"Which is your best unit?" Topic

At the wargame table, which is your člite unit always?

I'm speaking about that one that always had your best confidence in a hard battle.

And never failed!.

Amicalement
Armand

Airfix Highlanders
link

Love those old guys.

Probably my 4 battalions of the 1809 Wurttemberg Light Brigade (2 Battalions of Jager + 2 Battalions of Light Infantry) and the Chasseurs a Cheval of the Imperial Guard. All AB 15mm figures. IIRC they have never been beaten in an action.

I still have a unit or two of those Airfix Highlanders. When they first came out it was like a freaking revolution!

My best Napoleonics up until then were converted ACW infantry with shakos made of modeling clay, paper, and paint.

And all cav were converted Airfix US cav or French cuirassiers!

But my most elite wargaming unit is whoever is rolling well. There's no way for a successful unit in one game to maintain that "elan" into the next encounter.

Of course, we could make a rule . . .

I always ask for Mark's Polish division.

My Austrian Grenzers. Never been beaten.

In the old days I had a battalion of 25mm Bavarians. Nothing special by the rules but they never failed a morale test. With percentage dice, elite units routinely failed: 94% chance of passing and they roll 96.

These days, I have Hungarian Infantry Regiment 34 Davidovitch (Minifigs). Again they are nothing special in the rules but they always aquit themselves well, no snake eyes on combat rolls. They did well when posing as Walloon Guards at Bailen. Likewise my Austrian Uhlans did well their first time on the table, beating the new unit curse. They have done well since.

During a long campaign game in the '80's, HMS Hussar, 38, took French frigates of equal force on two separate occasions, and was on the winning side in a multi-frigate battle.

My 25mm
Never been beaten.
Mind you, never been used.

Vistula Legion foot and horse for the French side, Blankenstein Hussars (Austrian) for the Coalition.

3rd Swiss Regiment -- 1812

My best unit is the carabiniers I painted up several years ago :

link

also, in a campaign many years ago I captured HMS Victory (struck its colours) I repaired the ship and renamed it, "La Defeat".

That ship was the pride of my French navy after that /snicker

I have a battalion of Austrian infantry, #56 Wenzel Colloredo IR, that have never been beaten in combat.

My nicely painted Union and Household heavy british brigades. I have the confidence that they will lose all charges the few times they manage to charge. Also known as my inability to roll higher than 1 or snake eyes when I roll for them.

None, in my armies. Long time ago I had a batallion of Schaumburg-Lippe in my SYW Hannoverian army that never failed a morale check nor was defeated in a melee. Once it hold the left flank single handed against four French batallions, until the Guards came to its rescue and put the Frenchies in flight! Regretfully, the poor fellas couldn't resist the charge of the Baby Brigade and were wiped out(my eldest, when he was three, found exceedingly amusing the sound of the minis falling on the kitchen floor)

Well….I've been told…..

:)

My 4th reg. of grenzer's never failed me yet.

Two old reliables – the Iron Brigade, the Grenadier Guard of the Army of the Potomac – don't always win, but always put up a hell of a fight

An ancient Armourcast Shadowsword that I rescued from a friend who had painted it, for some reason, bright green – I repainted and extensively modified it – it has never failed me in the WH40K games I play, including an incredible single-shot destruction of a Chaos Titan

Strangely, a particular 1815 Netherlands militia battalion; they always seem to get lucky dice rolls.

My sons' best unit is a bog standard M4 Sherman; it seems to be firing satellite-guided DU rounds whenever it takes on a Tiger, Jagdpanther or King Tiger (yes, our WW2 games have moved on from firing airguns at model tanks).

My 20mm Mariupol Husars, converted from ESCI British Lt Drgs. Not that they have never been defeated, but only by heavies, and have won a few unequal fights.

I awarded them silver trumpets as a mark of courage ;-).

Well years ago I had a two Bdes of SYW British that did quite well.

In one of their very first battles they only was able to march around 18-20" onto the table and did not move any further. This was due to them having to fight off 7 opposing Bdes.

They were still sitting there at the end of the battle (though at less than a Bde strength) and the enemy had to fall back.

In another battle they were part of a force that was outnumbered 4:1 and while having been forced to retreat from the field they left around 3,500 French Casualities in front of their position.

I havent gamed Napleonics for some years (about 7 now)but am building up to do so. My best painted unit will hopefully be my 45th Nottinghamshires.
How they perform I don't know yet.

My Leib-Kurassiere have never lost a melee.

Well so far all my elite units have done very very badly--In every game the 95 Rifles and the 42nd Black Watch have both routed on getting shot at first time!!
By far the best unit I have fielded have been my Dutch Jaeger…Always faught to the bitter end!!

Hi
I am not too original…. My best unit is the Old Guard Grenadiers Infantry. I use napoleon's battles, and this unit is near invicible in close combat. The only way to stop them is to use artillery of course: the ball and shell do not known the difference between a grognard or a militia man!
Regards
Rafa

My extensively modified Prince August Dutch Light Dragoons.

Armand you may have missed my previous posts about a gentleman in Texas who played with Col Gray (Age of Eagles) and myself back in the 1970s. He had his Austrian 'Ghost' legions. He had primed the whole army in whute and each time the unit did well in a battle he gave them battlehonors by painting another color to the uniform. He had some completely white Grenadier units and some fully painted landwehr units.

For myself I ahd some very effective Prussian Line and Landwehr units which always performed good. On the Cavalry side a Prussian Hussar unit stood out.
In regards to Por-French forces my Northern Italian line and my pro-Joseph Spanish units always did well.

My Bonapartist Spanish units seem to perform about as well as their historical predecessors :(.

Well, my best-performing unit lately has been the Zanshi machine-gunner from my Yu Jing army. In head-to-head rolls against snipers, he has consistently capped the sniper with critical hits (needing a 1 or 2 to-hit on a d20, rolls the critical 2, while the sniper needed a 1-11 and rolled a hit, but not a critical hit).

Sadly, my 95th Rifles haven't done very well… playing Flintloque!

Dear Mr.RudyNelson, you are right.

Now I had read your post and I liked so much!.

Thanks for the advice.

Amicalement
Armand

For me it is my Battery of Guard 12pdrs (old Hinchliffe). They always do well.

A slightly sideways anecdote.

30+ years ago, when my then gaming oppo and I were moving out of Airfix and into metal, he'd lovingly painted up a unit of Hinchliffe Guard Lancers and I'd bought a Hinchy 24pdr cannon.

He posted his beloved Lancers almost on the baseline to avoid casualties. The problem was that they were in range of the 24pdr. I couldn't resist taking them off a figure a bound!

My Airfix Black Watch…at least in my mind.

A few.
I had an old Minifigs battalion of Oldenbergers (129th French Ligne) when I lived in the UK. These guys did some incredible stuff.

Another was a Minifig battalion of Dutch Jagers. I don't recall them ever falling back either.

But my favorite is a Connoisseur regiment of 2 battalions x24 of the 27th Leger. They've been with me for 15 years and have yet to do anything less than sterling service. Thier partners in the Brigade is the 45th Ligne. These boys have marched together all this time and continue to pound out all the opposition.

My 30mm Stadden Black Hussars (HR5 in the SYW) in my Prussian army have a split personality. Whenever anyone else commands them, they sweep all foes before them and do great deeds. When I command them, they always seem to get wiped out.

My Stadden IR15/III guard grenadier battalion in the SYW gets employed in much the same manner as Napoleon's Old Guard, i.e. very rarely. When they do engage in battle, I usually send them in to mop up the damage that their line infantry musketeers have inflicted on the enemy and so they seem to always get the glory, earned or unearned.

Dear Forum,

As far as success with a particular Napoleonic unit, I'd say that when I've brigaded my four(4) regiments of the Saxon Chevaulegers, they have always prevailed against whatever they encountered on the wargame tabletop battlefield….

Regards,
Wayne