Second one done

 A bit slower for the second collection but at the weekend I finished the French and Friends for 1813. 

From top left the guard (somehow I wound up with enough figures to do the old guard twice), the cavalry, the young guard, then bottom left French line infantry (theres 7 unpainted divisions in the lead pile), Saxons Wurtembergers and Baden/Hesse, Polish and Bavarians.

The project hit a brick wall last night at 9:30 pm when I used my last brigade base (from a pack of 120) doing Austrian line infantry. I knew it wasn't going to be enough bases but I did think it would get me a bit/lot further than this.

First one done

 After a couple of nights work, the British are rebased.

8 infantry divisions, the light division and a cavalry division. I've left the corps and army commanders on the larger bases for visual aids on the table. I'm quite happy with how its gone and how it looks.

Off to the races

 Well, at least all the figures are painted....

And yes, thats a bag of 120 Volley and bayonett brigade bases which are not going to be enough.

The Project that dare not speak its name.

 I've been pondering something for a while now 

One of the issues that I have with Volley and Bayonet at normal scale is that it really needs a large table (at least 8 by 6). Now this is fine if you are lucky enough to play at a club, but a struggle at home to find not just the table, but also the space to use it. A smaller table ( 6 by 4) isn't really pratical as cavalry can be across in 2 turns and infantry in 3 turns. This has implications for using the Road to Glory scenario system, especially if a sizable portion of your army starts off the table.

So there are a few options. One is to buy a bigger house. Another is to move everything to a smaller base size using the word every wargamer hates, rebasing. Keith McNelly worked this out a long time ago using 1/2 size bases (so 1.5" vs 3" and the smaller bases 3/4"). Possibly proof he's smarter than he looks.. This is a bridge to far for me and my sausage fingers. As I'm also beholden to Baccus and their 20mm infantry figure frontage. Two blocks plus a bit gets out to 50mm which is 2/3'rds. A 6 by 4 table is equivalent to 9 by 6 in normal scale which is about what I am looking for. The wise sages on the mailing list said it was a good idea too, possibly because it wasn't them facing the job.

It does reduce the number of figures required on a base by 1/3rd. This is fine for the line infantry but not so great for grenadiers and other elite units. Cavaly regiment spare figures will mostly be useless if they are unique regiments (Hussars). Artillery are the worst and almost all the limber horses I have ever brought and painted will be wasted. The pain should be worth it......

So, before I could change my mind last night, I ordered $50 of bases from Pendraken. I'm guessing I have about 4 weeks to put my affairs in order before I start this project.

A couple of IHMN companies

 I've not done too much recently on IHMN, but a break from 10mm DBA for a week allowed me to finish up a couple of companies.

First up the Old Etonians. Men of erudite wit with plenty of sang-froid to face off against the enemies of the queen.

Next up is a so far anonymous group of men who are obviously up to no good (but they do look cool).

Not sure who they will be (maybe the Men In Brown?) or what sort of back-story they will have. They also need a leader figure and some supports.

Foresting

 A couple of weeks ago I came across a post that suggested that a particular sort of bath mat could be used as a base for forests. At the weekend I was shopping at a local craft/homeware chain store when I came across a similar item. The material is heavy and would sit well on underlying terrain.

 

With a bit of colour work it shows definite promise forests for 6mm and is NZ$7 for a piece 80cm by 50 cm. I'm thinking about using it as a base for my WW2 winter terrain project. Painted black with a textured white spray paint it stand in well for a winter coniferous forrest.

Keeping track

 Only a month since the last post but far longer since a workbench post. Since the last workbench update I've mostly been panting 10mm for my 15th century Eastern European DBA project, and theres not much to see there untill I get another order from Pendraken to finish things up. More recently I've made a move back to my 1813 Volley and Bayonet project to try to lower one face of the lead mountain. Sifting through the pile I found that I was nowhere near done with the Russians army and that there was enough infantry for another 6 divisions of French. As I already have ~6000 pts of French its back to the Russians.

Hussars, lancers, Cossacks, 2 Grenadier divisions and a stack of Jagers. Even with all this I'm still short a few bits I will need to order....

Another part of the project I've been working on is some markers for the accounting side of the game. back in the day in Wellinton we used small pom poms to keep track of casualties on the table rather than on paper. While some of you might have issues with this I've always found it a sensible way to keep track of the degradation of units on the table. However I've never managed to find a source of the pom poms. Fortunately Baccus has a part solution for me in the packs of casualty figures.

British

Russian

I've not done a great job paint wise (though that seems to be par for the course) as they are just markers. And they look OK on the table.

 I still have to come up with a way to indicate disorder and exhaustion, posibly using the cavalry casualties as cavalry units tend to have far fewer strength points than infantry units. Until then, its back to painting Russians.