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Other Stuff => General Wargames and Hobby Discussion => Topic started by: traveller on September 28, 2020, 05:53:38 PM

Title: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: traveller on September 28, 2020, 05:53:38 PM
I have quite a few casualty miniatures in the leadpile but apart from dioramas, how do you use them in gameplay? None of the rulesets I use have any dedicated use for casualty miniatures as far as I have seen...
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: fastolfrus on September 28, 2020, 05:59:37 PM
Peter Pig rules use casualties as morale markers etc. in quite a few rule sets

Sharp Practice uses "shock" markers, some players use casualties rather than plastic tokens.

League of Augsburg uses casualty markers as most figures are based in groups.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: Plynkes on September 28, 2020, 06:24:47 PM
Most of the rules I use need some kind of marker to denote changing morale status. That's what I like to use them for.

Both myself and my most frequent gaming partner (my nephew) are also rather fond of leaving such figures on the table in places where decisive combats have occurred, or where units have been routed or wiped out, leaving a kind of visual record of the battle's events. You do have to be careful not to get them mixed up with the ones being used as morale markers for nearby units, mind, and also not fall for the temptation of marching your units away and leaving their status markers behind as battlefield scenery.

I have a friend who used to do that sort of thing quite a bit. He would always plead absent-mindedness, but we always suspected that some low cunning was behind it. :)


Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: v_lazy_dragon on September 28, 2020, 06:30:52 PM
American Uncivil War used them in a similar way to Plynkes- you plopped one down each time a took casualties; and these had an effect on later morale tests
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: armchairgeneral on September 28, 2020, 06:52:21 PM
I use them simply to show casualties received for units that are multi-based in fours/sixes.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: Captain Blood on September 28, 2020, 08:28:16 PM
As ‘daunted’ markers for Never Mind The Bill Hooks  :)

http://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=40936.1860
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: Polkovnik on September 28, 2020, 09:18:20 PM
For any game where hits, pins, shock, etc needs to be recorded, you can put a casualty figure on a base with a dice frame for a small six sided dice, and the number on the dice shows the number of hits the unit has taken. This is what I plan to do for my WW2 armies for Bolt Action / Chain of Command.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: Elbows on September 28, 2020, 10:49:58 PM
The only game I use them in is my old west game, and mainly for looks.  There is a function where a character can be revived - so having a place marker for them doesn't hurt.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: Wyrmalla on September 29, 2020, 02:52:34 AM
In the past I hardly used them. However following playing a zombie game where the "dead" zombies were placed on their side after being shot, the look of all the dead figures on the board was a nice feature. They charted how the game had progressed and gave more a scale of things - instead of a game ending with just a handfull of models left and all there being to show for it with the dozens of casualties being some figures sitting back in the box.

Nowadays in the military style games we play, whenever a soldier is killed its replaced by a generic casualty of the same Nation. So by the end of a game there winds up being clumps of dead figures all over.

To me it seems a bit more realistic instead of making the board a blank slate. The same goes for tanks and vehicles. I dislike removing destroyed vehicles, and instead leave them as they are or add some smoke to them to show their state.

Casualties aren't a thing which effect games on a mechanics level (apart from maybe zombies). It takes some effort to have enough for even one game of course, and the options out there for even common Nationalities out there aren't great. Let alone for post-WWII settings. So I can see why most don't bother with them. But if you're into the presentation side of games I'd say they're a fantastic element, and wish I'd see more at show games - rather than models just being placed on their sides.



Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: SteveBurt on September 29, 2020, 11:42:49 AM
I use them to show disorder/shock/fatigue. Sometimes multiple figures, or sometimes I blu-tak a casualty to the top of one of the Warbases 1-12 dials.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: Codsticker on September 30, 2020, 05:13:21 AM
I use them to show disorder/shock/fatigue. Sometimes multiple figures, or sometimes I blu-tak a casualty to the top of one of the Warbases 1-12 dials.
Pretty much how mine are used. In Pike and Shotte the prone casualties are Stamina markers and standing ones represent Disorder  or mark Wavering units in Pikeman's Lament.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: Jemima Fawr on September 30, 2020, 06:25:15 AM
Like others, I use them as disorder and rout markers (based on coins with different coloured edges to define either state), as well as casualty markers in lieu of figure removal.  When I was 'hired help' with AB Figures I painted hundreds and hundreds of them simply as 'table decoration' to be placed on the table to show where casualties had been suffered (it was their money...).  When we did a photo-shoot for Wargames Illustrated (the Battle of Eggmuhl 1809), someone actually wrote to the magazine to complain about all the bodies.  So, when we did the next photo-shoot (Auerstadt 1806) we used twice as many casualties...  lol 

We even set up a photo of Sharpe standing atop a mound of dead Frenchmen, with a 'crossed dead frenchmen' motif, though that photo sadly never made it into the magazine.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: traveller on September 30, 2020, 04:12:26 PM
Thanks all for your comments and input! Lots of good advice, now I just need to throw some paint on the poor buggers  ;)
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: has.been on September 30, 2020, 06:25:29 PM
As well as a lot of the above, Rebels & Patriots have 4 levels of moral for units,
OK, (nothing required)
Shaken (We use a chicken on a penny base)
Broken (We replace the chicken with a wounded figure)
Fled (nothing required).

Also
AK47 uses bases of dead. If your unit is near these it reduces morale.
Games against Vodkafan have had the table littered with piles of dead.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: traveller on September 30, 2020, 06:52:21 PM
As well as a lot of the above, Rebels & Patriots have 4 levels of moral for units,
OK, (nothing required)
Shaken (We use a chicken on a penny base)
Broken (We replace the chicken with a wounded figure)
Fled (nothing required).

Also
AK47 uses bases of dead. If your unit is near these it reduces morale.
Games against Vodkafan have had the table littered with piles of dead.

Chickens!  :D :D :D
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: Plynkes on September 30, 2020, 06:56:54 PM
I have some white flags on bases that have to stand in when I don't have suitable casualty figures for a unit, but I like the idea of chickens more. :)



Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: Jemima Fawr on September 30, 2020, 09:47:16 PM
Oh yeah, I forgot to add that I also pepper units with the odd body or 'falling wounded' figure, or on occasion a man running from the rear rank.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: has.been on October 01, 2020, 12:06:28 PM
Further to the 'Chickens' I am looking for something similar
for when Vodkafan & I get our Jacobite rebellion (using slightly
tweeked Reb.&Pats) going.

Any suggestions?
I have already ruled out 'wild haggis running free'.
may steal the cannonball idea (elsewhere on LAF), but would like
some kind of animal.
Based on a Scottish folk song I thought of (My Bonny) Moor Hen,
but no-one seems to make them in 28mm.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: Mindenbrush on October 01, 2020, 10:42:23 PM
When I played 25mm ACW Brother against Brother I had painted up 40 casualty figures for each side (1/3rd of the figures for each side) and these were laid down after shooting/melee casualties. When these were exhausted, that side took a simple Army Morale check to see if they continued to fight.
Now I have rebased and using Regimental F&F, some will be used as Disorder markers.
For my King Philip’s War M&T games I used the Litko acrylic “Man Down” markers (red for Indian beige for Settlers) to mark casualties.
I have more of the “Man Down” markers to use in CoC.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: Hammers on October 02, 2020, 10:38:02 AM
I use corpses, vultures, crows, jackals and similar to, depending on the rules, mark that a unit is routed, suppressed or broken.

Non-model tokens (pieces of paper, dice, plastic chips and other unsightly debris) are prohibited on my spread.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: has.been on October 02, 2020, 10:55:27 AM
Quote
I use corpses, vultures, crows, jackals and similar to, depending on the rules, mark that a unit is routed, suppressed or broken.

Thanks. Crows I CAN use for Jacobites, now who does crows in 28mm?
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: Hammers on October 02, 2020, 11:24:34 AM
Eureka, Reaper, Forge World, just to name a few.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: Citizen Sade on October 02, 2020, 01:01:58 PM
And Tabletop-Art do some nice metal ravens.

When painted, who'd know the difference?
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: has.been on October 02, 2020, 05:01:56 PM
Thanks Hammers & Citizen Sade, I will look there.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: Patrice on October 10, 2020, 10:32:38 AM
We use casualty miniatures to show where fierce fighting did happen; and also, with a RPG mind, when an important player character or NPC personality is wounded or knocked out during the battle and it can be of some importance for the following events that his/her body is recovered by friends ...or foes.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: Diablo Jon on October 10, 2020, 11:14:59 AM
I've used them for pinned/ morale makers in some games like AK-47 and TMWWBKs. In games that use multiple miniatures, on a single base, I've used them to create interesting mini dioramas in units.
Title: Re: How do you use your casualty miniatures?
Post by: tallyho on October 10, 2020, 11:34:06 AM
Don't really get the question.

They can be used for literally any purpose you want.