Dear V carter.
Use them on stand as simply a scenic effect. In my 18th century armies I always have little dioramas
1.On the stand. On some of my regiments I place them in the back row or somewhere on the stand. For example in one regiment I have the rear rank with a seregeatn major admiring the charms of a local business guirl who is pulling down here decolettage to him.
2. I have made a chessboard on a barrel with two sergeants playing chess behind the firing line.
3. for the Floatsam and Jetsam regiment (The Royal Marines) I have a figure trundling a wheelbarrow with a large tub on it in which there is a seal (that is the navy seal team) tossing a beach ball with its nose) as the regimental mascot.
4,I have in my Mackattack Indians unit six stnds. One of them has four Indians firing in one direction but two Indians turned around peering over a bush and a rock observing a couple en-flagrante delicto.
Alternatively you can use them in terrain pieces. For example in a tavern or by a building as an attention getter.
In my forest sections, which are large boxes in which troops can be truly hidden I have the box inset with a 1/2 to 1" edge around the outside. This has tree trunks, lichen and other bracken to disguise the box like character of the terrain piece. On this I have taken to making little scenes and vignettes.
For example on one is a gazebo with a lady and her swain in fond embrace. On the face before the ladies maid is running down a path to the gazebo. On the panel before that is the ladies husband, an old gouty fat man being pulled in a dog cart with his ghillies and servants pursuing to thrash the lady and her maid.
I also make scenes from nursery rhymes. In one face there is a black sheep in a corral. In the next side there is a man carrying three sacks. In the next, a stately Lord with one of the bags, the next a lady with a third, and in the last a little boy crying with an empty sack.
Baa Baa Black sheep have you any wool.
Marry sir, Marry sir three bags full.
One for my master and one for my dame
but none for the little boy who cries down the lane.,
There is one with little red riding hood, grandmothers house, the woodcutters house and of courst the big bad wolf.
I have an old woman who lived in a shoe,
Another with Hansel and Gretel.
I also use them in odd terrain pieces, for example an 18th century picnic which I use as a marker for a piece of strategic terrain to be taken, another of three soldiers, one snoozing, one smoking and third drinking while sitting at roadside shrine.
You can also use them for example on stands of wagons. I like to put in anachronistic things. I have a wagon train for one army which has all sorts of "realistic loads" in the back, barrels, boxes, bedrolls, tents. Another has a cook stove and pots and pans. In addition to the cook and the proper accoutements I have put in the figure of a "waitress form a 1950's car-hop on roller skates, holding the tray with burgers and fries above her head."
Lots of things to do with spare figures.
Got an extra cavalryman? Put him on an officer stand galloping up to a mounted officer and handing him with arm outstretched a dispatch. Got an extra infantryman, put him plodding along next to the wagon.
I've even taking to making units in entire Dioramas. I have a regiment of the militia of the army of Princess Trixie of Saxe-Burlap und Schleswig beerstein. Only it's the militia on their "militia drill day." All six stands are in a different configuration. One stand has figures surrounding a groaning table of turkeies, meats, salads and pies and pudding with napkins on their chins stuffing their faces. The next stand has six of them with the company colors and officers "en parade" being painted by an artist on a picture." The next stand has men gathered around a keyboard singing. The next one a man and a woman in front of stage props performing a Mozart Duet, another with the local tarts and trollops trying to entice the young recruites into their tents, another with the men playing bowls and ten pin.
I'm going to use this in combat like any other unit.
experiments with 3Dprinting tiles.
