Thanks all, for the kind words.
Cuirassier - Happy to explain, please forgive the length of the answer. Got on a bit of a roll once I started writing as I've become in the habit of explaining this all to the players I've introduced to the game here. In the Very Civile Actions rules set we're using, each unit consists of two elements: the troops and the commander - and each unit is assigned a named commander with 'characteristics'. In my case, having built to the forces present at Tippermuir, I consulted this
https://madeinperth.org/battle-of-tippermuir-1-september-1644/ and Buchan's biography of Montrose (great read by the way!) to determine what those characteristics were that seem to have likely been for the historical commander and 2IC of each battalia.
I made markers for each of these and added them to the ones that were already included. In fact, you'll notice in the second to last picture on this page that there is one of those small Colonel markers on top of the unit card to the rear of Tullibardine's regiment with "Cw'. This designates that he's considered a coward and it affects the behavior of the unit. If he's killed, which can happen often enough, the player randomly draws a replacement from the pile.
The colonel's base is matched to a specific unit as well. The base on this page I've matched to the Badenoch militia - shown in progress after the Irish regiments. They were hastily assembled from the local area and weren't too excited to be there. Hence, the figures themselves are a mish-mash of excess scraggy looking Irish and a couple sets of WL's Clubmen. There are also a few odds and ends for additional character - like the cuirassier on the distant flank firing from behind the cover of a rock throwing youngster. In this case, I couldn't source a flag for the regiment so went with something generally atmospheric. The figures on the other hand, all from the Captain's range, were intended to give a sense of what kind of unit this was said to have been. The other regiments are a bit more regular, so in most cases I've been able to match a set of regimental standards from either GMB or Flags of War that more closely match the troops and the colonel's base. Not sure if any of the pics show that very clearly, but that's the general scheme.
The colonel's base also functions as an activation marker for the unit - it's placed to the front of the troops prior to activation and then moved to the rear of the troops afterwards. VCA has number of opportunities to model scenic elements that take the place of counters from a book keeping perspective so you'll also see markers casualty and terror (like TFL shock) status (one yellow or red tuft per pip acquired), humiliation, taken prisoner, etc. Thought this would be a great way to elevate the atmospherics on the table top.
Anyway, hope that's not too TLDR, but we rolled our sleeves up developing our fairly subtle modifications, so we put a fair amount of thought into the project from top to bottom
Amazing work and your joint work fits together beautifully.
Can you explain how you use the colonel's bases - you have some with three figures and a flag.
Do they go with specific units ?
Just wonderful.
JM
26 November 2013, 02:08:40 AM