6mm Help needed for Bavarian general

[graham]

Trying to work out what Bavarians I should get based on orders of battle. Have we decided on a standard number of figs per base and how many bases per regiment or battalion (or per 1000) of infantry and cavalry. (Looks like I may have some spare Hussars!}

[terrywarden]

Hi Graham; It looks like the general agreement is to go with 24 figures per base (I may do some as 36) and each base to represent a Battalion.

[Matt]

Does this mean that you're going to increase the number of bases in use as I thought in M&R a base was a Brigade?

[Mark Wightman]

Oct 22, 2008 9:48:00 GMT Matt said:

Does this mean that you're going to increase the number of bases in use as I thought in M&R a base was a Brigade?

The units in M&R are brigades.

I'm not going to paint my figures as brigades though. That would be a bit dull. Plus I'd have to decide which of the many battalions present to paint them as.

My plan was to put 24 infantry figures on 60 x 30 base (2 lines of 3 strips, so 24 per base). This isn't right for M&R, where the bases should be square, but it will do. I'll paint these as a single Battalion.

When playing M&R I can then use 2 of them to represent a unit (brigade) 120 x 30mm in FF, or 60 x 60mm in MF.

Actually - thinking about this as I type, we could even use 4 of my battalions to represent a single M&R unit. Treating 2 60 x 30mm bases deployed one behind the other (60 x 60) as a single M&R stand. A unit would then be 120 x 60mm in FF, and 60 x 120 in MF.

That sounds much better, but much more expensive.

Hmmmm - may have to consider getting some 60 x 60 bases instead of 60 x 30, but then the figures wouldn't be as useful for use with other rule sets. Tricky, but I think the 60 x 30 is the way to go.

[graham]

OK ! will go for 24 little chaps per battalion (or 36 if in 3 ranks).

My next question - How many Cavalry figs per base / squadron battalion etc???

Sorry for the questions but trying to get what Bavarians I need for Blenheim from Baccus at Leeds...its all quite shocking I never realised there were so many of them.

[terrywarden]

I think the main point is that we are agreed upon the 60x30 bases; I am sure the units at some point will be used to represent Brigades; Battalions, Regiments...... I have purchased some 30x30 for commanders and a few 60x60 for the artillery. As for the cavalry I would say what every fits comfortably on to the base I would think 8 - 9 figures.

[Mark Wightman]

Oct 22, 2008 10:55:07 GMT graham said:

OK ! will go for 24 little chaps per battalion (or 36 if in 3 ranks).

My next question - How many Cavalry figs per base / squadron battalion etc???

Sorry for the questions but trying to get what Bavarians I need for Blenheim from Baccus at Leeds...its all quite shocking I never realised there were so many of them.

The Cavalry is much harder to sort out.

The easy bit is that I think that 9 figures per 60 x 30 mm base looks about right.

The hard bit is how big is a squadron - as it's never the same.

For example @ Blenheim

French
Gendarmares = 8 squadrons = 1500 men

Bavarians (Massenbach's Brigade)
* Regiment de Royal (three squadrons, 360 men)
* Regiment de La Ferronnaye (two squadrons, 240 men)
* Regiment de Levy (two squadrons, 240 men)
= 7 Squadrons =840 men

Hard to reconcile those figures.

It might be best just to look at it in M&R terms. They've based their game on a "unit" being equal to about 4 Battalions (2000 men) or 10 squadrons (1000-1200) men.

So, how many you would need will depend on how many stands you use to represent the basic unit from M&R.

Now I'm leaning towards using 4 bases of Infantry as a unit, and thus 4 bases of cavalry would match that. Each base would represent approximately 2 squadrons of Cavalry. Using the example above I'd deploy Massenbach's Brigade as follows:

Either:

A: 2 bases Regiment de Royal (three squadrons, 360 men)
1 base Regiment de La Ferronnaye (two squadrons, 240 men)
1 base Regiment de Levy (two squadrons, 240 men)

or combine the Brigade with the other 1st line brigade

B: 1 base Regiment de Royal (three squadrons, 360 men)
1 base Regiment de La Ferronnaye (two squadrons, 240 men)
1 base Regiment de Levy (two squadrons, 240 men)
1 base Regiment de Prince Charles de Lorraine (two squadrons, 240 men)
or Regiment de Choiseul (two squadrons, 240 men)

There is no right answer to this.

[Matt]

I think the think to remember is that with M&R as with Grand Armee the bases are representative of a brigade and indeed its suggested that in 6mm you can turn your base into a mini diorama.

The actual number of miniatures etc.. is not entirely relevant apart it should look right.

As for Base depth, I thought Grand Armee worked on square bases but not M&R. M&R does not rely on depth, merely BW. ( although I could be wrong - rules hopefully here at the weekend!)

Having played on a 6x4 board with 2"by 1" bases in 15mm I would imagine that square bases would look wrong to my mind. I think 60x30 seems about right and better still would enable us to play Polemos at the same time if the mood took us.

Of course I say all this I'm still trying to negotiate some additional finances to fund this as apparently we need all are money for my wedding! tch some people have got their priorities all wrong!

[Mark Wightman]

Oct 22, 2008 12:44:26 GMT Matt said:

As for Base depth, I thought Grand Armee worked on square bases but not M&R. M&R does not rely on depth, merely BW. ( although I could be wrong - rules hopefully here at the weekend!)

Grand Armee works with 3" square bases regardless of miniature size.

M&R confuses things. For 20mm+ figures they recommend 2" x 2" (50 x 50). For <20mm they recommend 2" x 1" (50 x 25).

The square bases didn't look wrong with 25mm figures, but I guess it could with the 6mm ones. Still, if we base them on 60 x 30's we can do either, simply by doubling up to give 60 x 60's, should we need to.

I'm going to build my army based upon the assumption that each 60 x 30 base is a battalion or two squadrons. I may end up with twice as many troops as I need, but I think the bigger unit will look better on the table.