Force multiplication through element basing


As some of you may have read, I am working on my Men Of The East army for 1st ed Warhammer.

Now, the figures arrived yesterday and are large and irregularly posed fellows in huge turbans, as befits proud Sons of the East.

Now, we have the old chestnut of basing and ranking up...

Those of us who were there at the start will know that the basing sizes were based on old 25mm scale models, in neat poses and as such a 20 x 20 base was more than enough.

As scale creep came along, basing could look decidedly odd, with models advancing with one shoulder forward, the other back, giving the appearance of a formation dancing Ska Boys!

At the end of the day, what governs the unit is the base footprint. 40 figures will always take up the same space and so the basing is the important factor.

To this end, you can do exciting things with less figures and not have the stiff and tricky posing you'd get otherwise.

With irregular armies (mobs, for those of you with Orcs & Goblins) you want a wild look, and you can also make it work where you have large bodies of formed archers or crossbows.

I am using a standard base of 40 x 40 for my M.O.T.E representing a 2 x 2 figure 'element'. I will use 3 figures per base which means that a 60 man unit will only use 45 models.

I have used this before with 7 or 8 models on a 10 figure base footprint. I wanted to convey a headlong Zulu charge over walls, with ranks of men being shot down. Here's a couple of pics from 2011 which illustrate ho effective the above method can look...




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