"AWI in 40mm and 1:20 figure ratio - help needed" Topic

Hi,

I want to paint some 40mm S&S figures as a present for a couple of people. Like me, they are followers of God's own figure ratio (GOFR) which is 1:20. This is the ratio which we already use for our Napoleonic games.

I'd like to know what sized infantry battalions and cavalry regiments drop out of GOFR for the Amerian War of Independence. I have a number of Ospreys for AWI. I'm not confident enough about my knowledge of AWI to just pull out an ORBAT or two and use this to determine a sensible unit size to game with.

I'd also like to know which rules sets people are using to play AWI with GOFR and, if possible, the base sizes they use for 28-40mm (I understand that S&S are made to stand in the same footprint as 28mm).

I know that these questions are somewhat involved. But we have a large staff of experts manning the TMP boards.

Cheers

Neil
reinforcementsbypost.com

I find that Larry brom's Disperse ye damned Rebels is a good set.

A battalion is 16-18 line plus 2 lights and 2 grenadiers on average.

Hi Neil,

Generally speaking, most British and American regiments had eight center companies each. With very few exceptions (like the 71st Highland Rgt.), regiments had only one battalion. If you choose to depict 320-man battalions on your tabletop, you'll end up with 16-figure battalions for both sides, using the 1:20 figure scale.

Paper strength for the regular units of both sides called for more than 320 men. But that seems to be a good ball-park figure that represents a lot of units at a strong field strength. You'd certainly be justified in making battalions smaller than 16 figures, especially for the Americans.

Both sides had elite companies, which were just about always removed from their parent battalions and put together in composite battalions. The British had light and grenadiers companies; the Americans had only light companies (although a handful of American grenadier companies did exist, I personally wouldn't bother with them.) The size of the elite company formations varied, depending on the amount of companies and their strengths. Burgoyne's elite battalions, for instance, had ten companies each.

There were some exceptional British formations, such as the battalions of the Highland regiments and the composite Guards battalions, which could be depicted with 24-man battalions.

The German troops, such as the soldiers of Hesse-Kassel, had regiments/battalions of five companies: four of musketeers or fusiliers, and one of grenadiers. The grenadiers were detached from their parent regiments and formed into four-company grenadier battalions. The German regiments could be depicted with 20 or 24 line infantry figures (that is, four companies with either five or six men each.) The jaegers (at least those of Hesse-Kassel) often fought in single companies, again using five to six miniature figures. Incidentally, there was no difference between Hessian musketeer and fusilier regiments: both fought as line infantry.

American militia formations seemed to vary in size, and I'm not sure if one could choose an average size. You could simply paint up a bunch of American militiamen, with a handful of command figures, and thus make miniature militia battalions of whatever size you wanted or needed.

What I've written is pretty general, and no doubt subject to correction! Hopefully this will give you a starting point. I'd like to recommend that you check out the Greg Novak books, which are published by Old Glory: "The American War of Independence: A Guide to the Armies of the American War of Independence." Book One covers the northern campaigns, Book Two the southern. These books are the most comprehensive, one-stop source of information on American Revolutionary armies and orders of battle that I can think of.

American militia could often be found in 'brigades' of 3-500 troops. One exception was TenBroek's militia brigade at Saratoga, which took the field with 10 regiments and was 1,800 strong. Basically you can field them as you like.

Neil,

Depending on what type of troop (regular or militia) and the time period/battle, the size of the individual units can vary dramatically from less than 100 to over 300 per unit. There is no such thing as a "standard" or "average" size for the entire war, although you can come to some average for a particular time period or campaign.

db

The following are my thoughts – disregard as wished

The use of a 1:20 scale for the AWI does not work that well unless you want to form troops on a wing basis. The average unit comes closest to being about 320 men divided into 8 companies – so you can paint 8 small stands of two figures each if you want to stick to a 1:20 ratio – paint up your flank companies as has been suggested and use them to form your "elite" battalions. Its not going to look that solid

If you want to do a ratio – them 1:10 works somewhat better as you can form your troops in offset two ranks – remember that in American one finds regulars on both sides using open order so a battalion will occupy a better frontage then their counterparts over in Europe. Thin about mounting your troops as a lone line – with the even number figures taking one step to the rear.

One other suggestion if you want to use 1:20 is to build battalions of two "color" stands and six line stands – you can drop stands to show a lower strenght – and form "converged" battalions as needed from the spare stands – as was done by both sides during the war

My .02

Greg

Thanks very much to everyone for their suggestions. I feel confident enough to paint up a couple of units of 16 British each. Now I think about it there won't be a problem either rebasing the figures or painting more bases of figures later on.

Neil
reinforcementsbypost.com