My first forays into Napoleonics

 I feel a little scatterbrained with all the games I've been convinced I'm going to focus on over the last couple of weeks. But there is a madness to the method.

It started when a friend showed me his copy of Warhammer The Old World. I borrowed it, read it, and we played a game, but the figures I used were a mish-mash of Chaos Warriors and Beastmen, the former which were from Age of Sigmar.

I didn't have a complete square based Warhammer rank and file army, or enough models to make one. Certainly not a 2000 point army.

So I looked around my shelves and found an unopened box of Kings of War Goblins. I had put together and half-painted the gobs from one of the starter sets, but the megabox was still untouched. And I had the Kings of War books, so there was more than enough to get me going playing a complete game (even if it was going to be 1000pt to start).

The goal was to play a game without spending any money, or as little as possible, because I've been unemployed for 6 months now, and I've had to sell a lot of things (including my car) to stay afloat. 

I started building the goblin force, being a big fan of multibasing and moving an element rather than a block of individual troops, this is the one I felt would stick. This would be my focus.

But my brain being what it is, I started looking online at other games too. I got a copy of Kings of War Historical so that I could play with some of my other minis--I have 28mm & 20mm Greeks, 20mm Egyptians (damaged in a quake a few years ago so will need a rebase and maybe some replacement minis), and 20mm Romans. I don't know why I have so many 20mm minis, because it's my least favourite scale, but it is what it is. Oh and I have a couple of DBA forces worth of 15mm Romans and Goths. 

Going through some of my other minis, I found the western figures and buildings, one of which I put together a few days ago. 

And maybe it was stumbling on a Youtube video, maybe it was something else, but I remembered that I had bought some 6mm Napoleonics from Irregular a couple of years ago during lockdown. A division each of French and British infantry. And I had only just undercoated the French line infantry. 

I had a set of rules, my friend Dave gave me a copy of the Warlord Epic Black Powder book, but for some reason, I wanted something else. I found Valour & Fortitude on the Perry's website, written by Jarvis Johnson. Totally free, and very short.

But I wanted something more. I'll play it, but I kept looking, trying to find something better suited to 6mm and with a bit more depth (ironic as I'm always looking for simpler rules for most of my games).

I don't know. I can't really explain my brain's functions (or malfunctions).

I also have to say I don't really know anything about the Napoleonic wars other than very surface level stuff. I hadn't even seen the recent movie, which I didn't know existed until I started searching for Napoleonics a few days ago. So I'm trying to find where I can learn more, especially about military heirarchy and organisation so I can apply it to my force creation, but so far I haven't got far past searching Youtube. I know of all the Osprey books, but I'm on a zero dollar budget atm (which I need to be stricter about, but I'll get to that in a moment).

What I haven't really found is an introduction to Napoleonic wargaming for someone who doesn't know the full history and any of the military background. If you know of videos, blogs, articles, etc, then please point me to them as I would welcome it all.

After looking around at various rule sets, I settled on General d'Armee 2, which has just been released a few days ago. Written by Dave Brown of Reisswitz Press and sold through Too Fat Lardies, this looks like an excellent game. The C-in-C command system sounds interesting as well, and from what little I understand, it sounds like it will give me some of the chaos of sending commands to regiments or battalions with the possibility of failure. This reminds me a lot of Warmaster, which is still spiritually my favourite game ever.

I splashed out for the physical/PDF bundle because I struggle to read rulebooks in digital (but the bundle means I can at least start reading it while the physical is shipped). Even though it was NZ$110 including shipping (aargh), ironically, that was actually slightly cheaper than me buying new colour and b&w ink cartridges for my printer.

Part of this has been the result of actually starting to paint those 6mm minis and finding that in 3 hours, I had completed what was probably a whole battalion!

Yeah, completed from just the undercoat.

After seeing the progress I'd made compared to the slog of painting the 28mm Kings of War minis, I thought to myself, you know what? Stuff it. I'm doing this.

That was yesterday, and literally as I write this, I have completed all the infantry for the entire division. I have yet to paint the commanders, the artillery, and some other figures I haven't identified yet, but what a morale boost that is to paint so much so fast!

Tomorrow I'm starting on the British, plus I've ordered some MDF bases which should arrive in a few days, at which point I'll base the French I've just done.

OK, so here's what I've just completed in two days.

That's 72 strips of minis, each with 6 soldiers. So 432 figures in a weekend! Haha. 😃

I managed to get my process down to:

• undercoat black
• drybrush white over all figures
• paint sleeves and back of coats blue (vallejo flat blue)
• paint pants white
• paint white straps on back
• paint flags white (leaving black in folds)
• paint faces and hands (AK basic skin tone)
• repaint hats and bayonets black
• paint guns brown (AK tan earth) - not correct, but the brown stands out better than the black or silver would
• paint bayonets silver
• paint drums (AK light brown) - this stands out better than bronze would at this scale
• highlight drums with blue (mixed vallejo flat blue with white for more of a sky blue, something a bit darker than army painter electric blue)
• cackle maniacally 

Here are some more pics, with close-ups of how it all looks, which is admittedly horrible looking blown up to this scale. But they look great at a distance.

Also of note, the minis have a distinct cuff, so once I figure out what regiment these will represent, I'll paint the cuffs. Actually there are also distinct turn-backs, so I might even do those given how quick these are, it doesn't feel like a chore. 😄

After guns painted brown, this is what they look like from the front

Rear shot - Guns painted brown, white straps

This is all the minis in the Irregular infantry division pack

That's it really. 

This gives me hope for doing more 6mm minis and is a technique I might try for 10mm and 15mm as well. Normally these days I undercoat in mid-grey, but undercoating black and then dry-brushing white to pick out the details really made this go so fast.

I remember being daunted and not finishing my 15mm British WWII (Flames of War) army years ago because I was using the same techniques I used for 28mm. I mean, they looked amazing close up, but they took so long and at a distance, did that effort make much of a difference?

There is one problem though. These were so quick to finish that I'm going to be tempted to buy more and that's not something I can afford at the moment. 😂