So I've read the rules a couple of times, written a Forth program to allow me to enter an army list, print it out, and automatically "characterize" it for a battle.  Now it's time to decide on an army and some figures.  I already have around 8 units of 15mm Austrian infantry painted and ready to play, so it would make sense to get to work on the equally large number of Prussians I have still sitting in their baggies.

The only problem is, I got some 28mm figures (My Berbers, as it turns out) and lined them up in the suggested basing for FoB (which is 2x2 figures in 40mm square blocks) and it looks REALLY COOL.  Much cooler than little 15mm guys, 3 to an inch wide base.

I guess it's like the "lead vs. plastic figures" thing - I like the bigger, heavier figures even though they're coniderably more expensive and harder to paint.

This is obviously a problem, since I already own some 15mm lead, much of which is already painted.  Though I'd need to buy more for any decent sized game.

The smart thing to do is forget all this 28mm silliness for FoB and get my 15mm stuff in order.  I'm certainly going to play my first few games with 15mm forces, though I'll need to use some 17th Century stand-ins for some extra units.

But I'm not generally very smart, and the point of this hobby is my own amusement, so does it really make sense to settle for "second best"?  Maybe it does if it gets me playing faster.  Fortunately, I'm also usually out of wargaming money, so at least for the next few months I'll need to "get by" with what I already have.

Aside: My FoB program is 75% done, and it's cool in that way Forth programs tend to be.  In this case, the "data" for the army is just more program code that when executed creates memory structures that describe the army.  Here's an example:

Create MyArmy

   Average commander" King Hrothgar"

Brigade" Left Wing"

   Superior leader" Mike The Barbarian"

   Crack infantry unit" Mike's Marauders"

   Regular infantry unit" Home Boys"

   Poor light cavalry unit" Loitering Larry's Losers"

Once this file is loaded, you can type 'MyArmy characterize', and then 'MyArmy .army'.

Each "word" of the above "data" file is actually a Forth command.  For example, "poor light cavalry unit" can be read as unit(poor, cavalry(light)), though frankly the Forth version reads better. :-)  The word unit" compiles data for a new unit including the unit's name, which is all of the text following unit" up until the next quotation mark.  Pretty slick, eh?

I may "solidify" the program to the point where you would just run a command line tool on army list files to generate a playable list for that army, but the program will be useable by me without doing that.