I have lots of WFB miniatures set in square bases and arranged in regiments but Age of Sigmar (AoS) introduced a new direction for my armies. Now the regiment formations are no more and the bases switched to circular. Humm not happy with that for several reasons:
1- Rebasing finished modeling projects is not what I would call fun time.
2- If I break the regiment formation and go circular bases for my miniatures they will no longer be compatible with previous editions of WFB or other companies emergent games.
3- It costs money to rebase hundreds of miniatures
So yes, I was inclined to leave them all in square bases and get on with it... well that was before I set some miniatures on the table in a skirmish arrangement.
Ouch that looks wrong in so many ways, its just a visual mess.
I got myself some 25mm circular bases to see the total footprint of my goblin archers regiment.
Its going to take more space on the table thats for sure.
When I dispersed my regiment I noticed that the unit fillers that I used would take the space of 10 models so effectively my 50 gobbo regiment was actually just 40 gobbos, a troll and some beetles.
Thing is, in AoS makes no sense to have these unit fillers. The nature of the skirmish game renders these fillers redundant. So I dropped them.
By now I only have 40 goblin archers, no cool fillers and some horrible pointy square bases in loose formation... Not a good starting point. What to do? Call it a day and do the clever thing and dont change a thing, thats what I should have done. But I didn't, I had the urge to rebase it all and so I got my heavy tools and butchered some squares, here is the results.
Since this is skirmish now I broke the unit in 2 smaller and more manageable detachments, luckily enough I had both old school and new models mixed into the archers so the obvious choice for clarity sake on the table was to divide them by edition.
One unit of the old farts ( they also gained an extra standard and musician):
and one unit of the new gobbos.
So the impulsive blind decision prevailed in the end and I will go AoS all the way, in the process I will rebase my armies. Lost my fillers but gained 1 extra unit with standard and musician.
They do look nice in little circles.
I won't do it. I never rebase anything, that's too much like work.
ReplyDeleteIn all likelihood I'll never play that game.
Agreed. Visually, it doesn't bother me what shape or size a mini is based on. Just as long as the mini looks good enough :)
DeleteThe game looks a lot like checkers on steroids. Although, l think chess would offer more of a challenge than AoS :D
I think AoS will be a good introduction for my son. Simple rules can be fun too, but yes I understand not everyones cup of tea.
DeleteAs for the bases I'm quite picky with that sort of thing and the idea of having mixed bases would stress me out, also the square nature of the previous bases introduce lots of visual noise in the form of infinite sharp angles, while round ones are almost rendered invisible in a loose formation. Like I said Im too picky.
For the bigger orcs I will get me some new 32mm's bases.
Visually I have no problem with squares, you are measuring from the model from what I understand. The squares will allow me to play other more challenging systems.
DeleteAnd therein I think lies the problem, I think their entire intent is to try and make this more kid friendly, but most kids I know don't like things that are not electronically displayed on a screen. I'm not wishing them failure, but I think it will fail.
I will measure from the base to keep things less confusing. I totally understand where tour coming from in therms of adapting your wfb armies to other games.
DeleteAs for kids and their digital addiction, I hear you but I managed to get my kid playing spacehulk and x wing ;D
I know its never going to replace his minecraft but If I manage to give him a taste of how fun our hobby can be maybe when he grows up he will enjoy it too. Age of Sigmar may fail in the future but at the present time It serves me just fine.