Polish army expansion headache

Over the past two weeks I've been looking into how to expand my Polish army to cover the remaining two organizations, "Cavalry" and "Motorized Cavalry" in a sensible manner.

At the moment I'm leaning towards expanding the regular cavalry first. Mainly because it is possible to include mounted and dismounted cavalry companies in a Polish infantry battalion, and the other way around Polish infantry companies in a Polish Cavalry regiment.

What would be needed for a fleshed out Polish cavalry regiment?

At least 1 more platoon of mounted cavalry to have a more stable and less fragile company.
2 dismounted cavalry companies with at least 2 platoons each as the platoons are tiny.
1 cavalry HMG company, with a Taczanka unit and 2 HMG platoons.

The remainder of the Cavalry regiment options I already have. The AT platoon, armored train, tankettes and armored cars

I think this army organization is the second hardest to play though, after the Polish tank company. There is very little AT power. The tankettes aren't fully armed with 20mm AT guns, only a single 37mm AT gun platoon, and light artillery options. For the heavy hitting it would really require the train to be at the right place at the right time to provide serious support.

I really like the infantry and cavalry in this organization though. Cavalry especially as they are very swift moving. All "core" units in this army are also Fearless/Veteran which would make them a tiny bit better than the Germans but they still suffer from poor rate of fire and I have zero confidence in the AT rifle teams (I have bailed 1 tank in 4 games with them).

I guess I could go for a "minimum option" and just get the mounted/dismounted cavalry. The scenarios in my September Campaign book do not include that many battles unique for the Polish cavalry, but the one's included are really cool.


On the other hand we have the Motorized Cavalry.

Here I'm thinking of "recycling" most of my Polish infantry already painted up whenever possible. The 10th motorized brigade is cool, but there are simply no models to be found for these guys that are up to my standards.

The biggest pain in the ass with this army would be getting the useless trucks and staff cars for every single platoon and company involved. Just to cover the transport needs of a full company I need 3 field cars and 6 trucks! Eeach company is made up of 3 tiny "5 stand" platoons so buying them at reduced strength would be dumb.

I would need at least two companies of motorized cavalry, that's 6 field cars and 12 trucks, another field car, one motorcycle and two trucks for the regiment HQ and their mortars.

The transport issue is what puts me off the most in this case, although I can appreciate fast moving infantry racing across the table in transports I generally don't have the cash to spend on such models that have no combat abilities or any other use than being depoyed on the table and then removed from play in turn 2....

This platoon would also require a few other things which I think would make it more expensive in the end than the regular cavalry. At least 1 Vickers tank platoon , the motorcyclist platoon, MG platoons, probably at least 1 more 37mm AT gun platoon as that is the main strength of this regiment - them being armed to the teeth with AT guns.

And of course the unit no one makes, the Fiat field car Taczanka HMG carrier.  Just need those technical’s!


Decisions... decisions...

And rumors that Forged in Battle are releasing Polish cavalry, tried to contact them but got no answers which kind of puts things on hold. If the cavalry were up to the same standards and in the same price range as their Polish infantry then the choice is easy. Will they be doing dismounted cavalry as well one might ask? I've been glancing at their French infantry as a possible stand in option, even thought of converting the French HMG team MG's to look Polish.

It is head ache inducing to try to figure out how to properly expand into those last two army organizations, to figure out what models to use and to expand in a way so that you don't end up with more stuff than is needed (or have storage room for which is one of the main concerns as well).  It really sucks that the Polish don't have a better coverage in miniatures... And would it be that hard to include pictures of those rare units that only one or two manufacturers produce?!

I had hoped that Battlefront would at least cover the vehicles necessary for all Polish armies. There are really not that many to begin with. Sent them an email as well about Polish Fiat Taczanka's and Vickers tanks but got no answer from them either *sigh*