TUTORIAL TIME! Unit basing tiny figures

Hello again.

When building my 10mm fantasy armies, I gave some consideration to how I would base them. The chosen rules ("Warband" by Pendraken Miniatures) require units to be based as a single entity on 100x50mm bases, rather than several small bases combined to make a unit as with most rules, so I was concerned at how I would base them with so many figures in the way of the glue, flock, textured paint, etc I use for such activities.

So, her for your delectation (or for you to ignore should you so choose), is my way of doing it. I make no claim to originality or even to common sense in how I achieved my aim. You may well read this and think "what a *********" (insert suitable derogatory term) at how I might have missed something obvious, but here goes.

Firstly, however, let me show you the sort of thing I am NOT concerned with here, such as this Elven command unit, seen in the first two photos. There is plenty of room in and around the figures in units like this to just stick them all down at once and texture and flock to your heart's content afterwards. So, in such cases, just get on with it!

NO!!! We are concerned with multi-figure units!

1) So, first up, gather your materials. A selection of textured paint, flock, white modelling glue/ PVA, cocktail sticks and bamboo skewers to apply the textured paint, small rocks sold as model railway ballast, grass tufts, bits of twig...you know the sort of thing, a selection of which is below.

2) Check out the two photos below, both of the same unit. Once you have your materials, take a 100x50mm base (or whatever size you are using) and paint it on both sides to help prevent warping later on.

3) Once this is dry (and after adding the little box for the unit record dice at the back left corner of the base, apply any twigs or rocks you want on the base, gluing them down securely. These will need to be bedded into the subsequent earth and grass textures to look the part.

4) Plan how your unit is to look and glue down the first row of figures, who will form the front rank of the unit when seen from the front of course.

5) Once these have stuck securely (I use superglue for this), take your chosen base texturing material (Basetex, Greenscene textured paint or whatever) and apply it around this front rank of figures, but ensure you cover enough of the base behind this front row to take the texturing up to where you intend to deploy the second row of figures. I use a cocktail stick in the main for this, but a bamboo skewer is fine for larger, less detailed work.  Sprinkle in a few of the tiny rocks from your pack of ballast as you go. They will be held in place by the wet textured paint.

6) Whilst the textured paint is still wet, glue down the second row, ensuring that you butt the front of the figure bases into the texture you have already applied so that it largely covers the front of the second row figure bases.

7) As with the first row of figures, apply more textured paint around the back of the second row of figures, again leaving enough to enable you to stick down the third row, again ensuring you push them partly into the textured paint around the second row of figures so that the front of each base of the third row figures is covered. Again add a few little ballast rocks to suit.

8) Then finish off the rest of the base with textured paint. Take GREAT care filling in any gaps by dropping in moistened textured paint form the end of a cocktail stick, pushing and shoving it into accessible gaps etc. If you do not take care, you may well end up dropping it all over a figure. If you do, wash it off immediately with water! Add a few more ballast rocks to suit.

9) Once the whole base has dried, you can add grass. Mix up a dilute solution of white glue/ PVA, apply it at the end of a row of figures and simply let gravity take it down the channels and around the figures. DO NOT allow it to build up like a snowdrift around any individual figures, but tilt the base to manipulate the flow of the glue.

10) Once you have applied the glue you want to where you want it, sprinkle flock and grass in a mix that suits your taste over the glue and tip and tap off  any excess onto newspaper, ready to collect it up later for re-use.

11) Once the grass has dried (give it at least a day), use whatever paint you like to highlight the bare earth of any visible textured paint.

12) Add tufts or other effects to the bases to finish off.

As you can hopefully see from the photos, a little care and effort, together with doing things in a suitable order, can lead to some fully based and useable figures with no gaps showing to spoil the overall effect you want. Job done!

I based my Goblins in exactly the same way, so it works for everything I have tried so far.

G

Finwe's Finest Finally Feature

Hello again.

The High Elves are here!

I actually painted the vast majority of the figures last year, but basing them has taken until this year to accomplish, as I have busied myself with other things, notably Vikings and Irish and then French & Indian Wars.

But the wait (for me at least!) is now over and the Goblins have some opposition of note (apart from fighting amongst themselves, at any rate).

The figures are all 10mm size and hail from the ranges of Pendraken. As with the Goblins, I bought the first ones at the Derby Show in 2015, buying one of the starter armies available at the time (and available still I believe, though the choices have expanded since then).

Blue is the theme colour and features on virtually all the figures to tie them together as a whole, unlike the rather more random look of the Goblins.

Now, I will show you the pictures as this juncture, but please tune in for the next post, as there are a couple of major considerations with these whole unit bases when it comes to texturing the bases that I would like to notify you about, should you ever choose to go the "Warband" route. I will do that next time...

So, till next time, here are Finwe's Finest.

G

The "Starter Army plus bits", which is still not the whole force available! The starter force is actually just 8 units, so this is a starter and a half!!!

The COMMAND stand, a mix of figures from the original command pack plus some additions.

The High Elf Sorcerers with pet statuette. It seems all the magician packs, regardless of which army they are for, get a pet statuette, rock or similar.

Massed ARCHERS!

And a close up to show my attempts to shade and highlight 10mm figures just as I would 28mm.

The open grave on the back left corner of each base is to hold a small d6 which shows unit strength in the "Warband" rules.

BOLT SHOOTERS, resplendent primarily in yellow, but with that almost ever-present blue visible too, which ties them in with the army as a whole. My thought process was that blue was their colour, but different units or types of units might have different main uniform colours, hence the yellow here and... 

...the green of the SCOUTS (again matched with blue).

But those mounted types are rather more fanciful and independent-minded, so blue may not feature at all, as on this unit, the BLOOD KNIGHTS.

The knights of the STAR LORDS regiment are mostly blue-clad, however.

The STAR OF THE AINUR regiment. The banners in all cases are simply pieces of self-adhesive label folded in half around the pole of a normal spearman figure in the case of the infantry.

The RED WINGS regiment.

The SWAN GUARD regiment.

And the two-handed swordsmen of the GOLDEN OAK regiment.

And another ultra-close up showing my attempt to shade and highlight these 10mm figures.

Goblin gribblies

Hello again.

A major part of the first few months of last year was taken up with building and painting my first ever 10mm scale army (well, size, as 10mm is not a scale, which would actually be about 1:180 I think). That army was Goblins, bought at Derby on October 2015 from Pendraken, along with a High Elf army as opposition, and both were to form my endeavours to get in some games of "Warband", the fantasy rules also published by Pendraken.

Well, I have yet to get a game in at all, but, during my break from having a show project to take up my time, I have now based all of the High Elves, having painted them last year too, and, as I will show in the pictures below, added a reinforcement to my Goblins, which is the main subject of this post. (I will show the Elves in all their frippery some time soon).

The long and the short of it is that I now have both sides to furnish some "Warband" games, if ever I get the time and find an opponent who is available when I am!

Anyway, the reinforcement...

Long time players of Orc and Goblin armies to that doyen of fantasy rules, "Warhammer" version 1 to whatever, will know these things as Squigs. They were usually fielded with some sort of handlers. Pendraken know them as Squogglers, so that is what we shall call them here seeing as how they are Pendraken figures. I am sure all the copyright stuff is done and dusted...

The "bouncy ball with teeth and attitude" idea is the same as far as I can see and, though I have no games under my belt to prove the notion, I suspect their usage in the two games is also similar. I have even included some spare Goblin/ Orc figures as handlers, all based on a 100x50mm rectangle of thin MDF, this base size being the one used for all units in "Warband" (I think...)

So, with Giants, Ogres and war machines still to add to the green ranks, (but safely mined from the Lead Mountain in readiness), I have at least finished these fellows by way of something slightly different to the usual fare of warbands, trolls and wolf riders with which Orc and Goblin armies are so replete.

G

The whole unit, simply based on one base, which I think is one of the strengths of the "Warband" rules.

I painted all my 10mm figures as if they were my usual 28mm, i.e. with base coat, wash and highlights. The Squogglers started, unusually for me, with a white undercoat. The base coat was a bright red, which I highlighted with a bright orange, then "knocked back" with a wash of red ink from GW. Although the photo might not show it clearly, there is a distinct graduation of colour on their flesh. The Orcs/ Goblins have the same minimum three-stage paint job too, by the way!

"Goblins. Fahsends of 'em"

Hello to you all on this last day of June.

In about three and a half months, I have brought my little (no pun intended) fantasy project to a state where I can successfully call something "finished". Well, strictly speaking, I may well add more figures in due course, but I have more than enough painted, based, varnished and ready to go to play some games of "Warband" if ever I can get the Nephews or sundry other associates in the same place at the same time sometime soon...

So, here for your delectation/ mild amusement/ distaste (set your own level to suit), I give you the "Burning Skulls" and their various hangers on. I don't normally paint Orcs green, but they looked right after I had painted the first few, so I stuck with it. Technically, in the rules, they are classed as "goblins" anyway, which I do paint green...

I am over-thinking this...

I was concerned about how I would base them (and was right to be), but settled on Basetex. This has caused a tiny bit of base warping as it has dried and contracted, but I hope to be able to sort that out by magnetising the ends of the bases only, rather than the middle. I trust this will cause the base to be pulled into shape better during storage, but I must admit there is no science behind this. I also stuck the figures down in stages on those bases with 20+ figures, then did a bit of texturing, then added more figures, etc. I am happy with the end result though.

They are not all I have been doing during this past three+ months, as I have also painted their High Elf opponents, but they are neither varnished nor based so you will not see them yet. Maybe by the end of July. And then there are the proposed reinforcements. And then I want some 10mm Balrogs. And something akin to some Haradrim would not go amiss...

Talk about project creep.

All the figures are Pendraken. I am impressed with them, especially given their size. They also cover lots of historical stuff for those not inclined towards fantasy, so do check them out at shows or their website.

G

The Bossmen - a command unit and another of shamen/ shamans. The little boxes at the rear corner of each base hold little dice used to mark unit strength in the "Warband" rules.

The boss and his entourage. The basic command pack only comes with five figures, so I added some spare warriors. Can you spot the theme for these bodyguard-types?

Mighty Magic-men of Mordor! Or hapless dupes if truth be told...I have a habit in fantasy games of seeing my wizards blow themselves up. I deliberately left other figures off this base: 1) See the first part of this caption and, 2) I doubt anyone would really want to stand by the average Orc shaman because they would probably expect some pain in my book!

Artillery (small scale). Reinforcements will include some bigger stuff...These will do for now.

Blokes on dogs. Erm, Wolf Riders, I mean.

What is the Black Speech word for "Charge!!!"

Blokes with bent sticks. The rearmost unit is one of Scouts, who have suitable special rules in the "Warband" book to do with something called "scouting". No, I don't know what that is either...

A close up of some of the blokes with bent sticks.

Ah, the Mirkwood Leichte Panzer Division.

Warriors!

And a close up of some general cannon fodder/ warriors.

And some others who wanted the publicity...

BIG STUFF, in the form of some Trolls. I don't know why I did three units. In the "Warband" rules, you can only have 200pts of these "Special" types, and these bases are 90pts each! Oh yes, I remember now. I don't just want to play basic games! (And I am a megalomaniac with a passion for big gribblies!)

Bill, Tom and the other one. With three of their friends.

And a few more. Where is Turin Turambar when you need him? (Go and read "The Silmarillion" if you don't get the reference you heathen).

Two months' labour (of love)

The absence of a major project for next year's show circuit has certainly not seen me switching off the paintbrush or evicting the muse, but has seen me doing something slightly different.

For the past several years, I have painted almost nothing except 28mm figures, anything from Dark Ages (SAGA) to late 17th Century (my stalled "1690" stuff), with mostly Medievals in between, and mostly with next year's show game firmly in mind. The few other things have included Mad Mullah Chapman's Turbaned Terrors (20mm Afghan insurgents) and some 15mm 2nd SS Panzer Division.

That was until now.

I bought two 10mm fantasy armies from Pendraken at the Derby Show last October, largely on that whim that grips me whenever I go to a show or see something new (magpie, me???), and in the esteemed hope that I would indeed see this one through. Well, I have seen this one through (almost...), by not only painting all the original figures I bought for my chosen Goblins and High Elves, but most of the extras I bought in April to fill things out a bit! I am averaging at least a couple of units painted a week, which is light-speed in my book!!! I approached the project with a little trepidation though, as I was simply unsure how I would paint figures so much smaller than the norm. Would I enjoy it? Would I be trapped in trying to do everything my 28mm way? Would I like or want the end result?

I am not one of those wargamers who are fantasy-averse, nor one who only ever buys metal figures, plays Napoleonics exclusively or only collects 15mm offerings, etc. I thought I had become a confirmed 28mm man, though, given my recent buying and painting history of the past five years or so, but life is getting in the way...

I'll explain.

1) 28mm figures are not cheap and I like lots of figures in the main rather than skirmishes, though will happily play those too.
2) 28mm figures take up a lot of time to paint, a lot of space to store and a lot of tabletop to have in the average British dwelling.
3) My eclectic tastes would see me firstly bankrupt, secondly divorced and thirdly deceased long before I ever got around to doing all the stuff I would want to do.

In light of all this, 28mm is a nice to have, though I am still committed to getting some French Wars of Religion figures done for 2019 (400th anniversary of Moncontour, Jarnac, etc) and to eventually finishing my "1690" project. I seriously doubt my Ancient Indians will ever be matched by some Macedonians/ Successors (though I have the figures), whether my Celts will ever see the light of day (though I have the figures), whether my Pacific WW2 forces will ever be done (though I...yeah, you guessed).
The way forwards for me has to lie in smaller scales in the main, however, simply for cost and storage issues if nothing else.

I expect future, big projects to be in smaller scales than 28mm.

Still, I do have an on-going quandary with these small figures, especially when multi-based, though it will be a no-brainer to those more versed in their completion. That quandary is around texturing their bases. I usually use textured paint rather than sand and glue, but either way, I need to work out my technique for completing these bases. Then I can play some games and decide if I like the rules! This basing quandary is a "biggie" for me, as I like basing marginally more than I like varnishing, and that and preparation are my absolutely least favourite things to do with a wargames figure.

And there's still the 7 Years' War in India, 1859/ 66, Eastern Front, Great Northern War...

Here are some samples to date.

G

"One rules set to rule them all, One rules set to find them, One rules set to bring them all and in the darkness bind them..."

Some trolls. I like trolls. As anyone who has ever fought my old, 28mm Orc army, you can have lots of fun with trolls. Well, your opponent can, when they wander off in a daze, not knowing why they are where they are or what they should be doing, whilst the rest of your Orc army is ground into the dust or shot down by silly Elves with uber-accurate bows...

Mirkwood's finest. I actually plan to get some of these for Lord of The Rings and similar 28mm fantasy games. They are about 30mm across which would be 6 feet in GW-scale! That's a Giant Spider in my book, if not exactly the fully-fledged Shelob!

The Goblin command group. They are all shaded and highlighted, just like my 28mm's, and still easy to do despite the small size. I like the aesthetic, so I will persist!