Perry Franco Prussian War 3 Ups!

[Donkeymilkman]

There is no question who is compatible with whom. It will be exciting.

Hopefully they are compatible with Northstars 1864 and 1866 line. I'd like to do all three of the wars of German unification. It would be handy if they are compatible as then I can save some cash not needing two different Prussian Armies, one to fit with the Northstar figures and one to fit with the Perrys French as I believe the Prussian army was the same in all three wars, bar the change to breech loading artillery in the Franco-Prussian war.

[pacofeanor]

Hello,

I'm a great fana of the FPW, and the new Perry range is like christmas for me !

this could of some interest for those who need practical and cheap infos :



It presents all the differents units with field dresses, especialy for garde national, francs tireurs (each unit had a particular dress!) etc ...

best regards
paco

[NurgleHH]

Well, I wonder if I will finally get to do that long cherished Prisoner of Zenda project - in plastic!
I see some mid C19th German states kitbashing in my future... 
I’m already working out which parts from the British colonial sets I can use to hybridise those Prussians 

Ver interesting idea. It is a while ago that I heard of it and read the book. So, introduce it again to me - in plastic this time

[Roo]

Any whispers on the wind gents on how these are shaping up?  Any close confidants of the Perry twins that can leak some good news to those of us waiting to recruit new additions to the plastic mountain?

[Atheling]

Any whispers on the wind gents on how these are shaping up?  Any close confidants of the Perry twins that can leak some good news to those of us waiting to recruit new additions to the plastic mountain?

I couldn't begin to tell you Roo.

As lovely as they are it might it be a bad thing if they take a little longer in the Renedra queue as I'm snowed under with stuff 

[FreakyFenton]

Any whispers on the wind gents on how these are shaping up?  Any close confidants of the Perry twins that can leak some good news to those of us waiting to recruit new additions to the plastic mountain?

I've just seen the post on facebook, and believe I read that there will be an accompanying range of metals.

[John Boadle]

Well, I have the honour of sculpting the artillery piece masters for this range, but I'm afraid that does not put me much more in the loop than everyone else! In terms of artillery, I am just starting to build masters for the French 4-pounder and mitrailleuse, plus the Prussian 4-pounder. Something should be with Michael Perry, whose range this is, within about the next month, which is when he wants them by. He will them be sculpting crews for them, which might take another couple of months. I am under the impression that the plastic sets and some metal figures, artillery at least, should be coming out something like February to April time. That's as much as I am aware of.

I can add a little about the artillery. The three pieces listed above are the starting point. They ought to be followed by a Prussian 6-pounder and then a French 12-pounder. The Prussian horse artillery used the standard 4-pounder, but with the well-known axle-seats removed as all the gunners rode horses. So this variant piece will be needed for the range. Horse artillery for both sides will be mainly a figure-sculpting job for Michael as they wore cavalry-style equipment: slung sabres, cartridge boxes and riding trousers, whereas the foot artillery had infantry-style gear. This will cover the ground for the Prussians and for the French in the early, "Imperial" phase of the war. At a later stage hopefully the range should extend to the other German armies. The Bavarians and Wurttembergers at least had their own versions of 4- and 6-pounder guns, so I hope we can do this accurately. The Bavarians even had a battery or two of their very own machine guns (they looked something like a Gardner gun, but were actually their own design, the "Feldl-Geschuetz"). In the "Republican" phase of the war, the French used small numbers of all sorts of quirky artillery: an 8-pounder, a 7-pounder breechloader, Armstrongs and different types of mitrailleuse. They also used a lot of mountain guns, and I recently built a master of the the French mountain gun as part of the Paraguayan War range which Alan Perry is doing, so this might get a more suitable crew sculpted for the Franco-Prussian range. In the fullness of time!

[Roo]

Thanks gents that list of artillery and suggested dates will keep me interested over the winter.  Atheling come on son crack on, spend less time of LAF and more painting😂.

John lovely artillery pieces those new releases...keep looking at elements of the range thinking ‘could I convert to Republican period troops’...must stay strong as I am only meant to be doing the Prussians and mates.

[Atheling]

Thanks gents that list of artillery and suggested dates will keep me interested over the winter.  Atheling come on son crack on, spend less time of LAF and more painting😂.

 

"I have such sights to show you" soon 

[carlos marighela]

I must admit I was flummoxed by the Perry choice of artillery for the Brazilians. There were but a handful of Armstrong field pieces in the Brazilian artillery park. Most of the Armstrong pieces purchased by Brazil were siege guns or fortress pieces. Dunno why they didn’t go with the far more numerous La Hitte pieces. Maybe they will produce some as crossovers for the FPW?

[John Boadle]

I think Alan intends to do Paraguyuan War crews for the 4-pounder La Hitte field gun which I am sculpting for his brother's FPW range. Alan and I did put out heads together a little, trying to work out what guns were used by each army in the Paraguayan War. As you say, Carlos, one certainty is that the La Hitte 4-pounder featured heavily. As it sounds like you know something about the subject, have you been in touch with Alan yourself? If not, I am sure he will appreciate hearing from you.

[Curassier]

Delighted John to hear that you are involved on the artillery front.
Might you be encouraged to post some thoughts on wargaming the conflict in 28mm - unit sizes, organisation etc. I know from past exchanges that you have thought about this a lot.
All best
JM

[ARKOUDAKI]

@John...on the subject of artillery...are you using 3D CAD for these or traditional scratch-building techniques? Just wondering as it seems most people are using CAD and 3D printers these days for such things (not so good for figures but good for equipment and such).

[General Lee]

If the February release estimate is correct, that would be a lot faster than I had imagined.

[John Boadle]

I am afraid my skills are strictly limited to the physical plane of modelmaking; I would not have a clue how to do the job digitally! Some of you may have seen the extremely neat masters of the Paraguayan War Armstrong guns, which someone else did produce via digital wizardry.  However I am optimistic of sculpting guns for this range that compare well with most wargames models in terms of detail and historical accuracy. About half the job is research actually, as full scale plans just aren't available. Even most of the photos that can be found online turn out to be mis-captioned! So it takes time to piece together partial plans and photos of surviving examples, or of contemporary instructional models. With a bit of geometry it's possible to work out missing dimensions credibly enough.

A February release would indeed be on the early side of what we can hope for. I only said that a timescale of something like February to April is consistent with the little I know (and with the Perrys' usual diligent efforts). Anyone who has measured the time that's actually elapsed between photos such as those we saw in July and subsequent release dates may be able to make a better-informed guess.

I think I do remember discussing wargames units, for the 1866 war at least with "Cuirassier", about ten years back. I had my own rules for that period, but the ones I'm using for the FPY are "1871" by Bruce Weigle. I'm a very picky feller when it comes to rules, but can recommend these wholeheartedly. Provided you want to represent big battles and are therefore prepared to accept six 28mm figures on a base as being a battalion (so your "unit" is really a regiment of 18 figures). Which most 28mm wargamers don't seem to be keen on! If you really want to represent the minor tactics and formations of the FPW, then you are going to have very large battalions indeed, because individual companies operated independently by this time, putting out their own skirmishers and so forth. To represent that, especially in 28mm, means you couldn't hope to get more than a brigade per side onto the table. However you want to do it, I would say the 1871 rules and the other sets in Bruce's Grand Tactical Rules series are value for money because of the superb information they provide on armies, tactics, weapons and battles.