"The Overstuffed Armies Problem" Topic

On a scale of 0 (none) to 10 (endemic), how much of a problem do you have with armies you continue to expand long after you have a sufficient tabletop force?

Eleven.

What's a guy gonna do with three thousand space goblins?

A 10 for several periods in which I game, such as 25mm Napoleonics, 28mm Very British Civil War, 28mm SYW, and 15mm early Medievals.

A 0 for my 15mm ACW as I concentrated on two corps, one Union and one Confederate.

A 4-6 for all the other periods.

Jim

In what way is this a problem? I always assumed I would continue to add new Vikings from time to time as new ones came out. I think there is a difference between adding a package two from time to time, and adding a whole new corps, more figures than could possibly fit on a table.

Grelber
Who obviously refuses to admit he has a problem at all.

Let me put it this way. During the American Revolution, the British had 105 regiments "on the establishment". I've only painted … 12. That will include CONVERGED battalions that shouldn't even count against the 105. Granted not all served in America, but I still have a lot of catching up to do.
Hessians, Brunswick, Anhalt Zerbst, Anspach, Waldeck, etc, same problem. I only have "some" of them. Let one red facings regiment serve as another? Blasphemy!
I don't even want to talk about Continental Light Dragoons, whose uniforms could radically change from year to year.
Loyalists. I have Butler's Rangers, deLancey, British Legion, Volunteers of Ireland…
Native Americans. Never have enough.
You would think that I would have "enough" militia, but as soon as a new company comes out with militia, I have to have them.

I am modest enough to never give myself a 10 on anything, so I'll settle for 8.

Seriously though. "In tonight's entertainment, the part of the second battalion of Guards will be played by deLancey. Try the veal and tip your waitress."
But I can't stop. If I heard that a mile wide asteroid would smash into Wilkes Barre tomorrow, I would be looking on line at the Brigade Games new FIW figures for militia and Indians. I need to get the Crann Tara Mohawks and bateaux. I'll try to get an order in before X-Hour. And Sarissa and thingsfromthebasement.

I'm with Grelber and John the OFM.

Also, having options is not a problem.

These days, 1. Such has not always been the case. but from bitter experience I started coordinating army building with scenario generation. No more troops are purchased than the generation system calls for, which are no more than fit on the intended table. Surplus head for the flea market.

But if you asked about owning more armies than I have time and opponents for, I couldn't give such a nice smug answer

What's a guy gonna do with three thousand space goblins?

Re: The actual topic--I would say 1, personally, but I am an outlier since I stopped collecting for a hiatus of about 25 years.

8

I'm not sure I understand the question. If you have enough for one side do you not need enough for two? Early and late? East front or West front? Full battle or skirmish? The permutations are endless. Where is the problem?

Any "modest skirmish collection" Ive ever done has aways got way out of hand.

0 – I really don't buy a lot past "sufficient".

For me a "sufficient" tabletop force is not the absolute minimum figures to play the smallest game possible.

Sufficient means I can pull a specific force from my minis (and I have some concept of "reasonable substitution" in there) for all the types of games I would expect to want to play (very fuzzy criterion).

So if one of my friends called up and said, "Hey, I just read this set of diaries from some Forest Brothers raid participants. Can you come over tomorrow? I've got the Sovs. Bring an Eastern European resistance unit with twenty unarmed to be swapped with ten rural rifle armed, five WWII SMG armed, and five farm implement armed. Two, one, and one females, respectively. And you need two demo teams of two each and a command/spotter with three.", then I could do that by pulling from my "sufficient" force of resistance fighters.

If sufficient means that other thing, it's also a zero. I really don't concern myself about that.

Doing inventory these last few days, 5,236 figures at least, all Napoleonic, haven't yet got to enough is enough.

Lets see, SYW a corps each for the French, Allies, Austrians, and Prussian. Still could use some Russians and maybe Spanish……Hmmm.

I don't think this is really a problem is it? How many is too many? If I want to host a six player game of something wonderfully obscure like the Philippine American War, I need to supply both sides, with all the options covered including sailors, Marines and Volunteers as well as the American regulars who were late to the party. There are Philippine "regulars" as well as tribal troops. Can't have too many. No problem at all. That's one project, I have over forty more.

I don't see it as a problem, although it's rare I get to that point what with changing rules, doing different scenarios, seeking alternative force structures.

DBA, Saga, Bolt Action, Crossfire all have a minimum number of figures needed to play a game but all can have buying more figures to tweak your force.

So, 0

One can never have to many Shermans and in any and all scales!

0

Many times I buy figures for the fun of painting them.

I am currently doing a complete Soviet regiment in micro armor at 1:1. And I'm doing EVERYTHING. Signal company. Ambulances. I'm going to skimp on trucks to start but will fill them in eventually.

I'll never be able to game with it.

Extra Crispy, that was one of my first projects way back when the earth was still cooling. I did a modern Soviet armored infantry regiment, 1:1, micro-armor, with infantry, and a tank company in support, never used them.

I guess I am blaspheming, but I never have surplus or excess minis. When I tire of a genre, scale or rules, the figures go up for sale. The money from said sales goes to new projects.

Years ago we had a customer-- from Ohio if I remember correctly who WAS NOT a gamer who was building and painting the entire artillery park for the Army of Northern Virginia complete with crews, limber, cassons, wagons,etc.
He would call every month and place his order.
Several years later he sent me photos of his completed project.

Russ Dunaway

I like to make sure I have enough stuff to cover all the basic options and then add specific things either for certain scenarios or just because they are fun to paint.

I don't regard it as a problem, I like painting things and organising them, and being secure in the knowledge that if I really, really need to do that battle which featured X,Y and Z, I have X,Y and Z in stock.

I covered the combat units first mostly in first 39 years but a battlefield has lots of clutter to fill in those spaces between, that's what I'm working on.

Surely the more you expand the army, the more flexible your composition can be, covering scenarios you couldn't field before, or skewed army builds in point systems. And when you have enough, now you can do a table where 2 armies combine with 2 generals. That has happened historically a number of times.

CeruLucifus has it. 1 army but the variety is vital. Recon teams, Heavy battalions, even HQ's for that raid on them. Bridge layers, Ihave yet to get a mat later, mine sweepers, demolition vehicles, Para drop vehicals. If you don't have several tables worth you are never gouing to do the intersting variations.

Only kit weighing less than 10 tonne due to bridge limists, changes what can be fielded no end.

Does doing the same period in 4 different scales count as overstuffing?

20th main 4 diffrent scale does seem a bit much. Unless the range is VERY big some must be very similar scales.

Maybe, 20th Maine, though I've been worse. I'd suggest that one needs one force of large castings individually based for skirmish/rpg gaming and the small, intimate battles and another with smaller castings based as units on standard-size frontages for battles involving whole corps or armies. Beyond that, you're usually talking special conditions, like 2mm armies for travel or soft plastics for playing with children.

But try not to buy and paint for the dumpster. If you're not using them, they need to be passed on before they become a burden to friends and family.

Medievals – 6mm, 15mm, 20mm, 25mm.

Madness.

6mm is armies (including DBA).

15mm is armies (WRG 5th / DBA)

20mm is skirmish. And Armies. Mostly soft plastic, with some metals mixed in. I'm a big fan of 1/72nd (ish) plastics.

25mm is skirmish….and armies.

Madness.

[It's driven (mostly) by two things – different rule sets and also I really like Medievals]

What is this "sufficient tabletop force" you speak of? There always seems to be just one more thing to acquire.

The solution to the too big an army problem is to concentrate on armies that have multiple uses. For example, I have a Syracusan army that can be used for a multitude of similar forces; once you have 100 stands of hoplites you are ready for almost anything. (except Romans. I have never beaten Romans with Syracusans.)

2 forces is the minimum practical, 8 is really preferred for hosting club/convention games, and surely 12 or 16 or more is just nice for variety of choice — no?

12+