"Napoleonic rules for Battalion and Company level games." Topic

I have just started painting Napoleonic units for the 1813 campaign. My plan is to use General de Brigade/General de Armee with about a division per side as the initial target.
With this in mind I producing Saxon Battalions with 32 figures (4 companies of 8 figures). Each 8 figure company is on one single base. I will then do some Prussians or Russians.

I was reading about the Battle of Kalisch. At many points in the battle there were one or two companies detached to defend a village . Or a single squadron of cavalry sent to support some infantry.

I was wondering if there is a set of rules out there that allow games of 3-4 battalions per side, where companies can be detached and act as independent units? I am not looking for skirmish rules as I want my 8 figure company base to be the smallest unit. I am instead looking for smaller battle type rules that will allow me to use my figures in a game before I complete a division per side for GdeB or GdeA.

If you lower the scale of Et Sans Resultat, to play each stand is a company, rather than a battalion, it has these exact rules. Mixed formations are possible as well as splitting and merging groups of stands.

Second edition is better IMO for whatever that is worth.

If you like a lot of detail and complexity, there is Chef de Bataillon. Not everyone's cup of tea. Ostensibly it is a 1:5 figure to man ratio but that's fungible. The key is it is geared to the scale of actions ou describe.

Chef de Battalion is a great game, if you scale it to 1:15. When you do that, depth is less of an issue and you don't have to rebase!

The Brigade game in Paddy Griffith's Napoleonic Wargaming for Fun allows this. The old Newbury Rules could handle that size of battle too. Polemos Ruse de Guerre will work also.

This lists some Brigade/Division scale rules. I am uncertain if any of them allow for detached companies.
youtu.be/xU864t-aCBU

You could probably use sharpe practice using 8 figure companies/divisions as units combined into formations. You could then detach units and operate with formations of less than a full battalion.

Sharp Practice would be my inclination.

Black Powder in thei AWI supplement has a scenarion which use companies. Maybe usable also for Napoleonic?

If you're talking 2 to 4 battalions a side then the problem with SP, surely, is that you have to switch to a different set of rules, on the same table, when you go from multi-battalion scale action to action at the level of detached companies. Not sure how that works.

Presumably, what's needed is a set of rules where the smallest unit represented is the company. The only set I can think of that does this is Quarrie. You can detach companies and squadrons and they then have the factors applicable to their troop type; so if you want to detach / converge your grenadier companies to defend something, they then have grenadier fire effect, morale etc.

You can constructively show this with other sets, but only if you luck out to the extent that all sides' company sizes and numbers happen to coincide with the number of bases and figures that the rules say are a battalion. The problem with this though is that depending on the date, the Russians and Prussians had four-company battalions, the Austrians had four or six, the French had six, eight or nine, and the British had nine or ten. So if your rules say a battalion is a fixed number of bases, they effectively will not allow the detachment of individual companies except probably for only one side, and where by dumb luck a battalion of (eg) four bases happens also to have had four companies IRL.

I have wanted this same thing for a while and struggle with the points 4th Cuirassier brings up.

If formations were always 100% full strength, then yeah, just make a base per company, with a width per base scaled correctly and you'd be fine. British could have ten slightly smaller bases than the 6 French and itd work out.

But how do you account for losses before battle? A unit would generally still keep it's number of companies, so you'd want the same number of bases. So now your ground scale is wrong(er). And you need some sort of "Hits" or "Stamina" mechanic to show the difference between full and under strength units, since the number of bases wouldn't be able to change.

You can use GdeB for small unit actions as we do for our War of 1812 games.

Small units like you are suggesting are catered for in GdeB ie detaching light companies for skirmishing duties or grenadiers for assaults. However, there are many instances during the War of 1812 where line companies were detached from their parent unit to garrison small forts and or villages plus strong/vital points such as bridges.

Accordingly, small detachments should be allowed but only as part of the scenario development. It should be the exception rather than the rule, otherwise you could have a myriad of companies (and the unrealistic command and control issues)
instead of the default battalions.

The problem is having musketry charts that reflect these small units of a company or more when most charts reflect only small battalions as the lowest denominator. My solution was to obtain the musketry charts for the GdeB 2nd Edition through David Brown (GdeB editor) via the informative GdeB web forum. The smallest unit on this chart is five or less, increasing to 10 or less etc. So, it will easily allow for the small two company detachments that you speak of.

So, again I do not think there is a need to change your rules. I hope this helps.

The OP stated he is not looking for skirmish rules so that mostly rules out Sharp Practice. It does have 8 figure units which you could use as a company formation, but you wouldn't play 3-4 battalions on a side. Chef de Battalion was designed for that level if you want an ASL level of detail!

DeRuyter,
Sharpe Practice has rules for formations that allow several units to form a line or various columns or squares that activate on a single leader action and spread hits taken across their component units. In such a case a player could certainly handle 3-4 4 unit formations and be able to detach companies for specific missions. Especially true since the rules say you can begin the game already in formation.

@ swammeyjoe

The same issue affects any rules, no?

Company Commander by Capitan Games would probably work. An infantry company/unit is 6-12 figures. The officer unit is 2 figures and ot may command from a company to a battalion.

Company Commander:

link

COMPANY COMMANDER is set in the XVIII & the first half of the XIX century. During this period there were many great battles with large armies and thousands of men but there were also many smaller actions where the use of a musket, ability in fencing, riding skills, personal courage and charisma were decisive.

COMPANY COMMANDER rules are designed for games between small units of men such as reconnaissance patrols, convoy escorts, intelligence missions, border attacks, and other missions which were given to small groups of selected troops. The actions of small groups of soldiers and the direct commands of their officers are the most important aspects of play. The system simulates the frantic rhythm of an encounter. The "human factors" of individual initiative, speed and leadership are worth more than the grand tactics of larger battles.

The rules are designed to use with 15/18mm figures. Figures can be based individually or in groups. But other scales as 28mm could be used.

For command figures, standard bearers, musicians and officers, one figure equals one man. In all other cases one figure represents three soldiers. 8-12 figures represent a section and three sections represent a company.

Each game turn represents about 3 minutes of time.

Ground scale is 1:100.

During 6 years the game has been developed with the suggestions of many players, clubs and hours of gaming.

Thanks for the link Mark; I just grabbed that pdf.

I'll likely stick with Sharp Practice, but nice to have options to ponder for doing a mashup of Silver Bayonet with a larger figure count game for black powder Gothic Horror.

—Cat

Chef de Batailion came to mind: link

Not sure if it would scale properly but might be a good set to have as background.

Thanks for all of the comments, some great thoughts.

I have Sharpe Practice and I hadn't really thought about it as I thought it was just skirmish. Reading through the rules, it does allow for larger formations, so it will probably fill my needs.

I will get Chef de Battalion based on some of the comments, just to see what it is all about.

I will also look at General de Brigade to see how it would work for lower level actions. I hadn't really considered this one either.

Again, thanks for all of your comments.

Can you actually still get Chef de Battalion?

28 years old now. Are they still in print, or would it have to be eBay?

Sharp Practice could work – it strikes me they are not totally sure what they are. Skirmish, as in just a few men, or small action, as in just a few small units!