Desert Fox | 21 Jul 2015 10:17 a.m. PST |
Continuing the quest for the Holy Grail of Napoleonic rulesets, I would like to know what are TMPers playing. What is your favorite Napoleonic ruleset where each unit represents an infantry battalion, cavalry regiment or artillery battery? It does not matter how many bases make up each unit, only that each unit represents an infantry battalion, cavalry regiment or artillery battery. Also include why you prefer the ruleset. What is it about this particular set of rules that makes you come back to it, despite all the other rulesets available that also model this approach. |
wrgmr1 | 21 Jul 2015 10:44 a.m. PST |
Our group plays Shako 2, a battalion, regiment, battery game. It gives a good flavour for the period. Scenarios are available and others can be adapted. Most smaller games 3 to 5 divisions a side can be played in 3 hours. We've done massive games, most recently Ligny and Waterloo with 18 players. All the usual rock, paper, scissors tactics are present. I prefer this set of rules over others of brigade or division level, because you can form line, column, square by battalion. Flank and rear support are crucial to tactics. |
Pictors Studio | 21 Jul 2015 10:49 a.m. PST |
Black Powder does this. I like the quick pace of the game, the customizability of it for period and nationality and how fog of war works in the game |
Larry R | 21 Jul 2015 10:51 a.m. PST |
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ColCampbell | 21 Jul 2015 10:54 a.m. PST |
We use Larry Brom's The Sound of the Guns rules sergeants3.com with our 25mm armies. They are easy to learn and fun to play. As long as each side is based similarly you can use just about any organization and it has options to use 15mm or smaller figures. Here's a typical game: link We've done all sorts of scenarios, both historical (like Quatre Bras) and fictional. Jim |
Texas Jack | 21 Jul 2015 12:05 p.m. PST |
Here is another vote for Black Powder. I love how the game flows and it generally is just loads of fun! |
pbishop12 | 21 Jul 2015 1:34 p.m. PST |
General de Brigade. Each unit represents what you're looking for. And units are big. Figure scale is 20:1. |
Fredloan | 21 Jul 2015 2:38 p.m. PST |
I like Shako 2 because I like the battalion, regiment, battery level of play. As wargmr1 said you have flank and rear support, so you really have to know tactics of the period. It makes for a simple yet accurate picture of the period. You have a variety of basing setups to choose from and I find it easy to learn. |
Joes Shop | 21 Jul 2015 2:47 p.m. PST |
Shako. For the reasons stated above. |
jeffreyw3 | 21 Jul 2015 2:52 p.m. PST |
The unit of maneuver for cavalry should be a squadron. |
raylev3 | 21 Jul 2015 2:57 p.m. PST |
We've gone with Black Powder, after trying Shako II, General de Brigade, and Die Fighting. Black Powder is quicker to learn which means it's quicker to introduce to others, and it's easier to find other players. (Although I personally prefer Die Fighting!) |
Extra Crispy | 21 Jul 2015 3:10 p.m. PST |
I play a variety of games at a variety of scales. This whole "finding one rule set" thing mystifies me. Why settle for potatoes when you can enjoy a buffet? |
Edwulf | 21 Jul 2015 3:23 p.m. PST |
Black Powder, Lasalle, General de brigade and the Shako games are probably your best bet. Black Powder … Lots of people play it and its from the Warlord family of games so pretty easy to pick up if players play their other games. |
IronDuke596 | 21 Jul 2015 3:31 p.m. PST |
General de Brigade (I have tried BP, S2 and others); it is a good balance between realistic rules that reflect Napoleonic tactics and quick play rules. I like the 20:1 ratio, which forces one to consider the terrain vis a vis the formation the battalion is in. I also like the orders regime that forces one to think ahead. Units within a brigade must operate within the order constraints. Most importantly I like the morale system that applies to units, brigades and divisions. Lastly, there is an active blog overseen by the rules author David Brown, which provides a venue for rules discussion for those seeking clarification. I find this blog most helpful. |
WarDepotDavid | 21 Jul 2015 3:40 p.m. PST |
Both I and the weekly group I game with use Empire V with house rules. Allows us to model individual units as well as multi corp engagements such as the Waterloo refight we did last month. |
vtsaogames | 21 Jul 2015 3:48 p.m. PST |
The unit of maneuver for cavalry should be a squadron. The only rules I know that do this is Chef de Battalion. Are there others? |
coopman | 21 Jul 2015 6:42 p.m. PST |
Our group has been using "Napoleon at War" for a couple of years now and have really enjoyed them. |
Frederick | 21 Jul 2015 6:50 p.m. PST |
I defer to the wisdom above – I am an Age of Eagles (each unit is a brigade) player |
Martin Rapier | 21 Jul 2015 11:18 p.m. PST |
I haven't played a battalion, battery, regiment game of Napoleonics for decades, but when I did my rules of preference were WRG 16xx to 18xx. I suppose Neil Thomas Napoleonic might count, but they are so abstract the units could be anything. |
daler240D | 22 Jul 2015 3:16 a.m. PST |
Napoleonic Command 2. It is slightly more abstracted than some rules, but is still pretty easy to grasp and captures a unique feel for being a commander. Does not count individual figures and is generally basing agnostic. The author has a few interesting scenarios and excellent pictures on his website to wet your appetite. link PDF link
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jeffreyw3 | 22 Jul 2015 5:14 a.m. PST |
vtsaogames--that's the only one I'm aware of. I'll start another thread on that and a related subject. |
Old Wolfman | 22 Jul 2015 7:03 a.m. PST |
Have played Shako,V&B,Piquet and working on Grand Armee. |
MichaelCollinsHimself | 22 Jul 2015 7:03 a.m. PST |
Having units at 1:1 – that is, representing battalions with just one unit somehow makes for a better game as I can identify with the historical regiments and their qualities – scaling it so that a division has the same number of men but an average unit size doesn't really do it for me. What I`ve done with my own rules is varying the number of bases to accommodate differing unit sizes – so I can have the 92nd Regiment with only about 300 muskets in the same army as a full, paper-strength Light infantry battalion. With squadrons too I can have them operating in isolation or independently, but the best thing is to have them together of course and in strength! …It was probably a failing of the Austrians that they tended to split their larger regimental cavalry formations up amongst their infantry commands. take a look at my website for more info… grandmanoeuvre.co.uk/about-gm |
4th Cuirassier | 22 Jul 2015 8:07 a.m. PST |
I still use Quarrie but with frontages unavoidably 5/3rds of what he stipulates and thus all other distances grossed up accordingly. This was the ruleset I started out with and I've never felt they needed to be improved. If a set of rules starts talking about bases or stands, and ignores actual unit composition, I instantly lose interest. Every army of the period, more or less, had battalions organised to contain different troop types, whether those be grenadiers, elite squadrons, or whatever; and the greatest military commander of modern times thought them worth persisting with, so to ignore them or abstract them away has always struck me as amounting to thinking that Napoleon did not know his business. |
MichaelCollinsHimself | 22 Jul 2015 8:36 a.m. PST |
I don`t wish to criticise the ancient wisdom of Quarrie or Bonaparte, but if one is tied to the literal representation of military organisations then larger scale battles are extremely fiddly and time-consuming to play out. |
Dexter Ward | 22 Jul 2015 8:41 a.m. PST |
Shako or Lasalle. Both allow decent sized games because they have nice clean mechanics. Shako requires more forward planning (and it is harder to recover once you have committed your troops). |
akselia | 22 Jul 2015 9:58 a.m. PST |
March attack from Crusader games is a pretty good set of rules IMHO. We've used it quite a bit at our cub. link Cheers, Aksu |
Marc the plastics fan | 22 Jul 2015 10:00 a.m. PST |
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4th Cuirassier | 22 Jul 2015 10:12 a.m. PST |
@ Michael Collins: Yes and no. The actual, practical constraint is how many figures you can paint and field so the actual as opposed to notional size of your battles is the same either way – it's 400 figures a side, or whatever. It's then a matter of disbelief suspension whether you consider that number of little lead guys to be a division or a corps. One of the attractions about Napoleonics to me has always been the fact that you can actually simulate campaigns because armies broadly moved in discrete and formed bodies. Any WW2 campaign in contrast can only ever be a very small slice of a wider front where the outcome of your campaign is going to be – or should be – limited by what I supposedly happening to either side. So it is feasible to consider 400 figures to be an "army" whereas a handful of tanks are only going to be believable ad a small piece of a bigger mosaic. |
akselia | 22 Jul 2015 10:27 a.m. PST |
Oh, forgot to explain why I like march attack: - simple core mechanics, easy to pick up. - large formations can be left in reserve and committed when needed. - committed formations are difficult to get out of the mess of battle. - you can actually see in a normal game a division mount an attack, be repulsed, reform and try again. Very rare in a lot of other sets, where battles are usually just one big push. Cheers, Aksu |
MichaelCollinsHimself | 22 Jul 2015 10:52 a.m. PST |
John, I`m not quite so convinced by the scaling down of large battles so that they are fought with fewer troops and fewer formations. I think it`s more important that units within commands act as they should do and that the commands fight for the periods (of time) that they tended to be able to… I believe that the sense of time is important in a game. I recently played out d'Erlon's attack at Waterloo (see the threads here: TMP link and TMP link In my view, it had to be done to scale and not missing out on either units, or factors. I don`t think you get the right sense of importance of it without "seeing" it as a whole – In that it left little or no alternative for Napoleon/Ney but to use up the French cavalry. 1st Corps had failed in the "big push" and was largely "spent" as a force – there was then little left to play with and they had few options in using it. I`m not saying what other guys do isn`t fun for them, just saying why I prefer to identify with the units and commands in my games that were involved in the actual battles too. |
4th Cuirassier | 22 Jul 2015 2:23 p.m. PST |
Well that makes sense Michael. For me the essence of the era is manoeuvring in column, Lin and square so I'd be reluctant to go to a higher level of unit representation that abstracted that away – the price for which is that your "army" is a division or so in size… |
MichaelCollinsHimself | 22 Jul 2015 11:11 p.m. PST |
I suppose I want my cake and eat it too John, I just must have the units in formations and the grand formations too ! |
herzogbrian | 24 Jul 2015 5:48 a.m. PST |
Here is my list of some of the best rules, IMO, depending on the level of play that you want to experience. I think all of them give you a good Napoleonic 'feel' for the level of play. Napoleon's Battles – Corps/Division level – move Brigades Valmy to Waterloo – Division/Brigade lvl- move Regiments Chef de Brigade – Bn/Regt lvl – move Battalions/companies Green Jackets and Voltigeurs – skirmish – move sqd/platoon |
cncbump | 24 Jul 2015 6:54 a.m. PST |
Shako II. Good feel with all the elements from skirmishers to divisional and army morale. Have not played Black Powder but heard good things. No need for us, as Shako II works for the group. |