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I recently bought some OOP Arduin Emperor's Choice miniatures for use in Frostgrave. These Julie Guthrie sculpts are just beautiful:The only problem is, they are from the 90s and mostly look 25mm at best compared with Northstar's 28mm:So any ideas on how I might creatively base the Arduin miniatures to make them stand out?

I plan to use the same Renedra plastic bases as I used on the Northstar miniatures pictures with them. You will probably also notice that they sit on pretty thick integrated bases.

And obviously, the skeleton warrior doesn't have a scale issue as he's a brute!

I would put a cork under the model, which raises its height and also gives you a nice stone texture It's also easy to make each one consistently taller.


On the bottommost picture of my contemptor, look at how much I'm able to exaggerate height and bulk of contemptor (which is already large) compared to the furioso.

Using cork slabs was my first thought, too, but there are a few issues. To begin with, I would need to cut into the cork to seat the miniatures' integrated bases and make sure the miniatures don't end up sitting down in holes by cushioning the "landing zone" with greenstuff. Tedious but not difficult. The larger problem is, having gone through that, what is the surface going to look like, with the contrasting rough cork and smooth white metal "pool" around the miniatures feet? That will need to be disguised with some basing texture and getting that to look right could be a challenge. Ultimately, however, my concern about using cork slabs is that I want to use thin Renedra bases. These do not provide any framing effect. Cork overhang looks really cool on pedestal bases and can look neat on beveled bases but it won't work with Renedra bases.

you could cut the metal bases away until your left with an amount of metal under the feet/foot that you then use as a peg or pin, to attach it to the base. Not necessarily cutting into the base but giving you more area around the miniatures feet to add strategically placed rocks, cork or what have you.

Or you could away just enough of the original metal base to give it a rocky look, add the cork under that and pin directly through the mini and cork, into the base you're going to use. No need to cut holes in the cork just stick the paperclip through it and secure to your actual base.

As a look for the base, you could do a ruined dungeon floor, very appropriate I think for Frostgrave too, which would give you varying heights as well as strategically placed rubble. Green stuff, molding paste, or a stone floor bit (or cast piece) could all be used for the flooring, which would help to cover the original metal base.

Anyway those are just some of my thoughts. Good luck! those look like some fun minis, I'm currently searching for just the right ones for my son's warband as well.

I am thinking of making greenstuff pedestals for them and then piling up crushed cork around that to create a rubble effect. This kind of thing will be okay for the more static, casting poses. But I do want to spice it up and am looking for some ideas to create variation on this basic approach.

I can recommend some cork bases with rubble paste. Pictured below, you set bits of cork to build the terrain up, then spread the paste (fine sand, heavy sand, eggshell bits, what have you) over the top. Helps to smooth out the cork and give it all a seamless look.

Cork:


Paste:


Paint:

I deal with that base with the perry miniatures that I use for bolt action. At many art stores you can find this stuff called ceramic stucko. It's a paint additive to give it a sandy texture, think really thick glue/fine sand. It's become my basing go too, want to do rubble? Mix in grey paint, want sand mix in tan paint, want snow mix in white paint. It's pretty thick too so you can put it on pretty thick to help hide those tabs, especially if you trim down the hard edges of the tab.

So here is the cork solution: