"Battalion level rules" Topic

We all know Chef de Bataillon (which I have and adore to read, but wouldn't even know where to start wargaming with them). These rules are at a 1:5 figure scale, as opposed to the 1:60 Empire rules by the same authors.

Are there other – playable! – rules for this level, that is one battalion or a few for each side? I would like to try a somewhat detailed simulation of a battalion manouvering in platoons or of a cavalry squadron charging infantry trying to form a square.

Back then 6 mm figures weren't popular. Nowadays similar rules could be wargamed at a 1:1 figure scale with them.

P.S. I am referring to small scale rules for formed units. No skirmish games.

Fascinating question. Will you be doing 1:1 figure scale in 6mm?

Would 1970-1980's vintage rules with firing and casualty removal by figure appeal to you? You may have to write your own rules for movement drill by platoon or company, troop or squadron, and low-level officer command. Or newer skirmish rules might still work, but with more rigorous formed drill bolted on.

Are there other – playable! – rules for this level, that is one battalion or a few for each side? I would like to try a somewhat detailed simulation of a battalion manouvering in platoons or of a cavalry squadron charging infantry trying to form a square.

Yes. There are some playable rules for precisely this level in Paddy Griffith's classic "Napoleonic Wargaming for Fun": link

Otherwise, the Too Fat Lardies "Sharp Practice" link can be used at this level too

I have looked into doing this and have run into a few problems.

• At 1:2 in 6mm a battalion is 19" long.
  
• Reading about the time it took for battalions to change formation, in order to show this in an interesting way, you'll need really short turns: 30 to 60 seconds.
  
• A battalion commander does not, in most cases, make many very interesting decisions IMO. All the real interesting decisions happen before the battalions go in. Move straight ahead and roll dice is not that much fun to me, but realistically that's what life was like for a battalion commander most of the time.
  
• Ground scale can be a challenge. With an 18" battalion, musket range should be about the same. So On a 4' table you pretty much start inside musket range. And movement rates will also be huge, specially cavalry!

In the end, when I do the game, it will be with a *very* simple set of rules, just so I can show off what the formations really looked like. I'll be aiming for a 1 hour game, maybe at a convention, that I run a dozen times in a row….

Thanks all for your answers.

lapatrie88, 1:1 would be nice, but Extra Crispy raises good points, which I had only partially thought of. Besides, I don't remember what ground scale Chef de Bataillon is. To be visually acceptable it should be near the scale of 6 mm, that is some 1:275 – 1:300, right?

Whirlwind, thanks for the links. I'll be sure to check them out. I heard of Sharp Practice, but always assumed it's skirmish only.

Extra Crispy, thanks for pointing out those problems. Let us know when you finalize the rules you'll use.

Pertti, a suggestion if you don't go Extra Crispy ' s route. While painting your lads, test the rules using pieces of cardboard labeled infantry, cavalry, etc. Nothing worse than basing lots of figures for rules you don't really like.

Not battalion level per se, but Jim Wallman has a fast set of rules for a brigade per side. Google his name and rules.

Perfect captain has rules for 1812 that can be easily modified.

My rules will be very simple. All die rolls will be a single D6. I will focus not on the mechanics but on the *decisions* the players make. Example:

Two battalions in attack column enter from the edge to dislodge an opposing battalion on the ridge. How far do you move? Do you shake out into line? When? At what range? At what range does defender use first volley (+1)?

Shooting will be of the "hits on a 6" variety. Morale will be "breaks at 50%" kind of thing.

The challenge will be designing a scenario that offers interesting choices. I might do a multi-table game where two sides are racing to seize the high ground, then fight over it. That way both sides are "attacking."

Last comment: unless you have a huge table you're probably limited to 1 or 2 player a side.

As far as I can see brigade is the lowest level--short of skirmishes--involving tactical options. Now, you can fight that with 6mm figures. At a rough count, six 6mm figures in one rank take up an inch, So a CLS/GdB of ITGM 36 figure French battalion taking up 12" could be replaced by 270 6mm figures in three ranks--which would be 2:1 or a bit over, and certainly look spectacular. And since your bases would only need to be 3/8" deep instead of 2",the formations would look more realistic. A column of divisions would be 4" broad and just over 1" deep, for instance. But even at that level, battalion drill is somewhat abstracted--and rightly so, if you want to fight a game.

If you just want to work out formations, I'd do it the way they trained young officers--blocks or sticks with soldiers painted on them cut to the right frontages--of course, today I'd photoshop, print out and glue instead of paint. An infantry battalion, a cavalry regiment and a battery for each side, with a block for each platoon, troop and gun would let you work through the maneuvers.

I spent quite a bit of time working through a 1:2 6mm setup so I could see how the drill looked in scale. Never finished, as I found I couldn't stand to paint 6mm. Oops. At any rate, the Baccus infantry stands work well with CdeB, since it uses a 3/4" "element" for basing, which is 10 infantry files or 5 cavalry. Here's a couple snippets of from my notes (Russian 1812) (Should be able to copy it and dump it into Excel)

Unit,Troops,NCOs/Officers,Files,Ranks,Width,Depth,1:285 w,1:285 d
Vzvod,60,"6 + O Behind. 2 Middle, 2 Right",20+2,3 + 2,15.4m,7.125m,54mm,25mm
Vzvod,66,"6 + O Behind. 2 Middle, 2 Right",22+2,3 + 2,16.8m,7.125m,58.95mm,25mm
Vzvod,72,"6 + O Behind. 2 Middle, 2 Right",24+2,3 + 2,18.2m,7.125m,63.86mm,25mm
,,,,,,,,
Unit,Troops,NCOs/Officers,Files,Width,Depth,1:285 w,1:285 d,NCO d
Section,6,,3,3m,7.32m,10.53mm,25.68mm,
Half Platoon,18,,9,9m,7.32m,32 mm,25.68mm,12mm d
Platoon,36,,18,18m,7.32m,63.15 mm,25.68mm,12mm d 3.5mm w
Squadron,144,,72,72m,12.0m,252.63mm,25.68mm,7mm w

Shako 2 is a battalion level game. We use 28mm figures, 12 figures for an infantry battalion, 6 figures for cavalry, 2 guns for a battery.
You could adapt these rules to companies and squadrons fairly easily, in my opinion.

Shako 2 is a battalion level game. We use 28mm figures, 12 figures for an infantry battalion, 6 figures for cavalry, 2 guns for a battery.

No, you misunderstand. When the OP said "battalion level" game he meant that each side has a single battalion.

At battalion level, details of terrain could be featured more prominantly than in full scale battles. Enemy cavalry coming in view from a spot of low ground or around a copse of trees do get mentioned in eye witness accounts

Thanks MajorB!

I still intend to get back to finishing my own small tactical rules, centred on the War of 1812; one day. A company was 4" wide, so that shows you the scale – a lot of table real estate for a regiment or battalion.

Stuff I came across doing research for them:

Jim Getz did a version for Chef de Bataillon for the Piquet rules system:
link

Meant to pick that one up to see how it compares to CdB, and will one day.

J.F. Grossman's The Complete Brigadier rules (older school) have a good scale and ideas that can be adapted. I think the Frying Pan & Blanket fellows still sell it.

Donald Enevoldsen's Covered With Glory might also be an alternative/complement to CdB – full appendixes of organization charts AND unit formation illustrations!

The Perfect Captain 1812 rules, as JCFrog wrote, also have some value on this scale too.

I played CdB when it first came out with 3 battalion Regiments and even with a brigade. It's a workable system. I actually liked it, the problem is finding someone else crazy enough to play it with you. Some of the activations a little much though.

I was always interested in a truly tactical set of rules to have a better understanding of what Napoleonic warfare was all about.

Fire and Discipline has a version for Napoleonics even though the basic rules are for mostly the 1700s. there were lists up to the Mexican-American War.
The 1700s scale was 1:10 and 1:15 whilw the 1800s scale was 1:20 so this may be too high for your needs.

I am in the process of reviewing the entire Fire and Discipline series for revision and re-release.

You can probably use any rule set that has 20- or 30-figure battalions as a basis from which to start. Simply convert the command rules from brigade/division/corps level down to battlion, and use each "battalion" as an individual company. As long as you fire by platoon/company, rather than the entire battalion as a whole, you should still get realistic results. Cavalry will become individual troops and artillery (I would keep that to a minimum – say a section of two tubes) becomes single guns – you might want to consider getting limbers, caissons, etc to simulate the "clutter" that was found behind a battery position. If you go "early" enough into Napoleonics you will have battalion guns, usually 3- or 4-pdrs.

[OP here] Thanks all for your suggestions. I was pleasantly surprised that there is interest in this scale/level, that there are rules available other than CdB… and that the same CdB is playable, at least according to some.

Finally my same problems!
I am dealing with refighting at 1:1 ratio with paper figures

As you can see the here there are2 battalions at 1:1 ratio. Every battalion is 70 cm wide.
I use a set of rules conceived by myself, where there is no use of dice, and the hits are calculated on the real number of (paper) soldier firing. The turn is 2 minutes long.
So for instance: 400 men firing at 70m distance cause 4,5% hits, i.e. 18 hits on the ennemy.
visit
paperbattles.it

add:

I split every battalion in sub-units at company level, as you can see in the picture. Every company sized stand has a number of micro stands with 4 or 5 men standing and the micro-stand is attached to the big-stand through a magnet

I bought CdB but couldn't get it to work for me. Spent too much time trying to activate. Too many abstract and counter-intuitive elements – especially firing. I quite liked the order/actions system though. And the scale definitely has an appeal.

What I would really like to see in this scale is a system that caters for Austrian and Prussian (and early French) deployment of the third line as skirmishers….which CdB never attempted.

Simply convert the command rules from brigade/division level down to battlion, and use each "battalion" as an individual company. As long as you fire by platoon/company, rather than the entire battalion as a whole, you should still get realistic results.

SuperS:
If we are talking about the Napoleonic wars or anything involving a division/brigade or more on a side, the command rules won't translate for two reasons:
1. The battalion commander had very little decision-making ability except in rare circumstances.
2. Because of that, the command system [up and down] for a battalion commander was different than for a divisional or brigade commander.

Check out G. Napier's description of what he did as a battalion commander at Corunna. He didn't do anything without permission or orders. His main activities involved encouraging the men, making sure his flanks were secure--still linked with the battalions on his flanks and observing. Twice he went and asked for permission to send out skirmishers and what to do about them when they are attacked in the village to his front.

Kinda boring. If the battalion is off by it's lonesome, then the commander has far more decision-making leaway, but that is basically a skirmish game.

A vote for WRG 1685-1845. The basic 15mm rules have a 30mm frontage element for infantry (4 figures) and cavalry (3 figures). Figure scale is 1:50 for infantry and 1:40 for cavalry. If you are looking at combat as described by the OP I would suggest you are looking at opposing troops no more than three minutes apart for infantry (say, 250 paces or approximately 200 m) and one minute apart for cavalry (say, 250 m assuming, for example, the Russian cavalry charge sequence of 50 paces free pace, 100 paces trot, 80 paces gallop and 80 paces full out charge = 220 m which took just under one minute to complete).
Given a modest amount of space to the rear of your opposing units that sets your table depth at 300 m. Assuming you have a minimum 4' deep table that makes your ground scale 1:250 or 4mm:1m. As your infantry element is 30mm wide this actually represents 7500mm or approximately 47 all ranks including file closers or approximately 1 figure:12 men. For simplicity, you could then simply multiply all the ranges and distances in the rules as printed by four and otherwise play the game as printed.
Obviously, you could apply the same principles to any rules.
Hope this helps.
Allan

Maybe consider the 2mm blocks from Irregular Miniatures. These range from 16 figs in two ranks (or 24 in three ranks) up to 56 men in two ranks (or 78 in three ranks. You would probably need to represent frontages of one quarter of a company as that is probably the smallest element of manouvre.

Also consider 2mm for another reason. Table space will be a challenge in whatever scale and this is the smallest.

A British battalion of 640 rank and file in two ranks will need 40 bases of 8 x 2 to represent 10 companies in quarter companies. I am assuming each base is 15mm so your frontage is 600mm or 60 cm or 2ft roughly. 320 files at 22 inches gives a frontage of 7040 inches or 180 metres. This fixes your ground scale 60cm of blocks = 180 metres or 1/300 ground scale.

Effective musketry range is 30cm (90 metres) so there is enough room on a 6x4 table to have infantry able to see four times its effective range as the depth of the table. Enough time perhaps to determine enemy advances and issue some response. Remember you will have your skirmishers out in front as well and they need depth to fight and delay the advance of the enemy forces.

This is still too short a distance to respond to cavalry. These would be best considered like air support in a WW2/modern game, they just disrupt your forces and you find your unit routed, or in square after the charge.

I think Paddy Griffith came up with a game "Colonels in command" aimed at this level with the focus on the commander deciding when to unleash the battalion volley.

An afterthought. Have a look at these 1:1 formations for a French battalion here

voltigeurs.populus.org/rub/7

You need plenty of table depth to represent a battalion in open column or even half distance.

Another option would be to consider perhaps the Kriegspiel where you are dealing with half battalion blocks and cavalry squadrons plus all the low level ground details you need taken from the game maps.

link

and see TMP link

@Mike

I have been looking for the Voltiguers de la garde website for ages – thanks for the link – the pictures of lines and columns are fantastic

I did a batallion in 3mm (o8 figures from picoarmor) at 1:2. I really need to take some pictures

I don't think a Napoleonic game with 1-3 batallions per side makes any sense historically.

Smaller games make sense – scouting/foraging parties running into each other – the Sharp practise kind of game. Any shooting is likely to be at point blank range.

Larger games make sense. As McLaddie says, there was very little that a batallion commander could do independently and companies only ever moved as part of formal batallion formations.

Medium sized games can make sense if considered as part of a larger action with strict victory conditions – for instance get VP for each turn ridge is controlled, enemy gets fresh troops after a couple of turns, game over after a certain number of turns

John

Check out G. Napier's description of what he did as a battalion commander at Corunna. He didn't do anything without permission or orders. His main activities involved encouraging the men, making sure his flanks were secure--still linked with the battalions on his flanks and observing. Twice he went and asked for permission to send out skirmishers and what to do about them when they are attacked in the village to his front.

If we're talking about the same G(eorge Thomas) Napier, then let's not forget he was only 25 at the time, and hence would have been very young – and inexperienced – for a battalion commander. Someone older, or with more experience, might well have done those things on his own.

Try 3mm. A company at 1:1 is 60mm x 40mm. Six of those is a battalion (for the French anyway). Squadrons are 8 such bases.

Table depth is actually more of an issue than width…

If we're talking about the same G(eorge Thomas) Napier, then let's not forget he was only 25 at the time, and hence would have been very young – and inexperienced – for a battalion commander. Someone older, or with more experience, might well have done those things on his own.

The only thing he did was ask permission to throw out the Grenadiers as skirmishers. So, an experienced officer *might* have done that on his own, but nothing else. His battalion was part of a line. Most all treatises and manuals made a battalion commander's area of concern/control very clear.

Clausewitz states in his "On War" that the further down the chain of command one goes to the Regimental officer, the fewer decisions he can make, to the point of the company officer, who has none.