"How do you organize your armies?" Topic

Jumping back into American Rev War after a very long time. Just curious about how you organize your miniature armies. Do you take a year/battle and follow a historical battle? Or paint what you like and say it's my army this is what I want mixing time/years? No right answers, just curious how you are doing it!

Hallo,

Take a battle like Guildfort court house to begin and than expant to Brandywine inorder to have nice armies. There are also synergies between these armies of the SYW in the west I.e. The british, hessian and French. Keeping this is mind is a feasable task to build a battle of Bergen of Minden.

Greetings

Hi there

Another newbie to the period here, I have decided to use the British Grenadier rules and the scenario books, therefore I am painting up both sides for the scenarios in date order.

MH
:-)

I just have a selection of units, including some of the slightly different ones such as the 71st, composite units of light infantry, composite units of grenadiers, Loyalist units such as the Queen's Rangers and so on. Regular line infantry units have a selection of different facing colours. I do have a unit with red facings (the 33rd) which was a relatively unusual facing colour. When forming armies for a specific scenario I try to match facing colours where possible, but frankly don't sweat it.

Like people said. I picked a battle, and did the troops for that. If we do a different one we just proxy as close as we can. This is a period that you can't be too anal. The Americans wore so many different uniforms at different times.

I like painting the various uniforms that were found throughout the war. So I have a wide range of units. I also like the various dragoon uniforms so I am a bit top heavy on cavalry. For me it is a colorful period with many good companies who produce the figures.

Matthew

I have generic units and my forces probably resemble what Major Bumsore is doing. They are what I say they are for a particular scenario.

I started with Guilford's Courthouse. Once I had everything for that I just added new units as I liked.

I went generic, especially for the Yanks. Blue or brown coats etc, and militia that can all basically be mixed in as needed.

For the Brits, key units are represented, grenadiers, light infantry and key line units, with some generic stuff as well.

I paint whatever Regiments I like. I love a variety of color so I have quite a varied lot including British, Americans, loyalists, Hessians, French, Indians and soon to add Spanish.
For my battles, I just use what I have. So, a mixture of uniform color is first priority and then I use them in the various Battles we fight. Not fussy in that matter.

I painted the units that were in the Osprey books.

Just starting out myself and as suggested above, I picked a battle I was interested in (Eutaw Springs) and am painting the units for it. I plan to add other units later as needed.

Also, the 2 AWI books by Greg Novak are great for background and Old Glory carries them.

Or paint th regiments that are in the John Mollo book.

I selected the battle of Brandywine and its order of battle as the basis for my current AWI collection and took it from there at a 1:10 ratio of figures to men. In some instances, I had to consolidate Continental regiments since their historical counterparts were so small at thi battle. Two 110 man regiments become one 220 regiment. I then round up or down to my basing system, so either a 20 figure unit or a 24-figure unit results from the amalgamation and I name the regiment after only one of the components

I started with Camden then expanded to Guilford CH and will then expand to Eutaw Springs

I'm only really really keen on the Southern campaigns but all this stuff still works for the north from about 1777 onwards; except Saratoga because of the different uniform styles of the Crown forces. I'll happily use Northern/Saratoga battles for scenarios though.

Eventually I'll get to Yorktown with a French force!

I organize my British in 24 man units, 4 grenadiers, 4 lights, and 16 line. I usually converge my lights and grenadiers. I have 8 British infantry units, all of my units were at Bunker Hill.
Having 8 line units makes for 8 16 man center companies and 2 16 man unit grenadier units and 4 8 man light units.
My Continentals are all 16 man units
My cavalry for both sides are 8 man units
I do have some American light units and they are 8 man units
For my Hessians I have 24 man units, 20 line and 4 grenadiers, and like the British, I converge my grenadiers. I along with two of my friends are working on a rules system for the AWI and we call it, "Damn Ye Rebels"
It works well for us, using moral for the different troop types such as militia, Indians, line troops, guards, and so forth….They are pretty good rules and seem to work well both mechanically and historically…..I'm sure they could be worked on a bit more….always a work in progress.
I still need to paint up some French, and they will be based as the British in 24 man units.

Look up post by John the OFM on this subject. This is one of his major periods and he has some good ideas.

Well I just paint what I fancy. After saying that I am slowly completing the specific units for Guildford (like that is new and different..!), I have the Brunswickers for Saratoga and everything else is just whatever I feel like doing at the time.I recently added a second Highland battalion and the Volunteers of Ireland so we could do Camden "more correctly" but it would't have stopped me refighting it with proxy units if I hadn't.

I picked Cowpens as my starting point repeatedly over the years, first at 28mm then at 10mm and now again at 15mm. Once/if I get Cowpens done in 15mm, I will probably move on to Trenton….

Most of my stuff is for 1775-79 in the Northern theater and then I have some legion troops for the South

Not a Revolutionary War gamer but I do have large SYW armies; I tend to paint units I find interesting or fun to paint at the start and then fill in where I need to – which means I am the stage of having to paint a lot more Austrian infantry!

I am one of those dinosaurs that likes to have the number of figures used bear some fixed relationship to the strength of the unit. This tends to work best when you have generic appearing troops or troops that can be used for multiple units. 50 musket armed militiamen could be used to represent one militia brigade or several smaller units, and could be used as Tory militia as well. A mixture of musket armed figures in hunting shirts and un-faced blue continental uniforms could be used to augment the strength of a continental unit in official dress, or they could be used to represent a stand alone unit or even militia. Figures in one official uniform can be used to represent another unit with a similar uniform by switching out command stands. They can also be used to augment the strength of another unit.

In deciding what units to depict in their official uniforms I follow the same practice as others have mentioned, namely pick a battle and paint figures appropriate to that action. Then move on to another battle and do the additional units needed for that action. The only major difference is that in deciding how many figures to paint I take into consideration the unit's strength at various different actions in addition to the one I am doing at the moment.

I am doing it by campaign. Started with the Southern campaign and I am now doing the Saratoga campaign. I also consult the OB of the battles within a campaign. The BG scenario books are a great guide for this.

Look up post by John the OFM on this subject. This is one of his major periods and he has some good ideas.

Here is my advice. Can't say that I followed it religiously, though.

TMP link

The first unit that I painted was the 38th Foot. Why? Because I had 3 different books showing three different features of the regiment. A grenadier, a LI and the flag.
I kind of went with Guilford Courthouse after that, but not knowing any better, I did all my British units in the 1768 warrant uniform, the "classic" look.

DAF has the right idea, since Brandywine featured the British units that had the most experience throughout the war. Half of the Boston garrison left and never came back.
The uniforms at Brandywine are pretty much campaign dress by now, and no one can object if you use them early or later. If they do, tell the objectors to buy for you and paint up the "proper" uniforms, so you will not make that mistake again.

I started at Saratoga and finished everything there. Then I moved into NY/Philadelphia and went through the units that fought there.
But my real love has always be the War in the South. Kings Mountain, Cowpens and Guilford are the pride of my collection.

So much so, that I commissioned my own figures to "get it right".

Here's a cheap plug.

kingsmtminis.com/catalog

Guilford is a good stepping-off point size-wise, and for the Americans (generic blue and brown coats with red facings, and a lot of militia). For the British it's more limited, but still a good start, as the Foot Guards, 33rd and 71st will feature in a lot of games as the "Cornwallis Dream Team" reserve division in the NYC and Philly campaigns.

It depends. I tend to paint the earlier units because I find the later Continentals just plain boring. Having said that, I do have some later Continentals. IMO – do what makes you happy. This isn't the Napoleonics board – No one is going to castigate you for getting the bricoles wrong.

If you can have 3 or 4 distinct uniforms for the 1st or 3rd Continental Light Dragoons, being anal about uniforms is rather silly.

Organised around Brandywine / Germantown period.
16 figure units for most battalions. 20 figures for Hessian.
8 figure for cavalry/mounted units. I can usually bump numbers up or down if needed. Might eventually expand the unit sizes when time allows.

Well, here is what NOT to do. I started out gaming the period with a friend who had a large collection of figures already. I began painting up units he did not have. He moved away a few years later leaving me with a mash of strange little units. I have fixed this later on by using the Brandywine Battle as a good starter. As mentioned above, the Cornwallis troops got lots of action. Continentals in brown and blue faced red with lots of rifle shirts. I make specific color stands and build units from the generic pool.