Looking for casualties

[madman]

May default to prone zombies but first, does anyone know of micro armour (6mm, 1/300, etc.) casualties? Ideally from WWII to ultra modern but beggars can't be choosers. I would rather mark locations with minis rather than just markers. Thank you for any leads.

[Mk 1]

I have taken to making my own casualty markers.

I cut irregular (not too big) pieces of thin sheet plastic. I paint them red. And then I take standing figures from my extras bin (mostly from another vendor, whose figures are just too fragile for my continued use), and mash them down into random crumpled prone positions and mount them onto the red plastic bases.

My goal is not specifically to look bloody, but to give me a marker that is clearly a man down on the battlefield.

I then place them ON my infantry stands to mark the stands that have taken casualties (needed in the Mein Panzer rules, as squad-sized stands can be reduced by casualities), and on the table when I remove a stand that has been fully eliminated.


Here is a close-up of how they look, and how I use them at game-time. Note some are on stands (marking casualties) and others are on the game table (marking eliminated stands).


Here is a wider view of how it looks on a game table.

It's a simple enough process for my purposes.

If I were buying GHQ figures specifically to make casualty markers, I would choose artillery crew figures. But I have enough figures in my extras bin to make another 40 or 50 markers if I need (I already have more than 20). So for me at least, there's no need to buy new figures for this purpose.

Your tankage may vary.

-Mark

[chrisswim]

Nice solution, and presentation.
Thank you

[madman]

Now there is an idea. I have a surplus of artillery figures and some 40+ year old figures which have what I described as "zombie flesh" coloured skin tones. Somehow, over the years, for someone who never did much infantry actions I have acquired maybe a hundred figures I could afford to "kill".

This is actually for very small skirmish gaming. I am going to try my hand at it using micro armour single based figures and a playing area about the size of a sheet of paper. There are so many cool skirmish games out there and it has taken a while for me to think my way out of some issues with micro scale figures. I might either magnetize the figures or the base in order to stabilize games and all buildings will have to be paper or card so figures can be located inside. Unless I use enlarged floor plans adjacent to the game surface for figures inside or on top of buildings.

Mostly a thought in process as for most of my gaming I use team or squad bases with losses amounting to entire bases. Again based on skirmish where tracking individual casualties is required I was just going to use rings cut out of plastic drinking straws on figures to denote wounded or killed. Just seeing what is going on in the larger scales had me thinking...

Thanks again. You keep my faith in micro scale gaming alive.

[Mk 1]

This is actually for very small skirmish gaming. I am going to try my hand at it using micro armour single based figures and a playing area about the size of a sheet of paper. ... I might either magnetize the figures or the base in order to stabilize games and all buildings will have to be paper or card so figures can be located inside.

That's an interesting idea.

https://www.allhellletloose.co.uk/2020/ ... roops.html

Here is a link to a blog by a fellow who has done a full-up 1/285 game board based on the artillery battery at Brecourt Manor that was the focus of one of the episodes in Band of Brothers. He created this board for skirmish-level gaming of that same engagement -- with 1/285 scale figures individually based to run around in the trenches.

I kind of like your idea of a game surface area the size of a piece of paper (or maybe the size of a chess board or some such).

I can see your concept of magnet bases, but for me I think that the various basing schemes I've imagined using magnets and purchased stands and fancy drilled sockets ... well they've all come to naught. I use pennies because, well, I've always got some around. I'm never out of pennies. I've never had a unit I was building, and then oops, I mis-counted or want to add just one more HQ unit or something and I don't have enough bases and now I can't finish my project for another 2 weeks and blah blah blah. I can always pull a cushion from the couch and find enough pennies to finish my project.

But if I was basing individual figures I would consider another approach.


In this image of some of my civilian stuff, which I placed in another thread for the fun of showing off the scratch-built farm cart, I might point out the bases I've used for the civilian figures. It's just thin styrene sheet, cut to about the size that I found convenient.

There is one individually based figure in a white shirt -- I took a GHQ modern figure with a manpad launcher and clipped off the missile tube front and back to make a video cameraman. The base makes him pretty stable on a tabletop. You could even do the base a bit smaller, and certainly could take off the squared corners, with little loss of stability.

If I was to try what you are working on, being the fan of cheap-and-cheerful I would probably go this way.

For your buildings, if you haven't yet looked at them I highly recommend the free building print files that GHQ offers on this website.

https://www.ghqmodels.com/pages/military/freestuff.asp

Lots of very nice prints you can use to make card stock buildings. Also some tutorial materials to help you get the most out of the free prints. Seems some folks cut sheet styrene to shape and glue the prints to the plastic sheets to give their buildings a bit more heft, but still retain the flexibility of hollow insides. Others just use stiff cardstock.

Gompel, a fellow who used to frequent this board, was kind enough to offer the results of many hours of his labor, and our hosts at GHQ are kind enough to host it for us, so that we can all access a remarkable resource in these files.

Sounds like a very interesting project. I hope you post a bit more on it if / as you progress. And pics, man, pics are always good for feeding the fan-base.



-Mark

[madman]

I have been thinking of this for some time now. I am just back into gaming (4 years now) after a 30+ year break and nothing is like it was. Skirmish is all the rage and the cool new rules sets, which get play around here, lean that way. I have to admit a more than passing interest but being both heavily invested in micro armour (MA) and being stuck in my ways, well....

Back in the day I was very into, and still am interested in updating, the Striker rules from GDW. So I based to suit which meant 2 to 4 troopers on 1/2" square polystyrene base about .020" thick. Getting back into gaming I am leaning towards bases of teams to squads but haven't based anything yet due to trying to figure out which rules to use. I bought a bunch of different sized steel bases to allow for different numbers of troops per base. I went with steel so I could use magnetic cards on my transport holders to keep things from moving around while in transit. Since then I have come to the realization that coins will work as well. Mostly nickles for half squads and dimes for teams with quarters for large squads. Sounds costly but cheaper than bought bases.

Originally I was looking at individual bases for leaders and this is what gave me the leads for single basing. The magnetic cards are the size of business cards adhesive on one side. The idea is you stick your business card to one side and then it can be put on a fridge. I have experimented with hole punching these cards as well as small washers with a possibility of a tiny rare earth magnet in the centre. The magnets can be gotten as small as 1/16" diameter and 1/32" thick. Not too much force to get them off a steel sheet. In any case after mounting and painting the base I figure a few coats of clear for protection as they will be handled quite a bit and the magnets will mean some force to move.

Pennies are not magnetic enough for me. Although I have found some which were a little magnetic.

I will look up the link but anything more than say 11" x 17" doesn't sound likely to me for this application. The bases in your picture look a little bigger than my old Striker bases. I assume the individual is on a 1/2" or 3/8" square. I like your thinking on how to modify the original mini.

I have lots of buildings, most solid with a few sets of paper. I made a bunch of paper buildings decades ago in my teens and they are still around, but I haven't got off my behind and made up any of the bought ones I got recently.

I will have to post more if I go this route. I can be very bad wrt starting something and going elsewhere, mind wise.

[madman]

Went to the site. Oh man! I would have to play on that table for years to justify that kind of work, although it looks awesome. I am still on the fence about making fixed game boards, good detail, or always just using drop cloths and loose terrain. If I go with fixed I am looking at duplicating in miniature the boards from some suitable board game like Conflict of Heroes (my current favorite) or Squad Leader/ASL (looked good until I had to read ALL THOSE RULES.

I have also seen here where guys just do "vignettes" like a farm or small town or parts of towns or cities, and add them to free range terrain. I like that idea, while still creating all the specific terrain for an existing game board you can then arrange it as you like, within reason.

[madman]

Mk1

Cool stuff. Is this based for Mein Panzer?

I am leaning towards not basing vehicles unless small like jeeps or otherwise delicate like artillery. Thoughts?

[BurtWolf]

Interesting Mk1 - never thought of doing it that way. Looks simple and effective. I think I would not do it, like you pointed out, unless I needed it to show something game related on a particular stand.

On a similar note I’m thinking of trying to have a Drop Zone littered with used chutes, spilled canisters, etc. may be good side project to work on...

[Mk 1]

Cool stuff. Is this based for Mein Panzer?

Yep. All my WW2 stuff is based for Mein Panzer. That is to say the infantry is squad-based.

I use 4 figures to indicate a full-sized regular squad (whatever that means for the force in question), 3 figures to indicate a special-purpose squad-sized group (may be a squad of combat engineers, or a big gun crew, or an HQ of more than about 7 men, whatever), and 2 figures to indicate a half-squad sized team (a support weapon crew, an AOP or MOP or commo team, a small HQ team, etc.).

I am leaning towards not basing vehicles unless small like jeeps or otherwise delicate like artillery. Thoughts?

I don't base my vehicles unless I need to because they are too small, or because there are bits I need to keep together.

So my motorcycles are based. And my wagons are based with the horses. But my tanks and trucks are not.

For artillery I create 3 figure gun crews. I keep the guns themselves loose. In this way I can adjudicate fire against the guns separately from the crews (which is called for by the MP rules), and I can have a fair variety of guns for a given army without duplicating the gun crews.

I think I would not do it, like you pointed out, unless I needed it to show something game related on a particular stand.

I actually have two reasons. Or maybe 3. But two are compelling (to me) and the third is just kinda maybe like a preference...

Reason 1: As I said, in the Mein Panzer rules (my preferred rule set) the infantry stand usually represents a squad of 8 - 12 men. But other stands (support weapons, command stands, etc.) can be half-squad sized. When adjudicating shots against a full sized squad, it takes two "kill" results to eliminate the squad. The first only de-rates the squad to a half-squad size. So I need a way to track squads that have taken casualties.

Reason 2: Not rule-specific, but when I build an infantry force I almost always build a team or two of medics. And my vehicles will include at least one ambulance for each country where that army was known to have dedicated vehicles for their medical services (I just use regular trucks for those armies that didn't have dedicated ambulances).

I often set up my scenarios with more tactical challenges than just move-and-shoot. Combat leaders are frequently challenged to mange multiple priorities at once. To make players think like commanders I often set up several ways to get or lose victory points. Each player will know how they get victory points, but may not know how other players (on the other side, but sometimes even on their same side) get victory points. So you have to watch what's going on, so that you can not only pursue your own victor points but also block your opponents from doing whatever it is they seem to be trying to do (to get their victory points).

Taking objectives, causing losses, and avoiding casualties are common ways to affect your victory points in my games. If your side loses victory points for the casualties you take, it affects how you play. I like that. But if you lose victory points for taking casualties, I often offer you medics and/or ambulances so you can rescue some of the casualties. So maybe you lose 1 point for each half-squad you lose, but you gain back 1 point for every lost squad marker (casualty marker on the table) your medics reach and bring back to your aid station.

Some armies invested a lot of effort into providing aid to wounded soldiers, some armies didn't. Its a real thing that can distract commanders on the battlefield.

Reason 3: I don't just turn tanks over when they are destroyed -- I have flame+smoke markers. So I also find it perhaps too clinical to have infantry just ... disappear ... when they are hit. If your infantry charges across open ground and gets gunned down, the ground should not look empty afterwards. I don't revel in gore or bloodiness. But it just feels empty and meaningless if there isn't at least some markers to remind you that you had a bunch of infantry, and now you don't, and it happened right there.

Your mileage may vary.

-Mark