With my mind on my minis . . .

 . . . and my minis on my mind.

I've been thinking of late about a project for one of the Black Book series of rules from Warlord (Black Powder, Hail Caesar, etc.).  I quite enjoy them, as last week's game reminded me, and own Black Powder and the Age of Reason supplement, Last Argument of Kings.  I've also been itching to work on some sort of big, long term project in the Black Powder period in 15mm.  While there's real appeal to doing something for the SYW (either in Europe or the colonies), the War of the Spanish Succession (have you SEEN the new Khurasan minis?), or the Great Northern War, I have a passion for the AB range, already have some AB Russian guard, and the Napoleonic period offers a greater variety of painting options than any others.  So, down the rabbit hole I go.

After some consultation (and an excellent suggestion from JJM, the THMG's English ambassador), I've decided to build some preliminary forces around the fighting on the first day of the Battle of Kulm, also known as the Battle of Priesten.  It's actually an interesting engagement, in which a rearguard composed of the Russian guard corps, supported by line troops and cavalry, hold off steadily increasing pressure from the French.   It reminds me a little of the first day of Gettysburg, where a small holding action gradually escalates into a massive dog pile.

With the Nafziger lists now available online, I was able to track down OOBs for both the Russians / Allies and the French.  To keep things manageable, I'm going to work on the approximate scale where 1 brigade of 4-6 battalions (or squadrons) is a BP unit, and a BP brigade roughly translates into a division.  While this isn't perfect (I need to fudge some of the historical formations into BP terms), it does give a reasonable organisational framework for planning out units / purchases and painting.  Loosely speaking, the Russian and Allied forces break down like this:

Russian / Allied General:  Generallieutenant Osterman-Tolstoy

BP Brigade 1 (Left Wing, Centre, of 1st line, General Bistrom I and Colonel Schelwinski)

Unit 1

Russian Guard Jager Regiment (3)

Murmon Infantry Regiment (2)

Unit 2

Guard Hussar Regiment (6)

Unit 3

Revel Infantry Regiment (2)

4th Jager Regiment (2)

BP Brigade 2 (Right wing of 1st line, Generalmajor Knorring)

Unit 1

Empress Curiassier Regiment (4)

Unit 2

Tartar Uhlan Regiment (6)

Unit 3

Illowaiski #12 Cossack Pulk

Unit 4

Loubny Hussar Regiment (2)

Serpuchov Uhlan Regiment (3)

                        Unit 5

Guard Horse Battery #1 (Bistram) (12 guns)

                       Unit 6 

                                    Erzherzog Johann Dragoon Regiment (4) (Austrian)

BP Brigade 3 (2nd line, V Guard Corps: Generallieutenant Yermolov

     

Unit 1:  1st Guard Infantry Division: Generalmajor Baron Rosen

Brigade: Generalmajor Potemkin

Preobragenski Guard Infantry (3)

Semenovski Guard Infantry (3)

Unit 2: (small?)

Brigade: Generalmajor Krapovitzsky

Ismailov Guard Infantry (3)

Unit 3:

            Guard Light Battery #1

Unit 4:

Guard Heavy Battery #2

Unit 5 Generalmajor Ljalin's Brigade, part of 14th Division: Generalmajor Helfreich

Tenguinsk Infantry Regiment (2)

Estonia Infantry Regiment (2)

Grand Duchess Catherine Battalion

            Unit 6:

                        (?) ½ Light Battery #6 (6 guns - not sure how to handle this?)

BP Brigade 4: 3rd Division: Generalmajor Schachafskoy (part of 2nd Russian Corps: Generallieutenant Duke Eugen von Württemberg)

Unit 1 Brigade: Colonel Wolff

Tchernigov Infantry Regiment (2)

Selenguinsk Infantry Regiment (2)

            Unit 2 4th Division: Brigade: Colonel Treffurt (small?)

Tobolsk Infantry Regiment (2)

Minsk Infantry Regiment (1)

             Unit 3 Corps Artillery:

                         Light Battery #27 (Baikov) (12 guns)

             Unit 4 

                         Heavy Battery # 14 (Cerenissomov) (12 guns) 

There's also two units of cavalry, part of the guard corps, that arrived later.  I'll have to figure out how to accommodate command for them:

Guard Uhlan Regiment (6)

Guard Dragoon Regiment (6)

You can see what I mean about fudging.  The historical OOB doesn't fit neatly into Black Powder terms, and even approximating it leaves me with some "light" brigades and units.  I can tinker with it as I go, of course, and in the mean time, it gives me something to build with.  One thing I find appealing is the ability to have multiple historical units comprise a BP unit.  It means more flags, more command, and more pretty on the table.  As all normal sized BP units are 6 stands, I'm going to have to fudge here a little as well.  The unit comprised of 3 battalions of two different guard regiments is straightforward; the one comprised of three different line units is less so.  Another way to do it would be to simply total up the available batallions of each type, and arbitrarily assign them to units / brigades, but that seems a little hinky.

Anyone with experience adapting historical OOBs to game terms, I'd much appreciate any advice you can give on the process.

FMB

WiP, reviews, booty.

Hi,

I've made a bit of progress over the last couple nights, once the kids are in bed.  Horses for the first (Mamluk command) base of the Ayyubids are finished, though I might pick out the manes and tails a bit more.  I'll do skin and mail on these next, and then have some fun with the scarves etc. and tack.



I've also snatched some time to read through The Last Argument of Kings, and part way through Black Powder (backwards, I know), and am enjoying both, not only as rules, but also as an engaging read, something I've rarely said about wargames rules.

LAoK serves as a broad survey of the major European conflicts of the 18th century, including the European colonial conflicts.  It begins with a few general modifications to the basic rules to reinforce the linearity of the period tactics, and a discussion of some of the developments of the period, but the real meat of the book lies in the later chapters.  Each of these focuses on a particular conflict, and generally consist of a brief history, and then profiles of key personalities and their associated nation and army.

In the section on the War of the Spanish Succession, for example, we have a brief survey on the causes and events of the war, a profile (and accompanying game-relevant crunchy bits) on Maurice de Saxe, and the profile for the French army in the 18th c., including both a historical sketch of the army, and broad guidelines in game terms.  These include stats for various units, guides to building an army (in both percentiles and absolutes for rarer units), and tweaks to the army at different points in the period covered.  Grognards may balk at the idea of a single list for the entire 18th c,. but it fits in well with the overall logic of the BP approach, which seems to be "here's a framework that works for us, it's plenty to get you started, muck around with it as you will".

In addition, I've dropped a bit of Christmas gold (filthy lucre anyway; frankincense and myrrh never seem to make it under the tree) on some reading material.  First up were a couple books I've heard about on TMP over and over again, "Swords Around a Throne" by John Elting, and "Carthage Must be Destroyed" by Richard Miles.

Whenever anyone on TMP asks about where to start reading on the Napoleonic wars, or more specifically the Grand Armee, Elting's book gets mentioned.  It seems to be wargamer-standard reading.  Miles' book generally comes up as a history of both Carthage and the Punic wars, but one that's a little less Romano-centric, to the extent that's possible.  As someone who's perilously tired by most things Roman, this comes as a welcome respite.  Throw in the fact that I've been fascinated by both Hannibal and Carthage since I was a kid, and I'm really looking forward to the public transit commute in the forthcoming weeks.

Last, my Beloved found me a terrific score on a trip downtown today, at BMV, the discount book store.  We had taken the kids down for a tramp down Yonge St., and stopped in for a poke-about.  What she came across were two half-price volumes of the bound library edition of Hellboy.

I'm a latecomer to both Mignola and Hellboy, but have become something of a rabid fanboy, maybe to make up for lost time.  Have nice, solid, bookish editions of the big red guy makes me feel all tingly, and now that I know they're out there, I'm going to have to track down the rest in the series.  Apparently there are editions for the BPRD as well.  Yummy.  As an aside, there's apparently a Dr. Doom / Dr. Strange graphic novel out there penciled by Mignola, the existence of which I discovered just the other day.  Going to have to find that as well.

FMB