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Hi,

Can anyone tell me the standard base size for fantasy infantry? I thought it was 25mm, but ordering such has landed me with the larger dryad-sized bases.

Different. Skaven and Goblins for example use 20mm bases whereas Chaos Warriors use 25mm bases.

Does it matter what bases are used in the game? I have heaps of undead from playing Armies of Arcana, where everything is on 1" square bases. Now someone at the club wants to give Warhammer a go, will my bases be a problem?

 obithius wrote:
Does it matter what bases are used in the game? I have heaps of undead from playing Armies of Arcana, where everything is on 1" square bases. Now someone at the club wants to give Warhammer a go, will my bases be a problem?

Unfortunately yes, it does matter. Corner to corner contact, maximizing, movement (wheeling), templates, everything gets affected and it can add up quick if there's an appreciable difference. It's not always a game changer, and if you're up front about it and the other guy agrees, then sure. I know I'd be happy to play a friendly game against you with slightly off bases, it's not a big deal to me, but it still does matter.

Unfortunately further, both undead armies use 20mm bases. 1 inch is almost exactly 25mm, so you could use them just fine as proxies for Warriors of Chaos or Lizardmen if you wanted to be more exact.

ok thanks! I'll stick to Armies of Arcana for now I guess. Jake Thornton's God of Battles is also on my to-do list, which is base friendly.

However, if everyone is using models on 1" bases instead of 20mm bases, then the system becomes workable - it doesn't really matter exactly how big the bases are, as long as they're of equivalent size to one another.

 obithius wrote:
ok thanks! I'll stick to Armies of Arcana for now I guess. Jake Thornton's God of Battles is also on my to-do list, which is base friendly.

Alternatively, if the particular unit you are using uses smaller bases, just take away one row of bases (4 base frontage instead of 5) and take away 1 figure for every two killed for the first couple casualties. It's an easy fix for games where the relative size of the units and their frontage is important.

Kings of War is another game where base size doesn't matter. In that game the overall footprint of the unit is what is important.

 Eilif wrote:

 obithius wrote:
ok thanks! I'll stick to Armies of Arcana for now I guess. Jake Thornton's God of Battles is also on my to-do list, which is base friendly.

Alternatively, if the particular unit you are using uses smaller bases, just take away one row of bases (4 base frontage instead of 5) and take away 1 figure for every two killed for the first couple casualties. It's an easy fix for games where the relative size of the units and their frontage is important.

Kings of War is another game where base size doesn't matter. In that game the overall footprint of the unit is what is important.

This is an excellent point, I think. As a further alternative, use a marker to indicate that the back rank has 4 models instead of 5 models, then take them away from the back rank until you get to a new one... no marker means there's 5, marker means there's 4. The front of 4 1" bases will be the same size as if you had 5 20mm bases. You'll just have to do a little mental math when calculating who can attack, but that shouldn't be too bad.

 Furyou Miko wrote:
However, if everyone is using models on 1" bases instead of 20mm bases, then the system becomes workable - it doesn't really matter exactly how big the bases are, as long as they're of equivalent size to one another.

Except there are plenty of units that come on 25mm standard, so to balance it out you'd have to put those models on 31.25mm bases. Otherwise you are removing one of the benefits of models being on 20mm bases, that is, that they can get more models in contact and the same number of models makes for a smaller and more mobile unit.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Furyou Miko wrote:
However, if everyone is using models on 1" bases instead of 20mm bases, then the system becomes workable - it doesn't really matter exactly how big the bases are, as long as they're of equivalent size to one another.

Except there are plenty of units that come on 25mm standard, so to balance it out you'd have to put those models on 31.25mm bases. Otherwise you are removing one of the benefits of models being on 20mm bases, that is, that they can get more models in contact and the same number of models makes for a smaller and more mobile unit.

I mostly agree with this, it's usually easier to put fewer minis on an appropriately sized tray than to upsize all the base sizes.

Counters are a great idea for marking how many more troops are "on" a given tray than are actually there. Just take away the counters instead of figures and play on.

One thing you'd still have to contend with when using 25mm figs for units usually based on 20mm is the potential for the unit to be a bit deeper when dealing with units that are 2 figs deep. If you include two ranks of figs, you're going to end up with 10mm of extra depth from two 25mm miniatures. I don't think it should have too much effect on the game, but it is something to keep in mind.

Human sized creatures are usually on 20mm bases.

Chaos Warriors/Dryads/etc are on 25mm bases.

Things like Ogres go on 40mm bases.

25mm is the standard for 40k(only having 25, 40, and 50mm round bases) but because Fantasy bases are square instead of round they actually have greater surface area.

Instead of being Pi times 12.5^2 they're just 25mm x 25mm. Which is significantly larger surface area.

Seems like hard work to me! Its a shame, because models rank up so much nicer on 1" bases.

 obithius wrote:
will my bases be a problem?

Not really.

Most players will be okay if you use 25x25mm bases instead of 20x20, because you'll put less minis (i.e. less wounds/attacks) on a given frontage.

25x25 will give you a slight advantage when your unit is hit by template weapons, but that's it.