"16th Century Scale and Rules Recommendations?" Topic

This is blue sky stuff, but I've been reading on the Habsburg-Valois wars again. Supposing I want to fight big battles between Fornovo and Ceresole, maybe stretching as far as Ivry and Nieuport. Big battles on a modest table, and I want to command pike blocks, not count off injured pikemen.
1) What lines of figures would you recommend, no larger than 10mm?
2) What are the shortest, simplest rules which get the main points right?

No right or wrong answers, and if I have any sense, this project will never come to pass.

But thanks.

Our old, large group had several campaigns based on early Italian Wars situations and had good results from Fields of Glory-Renaissance. They seem to have fallen from fashion and our group dissolved from the loss of our FLGS. Our new, smaller group has not played the rules in several years.

I was researching similar style rules for larger battles of the mid to late-16th century in 10mm and initially leaned towards In Deo Veritas by Helion Wargames. Ultimately I decided to use Liber Militum Tercios. I think both sets are designed for early 17th century but I like the simple mechanics of Tercios. Others have modified it for the Italian Wars so I have no doubt it could give a good game for the Hapsburg-Valois wars.

We re-fought Pavia for the 500th anniversary on the weekend just past. Two battles, two wins for the Imperialists. We used Furioso.
Not the most well edited set of rules, everything is there, just not always where you expected to find it. But they work.

Most of the collection used was mine, consisting of 25/28mm figures from – Wargames Foundry, Front Rank, Artizan Design, Perry Brothers, Old Glory, Eureka Miniatures, and, Essex Miniatures. Think I got them all.

As for rules it really depends on what you want to see and experience. I started with Gush, have played Baroque, DBMM, DBM, DBR and now Furioso. For our re-fight games, lots of figures and multiple players, Furioso works ok. Not a competition set though. And 28mm always looks good.

I think Furioso would transition to the later 16th century ok. My collection for the late 16th century has not been on the table or even completed yet, but hopefully it will in the not overly distant future.

Not very familiar with the period but I believe Pendraken do a range for it.

I have their 30 years war figures which are excellent

link

Not my period, but Pendraken seem an obvious choice in 10mm. As for rules, if you like the simplicity of hexes I would go for San Peru et Reproche a free set published in the Battle magazine. If not, I would use Brevis Tercios with some bespoke mods for the period. Another good set IMO would be Piquet, although they are a marmite set.

Baccus have just started releasing Italian Wars codes for 6mm: link

For battles in this period, I have used DBA, Neil Thomas' rules and the (free) Polemos variant for the period, "Wars of the Counter Reformation": link

They all seemed to give reasonable games.

If you're up for 6mm, Heroics & Ros do a Renaissance range.

PS: We played in both 15mm and 28mm so can't suggest something for the smaller scales.

Pendraken have a nice range of 16th century figures and there is also Warmonger which are a bit on the pricy side but very nice:
link

I'm doing 15s so I can't help with figs. Impetus, Basic Impetus, or Baroque would work well. I'm using Impetus for the Italian wars and Baroque for ECW