1809 Hessians

[Saxonian]

One of my first armies in Napoleonics was Massena's 4th Corps in 1809, which included the Hesse-Darmstadt contingent, and I am a little confused as to the ratings of these troops in ToN.
In ToN the Chevau-Legers are rated as Guards, while the infantry are simply veteran.
While the Hessian cavalry was certainly above average, I have never seen them referred to as Guards in any of my reading about this campaign.
One of the infantry brigades, however, was the Leibgarde Brigade. The performance of the Hessian infantry, particularly at the Battle of Aspern-Essling, I feel warrants their rating as either Superior or Guard (or both ).
I note that in the list for 1812 the ratings do seem to be reversed (I think this is correct - I'm writing without the book in front of me).

[hazelbark]

I think the term "brigade" isn't quite right, but sort of is.
I think the brigade had two regiments.
Leib Garde and Leib
Somewhere over the years someone nicknamed it the Leib brigade. And technically the two regiments were in the same brigade. Then the name filtered down to the regiments.

Actually in game terms Veteran Garde is plenty good for the infantry, the superior on top of that make them old guard.
So drilled Guard or just plain Veteran are probably historically about right.

I need to check on the cavalry.

[MikeHorah]

Performance versus nomenclature can be a difficult choice when assessing a unit or formation and I don't think there is any kind of algorithm for giving the answer .

Some decisions could go several ways with equal validity especially for what were relatively small formations comprised of different units. You can also get examples of well regarded normally high performing units not doing so well ( a French Carabinier unit in 1813 who refused to charge on one occasion. )That's is what D rolls are all about. I think we have had as much challenge for being too generous in our classifications as the reverse. That does not mean we got it " about right" just that its not a science with the " right answer" waiting to be found. We all have our favourite units too ( although mine include some utterly bad and notorious ones eg the Regts Etranger!)

We rejected the idea of making all units called " garde" or lieb garde" etc the same in elan and training- that would inject a highly inflationary element in points and other terms as well as being inherently challengeable but we also wanted to have more variety and nuance across the piece. Some past rules sets in this era just leave it to players to decide who counts as Guards who as Elite who as veterans etc so long as you pay the points. Even giving formations such as the Hessians a specific mention is comparatively unusual perhaps as compared with using the term " other Guards" .

There is a case however for reviewing, at some point their consistency and picking up any unintended variations in our overall treatment across the lists, of some specific units that appear in many of them eg the Young Guard.

The late decision ( mainly by Osprey ) to go for two big hard back books of lists rather than 5 or 6 slimmer ones (as in FOG(AM and (R)) meant that all the TON lists had now to be completed for publication well before some of them had even been identified by us let alone written . We had been working on the basis that each slimmer book would be internally consistent and produced over a longer timeframe.

We were producing I think the largest set of lists for this era ( c 140) that anyone had tried to do and bit more time between finalising the rules at the back-end of 2011 ( and some lists to put in them also a very late publishers' requirement) and getting the full set of lists out in 2012 would have been helpful if only in reducing the errata. In practice as authors we had much less time between the books than the publication schedule suggests. But I guess all authors want more time!

[Saxonian]

From my reading (and not all sources say the same thing), the Hesse-Darmstadt contingent for this campaign consisted of six battalions:
- Leib-Garde...............2 batts.
- Leib Garde Fusiliers....1 batt.
- Leib Fusiliers............1 batt.
- Line Musketeers.........1 batt.
- Line Fusiliers.............1 batt.
The presence of so many units with 'Leib' in front, I agree, led to the use of the term 'Leib Brigade'. It was not an official, or even historical term.
The highest strength return I can find for the Chevau-Legers is only about 350 sabres - not even a small unit in FOGN.

At Aspern-Essling, the line musketeer batt appears to have been absent (I think it had been detached to protect line of supply) and the other five battalions were in a single brigade. The musketeers returned in time for Wagram.
The strength of this brigade (once again up for debate, depends on who you believe) seems to equate to the two large units permitted in ToN.
I was expecting one of these two large infantry units to be rated slightly higher than the other, probably as superior rather than guard. (I wasn't seriously suggesting they should be rated the same as OG!)

My initial post was more to point out that if any of the Hessians were to be picked out for guard status, I would have thought it should be one of the infantry units rather than the cavalry, as is the case in the 1812 list.
I actually think the authors have done an excellent job in the balance they have struck with their various ratings - I honestly thought that some kind of snafu had occurred, as is to be expected when things as complex as wargame rules go to print.

[MikeHorah]

Don't rule out a snafu - or at least an insufficiently deep researched decision! I was probably a but too self satisfied with myself for just getingt them in at all ! Now that you have flagged it up its one to have another look at if we have the opportunity . Mind you we might just delete the Cavalry Guard status ! From a personal perspective I like lots of nuance.