Review: 10mm Napoleonics by Old Glory Grand Scale

From De nerdibus

So, in December, I sold off the last of the 15mm Napoleonics I had accumulated in high school and college. I was a pretty crappy painter then, without much eye for historical detail. I wanted to do Napoleonics right, with crisp-looking uniforms and mountains of lead on the table.

I settled on 10mm. More bang for the buck than 15mm. I had done some 6mm figures a few years back and mounted them for Polemos. They painted up quickly, but they were so small that they didn't look colorful from a distance, and color is part of the fun of Napoleonics.

So I went with 10mm and decided to go with Old Glory. Their "Old Glory Army" promotion was too good to pass up. With 40% off all miniatures, infantry figures cost about $.10 each. I could get two huge armies (French and Austrian) for under $300.

I ordered shortly after Christmas. I was told at the time that a backlog meant that I would have to wait for my order to be completed. In the end, I got my minis in 20 days. I still think that's pretty good, considering they also had to cast the models. A later supplemental order (had to get some English, don't you know) came in about half that time. With good communications, a great price, and timely shipping, I give Old Glory high marks for service.

The figures looked good, better than many 10mm figures I have seen on 10mmworld.com. The infantry were mounted on strips of 5, which pretty much determined how I was going to mount my battalions. The strips were an inch long, although some were slightly longer, forcing me to trim the edges to fit on my bases. For infantry mounted in strips, there is only one pose--marching high port arms. I think this is fine and appropriate for napoleonics, but I think it would be a turn-off if I wanted to game in a later period. I want my ACW Confederates to look ragged, thank you very much. There were five variants among artillery crew, and three basic skirmisher poses (plus command). Cavalry was cast separate from the horses (except for the Polish Lancers). There were three horse variants. A few troopers did not sit cleanly on their mounts and needed some filling.

There was some flash on the tips of the muskets which was easily pulled off with fingertips. Some bases had a nub of lead on the bottom which required a swipe with the hobby knife to remove. Overall pretty clean. Even the individually mounted skirmishers and artillerymen, with their insanely small bases, stood independently with very little work. Gluing them to bases was no problem, even with my clumsy little sausage fingers.

The figures painted up nicely, with just the right amount of sculptural detail for the scale, in my opinion. Too much and the figure looks busy, too little and they become blobs. These guys looked better than my old 15mm despite being much smaller. I did not use shading (pointless at that scale) but I did use a "magic dip" wash, which brought out details and made belts and straps stand out. You can see the results in other posts.

Overall, I'm very happy with Old Glory 10mm's. They have helped re-ignite my passion for the hobby and the period.