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I was messing around with my figures and got to looking that every base made is just enough difference not to have a standard look across lines.

GW bases all have a certain height with angled edges
PP bases are rounded at the edge
Reaper are flat edge
and Wiz Kids are all coin shaped.

Is this because of a patent of some type???

Would love to have a standard look for my figures that I mix and match but the companies want to have their bases different I guess.

It's mostly just down to the preferences of the companies making the minis. There are plenty of companies that share similar base styles, although a game will sometimes use something different as a style feature or for particular game features.

Corvus Belli use the same style of bases for Infinity as GW use (straight edge) and Wyrd and Knight Models use the same type as PP (lipped, although KM use pre textured lipped bases). I think you've just had a smaller sample size when looking, there's definitely some level of standardisation in the industry, although not universal. Take a look at third party base companies, they're almost always lipped or straight edge, nothing else

Steamforged, being of former Warmachine players, also use the same bases as PP. The two I hate the most are Infinity’s, as they just feel flimsy and lower quality, and Knight’s pretextured ones with slots cut thru piles of rubble that I hate more than any other.

No, it is not a patent thing. You can't patent a simple geometric shape like a cylinder with a beveled edge.

Back in the 90s, Grenadier used to provide bevelled edge slotta bases just like GW's ones for their tabbed metal figures (GW bought their bases from the same company that Grenadier used).

** There may have even attempted legal action from GW against their "competition" but I don't recall it getting very far if it did.

Despite what GW tries to tell people, not everything they do is copyrighted or patented :p

I think I remember Ian Livingston saying he wished they had patented the slotta base in an interview on Realm of Chaos, but it may have been some other early GW member.

The bases Privateer Press and others use were originally designed for the Dark Age miniatures game in the mid 90s. I think at first PP were getting them from the same supplier as Dark Age, but the more recent ones with the shallower lip are made specially for PP. Asmodée also had their own designs for Hell Dorado, with the game logo on the underside.

GW have made their own since about 1992 (at least, that's the earliest date I've seen on a 25mm round base), and there's always been loads of suppliers. The height, angle of bevel, size and position of the slot and the top texture vary widely. Even GW's bases have changed over the years. Older bases came 4 to a sprue, with the attachment point on the edge of the base. Now the attachment point is underneath the base so the modeller doesn't need to clean up the sprue join and they're supplied loose. Presumably they're redesigned as moulds wear out.

I've also seen square bases with round indentations, designed to take miniatures with integral cast bases (such as those from Ral Partha or other older manufacturers)

Not sure about the USA, but in the UK Dice And Games are a big supplier of bases to the smaller manufacturers.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 StygianBeach wrote:
I think I remember Ian Livingston saying he wished they had patented the slotta base in an interview on Realm of Chaos, but it may have been some other early GW member.

They did register the Slottabase trademark, though. And register the design for the screwtop "bolter shell" paint pot and the original scatter dice introduced in 2nd edition Space Marine, 4th edition Warhammer and 2nd edition 40k. They held onto that registration until 2016. I wonder if the change from having "Hit" on two faces to the roundel with a point was enough to count as a different design?

I get my bases from Dice & Games Ltd in the UK. They're the exact same as the Privateer Press kind. They also carry GW style bases with the angled edge, with or without slots. There's lots of options out there

 Peregrine wrote:
No, it is not a patent thing. You can't patent a simple geometric shape like a cylinder with a beveled edge.

Oh yeah?

https://www.theverge.com/2012/11/7/3614506/apple-patents-rectangle-with-rounded-corners

You were saying?

I believe that only held up in one country, though.

... and was overturned in several others.