Starting Napoleonics - what scale?

[jon_1066]

28mm is King

Only if you live like royalty

[FierceKitty]

28mm is King

10mm is emperor.

[peleset]

28mm IS great, but it is also a BIG commitment. As mentioned by others footprint and storage are important considerations.

Dipping your toe, e-a-s-i-n-g into the tub may lead to a more enjoyable bath in the end even if it takes a little longer, not to mention the therapeutic aspect of mulling it over and jawboning with like minded individuals.

[darthfozzywig]

I have a bunch of 15mm but if I were starting over I would go with 10mm Old Glory minis.

[Ethelred the Almost Ready]

If you are wanting to play Austerlitz you will need to consider space, cost, how much painting you can realistically do. 
Then you will need to consider the degree of abstraction you are happy with.  Will you bathtub units so that battalions stand in for brigades so you can form square, line and column?  Are you happy to have bigger maneouvre units - battalions or divisions as your smallest units - and not worrying about battalion formations?
Even 6mm figures (I have 15 and 6mm Naps) cover a big area if you want to field an entire army (other than the Peninsula War).  I suspect 3mm is the way to go for what you want.  On certain other wargames sites people are rather disparaging about the smaller scales, but a unit of 30 or more 6mm figures looks better than a unit of 12 or so 28mm figures.  I suspect 60 or more 3mm figures will look better.  Yes, you will not be able to make out the uniforms as much, but the mass of figures will have it's own quality.  Some people will say 3mm figures are no better than cardboard cutouts, but from photos I have seen this is simply not true.

As far as rules, there are many.  The link below is good.  It doesn't mention Et Sans Resultat - now in it's 3rd edition. 
https://wargamingeverything.home.blog/2022/07/31/the-ultimate-napoleonic-wargame-rules-review-and-comparison/

[Axebreaker]

Since 28mm is all about the figure/model I have no problem fielding 10 or 12 man units that can handle large battles if I want that and can be painted up in a reasonable time. If your looking for mass effect you need to drop scales and the more you drop the bigger the effect will be.

Christopher

[Wellyboots]

I think it’s all about the spectacle with Napoleonics, groups of large units of miniature battalions and cavalry.

Which in the end depends on your available funds and space, 15mm is certainly a good scale for the big battalions but I prefer 28mm.

I’ve played many sets of Napoleonic rules but I find I always come back to General D’Armee by Dave Brown. The game is well supported and is due shortly a second edition.

http://toofatlardies.co.uk/forum/viewforum.php?f=41&sid=66a70aef5bca0c00a80026b8f7044c21

[Ray Rivers]

Everybody has their own preference, so it is really hard to figure out what direction to go. I would recommend this avenue of approach:

Since you are starting from scratch, I suggest the following:
Get a set of rules. Cut out cardboard bases per the rules and try some small games with the cardboard units. If the rules feel right, go ahead and mount the figures for those rules. Nothing as foul as basing up a boatload of figures and finding the rules just don't cut it.
This way, if the rules don't float your boat, get the next set, cut out more units if the old ones don't work. Repeat as necessary.

I would say, start with a rule set that you can find basically for free and then do the above. This will give you a general impression of what your battlefield will look like if it was populated with miniatures. From there you will have a base of knowledge as to which scale to persue.

[MaleGriffin]

For me it's all about the ascetics. If I didn't care about how the figures and terrain looked, I'd still be playing on hex-based maps with cardboard counters. I chose 28mm precisely because my aging eyes and trembly hands simply can't paint an acceptable level of quality in 10mm or 15/18mm and 6mm is right out. YMMV. I would also rather play a gorgeous 28mm fight for Hougoumont than the entire battle of Waterloo in 6mm. For skirmishing, if I had it to do over again, I'd go with 40mm.

[Aethelflaeda was framed]

why stop at 40…54mm are pretty awesome.

[Mindenbrush]

Having played many different Napoleonic rulesets and figures scale - 18mm is the current one - I would suggest you try to find games that you can play in before opening the wallet.
Failing that, check YouTube to see if there are rules that spark your interest.
Good luck 👍

[Norm]

It might be worth your while cutting out some blank cardboard bases for what you think is the army you want and for the number of units that you would likely want / need.

Place these out on the table and you will probably get a good idea of what you would be best going for.

Try units of 4 bases, each base at 40mm or 50mm wide and just how you might get on with that.

[Cerdic]

10mm

It’s the future!

[Khusru2]

I used 6mm and Blucher rules.

[olicana]

There are only ever three considerations:

Time. Money. Space.

Actually, the last of these is possibly the most important. There is no point collecting thousands if you will only ever have a venue big enough to play in once every couple of years. If your table is 6'x8' or preferably larger I'd say 15mm - 28mm. You can comfortably get 1500 28mm on a 12'x6'. Smaller tables and you can't look at 28mm, though a reasonably big game in 15mm can be had on an 8'x4'.

Time and money go hand in hand, because if you are rolling in money you simply buy someone else's time to do everything for you. If you're not, then time will be the killer. I am quite a prolific painter (pro) but even if I paint several hours a week for myself, I'll be lucky to paint more than 400 28mm Napoleonic figures a year (big lulls due to boredom or having something better to do than take a busman's holiday) - each figure takes me roughly half an hour, and the most I've ever painted in a year for myself was around 800 figures (SYW)* when I had (over) promised to do a convention game - this game (where more than half had already been done over a couple of years and I figured it would be easy) and that year was a killer.



*I did paint 2,100 Punics in two years but, not being proper figures (LOL), Ancients don't count.

I admire your ambition. It probably surpasses my own. If you are doing it all yourself you will need an iron will to get it done. My method isn't to everyone's taste. I generally buy a lot of figures to fully tie me financially to a project, so that I can't afford not to carry things through.

A big box of stuff looks like this, this one weighed in at over 60lbs and contained £2000 worth of Front Rank figures: It was quite a bit of my three army Peninsular project, plus a few hundred figures to finish my SYW Austrians (which I did first, of course).



Laying everything out it looked pretty daunting - this was just the British in the box (about 70% of the of the eventual number of British). With my method, it's always like this: You look at them and wonder just how much you've bitten off.



I bought that box in June 2015. I started painting the Napoleonic figures, in earnest, in May 2016. Today, after a further investment of over £1600, 2,700 men (not including horses, etc.) are painted and I have just three Spanish units left to paint - the end is nigh! (Or, I can see the pub from 'ere!)

It can be done, believe me. Just keep going. Good luck with whatever you decide! One piece of advice - pick Peninsular or 1805, not both: the dilution of effort might sound the death knell to both. Do both, but do one after the other.

My British



My French



Spanish roll call imminent!

BTW. If you are rolling in money, I might consider an offer of £50,000. Not promising anything but, I'd think about it. A close up of some Brits.