Starting a new Pocket Army for Dodgy Backs!

Well, there is a bit more to it than that - it is connected to some ‘thinking’ - Oh Dear!

It is a Pocket Army because its size will be contained, but it is also a three foot army because I am speed painting and viewing at the three foot rule is a guiding principle. It is also a …. Oh what should I call it! …. A restricted mobility army for those occasions that my back / leg problems have a flare-up and I need to sit at the table with just a small game in front of me. It is also an experimental army to bring all of the above together for some sort of assessment of feasibility on how best to proceed.

Since doing the 10mm infantry in 2 ranks on 3 bases, I am now looking a 3 ranks on 2 bases, but having a similar total frontage of 110 - 120mm.

Pocket Army - 5 x infantry, 1 x artillery, 1 x light horse and 1 x heavy horse per side will be the object of the exercise. Last year I cut a couple of neoprene gaming mats down to 4’ x 2’ and I would see these armies operating in that sort of space.

Three Foot Army - Painting with the three foot rule in mind. I have been doing some test bases, where the figures are primed and then glued into positions on bases ….. and then painted - fast! I have never previously thought this a good idea, but it certainly forces you away from getting involved in all of the detail. 

Just get a general impression and the paint only goes where the brush and the eye can go and it is a faster way to paint. I don’t enjoy seeing the results close up, but at gaming distance (three foot), there is a lot of forgiveness. I know this sounds a terrible thing to say, but without the usual love poured into them, it allows me to tell the family that when I’m dearly departed, not to worry about them, they can even be thrown away! They will be as disposable as any football or concert ticket.

So far I have painted a group of Pendraken 10mm bases and now a group of these Epic bases. At the conclusion of that, I think it just comes down to personal preference, though I think the looser 10mm artillery looks better to the eye than the very fixed Epic poses with the gunners in rigid positions, but I like the Epic infantry better (I will rebase by 10mm to the same look and see how I feel about that). The cavalry fight it out on equal terms.

Restricted Mobility Army - I am having problems standing for lengthy periods at my gaming table. It is 40” off the ground to reduce bending, which is good, but being on my feet in a fairly static position can soon bring discomfort that lasts for a few days. Sitting at the dining table brings some relief, but not if stretching across it, so the idea of having a 2 x 4 mat under my nose, while sitting, holds some appeal - restrictive, but sometime you can’t have a cake and a bun!

Long (long) term, more of my gaming may come down to this sort of play, so perhaps having a couple of Pocket Armies on stand-by for that eventuality is not such a bad idea.

Experimental Army - I have a potted history of jumping back and forth between scales, systems and table setups. There is of course a financial cost to this, but equally important a time cost, whether that be painting or moving between systems etc, so I am just feeling my way along with this project, to see where it goes ..... if anywhere! 

One of the benefits of going with the ‘three foot army’, with most things being painted while on their base, I can build all of the bases of the whole Pocket Army ahead of time and game with them unpainted, pushing them into the painting queue one at a time as the fancy takes me, until the armies move slowly from being mostly unpainted, to painted.

This a critically more effective way of seeing whether a project suits and settling upon the right set of rules, rather than having to paint everything first.

In my minds eye at the moment, is a game with relatively big bases and fewer moving parts. Having tried variations on this theme, I quite like the latest iteration as follows.

Infantry - For Napoleonics, taking the British aside, the formations can be represented 3 ranks deep, so even if I go for a smaller frontage, the extra rank keeps the number of heads in the unit high enough for a good visual presence.

Above - This is a three foot photo of a 3 foot unit .... it looks okay to my eyes! (actually, in truth, it does withstand closer inspection).

2 bases are needed per unit as I want to be gaming at the more tactical level, where the difference between line, assault column and square can be shown. My first unit off the production line to have these traits are Epic Prussian musketeers, with each base measuring 55mm x 35, the whole unit occupies a frontage of 110mm, with a total of 60 heads, which gives a fair sense of mass.

Above - the same two infantry bases now in column. 

The only thing I am not sure about yet is whether the ranks might be better positioned slightly closer together on say a 30mm deep base, but the deeper base makes assault column look ... deeper! Anyway 5 or so such units on the 4 x 2 should work okay. 

Cavalry - These are set on 80mm x 60mm bases in two ranks of 6 to give 12 models. The example here are Epic French Dragoons. When I did the same base in 10mm, for the same ‘look’ it allowed two ranks of 7. Both look good. 

I intend to use the cavalry as a single base per unit and not concern myself with formation, their class of light, heavy, lancer etc will be what matters. Three bases can represent a whole brigade, say 2 up front and 1 behind, with a frontage of 160 - 180mm .

Artillery - These (above - Epic) are set as 3 guns on a 80mm x 40mm base to represent a battery. In my games, usually 2 guns are used for a battery, so the 3 models offers a bit more real estate. 

However, if I compare the Epic base to the 10mm base (above), In my view, I think the 10mm looks better. The guns have more room to breath and the crew are scattered more randomly over the entire base. My Epic version by comparison looks a bit too rigid. I will likely try and do a separate limber base, to represent the guns when on the move.  

Anyway, as stated, this is a plodders project, that may or may not bloom!