"SYW French Figures?" Topic

Hello,
This topic may have been already addressed. Please forgive me on string.

What are the manufacturing lines for Seven Years War on the continent? Specifically, I am looking at building a French Army to supplement my Austrian Army.

With the Old Glory Army Deal, would any of the non-FI lines work and which package codes specificially? Looking for the normal mix of arty crews, Line Infantry, Dragoons, and Hvy Cav.

Also, I would like a recommendation on Hussar figures that will not break the bank?

If you like, you can look at some figures from previous SYW games at link All of my post-game photos are in albumswith suffix "at Steve's". 95% of the SYW figures are from the Old Glory.

Thank you for your assistance!

Sincerely,
Steve R.

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My SYW armies are Spencer Smith figures.

what scale??

Which continent?

Thanks for your responses.

Looking for 28mm figures for the European Continent.

You might want to check out Dayton Painting Consortium. They carry the RSM figures and they have SYW French (including cavalry). They are nice figures (actually look like real humans) and the price is great too.

I have a bunch of their Prussian infantry and cavalry (and Austrian cavalry too). I also have some old glory, front rank, crusader, and foundry figures. You wouldn't mix these together in the same unit but they look fine on the same table with all of the above mentioned manufacturers.

Steve,

I forgot to mention, if you want me to send you some pictures of the RSM figures next to other types such as Old Glory I would be happy to do so. Just let me know what you email address is and i will send you a picture or two.

I have Dixons, Crusader and Front Rank

Of them, I like the Front Rank best but the Dixons are nice as well; the Front Rank look a little closer to my Old Glory Austrians

I like RSM as well. They have normal proportions, and they have that Old School/nostalgia air to them. For me, they have the proper amount of detail -- not too much and not too little.

RSM are great. Kind of a small operation though, so not a great website with pictures etc. You have to work a little harder to know what you want.

Old Glory 28mm F&IW Infantry, Artillery and Command packs are excellent, lively figures with nothing that marks them particularly as troops in North America. They'll work fine for the SYW in Germany. The Command pack even includes a couple figures of the provisional cavalry unit in New France, in their fur bonnets. They could work for French Horse in Germany.

But. Most of the cavalry isn't represented in the OG F&IW line: no Hussars, Chaussers, Dragoons, Cuirassiers, Horse in hats, Maison or Voluntaires. Likewise there are no special infantry figures: no grenadiers in bonnets, no Guard or Voluntaires.

RSM 25mm SYW figures are height-compatible with OG. The RSM people are a little slimmer and the RSM horses are a little taller than OG, but I mix the figures in units.

The thing is, where OG figures are multi-pose and lively, RSM figures are more formally posed and usually have only one (cavalry) or three or four (infantry) poses per troop type plus command: marching, standing firing, kneeling firing and charge bayonets are typical poses for the infantry.

So units of OG have a different style than units of RSM, and you might not want to mix units of the two brands in your army. Many gamers like the formal look of single pose figures for black powder era regular armies. If that is your preference, RSM has all the troop types you will need to build a complete SYW French army.

RSM95 figures in a heartbeat! Economical, nice size (sold as "True 30mm" back in the days when Steve Hezzlewood designed and sold them as Pax Britannica, and not too much excessive detail to paint.

Although a bit more expensive, the 1/56 Minden Miniatures are remarkably similar in height and proportions, meaning the two lines work well together and you can supplement the RSM figures with numerous command personality figures from Minden.

For my money, these two ranges are THE ones to use for mid-18th century European tabletop warfare.

Now that I think about it, various holes in the RSM95 and Minden ranges can also be filled rather nicely by figures from Eureka and, in some instances, the Jackdaw and Suren (Willie) ranges too. RSM95 are by far the least pricy these days, but there is no reason why you can't add some special command figures and other special vignettes of a few figures each using the more expensive figures from Minden/Fife&Drum, Eureka, Jackdaw, and/or Willie as and when the mood strikes you. Please drop by my Grand Duchy of Stollen blog for a look at how nicely all of these figures might be incorporated into a fairly unified tabletop force. Here's the link: grandduchyofstollen.blogspot.com

Best Regards,

After going thru a similar process, I went with Minden and have been very pleased. The line continues to grow with the Grenadiers de France just released. They are well detailed, well cast, exquisitely detailed miniatures.

I've just acquired some Minden/Crann Tara figures. Don't you find the heads a wee bit small. Many other ranges heads are a wee bit large, but we've become accustomed to that!

They're reminiscent of Willie/Suren figures.

Depending on the army/unit Eureka are among my favourites.

Much thanks on your suggestions and opinions.

For me, it is really hard to beat the quality and especially the price of Old Glory Miniatures. With the OG Army deal of 40% off, it drops the price from to about $2.16 USD (Normal Bag of 10 mounted) to $2.55 USD (The Wars of Marlborough) for a rider and horse, and $0.72 USD (normal bag of 30 infantry) to $1.02 USD for infantry (spacial bags of 10).

These do not sound like much, but I recently priced out two units of 8 mounted figures of Front Rank and it with shipping would be over $100. USD Let say, I am reconsidering the purchase. In comparison, two units of 10 OG mounted figures would be $43.20 USD.

So, has anyone used the OG's The Wars of Marlborough line to fill out the SYW French?

Sincerely,
Steve R.

The Old Glory F&I Wars French (and British) are 25mm tall like their WSS range figures while the SYW Austrians and Prussians are 28mm tall. The French line infantry are fine for Continental fighting--I'm using them for 1740's Spanish as they don't have swords.

However, the OG Jacobite Rebellion figures are 28mm too if you want French that will match OG Austrians better for height and heftiness.

Using either OG range will leave you shy of specialist cavalry but using the Prussians for e.g. hussars would help with that.