Announced today, the second game in Warlord Games Epic Battles series. Seems like they have fixed a lot of the issues with the first game such as better range with 3 plastic kits per army at launch - 1 infantry and 2 cavalry with a mix of units on each sprue (as an example, the British infantry sprue has both line infantry and 95th Rifles along with cannons and mounted command). Only British and French to start with but Prussians teased along with named commanders).
What makes for an Epic Battle? After the triumphant release of our Epic Battles: American Civil War range last year, we’ve been pondering which other period of the Black Powder Age would warrant the Epic Battles treatment. There are far too numerous possibilities to list them all here, but ultimately the answer was obvious. The battle that is universally cited as a critical turning point in European military history – its outcome ushering in (relative) peacetime on the continent and ending an era of warfare that had begun with the French Revolution in the 1790s: Sunday 18th June 1815 – Waterloo.
The Most Epic Battle at an Epic Scale
This is one of our biggest ever releases – with two starter sets, one each for the British and French to choose from – each absolutely stuffed with miniatures, this is the ultimate way to replicate the most famous battle in history (or any other Hundred Days Campaign battles) on an Epic, yet manageable, scale.
Each of the two starter sets contains over 1000 figures, plus terrain, a bespoke A5 rulebook, bases and everything to get you started. Each contains a mixture of infantry, heavy cavalry, light cavalry, artillery and commanders all in plastic. Cavalry is vital for Napoleonic gaming and so we’ve made sure to cover the most iconic regiments in numbers that best represent how many were fielded in the armies covered (ie. British Scots Greys are in the box but only 2 per sprue as there was only one regiment of them).
As much of a surprise as the sun rising and setting, but a welcome one.
Note that the cavalry boxes are almost half the price of the ACW sets and in plastic - presumably they realised everybody was just buying everything but the core set from Kalistra instead.
Wargames Illustrated are also all but confirmed to be including sprues in their November issue again so keep an eye out for those before they inevitably go out of stock.
For now, any other setting but Waterloo would have been nice
But yeah, need to have british and french forces as well as the british winning and being a more known "name"
So now we have Waterloo in any possible scale and material
For models/units, we have a suggested 4 bases of 20 models per unit, which takes us to the "standard" 24cm line unit of Black Powder
so the very same as with 28mm
so again the same as with Epic ACW, they don't really take advantage of the smaller scale and you still need a larger table to play while the units itself are not more realistic or historical accurate than the 1/72 or 28mm versions
(in addition that the french frame looks like not having enough elite models, making a unit of 3 bases being the better option)
advertising it as a more manageable scale is tricky, still need a lot of units and a large table, and if 15mm is easier/faster to paint than 28mm really depends on technique and skill.
Would call it more affordable as the guns are "free" compared to 28mm (one get an infantry brigade of 3 battalions for 30€ from the Victrix box as well) and the plastic cavalry in most 28mm boxes make 2 squadrons were you get 2,5 in the epic boxes for similar price
with the problem that cavalry is mixed and in strange numbers, like the british light cavalry with 6 bases hussars and 5 bases dragoons, so 1 box get you 1,5 squadrons hussars and 1 squadron dragoons if you use standard sized units, were the french ones have 4 and 3 bases but 3 different types of cavalry in each box, the overall saving compared to 28mm are the with the artillery
if you wanted to use a lot of guns, epic you saves a lot
personally I think this model range is best use either with other rules, as those would make nice models for Blücher or Republique, or using halve sized units in Black Powder
With 12cm standard sized line and 2 bases per standard unit, this would work much better with BP and also would take advantage of that scale (as it still looks good were 28mm with such a low model count looks rather empty)
The compromise to put the other units on the same sprue as the infantry and cavalry is definitely a double edged sword.
It’s great that the units are in plastic rather than very expensive metal / resin but if you are trying to make a historically accurate force you will, as an example, quickly get too many 95th Rifles and Scottish Cavalry as the ratio works for the starter set but not for larger armies.
I think having Highlanders rather than Rifles in the starter would have made more sense with the rifles available as a metal / resin kit due to the lower numbers needed. Same with the Scottish Cavalry.
I am interested to see where they go with this but I am already invested in too many games and have a backlog that fills my attic so realistically I wont have time to paint this many models (even trying to speed things with either Army Painter dips or Contrast).
Never had any interest in Napoleonics, but I'm being tempted. Will probably pass, at least for now, as I have to finish building out my ACW armies. Curious to see if they release more nations in plastic for this setting, if so I might very well jump into some Austrians and/or Prussians.
Glad to see they are expanding the concept though, still hoping for 15mm Pike & Shotte plastics.
chaos0xomega wrote: Never had any interest in Napoleonics, but I'm being tempted. Will probably pass, at least for now, as I have to finish building out my ACW armies. Curious to see if they release more nations in plastic for this setting, if so I might very well jump into some Austrians and/or Prussians.
Glad to see they are expanding the concept though, still hoping for 15mm Pike & Shotte plastics.
They've said Prussians are coming next.
There's rumours of the next set being English Civil War.
Still think that not doing Seven Years War is a missed opportunity, as there you could really get away with 1 set of infantry/cavalry for all nations and there are not many doing that period out there
going with 1 famous battle per setting and not supporting anything else is understandable and we have seen the same from Italeri in 1:72
I do wish they'd done almost any other Napoleonic campaign but Waterloo, to be honest. But I suspect I'm in the minority there, and they're just doing what will sell.
i think the appeal is all of Europe was involved so you can play as the 'home' team wherever your from and shifting alliances means almost everybody can find a set of battles their 'team' won
plus there has been a long tradition of gaming the battle from army officer training prior to totally hobby stuff
as well as they're towards the end of the set battle peroid with units acting en-block in the main rather than spread out (and thus a pain to move) skirmishers
Cronch wrote: I still do not get the appeal of nappy wargaming, but the boxes do look very appealing in terms of how much stuff you get.
I assume it appeals mainly to French and English gamers (and Anglo/Francophiles or people of English/French descent). Those seem to be the common threads amongst basically everyone I have ever encountered personally who had interest in Napoleonic wargaming. I assume it has to do with the historic ties and rivalries between the two. For the French it was when France was ascendant and arguably at its most powerful (having conquered/subjugated most of Europe). For the English they basically got to fight and win a world war against their historic rival while being the senior/dominant partner in the opposition instead of playing second fiddle to another power, etc. Thats my theory anyway, could be off base, but for the most part I never found much of an appeal in Napoleonic gaming, whereas as an American I do find an appeal in the somewhat similar but still dramatically different ACW era.
Cronch wrote: I still do not get the appeal of nappy wargaming, but the boxes do look very appealing in terms of how much stuff you get.
I assume it appeals mainly to French and English gamers (and Anglo/Francophiles or people of English/French descent). Those seem to be the common threads amongst basically everyone I have ever encountered personally who had interest in Napoleonic wargaming. I assume it has to do with the historic ties and rivalries between the two. For the French it was when France was ascendant and arguably at its most powerful (having conquered/subjugated most of Europe). For the English they basically got to fight and win a world war against their historic rival while being the senior/dominant partner in the opposition instead of playing second fiddle to another power, etc. Thats my theory anyway, could be off base, but for the most part I never found much of an appeal in Napoleonic gaming, whereas as an American I do find an appeal in the somewhat similar but still dramatically different ACW era.
Waterloo is very very famous in England, there are more books about Waterloo and the units/officers there in English than about the rest of the Napoleonic Wars together, and yes all those campaigns were France won and specially all those battles were the british forces lost are a non-topic most of the time
for French, Waterloo was the battle were all was lost, but neither France nor Napoleon were on the high if its power, this was 1805-1811 and having a box about the Battle of Austerlitz, Friedland or Wagram would be much more appreciated on the continent than Waterloo. Yet those are without Britain hence a British company won't release one.
It is the most iconic battle in history and pop culture, because it is so well researched and everyone knows what it is about if the name drops, but this is also the reason everyone is doing it.
You can get Waterloo in 54mm, 28mm, 20mm, 15mm, 10mm, 6mm and 2mm now, in metal, resin and plastic, another set to add 15mm plastic to the list is overkill, specially with boxes that only work for that single battle
Cronch wrote: I still do not get the appeal of nappy wargaming, but the boxes do look very appealing in terms of how much stuff you get.
I assume it appeals mainly to French and English gamers (and Anglo/Francophiles or people of English/French descent). Those seem to be the common threads amongst basically everyone I have ever encountered personally who had interest in Napoleonic wargaming. I assume it has to do with the historic ties and rivalries between the two. For the French it was when France was ascendant and arguably at its most powerful (having conquered/subjugated most of Europe). For the English they basically got to fight and win a world war against their historic rival while being the senior/dominant partner in the opposition instead of playing second fiddle to another power, etc. Thats my theory anyway, could be off base, but for the most part I never found much of an appeal in Napoleonic gaming, whereas as an American I do find an appeal in the somewhat similar but still dramatically different ACW era.
Waterloo is very very famous in England, there are more books about Waterloo and the units/officers there in English than about the rest of the Napoleonic Wars together, and yes all those campaigns were France won and specially all those battles were the british forces lost are a non-topic most of the time
for French, Waterloo was the battle were all was lost, but neither France nor Napoleon were on the high if its power, this was 1805-1811 and having a box about the Battle of Austerlitz, Friedland or Wagram would be much more appreciated on the continent than Waterloo. Yet those are without Britain hence a British company won't release one.
It is the most iconic battle in history and pop culture, because it is so well researched and everyone knows what it is about if the name drops, but this is also the reason everyone is doing it.
You can get Waterloo in 54mm, 28mm, 20mm, 15mm, 10mm, 6mm and 2mm now, in metal, resin and plastic, another set to add 15mm plastic to the list is overkill, specially with boxes that only work for that single battle
thats all well and good, but the discussion we (that is, cronch and myself) are having is about "nappy gaming", not "waterloo gaming".
I love the scale and simplicity of the models, but just not sure if I'd jump in yet, especially since it will likely be a solo adventure. I might be tempted by another era down the line (perhaps ancients) but I do at least love the possibility.
I get why it's a popular topic in the UK and (presumably) France, but I meant more...the actual gameplay, which always struck me as being the worst of both rank and file and gun-line types. The most interesting battles of the period are the ones which break the mould imo. Like I said, I accept that it's a wildly popular subject, I just don't get why you'd like to replay it on tabletop as anything but chits-and-hexes boardgame.
one of the appeal is the "what if", as during that time a lot of things happend because of single events/decisions were made on a "small" scale
and the models look cool as you have a large variation of colourful uniforms and troop types on the smaller levels as well
and it is the last time were big battles were fought in Rank & File style units and yes the most interesting battles are the smaller ones were not just 2 large lines were facing each other
hence if historical scenarios are played you usually take those interesting parts and not the whole engagement
you can play Napo on army level, but than it is much more a strategic game than it is a tactical wargame, were on Bataillone/Division level the tactical aspect is more important
the good rules out there also have a very dynamic game play were being in the right formation at the right time is important but also keeping the initiative
Napoleonics is more or less the archetype of R&F wargaming and with the very original Kriegspiel started ~1812 to train for those battles, this is the setting of the very first wargame in general
lets put it in a different way, it was the last time such large armies fought in Rank & File units as after that, armies were either smaller or not organized in those large blocks any more
Thats debatable. The large formations persisted in Europe (and the United States) well into the end of the 19th century. You may not see battles as large as Leipzig again, but I think its splitting hairs to say that something like the Battle of Gravelotte during the Franco-Prussian War was "small" because there were "only" 300,000 troops on the battlefield instead of the 500,000 at Leipzig. Even still, there were about 50% more soldiers on the battlefield at Gravelotte than there were at Waterloo, and many of what are considered to be "major battles" during the Napoleonic wars (Raszyn, Eckmuhl, Raab, Aspern-Essling, Wagram, Smolensk) are smaller than some of the larger battles during the American Civil War, Franco Prussian War, Austro Prussian War, and Crimean War.
stonehorse wrote: I am quite interested in this. How does the Epic game differ from the Black Powder rules? Is it just smaller scale and distances?
The only real difference is the size of the figures, and the way that they're assembled (ranked infantry is a single strip of ten figures in a close line). The distances and the size of the trays is exactly the same as in "normal" Black Powder.
Because the figures are smaller but the trays are the same size, you have more figures in a unit. But otherwise, it's the same.
The inclusion of one unit of Rifles for every three line units in the British boxes is rather strange. And the decision to have the Rifles formed up without skirmishers is even stranger.
I agree Derek, especially since the French light infantry are separate and skirmishing. Maybe there's something about he uniform that made that harder to do with the British?
Razor, as far as I know these are the first less than 28mm plastic Napoleonic miniatures. I'm very happy to see more small scale plastic stuff on strips, even if they have to start with the most popular periods.
the first 15mm ones were the Risk plastic models and depending on your definition if plastic, 1/72i s the most common scale for plastic Napeolonic and those already existed long before 28mm in plastic was a thing
now we have 28mm, 25mm, 15mm and 8mm plastic minis for Napo
As an spaniard, though, playing either french of brits of that era feels somewhat wrong, for some reason
Then you'll need to convince a Spanish or other Continental manufacturer to make a similar line for L'Empereur Napoleon's other foes. Otherwise, of course a British manufacturer is going to focus exclusively on a British victory. Similarly, Warlord and Perry Bros. sell Rorke's Drifts starters for the Anglo-Zulu War, but not the Battle of Isandlwana where the British lost.
Perhaps it is different outside of the Anglosphere, but I find most people within it forget that Napoleon's military reputation is built mainly on the bodies of Austrians and Prussians. Especially the former, starting with Italy when Napoleon was still a general for Revolutionary France, then throughout the Napoleonic period proper (with pauses as the Austrians had to train new troops after their previous defeat). But like the Terminator, the Austrians would be back.
And despite being tempted as a former Napoleonic player, I too am tired of yet another Waterloo starter, and so will give this a pass. Need to get a French manufacturer to make a Austerlitz starter, the "Battle of Three Emperors" with the French at their peak decisively defeating the allied Austrian and Russian armies.
Derek H wrote: The inclusion of one unit of Rifles for every three line units in the British boxes is rather strange. And the decision to have the Rifles formed up without skirmishers is even stranger.
There were 26 British Battalions at Waterloo of which only three were Rifles. And two of those were understrength with six companies instead of the usual ten.
That's about 1 in ten battalions compared to the one in four found in in the Warlord boxes.
RazorEdge wrote: Thank you Warlord Games for missed the chance to bring another something other instead of the 1.000.000th Napoleon Range...
It's not about doing something new, it's about creating a new entry-level drug for people who stick to Warlord as their source of Baby's First Historcal - remember, without trying to sound too unflattering with the comparison, they're the GW of historicals and I've noticed a lot more people get into the scale as a rest of the ACW set, specifically because A) Warlord was pushing it and B) It was a solid, plastic starting point.
Having a large box of 13mm plastics from a well known company rather than going onto a website from the 90s and ordering several dozen metal packs (not dissing, most of my ACW stuff is from Kalistra) is going to, and has had, a large draw for newblood into historicals below 28mm.
ACW has the advantage of just 2 factions and that you got most what you needed from the plastic sets
Napoleonic with just the 3 factions present at Waterloo is not even an entry level for 15mm Napo but just what it is, a single boxed set for Waterloo were the it is cheaper to buy 28mm from other companies than trying to set up an Epic army for another scenario (because of the strange unit composition in the boxes)
kodos wrote: ACW has the advantage of just 2 factions and that you got most what you needed from the plastic sets
Napoleonic with just the 3 factions present at Waterloo is not even an entry level for 15mm Napo but just what it is, a single boxed set for Waterloo were the it is cheaper to buy 28mm from other companies than trying to set up an Epic army for another scenario (because of the strange unit composition in the boxes)
Depends what you consider a "faction present at Waterloo"? The Anglo-Allied Army has substantial contingents of British, KGL, Hanovarian, Dutch, Belgian, Brunswick and Nassau troops, all of which could be considered as different "factions".
Though to my mind "faction" is just not a useful term when discussing historical wargaming.
The problem with the ACW set was that you got nothing you needed from the plastic set, because the uniform wasn't right for either side. But yeah, these things I guess are good as a starting point for people who want to get into historical gaming and Black Powder without having to figure out exactly what to buy. And I'd be happy to see more strips of small scale plastic miniatures for the horse and musket period.
The ACW set was clearly a low budget low risk product test to see what demand was like. They only needed to cut one set of sprues in plastic for it, basically and it was "good enough" to fill in both sides of the conflict even if it was less than perfect. I'm guessing they've moved to Napoleonics now because ACW was well received.
Following last week's announcement of Epic Battles: Waterloo we were inundated with questions ,the most common of which was: "will there be more plastics?" Though we can't say too much quite yet, here's an early preview of more upcoming plastic British.
This makes their decision to put rifles in strips on the infantry sprue even more baffling. You were going to end up with may more than you'd ever need already. Now you're going to replace the strip ones with these anyway. Really reduces the value of that infantry box since it makes you buy a bunch of stuff you aren't going to use.
A podcast mentioned that there were 11 plastic sprues created so far. The pre-order had 6 so that leaves another 5. I was thinking the split could be 1 for the British (Highlanders plus Skirmishing Rifles), 1 for the French and 3 for Prussians.
It was also mentioned that Austrians and Russians may come in the future but the plastic mould costs are prohibitive.
Albino Squirrel wrote: This makes their decision to put rifles in strips on the infantry sprue even more baffling. You were going to end up with may more than you'd ever need already. Now you're going to replace the strip ones with these anyway. Really reduces the value of that infantry box since it makes you buy a bunch of stuff you aren't going to use.
It baffled me when I mentioned it on the first page of this discussion but, even though they were Light Infantry and are famous for skirmishing, the 60th and 95th Rifles were just as capable as forming line with regular battalions.
Maybe the 95th were included in Line formation because Warlord is a British Company and, thanks to Bernard Cornwell and Sean Bean, us Brits love a Greenjacket.
95th Rifles are popular. Warlord knows people are going to want them, so what better well to buff sales than sell their skirmishing variation separately? Voltigeurs aren't nearly as known/popular, so they got away with skirmishing in the starter set.
The next issue of Wargames Illustrated has a free sprue of either English or French Heavy Cavalry on for those interested in having a closer look at the models without buying a full box
Waterloo is the famous battle everyone has heard of in this time period. (but it is starting at the end of the period)
& as a starter set its the best bet to start for a new scale/ battle system for any company
Gives the possibility of expansion of range growth straight away with the Prussians
if it doesn't go down that well with the paying public. the people who have bought it can play it out to there hearts content as it looks quite a good self contained set.
if it does succeed. it has the scope of other settings / new starter sets
Austerlitz , Borodino , Peninsular war or Egypt
plus lots of scope to bring out booster box's for gaps in the range
(& inexpensive to produce a new sprue now & then the keep new release's every 3 to 6 months to keep interest peeked)
ive bought both box's
ive never played warlords game system 'black powder' before but if i dont like the games mechanic i can use a another rule set for epic Napoleonic's
endtransmission wrote: In an interview recently they also said that if this goes well, the next one would be ECW... which wouldn't require many sprue at all to make
John stallard is a massive fan of ECW. So its not a surprise that's the next on the list
but i hope they continue to support the previous release's in the Epic Battles range
I'll be going to Salute tomorrow and seeing as Warlord will be there I'm going to have a close look at this, very tempted. I've never played one of these small scale historicals before so it could well lure me in.
Black Powder is a fun game. But if you're used to either very competitive games where you build killer lists, or games with lots of gamey stuff, like spending points on tactics to give you buffs and stuff like that, it will be very different. If you like more narrative games, and are interested in the historical period, it's very fun. Similar in mechanics to Warmaster, where a lot of the focus is on command and control and dealing with not always being able to do everything you want with all your units. Much smaller numbers of dice are rolled than in a typical warhammer game, so dramatic things can happen.
endtransmission wrote: In an interview recently they also said that if this goes well, the next one would be ECW... which wouldn't require many sprue at all to make
OK, now that is one that will most definitely be of interest to me.
I was tempted by Epic Napoleonics, but decided to go for Perry Miniatures Travel Battle instead. Smaller scale, but it has everything I need in one box. Of the rules aren't great, I can just adapt them as needed.
Huron black heart wrote: I'll be going to Salute tomorrow and seeing as Warlord will be there I'm going to have a close look at this, very tempted. I've never played one of these small scale historicals before so it could well lure me in.
I'm sure you won't be the only one to ask, but would ask them if they're intent on releasing more french units and/or battles in the period, please ?
The new Wargames Illustrated does mention that more unique units which people won’t need a lot of will most likely be in metal which is understandable.
They couldn't bother to do 2 different plastic sprues for the ACW line, but they'll do dozens of them for this single campaign? Two different sprues for ACW, each with a plausible uniform for one of the sides, would have gone a long way toward making that whole thing much more appealing.
As it's been pointed out, they're an English company.
That or the ACW set was purely a test product to see if it's worth investing more into the line at all.
Cronch wrote: As it's been pointed out, they're an English company.
That or the ACW set was purely a test product to see if it's worth investing more into the line at all.
I have seen mention in interviews that ACW was a trial run to test the waters so it had the very limited plastic support. I would expect to see more plastics in future ranges (ECW likely to be limited again though due to limited range of troops taking part).
Albino Squirrel wrote: They couldn't bother to do 2 different plastic sprues for the ACW line, but they'll do dozens of them for this single campaign? Two different sprues for ACW, each with a plausible uniform for one of the sides, would have gone a long way toward making that whole thing much more appealing.
Bigger audience I suppose. ACW's one of the more popular periods, but Waterloo alone probably still trumps it in terms of sales.
Cronch wrote: As it's been pointed out, they're an English company. .
Thats the Problem. Next Theme will be ECW, TYW would sell much better.
I know it's all but confirmed, but ECW did surprise me. It's not the most popular period. I'd have expected AWoIndependance next, or maybe the War of 1812.
Albino Squirrel wrote: I do wish they'd done almost any other Napoleonic campaign but Waterloo, to be honest. But I suspect I'm in the minority there, and they're just doing what will sell.
Agreed. It makes sense with Warlord being a British company and Waterloo being so iconic. But it'd be cool to see Napoleon in his best form taking on Austria and Russia at Austerlitz, or the slugfest that was Borodino.
Albino Squirrel wrote: I do wish they'd done almost any other Napoleonic campaign but Waterloo, to be honest. But I suspect I'm in the minority there, and they're just doing what will sell.
Agreed. It makes sense with Warlord being a British company and Waterloo being so iconic. But it'd be cool to see Napoleon in his best form taking on Austria and Russia at Austerlitz, or the slugfest that was Borodino.
I'd definitely be interested if in the Russians if there was a Borodino set.
But I feel somewhat burned by the ACW thing, and the fact that the subsequent releases for that war weren't plastic. Plus, my primary Napoleonics opponent is no longer around. So even if there is a Russian Napoleonics release, I'll likely still take a wait and see attitude toward it.
I'm pretty tempted by this (even if just for solo play), but the thought of all that painting, especially with my current backlog......ugh. Probably the biggest obstacle for me.
Well I checked this out at Salute, Paul Sawyer wasn't particularly engaging when I tried to ask him about this, he actually said he didn't have a lot to do with it!
Models are very nice, (free sprue on Wargames illustrated magazine) small enough for the big battle feel but with enough detail you can do a nice paint job if you want to.
Looking at the price however I can't see too much enticing me towards the all in set (500 quid) I may even wait to see if I can order this from independent retailers for a hopefully 20% discount. I have decided will buy into it one way or the other though.
Albino Squirrel wrote: Black Powder is a fun game. But if you're used to either very competitive games where you build killer lists, or games with lots of gamey stuff, like spending points on tactics to give you buffs and stuff like that, it will be very different. If you like more narrative games, and are interested in the historical period, it's very fun. Similar in mechanics to Warmaster, where a lot of the focus is on command and control and dealing with not always being able to do everything you want with all your units. Much smaller numbers of dice are rolled than in a typical warhammer game, so dramatic things can happen.
Ive played warmaster back in the day (good game)
orders out to troops etc each turn , fail leadership & end your turn
with jeopardy of fog of war, instead of the warhammer your turn my turn mechanic
The new Wargames Illustrated does mention that more unique units which people won’t need a lot of will most likely be in metal which is understandable.
if its all plastics, its make the mould & knock out the sprues.
i just hope its continued support by WG after the 1st wave of expansions
I probably would buy a Borodino themed set. Though obviously Black Powder isn't really meant for battles of that size, you could represent part of the battle or many actions during the campaign.
RazorEdge wrote: Thats the Problem. Next Theme will be ECW, TYW would sell much better.
... They will be Thirty Years War. Late period, perhaps, but still. They will have Pike, Shot, Horse and guns. I have a 1/72 ECW army made entirely of the redoubtable Revell kits, it is doable.
Fewer of the 'unique' troops in an unusual scale? Yes, and that is probably exactly why it is the comparative backwater of the Three Kingdoms rather than the full-fat TYW, quite besides the "home-town" factor.
RazorEdge wrote: Wars of the Sun King would be nice but not "Hail Britannia, Britannia rules the world" egocentric enough for Warlord Games....
A War of the Spanish Succession Starter set based on the Battle of Blenheim where the English commanded by John Churchill, First Duke of Marleborough {Ancestor of Winston Churchill} defeat the French under Marshal Tallard. So England beating the French again should be "Hail Britannia, Britannia rules the world" egocentric enough.
Okay, Warlord Games, how about a War of 1812 starter based on the Battle of New Orleans? Or a American War of Independence starter built around the Battle of Yorktown? No takers? Not surprised.
RazorEdge wrote: Wars of the Sun King would be nice but not "Hail Britannia, Britannia rules the world" egocentric enough for Warlord Games....
A War of the Spanish Succession Starter set based on the Battle of Blenheim where the English commanded by John Churchill, First Duke of Marleborough {Ancestor of Winston Churchill} defeat the French under Marshal Tallard. So England beating the French again should be "Hail Britannia, Britannia rules the world" egocentric enough.
Albino Squirrel wrote: This makes their decision to put rifles in strips on the infantry sprue even more baffling. You were going to end up with may more than you'd ever need already. Now you're going to replace the strip ones with these anyway. Really reduces the value of that infantry box since it makes you buy a bunch of stuff you aren't going to use.
It baffled me when I mentioned it on the first page of this discussion but, even though they were Light Infantry and are famous for skirmishing, the 60th and 95th Rifles were just as capable as forming line with regular battalions.
Maybe the 95th were included in Line formation because Warlord is a British Company and, thanks to Bernard Cornwell and Sean Bean, us Brits love a Greenjacket.
I'm going to guess that the riflemen are in line formation ... because they fought in line for most of the day.
this it the strange thing about this lineup, some units like the 95th in formation, are mostly exclusive to Waterloo, while others are not meant to be there at all
kodos wrote: this it the strange thing about this lineup, some units like the 95th in formation, are mostly exclusive to Waterloo, while others are not meant to be there at all
Seems like they just called it "Waterloo" for the branding. The only reason why I can think they didn't just call it Epic Battles: Napoleonics is because GMT's Command & Colours: EPIC Napoleonic is already a thing, maybe it'd be tough to try and get the rights to that, or dispute it?
The inclusion of the 95th does seem like they've shot themselves in the foot. It would have been smarter just to have a resin 95th box with a couple units in line and a couple units skirmishing, then you'd guarantee everyone would buy a box of that. Maybe if you're not a button-counter you could just paint the 95th units as regular light infantry? But even then, dedicated light infantry regiments weren't fielded in a 1:3 ratio.
At least the voltigeurs in the French box come in skirmishing formation.
Albino Squirrel wrote: This makes their decision to put rifles in strips on the infantry sprue even more baffling. You were going to end up with may more than you'd ever need already. Now you're going to replace the strip ones with these anyway. Really reduces the value of that infantry box since it makes you buy a bunch of stuff you aren't going to use.
It baffled me when I mentioned it on the first page of this discussion but, even though they were Light Infantry and are famous for skirmishing, the 60th and 95th Rifles were just as capable as forming line with regular battalions.
Maybe the 95th were included in Line formation because Warlord is a British Company and, thanks to Bernard Cornwell and Sean Bean, us Brits love a Greenjacket.
I'm going to guess that the riflemen are in line formation ... because they fought in line for most of the day.
Correct. My gut instinct still lies with the Rifles being included in this box rather than, say, the Highlanders or even one of the Hanoverian or Netherlands Regiments is due to the Sharpe effect.
And sales. A gamer can now buy the Highlanders and skirmishing Rifles separately.
kodos wrote: this it the strange thing about this lineup, some units like the 95th in formation, are mostly exclusive to Waterloo, while others are not meant to be there at all
Seems like they just called it "Waterloo" for the branding. The only reason why I can think they didn't just call it Epic Battles: Napoleonics is because GMT's Command & Colours: EPIC Napoleonic is already a thing, maybe it'd be tough to try and get the rights to that, or dispute it?
The inclusion of the 95th does seem like they've shot themselves in the foot. It would have been smarter just to have a resin 95th box with a couple units in line and a couple units skirmishing, then you'd guarantee everyone would buy a box of that. Maybe if you're not a button-counter you could just paint the 95th units as regular light infantry? But even then, dedicated light infantry regiments weren't fielded in a 1:3 ratio.
At least the voltigeurs in the French box come in skirmishing formation.
Hmm I'm not sure what is meant about "others are not meant to be there at all" as I'm pretty sure every unit in these sets contains units that were at Waterloo, unless I am somehow mistaken (please correct me if I am).
In terms of the infantry kerfuffle...
It's obvious that the rifles are in line because they spent most of the battle of Waterloo fighting in line (and in square). Having them be in skirmish order for a Waterloo box would not make much sense for the battle overall. The fact Warlord is making a separate set for skirmishing rifles is great for the few times they were in skirmish order during the battle (if memory serves they formed skirmish at the end of the battle to harass fleeing French units)
As for the British sprue layout, it seems to me that the produced configuration makes the most sense; each sprue is a single British line battalion (four stands, of eight "rank" pieces) and one stand (two "ranks") of rifles; with three sprues you have three regular sized line units (of four stands) and one small sized rifle unit (of three stands). Reducing the sprue to one "rank" of rifles would mean you'd need to double the number of British Waterloo sprues to get a small unit of rifles. Considering there were three battalions of the 95th at Waterloo, it works rather well (plus two KGL light rifle battalions, and at this scale, not sure one would notice the difference of the shako)
(to be fair, I think I'd prefer one "rank" of rifles and one "rank" of another unit - but then I'm sure the internet would switch the complaint that "how dare they include a small unit of rifles in this box!" to "how dare they include two unplayable units in this box, it's a cash grab to make you buy multiple boxes!" along with sacrificing the two unique "rank" rifle sculpts to a single repeated "rank" sculpt... or if they substituted another unit entirely, the criticism would be "the rifles are iconic! it's a cash grab to make us buy rifles separately. who cares about these highlanders!" - see above post )
French wise, Voltigeurs would also make no sense being a separate line anyway as they were merely a single company of an infantry battalion that was thrown forward to screen the battalion, and reformed into line (the left company) when engaged. The French sprues already have the flank companies represented on the sprues (the right company "rank" piece has a wing of grenadiers, the left company "rank" piece has a wing of Voltigeurs), which conforms to Black Powder rules (Voltigeurs skirmishing are represented by a handful of fellas in front of the unit in question; you don't physically break apart the unit left company or anything)
judgedoug wrote: Hmm I'm not sure what is meant about "others are not meant to be there at all" as I'm pretty sure every unit in these sets contains units that were at Waterloo, unless I am somehow mistaken (please correct me if I am).
the Dragons were there but not used and there were only 2 regiments of Carabiniers, but you need more of those boxes to get enough Cuirassiers and get more Carabiniers than exited
As to the Rifles issue: don't forget you can use them also to represent KGL light infantry or Hannoverian units in such uniform. There were quite a few units at Waterloo that look almost identical at this scale.
So nothing is for the trash bin if you buy several sets.
judgedoug wrote: Hmm I'm not sure what is meant about "others are not meant to be there at all" as I'm pretty sure every unit in these sets contains units that were at Waterloo, unless I am somehow mistaken (please correct me if I am).
the Dragons were there but not used and there were only 2 regiments of Carabiniers, but you need more of those boxes to get enough Cuirassiers and get more Carabiniers than exited
Whether they were used or not the Regiment de Dragons were definitely present - I believe fourteen regiments in total across five cavalry divisions? You are correct on the Carabiniers, only two regiments were present, but I think this again goes to the sprue design - the numbers would be wonky (not enough models for bases, less sculpts, etc).
Automatically Appended Next Post: Well here's John Stallard talking about all the internet complaints about 95th in line, extra carabiniers, plus upcoming releases, etc:
judgedoug wrote: You are correct on the Carabiniers, only two regiments were present, but I think this again goes to the sprue design - the numbers would be wonky (not enough models for bases, less sculpts, etc).
the problem with them is not that just 2 were present, there ever only exited 2 of them, so even on any other battle you would have more than you ever need
those are a unit were nobody would have had any problem if they would come in resin, as a single box would have been all you ever needed
French dragoon regiments were there, as were more chasseur a' cheval regiments than I thought. It looks like you'd only need a company of Guard Engineers though.
kodos wrote: those are a unit were nobody would have had any problem if they would come in resin, as a single box would have been all you ever needed
I'm not sure I agree: if using the internet has taught me anything it is that grumblers will grumble; the complaint would then be "cash grab because Warlord knows people would want them so they make us buy another box", (re alphaecho's previous comment about how highlanders weren't on the sprue for sales reasons, "gamers can buy the highlanders separately")
John Stallard's video I posted above is worth watching - and I will lose my mind with an Austerlitz or Borodino set. I already have a massive Austrian army in 28mm (painted) and an even more massive Russian army in 28mm (unpainted... in a big box... in my attic?) but would immediately buy it all again (and more) in "epic" scale, just because those campaigns are so cool
judgedoug wrote: John Stallard's video I posted above is worth watching - and I will lose my mind with an Austerlitz or Borodino set. I already have a massive Austrian army in 28mm (painted) and an even more massive Russian army in 28mm (unpainted... in a big box... in my attic?) but would immediately buy it all again (and more) in "epic" scale, just because those campaigns are so cool
Beats my box of 28mm Rifles from Wargames Atlantic.
They posted pictures to Twitter showing the process is underway, but the official statement is "end of" January so likely sometime the week of the 24th officially.
kodos wrote: the same as with 28mm, you just have more models on each base if you go by the suggestions of Warlord and Black Powder
When talking about "scale" they mean how tall the average dude is, for example 28mm (well closer to 32mm now) for Warhammer.
and why does the model height matter for the matt size? as the important part for how large a matt needs to be is the size of the bases and how many bases/units are on the table
most matts aimed for 15mm will be too small to play BlackPowder with the Epic models, as 48x72 is still the minimum size
I wonder if Warlord Games plans a similary system for Bolt Action as "15mm" mass battle to replace FoW after Battlefront hates their old playerbase with their new North Africa V4 WoT Edition Compilation ghak.
RazorEdge wrote: I wonder if Warlord Games plans a similary system for Bolt Action as "15mm" mass battle to replace FoW after Battlefront hates their old playerbase with their new North Africa V4 WoT Edition Compilation ghak.
You mean the old fan base that was around first time the Midwar Monsters came out in 2013?
RazorEdge wrote: I wonder if Warlord Games plans a similary system for Bolt Action as "15mm" mass battle to replace FoW after Battlefront hates their old playerbase with their new North Africa V4 WoT Edition Compilation ghak.
It's probably only a matter of time. Bolt Action and Legion seem to have replaced Warmahordes for the first place 40k refugees end up and with Epic very much being a gateway drug for under-28mm games they'd be coocoo not to take advantage of it.
I know, I know, there's no lack of WW2 in literally every conceivable scale but Warlord would, like with ACW/Waterloo, be selling their name to lure in a bigger audience.
Most likely it would be some weird niche scale (like their 13.5mm ACW/Waterloo). Maybe 18.5mm since BA scales down pretty well outside of infantry still being individuals and Plastic Soldier Company are already doing 20mm.
There's an announced Coming Soon product that's supposed to combine Bolt Action, Blood Red Skies, and Victory at Sea. Warlord is definitely not moving away from World War 2 anytime soon.
and Victrix in 1/144, as well as Revell, Italeri, Zvezda in different scales (1/72, 1/100, 1/48)
ACW in plastic is 28mm and 1/72, while for Napeolonics there is 28mm, 1/72 (and 18mm but they are OOP)
here both have good metal ranges but mainly 10 or 6mm for Napo, were there are good models in 12mm for ACW (which is already a problem for Warlord as their Epic ACW Resin is more expensive with worse quality but not much different in size)
Two new sets of troops on pre-order. As mentioned above, the Highlanders are available for pre-order. And on the French side, you can now pre-order the Guard. The default is the Old Guard, but there's a head option to make them Middle Guard.
Two bundles. One is three Guard boxes. The other is two Guard boxes, and one Highlander box.
I think I will grab the two guard and one highlander bundle (or pick up the same with a better discount elsewhere). Shame you get so few skirmishing rifles as would have ideally liked more but one box gets you all the Highlanders you need for Waterloo.
How hard are these games to play? Id be interested but only if its very simplified....id be playing against my old man and I dont have the brain capacity for more rule sets in my brain
Black Powder is a more detailed rules set so it can cover all kinds of armies and battles during the 200 year time frame it covers
so there are a lot of things you may not need or need to adjust to your liking (most common house rule I have seen is to cut down units sizes to play games in normal sized tables or to give easier access for people who started with different rules)
it plays good though and if you don't want to work out your own army lists, the 100 days campaign book comes in handy to play Waterloo
for a more simplified and dynamic set of rules, I recommend Lasalle from Sam Mustafa over BP.
VAYASEN wrote: I think they are designed for Black Powder?
How hard are these games to play? Id be interested but only if its very simplified....id be playing against my old man and I dont have the brain capacity for more rule sets in my brain
It's pretty simple. I've seen people play it at conventions who hadn't played it before and they do fine. The most complicated and unusual part is the command phase. You have leaders who can issue an order to a unit or group of units (if they are close together). You state the orders out loud, and it's intended you do it somewhat "in character", or similar to how the order would actually be stated. For example, "the 59th Massachusetts will march to the crest of the hill and deploy into line", rather than "this unit will move 10 inches forward". Then you take a command roll, which might result in the unit or group getting to move zero, 1, 2, or 3 times. So you won't know until you roll if they will reach their destination or not, or they may not move at all that turn.
Then you shoot. Each unit shoots the nearest enemy for the most part. You roll the units number of shooting dice (usually 3 for regular sided units) and hit on 4+ (with a few possible modifiers, like +1 for very close range). For each hit, the target makes a save on their morale value, with a few modifiers. Anything not saved causes damage. Once you reach your stamina value (usually 3) in damage points you are shaken, and get -1 to hit. Any damage beyond your stamina and you take a break test, which could result in standing your ground, falling back, or fleeing the battle entirely and being removed. You can give rally orders with your commanders in the command phase to remove a point of damage.
Combat is similar to shooting, except you roll more dice (usually 6) and both sides fight. The loser always takes a break test, so it can be more conclusive than shooting. That's the basics. But units can have special abilities to make them more different, like being ferocious and getting re-rolls to hit when charging, or being sharpshooters and getting to re-roll 1s to hit when shooting, or lots of other things like that. Because the stats are pretty standard for units, any major difference comes from these abilities, so there is stuff to remember there.
rockgod2304 wrote: i thought the Prussian's would of been out before the expansions to the British & French
So you can actually waterloo (The whole point & name of the game)
The scale isn't really appropriate for playing the full battle. Each unit (a collection of generally up to five bases, with twenty figures on each base) represents a regiment. So you're not going to be depicting the full battlefield unless you have a *very* large table.
The main barrier is unit frontages really, once they're in line these units take up a similar frontage in mm as larger scale figures do. People are taller than they are wide. You're fitting an extra unit or two in a battle line on a 6x4 table but it isn't a huge difference. Even in columns, these units are only about half the width of the equivalent 28mm units, so they're a good bit more maneuverable but you're fighting in line most of the time.
Hoping for my preorder to get dispatched this week - it came into stock then went out again at the retailer I went with so a bit sus
kodos wrote: but unlike ACW and Napoleonic, WW2 is already available in all kind of scales
going their epic scale and people just use 1/144, going close to 18mm and people use 1/72
and the new rules/campaigns will be interesting, I hope they don't focus just on specific battles
Uh, what? ACW and Napoleonic are widely available in pretty much every scale imaginable, 2mm, 3mm, 6mm, 10mm, 12mm, 15mm, 18mm, 20mm, 25mm, 28mm, not so sure about 32/35mm options, but 54mm is definitely on the table.
chaos0xomega wrote: Battlefront has a huge range of 15mm plastics, and PSC has a fairly large 15mm plastic range as well.
But thats besides the point because nobody (including yourself) ever specified we were discussing plastic minis in this context.
the context was that releasing a new 13mm WW2 epic range from Warlord (which is plastic) makes no sence as the market is flushed with such minis already
while there are not that many for Napoleonics and ACW (and I haven't seen any from PSC or BF), while Warlord messed the ACW range up by having just a generic infantry range and resin cavalry which is more expensive than metal models from other companies
in that context (as I also mentioned the WW2 plastic manufacturer which do a small 12-15mm scale), it should be clear that we talk about hard plastic minis (of course I should have been clearer)
Aeneades wrote: More news from the podcast Warlord Games posted this week (thanks to facebook group for posting) -
• Prussians in 2-3 months
• Generals coming in resin
• French Imperial Guard Cavalry coming in resin
Also, interestingly, they are going to redo some of the metal ACW epic range in plastic.
metal? I haven't bought anything other than the plastic kits, but I thought the others were resin?
They were advertised as being in metal but the first production run was in resin (they stuck a little resin sticker on the pack as the contents said metal models). No idea why they did the first release as resin but when they restocked they were produced in metal as originally planned -
i wonder if they were trying Siocast resin (perhaps with a borrowed machine but have found it's not working as well as they hoped so returned it and went back to metal as originally planned?)
I have got hold of some French infantry from the cover of Wargames Illustrated (which has a bunch of features on the game in there too). Lovely little minis, not massive amounts of detail but I can imagine them being pretty easy to paint in a couple of steps and they look quite adequate for their purpose.
Has anyone gone 'all in' for this one, with both British and French, or are people just collecting a single boxset?
Pacific wrote: I have got hold of some French infantry from the cover of Wargames Illustrated (which has a bunch of features on the game in there too). Lovely little minis, not massive amounts of detail but I can imagine them being pretty easy to paint in a couple of steps and they look quite adequate for their purpose.
Has anyone gone 'all in' for this one, with both British and French, or are people just collecting a single boxset?
I finally received my two starters plus the two Sarissa scenery sets (I preordered em a while back but was too lazy/busy to get to the store where I ordered em until yesterday). Holy crap, they're awesome. Giant boxes just chock full of stuff. Models look perfectly designed - in that they have nice bold features which will make painting them very easy (judging from the Napoleonic fb group, people are painting 'em en masse quickly so looking forward to some batch painting). Lots more sculpt variety; much better than the ACW stuff. Pretty stoked, and I'm going to be insta buying at least one of every box that comes out. I love the Black Powder Napoleonic small format softcover rulebook; I wasn't really paying attention to this during the previews and it turns out that instead of just a mini BP rulebook we get a nice redesigned and re-edited Naps-only book to only include the relevant stuff for Napoleonics and all examples/etc use the new models/basing. They even ported over the "matched play, points-based, army list construction" stuff from the older supplements for the armies in case you just want to do an ahistorical battle. My biggest complaint is that my expensive Hougoumont scenery set doesn't have a corresponding scenario to use it, necessitating me to grab the Albion Triumphant Vol 2 book from my bookshelf. (strangely, 2/3 of the scenarios from Albion Triumphant vol 2 are included in the new book, along with several new scenarios... but not the Hougomont scenario. Thanks, Warlord).
For the next wave of expansions, it seems like the optimum number of copies is 1 Highlanders and 2 Imperial Guard (Warlord are even bundling them up like this on the webstore).
Only downside is that you don’t get a lot of Skirmishing 95th Rifles.
Infantry, cavalry, and landswher are all available, as is a version of the starter that's filled with Prussian troops instead of French or British. For the ambitious, there are also combo boxes, including one rather pricey juggernaut that has everything released to date.
Black Powder is recommended on 8x4 with 6x4 being a minimum
the easiest way to play BP with Epic models on 6x4 is to half the units sizes
instead of doing a 24cm line as Standard Sized unit (4 bases of Epic models, 6cm each) you use 12cm for Standard (2 bases), 6cm for Small (1 base) and 3-4 bases for Large units
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