The casualty markers: The foot fit onto 20mm circular mdf bases, and the horse ones onto 25mm circular bases. I have large numbers of mark disorder!  Re 'wriggle room', I think it is a great and necessary idea when using sabots. Rather than use it on the bases, I ask for its inclusion in the space left in the sabots. I normally allow 1mm for every base along that particular axis of the sabot. So if your sabot is to contain three bases, left to right, I would add an extra 3 mm in the sabot. If you have two bases front to back, then add 2mm. 

Thanks Mollinary

I'm looking to include a few casualties to add variety to the units and will use some small brown pom poms we already use for a number of different rule sets to show disorder

I'm leaving wiggle room in the sabots and plan to standardised on a 130x55mm base with a 124x42mm hole for both battalia and Swedish horse. For horse there will be three 40x40mm bases, for foot three 40x30mm bases for pike and shot plus three 40x9mm bases for officers, drummers and standards. Perhaps I can get away with 40x10mm for the officers etc.

I'll be having a chat to that nice Mr Leon in due course

I've been doing some research on ECW battles looking for something that isn't too big but is significant and interesting to base this project on

I came across Cheriton 28^th March 1644 it pits The Earl of Forth and Lord Hopton against Sir William Waller with about 5,000 foot and 3,500 horse on each side.
Interestingly for an ECW battle there is a lot of terrain including at least 2 ridges, a large wood and a lot of enclosed fields; both sides used a lot of commanded shot.

Mollinary has been very helpful and I now have a couple of orders of battle and a possible order sorted out.
I will leave both Mollinary and Leon in peace until after Salute

The order is, of course, larger than I initially intended and that is without the sabot bases

Quote from: paulr on 07 April 2018, 06:39:48 AM
Baroque is one of the reasons we are looking at 12cm wide bases
They also will work work well with FK&P using a 15cm grid

I'm definitely tempted by the scope to add scenic displays on unit bases :-

I am following you on this with my ECW project, which is next on the list.

I will be using 120mm frontage large bases as per Baroque as I want to be able to use the armies with at least three sets of rules FK&P, Baroque and Pike and Shotte.

Also the large units will offer a good modeling scheme...

A couple of questions as I start refining my wish list

Did English musketeers in the ECW use rests?
If so would all musketeers in a battalia use them or is a mix more likely / possible

At the moment I'm looking at using a mix of
EC03 Musketeers cap (with rest)
EC14 Musketeers hat (with rest)
EC28 Musketeers advancing hat (which I'm told are actually Musketeers firing hat, no rest)
EC37 Musketeers, advancing (with no obvious rests)

Also by 1644 how many pikemen might still be wearing armour?

I'm looking to use a mix of
EC1 Armoured pike
EC2 Unarmoured pike

more to mix poses than to include armour, would 20% armoured be too many?

With regard to the use of rests, they were certainly used at the start of the ECW, but were gradually discarded as lighter muskets were adopted. It's pretty safe to assume that the NMA didn't use rests and probably not the Royalists either by 1644. I have only a few units with rests, and am shying away from pretty coloured regiments these days, as most of the evidence points to them only really being prevalent at Edge Hill. As the war progressed most of them seem to have gone for undyed wool, blues, reds and greens, probably in muted colours. Many units outside of the main armies, eg the Cornish, appear to have worn civilian dress with a field sign. As for armour, I'm not so clear on that, but I believe the first thing to be dropped was tassets,  probably followed by the back plate, and many troops later abandoned it altogether, including the helmet.

This project is definitely firming up

I've now calculated the number of figures I need, based on my current lists for Cheriton, in two different ways and came to exactly the same number of figures

The answer is, of course, more than originally intended

That jolly helpful Mr Leon is willing and able to produce the sabot bases I'm after

Now all we need to do is:

• play a test game with our regular group, to see if they enjoy the rules as much as Pierre the Shy and I do
• confirm my lists for Cheriton
• confirm Pierre the Shy's order for his forces from up north, we'll combine the orders to save on postage

Had a brief chat about this project with Pierre the Shy after our continuing Napoleonic game last night
Another pack of mounted Dragoons and 4 sabot bases added to my order

The magnetic vinyl I glue to the underside of my bases for security during storage and transport is 1-2mm thick

Using sabot bases for this project will mean that using this magnetic vinyl would make the bases too thick

What do people use...

Quote from: paulr on 23 April 2018, 08:51:47 PM
The magnetic vinyl I glue to the underside of my bases for security during storage and transport is 1-2mm thick

Using sabot bases for this project will mean that using this magnetic vinyl would make the bases too thick

What do people use...

Hi Paul,
I didn't quite understand what you meant by "too thick". Do you mean when they are place in a sabot the are raised too much?
FWIW I use the magnetic vinyl on my bases as well but now use magnet receptive sheets (also ~1mm) to cover the MDF Leon custom cuts for me to make sabots. I don't frame the sabots since things seem to hold together pretty well using this construction.

Hi d_Guy, the bottom of the sabot is 2mmt thick MDF, then the 1-2mm thick magnetic vinyl, then the 2mm thick MDF base the figures are on means the bottom of the figure base will be 5-6mm above the table

This approach would also mean transporting the figure stands out of their sabots, so there magnetic vinyl can hold them safe while traveling

Pierre the Shy has a foam transport option I'll have a look at on the weekend

Another option I'm thinking about is 'steel paper' or 'magnetic paper' but I'm also interested in other approaches

Hi Paul - thanks, I see what you mean. obviously I accept the figures being raised but understand a "thinner" approach looks better. Incidently the magnet receptive sheet I am using is probably the "steel paper" you mention. This stuff:

https://www.custom-magnets.com/magnet-receptive-rolled-steel-plain.html

Paul the magnetic vinyl you use sounds very thick. The self adhesive magnetic sheet I use is 0.7mm I think. Steel paper is very thin, just the thickness of a couple of sheets of paper.

Yes, the vinyl I currently use is deliberately thick, it makes the bases easier to pick up without making them to thick (the vinyl doesn't go right to the edge of the base)

It is also readily available at a reasonable from sign writer supply stores, it is used for applying removable signs to cars and for fridge magnets and similar...

Quote from: Leman on 07 April 2018, 07:23:26 AM
Forgive me for seeming a bit dozy, but isn't three (or four, with separate command) 40mm bases more flexible than one 120mm base. Lots of figures means lots of glue, means more chance of warping as well. Then there is the opportunity to field different units with the same figures - just change the command base, which can be shallower than the other bases and thus less intrusive.

The potential warping of the bases is not an issue for me as I use Tiny Tin Trooper's pre-magnetized bases.  The magnetic strip take away that issue.

Could you not just base the figures directly into the magnetic vinyl to reduce the height by 2mm?

If you're worried about warping just magnetise them to any old tin tray/biscuit tin lid/baking sheet while the basing material sets and maybe increase the rigidity with Milliput or similar.

Cheers!

Meirion

I've had the chance to compare the lists that I, with assistance from Mollinary, came up with for Cheriton with an article on the battle in a recent issue of the Arquebusier from the Pike and Shot Society

I was very pleased to see a high level of agreement between the article and the lists

This project is getting very close to being ordered

There are a number of decent OOB's for Cheriton, including the one in the Pike and Shot society magazine, but I am afraid they involve a lot of guess work. They are also not the worst problem with doing Cheriton. There is a lot of dispute about exactly where the battle happened and what the terrain was like. Also on the details of the units - tactics, etc. The good news is it is a good game, or at least with the rules I have used.

There is also a useful OOB and map for Cheriton in the first ECW campaign scenarios book (available from Caliver) which covers the west country campaigns of Waller and Hopton, including some very obscure little affrays as well as the bigger scraps like Roundway Down.

Leman reminds me that there is also the four volumn set of battle scenarios at Partizan Press (and an additional one for sieges IIRC). Lot's of grist for the mill. A few errors here and there but not objectionably so. Cover most of the battles in Montrose's campaign, Benburb in Ireland and, as Leman says, many obscure battles (including the one fought on this side of the Atlantic in Maryland). Worth having if you are pursuing ECW (WTK).