Warlord Epic Waterloo – Vive L’ (tiny) Emperor!

by Troy A. Hill

“For the love of God! Troy! Here we are painting up stuff in 28mm and you go batshit crazy in 12mm…” was what one of my local gaming friends posted under the photo of my newly arrived Epic Battles French and British Waterloo sets on Facebook.

He might be correct.

Warlord Games took a gamble on their Epic Battles Scale, and its first incarnation with the American Civil War (ACW). And that gamble paid off big. The napoleonic era seemed to be the next logical entry into the Epic Battles line. So I wasn’t surprised when I learned that Waterloo was the next focus for Warlord.

But why such tiny figures? Warlord is known as the go-to company for 28mm historical (along with their friends the Perry Brothers, who fill the gaps around Warlord’s ranges.) Why produce such a small figure size that doesn’t line up with the other majorly produced conventional scale?

There is a reason my wargamers my age (late 50s) or older are referred to as grognards. Napoleon’s old guard earned that title, not for their military prowess, nor for their well-deserved sterling reputation on the field of battle. Instead, the word in French means grumblers. And, like Napoleon’s ‘grande armée’, tabletop wargaming has its share of Old Grumblers.

Warlord showed their ability to find scales for their models that were in between other popular scales. From the MTBs of Cruel seas, WWII planes in Blood Red Skies, to Victory at Sea, all the games fall between the predominant scales popular in other game systems or model manufacturers. This allows Warlord to produce product lines with more detail than the smaller scales, but not as table filling as the larger scales.

 

And, Warlord rulesets are usually scale-agnostic, as the main Black Powder rulebook is. Too often, gamers are faced with the trade-off getting more detail on larger scale figures or downscaling to get a better sense of the grand battle. Conventions have to be made in the black powder era to even come relatively in the ballpark close to having a grand battle of some historic battles. Our little tables in the local game store or club, or working on our home dining room tables just can’t do these battles justice on larger scales.

Many existing historical gamers already have their armies in the scale they chose to balance the figure detail vs scope of the battle equation. So the old grumblers come into play, and grouse that the new set’s scale doesn’t fit their already painted existing collection. Like Napoleon’s Old Guard, we gamers can grumble!

A New Set for New Hobbyists

Fortunately, Warlord targeted this set to fill a void in the gaming space. Like their Epic Battles ACW, and all the way back to GW’s Warmaster (written by Rick Priestley- remember him from the front page of the Black Powder rule book?), and other Epic scale ranges, the ability to put hordes of troops on the table is a grand desire. But the 28mm scale just doesn’t do these epic battles justice.

With a smaller scale of figures, new-to-historical gamers, looking to move over from bolter, blasters, and space-grunts can see grand battles unfold at their local game days or game conventions.

And that’s the gamer Warlord is targeting. Space games bring younger generations into tabletop gaming. Historical games try to attract those gamers as they look to expand their horizons. Every game company in the market is trying to capture those gamers as they begin to look beyond space apocalypse games or the hot new licensed from popular movie franchises.

Warlord is good at finding the scales that work for their casting process, and still delivers good detail in their figures. And the price point for one of the starter boxes is very approachable for a hobbyist looking to move from 30mm heroic-scale space greenskins into the world of historical gaming.

I’ve found from my limited time painting Warlord’s Epic Battles ACW that the figures do paint quickly if one is painting to tabletop standards. I’m currently experimenting with inks and hoping that Army Painter’s new Speed Paints lend themselves to this scale.

So, for gamers with existing collections in ranges like 10, 15, or even 18mm (Yes, Matt Varnish, I’m looking at you!), adding another scale so close to your existing scale might not be right for you.

However, for a teacher, looking for new teaching aids, this set (or the ACW set) might just be a godsend.

For the previously mentioned GW-style convert to Historical Gaming, this is a great scale. Easy to paint, affordable price point, and enough figures/stands to get a table-filling experience. Just find a gaming friend to purchase the other side’s set, and you’ve got a host of battles before you.

A note on scale. The Epic Battles ACW set measured in at 13.5mm foot to eye-line. To my measurement, the Waterloo figures look to be a solid 14mm foot to eye.

The starter sets:

Since there are a plethora of unboxing videos on YouTube, I’ll just list the highlights of what is in the starter boxes here.

There are, of course, sprues of the signature Epic Battles figures, ranked up, shoulder to shoulder. Ten figures wide per rank. Two ranks per base, and enough 60x20mm bases for them. Each sprue gives four bases total (8 ranks of 10 figures), plus a commander, and a canon. Eight skirmishing voltigeurs complete the frame. You get ten of these frames in the starter set.

Three frames of light cavalry, each of which includes a Horse Artillery 6-pounder. Three more frames feature the heavy cavalry, again with an artillery piece, and spare eagles.

The box also includes a painting guide, as well as a sheet of flags and banners for your units. In addition, there’s a flat-packed Sarissa MDF Building (the Dacoster House from Waterloo). That’s pretty good value for $145 USD.

The Rules

The A5-sized rulebook is probably the best thing in the new set. In the previous ACW set, an A5 sized reprint of the main Black Powder rule book was supplemented with a larger format glossy pamphlet. That pamphlet condensed the information from Warlord’s Glory Hallelujah sourcebook, for the new system. However, information on how to convert the existing rules down to the new scale mimicked the original rules-agnostic stance of Black Powder. It left it to the gamers to decide what worked best.

Warlord showed their ability to react to feedback, and continue to improve their system. The new rulebook in this set tailor makes the experience just for players in the Epic Battles Napoleonic experience. While the main Black Powder rulebook (in both the hardcover and smaller paperback A5 size included with the ACW set), gamers will have rules for multiple time periods.

Because they’ve gone beyond just downsizing an existing document, Warlord’s new rulebook is set in a larger font, which is easier on old grumbler eyes. A welcome improvement over the old A5-sized book.

In the new rulebook, Warlord has retooled the rules presentation to fit Epic Battles Waterloo. The core rules have been trimmed to what gamers need to play Napoleonics, separating the wheat for this time period from the chaff of earlier and later time periods. As far as I can tell, the rules haven’t been altered from 2nd Edition Black Powder.

In addition, the editors have included a revised section on basing and stands and frontage to deal specifically with Epic Battles, using four 60x20mm stands per unit. Large units add a stand, small units subtract a stand. Interestingly, there are no tiny stand references either in this section or in the army composition pages at the back of the book.

Finally, after the main ruleset, the book includes much of the material from Albion Triumphant, Vol 2 The Hundred Days Campaign. Again, the material has been slightly reworked to fit the Epic Battles concept.

Overall, their attention to answering the need for addressing the How do I do… type of question that arose from Epic Battles ACW is greatly appreciated by both myself, and by many of the YouTube gamers who have unboxed the sets on their channels.

Now, as for me, the toughest choice is not which army to paint first between my French or British, but what to do with my huge pile of shame hiding under, above, and around my painting desk. Do I finish my ACW set before I move on to the new Napoleonics? What about my Blood Red Skies air wings? Oh, and the Victory at Sea, and Black Seas fleets. And my friends in the 28mm Napoleonics range really want me to get my 28mm Chasseurs painted soon. Oh, and the Bolt Action Italian and Russian armies are still waiting to be completed.

And I haven’t even begun to collect Pike and Shotte!

If Warlord could work on a painting desk, much like Thomas Jefferson’s infamous writing desk – where Jefferson moved one stylus, and the contraption copied his moves on another stylus, making a second copy of his correspondence – but one that painted minis? That could cut my painting time in half… or more. Or, perhaps a painting robot?

Warlord just keeps making games I need to own and play. At this rate, I might finish that pile of shame by the twenty-fourth century. Maybe.

Painting robot?! Hey, Mr. Stallard: Can you get your team working on one of those?