Tuesday, March 16, 2021

Additions to the 2mm Napoleonic Collection


Here are a few more units to add to my 2mm Napoleonic collection. A project I started a few years ago.  

This madness stemmed from spending years reading battlefield accounts and looking at drawings describing the formations used during the Napoleonic wars. I've always been fascinated by the 'Rock, Paper, Scissors' aspect to Napoleonic tactics. How line defeated column, cavalry smashed lines, squares bested cavalry, etc. So I wanted 'gaming pieces' to reflect these formations on the tabletop, at a ground scale that was somewhat closer to reality. What you see here is essentially a wide-angle perspective of how armies may have looked in the field, which oddly appeals to my lizard brain.

Here we have a force of Austrian infantry arrayed in line, a regiment of French cavalry, a deployed battery of French artillery and a command stand. The 'smoke' markers are simply layered MDF I had designed, painted to suit.


In my collection I have each unit illustrated in the various formations in which it could have been deployed. So an infantry unit will have bases depicting it in line, column and square; cavalry are in lines and columns of squadrons and artillery are shown both limbered-up and deployed with their trail of caissons and wagons. Here are five battalions of Austrian line infantry arrayed in a 3-rank line formation.


A regiment of Imperial Dutch Lancers in a 2-rank line, ready for the charge. I love dudes in pink.


As you can see with the artillery battery below, I wanted to reflect the depth of these formations which can be quite striking. Often, we think of a Horse & Musket battery as being simply a line of big guns, whereas in fact a deployed artillery battery was a tremendously deep column, with successive lines of caissons and supply wagons servicing the guns. I find reflecting this on the tabletop to be really interesting as one quickly discovers that these formations need a lot of space to both deploy and maneuver.


A French upper level command stand.


In addition I put together a pair of Built-Up-Area (BUA) tiles to represent a quasi-Germanic aesthetic. Again, like the other figures here, these building models are from Forward March Figures. I tried to mimic the organic flow of an older city, with its streets and avenues sprouting from all over the compass. 


I had fun making the various parks and green spaces. Sarah says she wants to have coffee in the bistro next to the Cathedral. :)


I also made a few trees for the bases using my tried-and-true method of clipping figure foam packing into roughly spherical shapes and gluing brad nails into them to serve as trunks. I then coated them with Liquitex, give them a quick paint and drybrush and presto, 2mm scaled trees!




Next Up: Something inspired from Lord of the Rings!

- Curt


17 comments:

  1. Excellent. This really is the proper scale for wargaming but we always just get seduced by the beauty of 28mm figures, I guess! Great stuff.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Kym! Yes, this is my fourth(!) scale in Napoleonics. My first love is still my 28s in all their martial frippery.

      Delete
  2. Curt these are the ultimate for big battle Naps. Despite having lots of 6mm Naps, I’m sorely tempted to jump in as well! Well done!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you Mike. Yes, 2mm really allows one to establish a wide-angle view of a battle. Just keep it basic and the project is not too daunting.

      Delete
  3. Those are very impressive and really give the impression of large units manouevering etc, plus the BUA's look great.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Beautifully done Curt. I love this scale and these figures. Your big bases look great, particularly as a true representation. I have gone for a far more pragmatic, wargaming pieces for mine.
    Such excellent painting and basing. You should send some pics to Ian Kay to put on their website.
    Regards, James

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks James, I'm delighted you like the project. It's been great fun to work on.

      Delete
  5. good to showcase the volume of space 'behind' the guns demonstrating the works needed to service artillery properly.

    I think I may do up a little diorama to show it all off in a larger scale ...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Cheers Murdock. Great idea. I've always wanted to add a line of caissons to my 28mm batteries to add a bit of depth. Right now I just use some officers and other flunkies to bulk them out.

      https://analogue-hobbies.blogspot.com/2020/01/french-aide-de-camp-having-peek-for.html

      Delete
  6. Looking grand . Now we need to to a proper battle laid out methinks

    ReplyDelete
  7. Wonderful modelling project Curt and I agree it really helps add some perspective to things! :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you! Perspective was one of the primary goals of this little project.

      Delete
  8. Sir, let me tell you are clinically insane. But it is a kind of madness I like! 😂

    ReplyDelete

Thanks for your comment! As long as you're not a spam droid I'll have it up on the blog soon. :)