Ratio of artillery models in an army

[Marechal de France]

I know this topic has been dealt with before on this forum, as I read all these, but as a somewhat newbie to BLB I would really like to have some comment from other players on how many gun models they seem to agree is correct, in relation to their other troops.

As I play in 6mm with a French army, I currently have 16 infantry battalions, will expand to 17 cavalry squadrons (now 10), and have 4 field guns.
Sometimes I play against opponents who have at least 8 or more guns in that same ratio of troops, which seems very much to me and than the guns tend to dominate the game/battlefield.

So is 4 guns enough, or not? And what else for comment and ideas?

[Marechal de France]

Please understand my question regards the original BLB1 version; we more or less agreed at our wargameclub not to go over to version 2, as we rather like the fastplay character of the rules and with 6mm we can field enough troops on the table anyway.

[Churchill]

Ray.

[flick40]

Eight guns in BLB1 is far too many guns, be they light or field guns. And they deffinitely shouldn't be siege guns. A force the size you describe I would say 4 guns tops per side of which 2 could be field guns. I'm not talking from an historical perspective but rather from the gameplay and rules side. Get too gun heavy and it will detract from play.

Joe

[Marechal de France]

Thanks guys. So is there a general rule of thumb in your gaming experience to say something like, a gun per 4 infantry battalions?

And I am too heavy Joe? Can be, I might be convinced to exchange to field guns for two light guns. I already told my opponents who play Dutch and English, they really ought to have 50% of their guns modelled as battalion guns to be realistic.

My experience after some 6 games is that if there is indeed too much artillery on the table, you are constantly bombarded and the game ends before you even get close with your infantry and it is even worse for the 6-figure squadrons, who drop out vary rapidly.

[barr7430]

Actually Le Marechal I tihnk you may be coming at the argument from the wrong angle. The ratio of guns is definitely too heavy. 4 max for 16 battalions, no guns of Position. But even at that it seems a little much.

My main point though is this.. the games will take on a very predictable flavour because of the low ratio of Foot to Horse. With 16 battalions of foot you should have 24 - 32 squadrons of Horse to get the right balance. By applying a 2:1 ratio you will find the artillery is a lot more nervous and plays a balanced role in the game. You need more cavalry

So either:
reduce the guns or increase the Horse (Highly recommended)

[j1mwallace]

In our games of about 15 battalions a side we normally have no more than 3 guns
Also remember, do not combine your guns into big batteries of more than 1 gun model. Artillery was usually spread along the battle line.
Combined batteries give far too much firepower

[Marechal de France]

I see Barry! Well, there is definately something to be done than for the cavalry. I can paint up some extra Maison du Roy squadrons, make more regular line units.
The more I have of those, yes, the more difficult it is to target all of them.

We do indeed spread out all the artillery along the battle line; no concentrating and chossing the same target.

[barr7430]

combined batteries are not allowed ineither BLB1 or BLB2. There is no concentration of fire unless:

1. no other targets are available
2. The target is a built up area being bombarded

Le Marechal, BLB2 have definitely NOT lost the FAST PLAY element so maybe you shuld give it a look when it comes out!

[Churchill]

Ray.

[Marechal de France]

Well Ray, it is a good appetiser to see your unit being fitted out in its colours. Getting the ratio of infantry : cavalry to 1:2 in my army really inspires me to paint some easy going 6mm regular line Horse for my French, and perhaps get my Maison du Roy up to about 3 or 4 squadrons. And it also gives me a chance to invest in more than the current 6 Dragoon units I have.

(When I counted correctly, I happened to have 15 squadrons now, and am painting this afternoon on another 7 Horse!)

In fact with the original information on the French army, it is indeed quite easy to have numerous squadrons on the tabletop from the same regiment to combine these into an all or nothing charge. (I know, you can do this as well with singular squadrons fielded from different regiments. I saw Barry's good comments on this as well!) But it is fun to paint them up in the same colours, even when they're only 6mm

[barr7430]

Important to note that because of the model to man ratio of BLB 1:40 as opposed to the 1:20 of R2E, 1 gaming squadron is equivalent to approx 240 men or 2 real life squadrons. So, squadrons can and do operate individually because the are actually representing 2 squadrons operating in concert.
The regiment can never be tested as a whole for morale purposes unless it is performing an All or Nothing charge. Any shooting casualties or casualties taken by a squadron in combat which do not relate to All or Nothing means the squadron itself take the morale check in isolation.

ie
6 model squadron taking 2 shooting casualties has 33% or 1/3 casualties even if it is part of a 3 squadron regiment. The only time the casualties are calculated on the full regimental strength is during the All or Nothing charge and subsequent combat. The All or Nothing charge can only be used once per regiment and then it reverts back to operating in individual squadrons of 6.

[Marechal de France]

For my French cavalry I will revert to the topic here on that issue.

[Marechal de France]

With regards to the artillery ratio in BLB, we had an ongoing discussion amongst our members of our club who play the ruleset, and I even made a large comparitive investigation into other rulesets similar to the period, such as the "English Civil War" from WAB, or the "1685-1845" set from the Wargame Research Group, inclusing as well their set for the 'renaissance' period, and various other ones.
The main conclusion was indeed that in comparison to infantry & artillery, the role and number of artillery (per models on the table top) was limited.

Nonetheless, some of the members in our club thought the explanations above in this thread were not yet conclusive.

What I had nevertheless told them in my comparison of various other rulesets, was that whatever the ratio of actual guns versus models, in all of these rules you were only allowed to roll one dice. Whereas in BLB depending on the type of gun you get to roll a number of either 2-4-6 dice; thus representing a much greater opportunity to 'kill' more troops, i.e figures in a single game turn.

Then today, as we played another game, one of us came up with a reasonable solution for the ratio of gunmodels:

In one of the Osprey booklets referring to the period, it is mentioned that on average 1.34 gun was available for every 1000 men in the field.
We applied this for every nations, with in the back of our minds that the outcome of the equations should be that for every thousand men, you will receive one artillery dice, to be spent in a battlefield game as you wish either on a field gun or light gun.
So we made simple math and counted the number of infantry battalions and cavalry squadrons per number of represented figures (either 18 or 6) and multiplied these by 35 actual 'people', as we play large type battles, and thus came up with numbers such as having 19 or 20 dice available to spend into types of guns.
A field gun needs 4 dice, so make the math; similarly a light gun needs 2 dice, etc. etc.

It worked out quite well for us today!

If you have anymore questions on the math, please let me know, and I will calculate an example here based upon my own French army.

[Marechal de France]

For example my French army had 16 infantry battalions (18 figures each) and 22 cavalry squadrons at the moment (6 figures each).

After multiplying (16 x 18 x 35) + (22 x 6 x 35) the net result of actual men on the battlefield was: 14.700.

1.34 x 14.7 (thousand numbers) = 19,698 dice.
The number of dice is middled up above to 20, and such should every sum be to make even numbers, as gun types need even numbers as well in the BLB ruleset.

Once again, this is our explanation at our club to come to a reasonable number of gunmodels. If you don't agree, that's fine. If it is to any help to you, fine as well!