"By Fire and Sword- figure basing and frontage?" Topic

Gents,

No doubt some of you have got and/or played BFaS with figures based on the 'standard' 40mm frontage. I have armies based on 25mm square bases.

Do you think that by combining two bases together and making each BFaS base effectively 50mmx25mm that the game system would suffer if I was playing vs an opponent based on 40mm frontage per element?

I was thinking of the larger divisional scale game and about 8-10 units in an army.

Cheers

Happy Wanderer

I'm afraid You will be at disadvantage – for example Your units will be much more visible and will be able to use less bases in close combat then the enemy, there will be problem with Open Order units as well.

Thanks Kadrinazi.

As an aside, how do you think BFaS will play out with pike and shot based armies, where focus isn't on lots of cavalry.

Will it still give dynamic push of pike type games?

Cheers

Happy Wanderer

As long as You will play with counting ammo it should be ok ;) Obviously majority armies I can see on division levels played in Poland are cavalry-heavy, so can't really say how two infantry-heavy (in pike and shot type, not Cossacks and their good old tabor wagons) will behave. 8-10 Units per division seems bit small, so at least that should run quite quickly. Much will depends on constructio of Your armies, difference in Strenght, choice of Tactics nad Additional Effects.

Thanks Michal,

I was thinking on using my existing ECW/TYW armies that are P&S heavy until some new mobile Eastern troops are raised :-)

Thanks again.

Rolf

Currently we're working on improvements to Pike and Shot Formation rules anyway, they're not good enough and because more and more players in Poland are playing division now they've started discussion about this rule. So expect some changes here in future.

Best regards
Michal Paradowski
By Fire and Sword team
[I need to remember to add my signature, when writing in 'official' BFaS topics ;)]

Same problem as I had when going from Napoleon's Battles to Lasalle.

The solution is to use 3 square 25mm bases = 2 40mm bases. This works very well with cavalry in line, especially if you make a 1/2" wide single figure base for when not in multiples of two (e.g. 3 base/9 figure banners). For column alternate 2-1-2-1 bases and add a 5mm gap between ranks.

For infantry the extra 5mm depth may pose a problem when calculating firing distances. I suggest you cut out a piece of card with the official dimensions of the unit and place the figures on top matching as closely as possible. In cases of uncertainty temporarily remove the figures and calculate all distances from the card.