Modelling Napoleonic - dumb questions

[happyhiker]

My Son and I are looking at starting some Napoleonic figures(waterloo starter set for xmas), and I’m trying to work out how to paint and model when the time comes. Could anyone answer some basic questions? My son is very keen to make them historically accurate.

We’re looking at doing 24 men battalions. Some sets come in 40/60 men. Is the idea you buy a 4 man command for these to flesh them out ? Do these have to be metal?

I understand battalions have flank companies how many men should be in a company, if 24 = battalion?(is a battalion 600 men ?)
I was think of just making the left most man a Voltigeur and the right most a Grenadier in each row. Is that what most people do?

I have citadel Mephiston Red and Space Marine Blue, are these close enough for British Red coats and French Blue, they’re the main colours so I want to get them right.

Is there  a website that gives the different colours for different battalions and their flags ? How do people pick which battalion to do ?

If we mix waterloo(1815) figures with earlier ones, whats the difference ? I know late French wore greatcoats, but they must have taken them off when it got hot, so is it still accurate to have blue French along with great coat French ? We want blue French cos they’re cooler. The waterloo set comes with Greatcoats, but I thought we could mix and match maybe?

Sorry for all the questions.

[NurgleHH]

When you bought the Warlord Box maybe you should use their suggested unit ideas. They divide the units in small, normal and big, when I remember it correct. I think a rulebook is part of the box, isn't it?

There is a colour comparison at the dakkadakka-Forum to find the gw-color-equivalent to vallejo.

At the warlord page you can see which Vallejo-Colour they use unter the Paint-Sets:

https://store.warlordgames.com/collections/paints-painting/products/napoleonic-british-infantry-paint-set for the brits

https://store.warlordgames.com/collections/paints-painting/products/napoleonic-french-infantry-paint-set for the french

[happyhiker]

Thanks for the response., I've looked at the colour chart but it doesn't have flat red and prussian blue.
I have gone through the warlord starter paint sets and looked for equivalents, and maybe I'm getting too hung up, red is after all red.

The set is for xmas so we've not looked at the contents yet, it may be my questions are answered by the set.

[Steve63]

Look Mate, speaking as a father of 3 and someone who has painted figures for longer than I care to remember, I really think you are over thinking this.
The object of the exercise is to spend some quality time with your son and for both of you to have some FUN.
Use the guides provided in the box and stop stressing about the minutia of uniforms and organisation.
What it comes down to is painting the toys, so just paint them as simple as you can and as quickly as you can, then play a few games and have some fun.  Both you and your son are inexperienced painters, no one can pick up a brush from scratch and paint like a pro, if you both decide to keep it up, some time in the future you will look at the figures and think I can do that better now, then you buy more figures and paint them better.  That's how it works.  
Buy your son a couple of Osprey books as stocking fillers for Christmas and stop worrying.
Be sure to post a few pictures of your games when you get the toys painted.
Cheers

[Norm]

There is the Perry ACW battle in a box, but that is going for around £95. There are still 50% marching poses in there, but there are also some dynamic poses with the Confederate set and you get the colourful Zouaves as well. That box does have command sprues for each of the formations (18 man formations). Bases etc are supplied, as is a building and an easy starter set of rules. There is also a uniform guide in the box and paper flags.

I did an out of the box video, which may give a good idea of what the box contains .... LINK.

http://battlefieldswarriors.blogspot.co.uk/2015/11/perry-28mm-battle-in-box-video.html


 

[Flashman14]

I'd stay away from the Vallejo Prussian blues - they are simply the wrong foundation for French (and Prussians for that matter).

I can't tell from here but whatever Foundry did to get this cloak on the guy at right is the closest I've seen that still has a dynamic range of shade and highlights:

It appears to be the Deep Blue 20 triad or the Storm Blue 39 but I can't be sure.

[happyhiker]

Funnily enough it's my son that's really into the Minutia, I thought we'd do some Orc on elf action and be done, but he's really got into the history of it. He wants to be an archiologist (or a clone trooper). So getting the details right is important to him ( I couldn't care less on the pom-pom colour a bunch of dead French guys wore 200 years ago  ). He's actually painted nearly 80 wor figures really well - I mean decent table top standard not like some of the photos on here, but you know for an 8 year old really impressive(I think anyway), so the details is what he's into. I'm kinda going along with it, and a bit bored at work, but I don't want to spend hours researching it, hence the questions.

@normsmith he's into napolionics at the moment, acw might well be next month though!
@flashman14, thanks for that, that's a really dark blue. If there's no definitive colour then what I have will probably do.

[Flashman14]

You specifically mentioned you wanted accuracy. The darker blue is more plausible than anything else I've yet seen on it: https://historicalequestrian.wordpress.com/2015/08/30/bleu-de/

And it's singularly common among re-enactors too:






Prussians:

I suppose you could mix black into the Dark Prussian Blue but that's a step too many and it would be difficult to replicate that precisely over a large army. Of course, what constitutes a "drop" of paint can vary over the length of time the bottle has been in use.

In any event, Space Marine Blue is way off if there's any concern for accuracy. Even as a highlight it just doesn't make sense.

[Jabba]

If you are after a fairly accurate guide to uniforms for the Waterloo campaign I would suggest here http://centjours.mont-saint-jean.com/ is a good start point.

Tony

[happyhiker]

thanks, love the photos. That's a very dark blue. What does everyone else use ? I sort of thought there would be a definitive answer to what colour, as clever, more knowledgeable people than me will have researched it. I suppose I figured the Vallejo starter set would be the answer. If I use Dark Tone on top of Prussian Blue would that be dark enough ?

Thanks for the website I'll have to use google translate on it...

[julesav]

You could stick with GW paints but give the blue a wash (or two?) of their black ink. There is a fair bit of evidence that many French Line units at Waterloo (or during the 100 Days campaign) only had Greatcoats, shakos, packs and kit plus weapons issued. The elite Grenadier and Voltigeur companies possibly had epaulettes to attach to their greatcoats. The relevant plumes probably came with the shako - centre companies had different colour 'pom-poms' for identification.

French battalions had 6 companies, one was Grenadiers, one was Voltigeurs, and the other four were Fusiliers.

British units had ten companies, one 'light' and one 'grenadier' plus 8 'centre' companies.

Unit strengths varied considerably 600 being fairly 'average' although British Guards could possibly be up to 1100 strong!

This site has some of the best uniform info available although the text is French. http://centjours.mont-saint-jean.com/

[happyhiker]

Thanks, website looks really good.
So if I do 24 guys on 6 bases of 4, then 1 base = 1company. So I should do 1 base of grenadiers ans 1 base of voultigers? I suppose for British I should do the same just for consistency ? Is it better to just do the four guys on rear left base, rather than a right column of 4 guys? Or does it just not matter. I'm suprised there is not a napolien for dummy's guide somewhere. Being a dummy that would be useful.

[Kitsune]

Perry boxes come with a good idiots guide to the units and colours. I'm forever referencing them.