"army size & period" Topic

I've been reading an old Charles Grant book in which he argues certain periods suit larger or smaller forces. Although figure ratios may mean the same number of figures on the table, the game may represent a clash of armies or a skirmish.
For example, he argues the Byzantine period calls out for large armies whilst medieval better suits encounters between small forces.

Clearly this is a matter of taste & you can do any period with any sized army (or "army", if you prefer) but he may be on to something.

I would argue:

WW2: small forces
Napoleonics: large armies

Your thoughts?

I think you may be right.

Obviously you can have a small skirmish in any period but some seem better suited to big battles than others.

Depends

What's a large army? I do WWII (early and between the wars with a table crowded with figures, but it's an ARMY game where each side has an army under his command.

I'm not a fan of skirmish games.

I think that everyone enjoys seeing the spectacle of a large Napoleonic miniatures battle. Whether or not they want to be involved in the mammoth game is another matter!

I would largely agree, it is a question of picking representative levels of engagement for each period. However, like Otto, I tend to be a "big battle" type of guy, whether it is WW2, Napoleonics or Ancients.

Depends on what you mean by armies. Representing a WWII German or Soviet army group at the table top with miniatures would be hard without crossing to the board-game territory. On the other hand depending on figure scale and ratio you could do a credible job fighting a multi-corps action in the Napoleonic War on one table.

Obviously you can represent anything you want by going from relational to virtual representation.

My early and enduring enthusiasm for Napoleonic gaming ensures that all the other periods I game are small forces.

Rick

I am a fan of skirmishes, and almost all WWII games I play are skirmishes.

However, I would have a hard time saying WWII was "more suited" to skirmishes than large battles. With Leningrad, Stalingrad, Kiev, Warsaw, Kursk, and Berlin, I would guess in terms of sheer numbers, WWII would have a lot of slots in the list of the largest armies that took the field in a battle.

I tend to think that periods have good matches both in the scope of the game and the size of the miniatures used. However, I guess we're all a bit fickle sometimes and can easily be persuaded otherwise. For example, when the Perrys announced they were doing Western Desert WW2 in 28mm there was a general feeling expressed that if you wanted to game that period you used micro armour to get a sense of the expanse of the terrain and that doing it in 28mm made little sense. Over time that view may have shifted and the Perry WW2 range seems to be selling. WW2 for me has either been skirmish or large skirmish and anything else more elaborate is best played as a boardgame. I'm surprised that more boardgames haven't been converted into miniatures games with the hex based terrain.

Napoelonics I've always considered big battle but with Battalions as the smallest element not brigades. Then TFL came along with Sharp Practice and that shifted my perception a little. It doesn't really appeal to me that much as I prefer the epic sweep of vast actions but for many it is ideal with say, 100 figures per side.

However, we're all different in what we want out of the hobby – for me lining up two 28mm armies of a few hundred figures along base edges 3' apart before advancing to contact has zero appeal and is why I'm increasingly considering the smaller scales. I will always wish I'd done the Sudan in 15mm not 28mm.

Ground scale determines all. An "army level" game has a larger scale, as in more feet/meters per inch (2.54 centimeter worm). Scale of miniatures used reflects the appearance chosen. For instance, my favorite scale is true 25mm, but I have "crept" up to "large 25s". The scale of my ancmed rules is ten yards to the inch. A single infantry miniature on a 20mm by 20mm base represents 64 men eight wide and eight deep. Obviously that ONE GUY does not visually resemble the reality modeled. A 6mm scale would work, if you prefer the "massy" look. If you are going to model Agincourt, for example, visually the "thirty ranks" of the French first battle as they crammed together is going to look a lot more convincing in 6mm than 25mm. But, aside from that visual difference, the actual number of bases involved is identical….