako or forage cap. So much of my early units are thus...making the painting much easier by the way!

However one crack in this theory came as I had completed the painting and had terrained the units and viewing them on the table.  "What a dull lot" I thought.  Then I observed that I had forgotten to paint the pompoms on the shakos!  Hmm, well the orange, purple and bright blues should add a bit, what. 
Certainly did.  With that splash of color I am back on the true Napoleonics train.....

Perry metal General with accompanying Victrix infantryman

French Naval Artillery Regiments

This unique Napoleonic unit(s) fought during the 1813 and 1814 campaigns when after destroying his Grande Armee in Russia, Napoleon looked to various sources of manpower.  The naval ships, blockaded in harbors, proved to be a surprisingly good source of quality troops in this regard. While often incorrectly titled as 'Marines',  these Naval Artillery units could be considered elite, or at least, very reliable and conducted themselves well in an infantry role.

While there is some debate about the uniform and color of the belts, I went with the "classic" dark blue artillery overcoat, white belts and red shoulder fringes.  The distinctive carrot-shaped pompon of these units, I made, adding a bit of 'green stuff' to the existing round pompon on the shako.  I got them sort of the same size and my heavy coats of paint hides many imperfections.

The small d6 die is placed within a divot in the terrain and used to indicate any change in the unit's morale/hits.  The blank space in the rear will be used to easily attach the unit's commander's name for game purposes.

I'll add a photo of my Imperial Guard.  One can understand the Prussian reports from the fight for Mockern during the Battle of Leipzig (1813) mistakingly having fought with elements of the French Guard rather than these fine units.