Infantry Basing Advice Needed

[Extra Crispy]

I just finished painting a couple packs of Soviet infantry for my half-size FoW project and I'm looking for basing advice. I'll be putting 3-5 figures on 16x25mm bases made of thin steel. My concern is that players will have to pick the bases up by the figures and the figures look awfully frail....

How do you base your infantry to survive the wear and tear?

[Mk 1]

Extra Crispy enquired:
How do you base your infantry to survive the wear and tear?

I have found the new GHQ individual infantry to be reasonably robust.


Here, by example, are my Italian infantry. These were completed and had their first foray onto a wargaming table about a year before this picture was taken. They have been re-boxed twice since that time (I often organize, and re-organize, my armies).

GHQ has done a good job providing robust ankles on their individual infantry castings. In my experience the ankles have been the weakest link in some of the other vendor's infantry. I am accustomed to a "casualty rate" with units composed of figures from other vendors. Every time they come out of their boxes, a stand or two looses someone. Can't count how many loose bases or finished stands I have laying about that have a pair or two of empty boots on them. Such a sad sight...

I have not seen any of that with GHQ individual infantry. Yet. Maybe I'll see it in the future. Conventioneers seem to be the most ham-fisted in the handling of micros, and I can't say as my GHQ infantry has seen much convention use. But I'm pretty pleased with their comparitive robustness among the various offerings in this scale.

I think the key is to base them securely onto robust stands. Make sure whatever material you choose does not flex -- flexing is the easiest way to break a glue bond. I suggest using a rigid stand (I use Pennies), and applying LOTS of glue. I use regular old Elmer's White Glue, thick enough to mostly obscure the figure-base on the stand. Thickly-applied white glue has a minor amount of flex to it. This may not be immediately obvious, but if you compare it to the various super-glues, which have NO flex, you'll notice just enough "give" to avoid popping the figure off. So I avoid the super-glues for this purpose. White glue, when combined with the rigid stands, seems to give a notably more resilient mounting.

Then, however you paint and flock them, I also suggest applying multiple coatings of overspray. I use Testor's Dullcote. As was suggested to me on this board, multiple layers of Dullcote has not only protected the painted figures (as I would have expected), but also has protected the flocking on the bases (which was shedding at an alarming rate from my early efforts).

At least that's what I'm doing. Seems to work for me.

[Extra Crispy]

Thanks guys. I'll use epoxy and steel bases. I thought abot tree stump "handles" but I'm doing over 100 bases of infantry and after a dozen I'd run out of ideas for scneic "handles."

[Theodore]

I use linoleum floor tiles The are about 1/8 inch thick so you can pick them up by the bases. They also allow you to dig into the bases for terrain, foxholes, and hull down positions.

[1ComOpsCtr]

Using small brads with the flat head fixed to the base helps when handling figures for conventions and simulations...

Example:



These aren't GHQ Pz Grenadiers, but they fight and die just the same...

Will
ComOpsCtr

[Hetzen]

Lol @ Cama

I've done the same as Mk-1, with the addition of adding magnetic strip to the base of the penny. I've found this gives enough clearence off the table to make it quite easy to pick up from the base.

[jb]

Here is the results of some experimentation I've been doing with infantry.
Lately I've been going to a base equals one squad scale for my gaming. One main reason is that my game scale equals 1"=100m,so an infantry base would equal 75 meters. When I used to use 1 to 1 scale I needed 2 fireteams or (2) 3/4 inch bases to equal a squad. I felt this was way out of kilter when incorporating other weapon systems.
What I ended up doing is placing a small piece of steel under each individual infantryman. I then took 1/32'X1/8" magnets and glued 5 of them to a 3/4X3/4" metal base. When these dried I spray painted them,and flocked them. I can now place up to 5 infantryman on a base or 4 with a metal ID tag. This would represent a squad. Now what is really neat is that I can take single caualties or a percentage of a squad. Different squad compositions may also be done. This comes in real handy for me because I still use what weapon is represented by the figure. I can put 2 saws or 2 dragons or whatever in a squad.
Here are spome pictures to give you an idea of what I'm talking about.

[Mk 1]

Swear to G-d, JB, Sometimes I think you really ARE showing us 25mm figures and claiming they're 1/285s!

You painting tatoos on the arms of the Vietnam infantry now?

How the h3ll do you manage that kind of detail? Kee-riste, I can't even see where the face IS half the time when I'm painting, and this guy's putting lipstick and eyeliner on his figs!



(I suppose you wanted us to look at the way you base them. Sorry, I can't get past the figs themselves. You'll have to base someone else's paint jobs if you want me to look at the basing. )

[jb]

Swear to G-d, JB, Sometimes I think you really ARE showing us 25mm figures and claiming they're 1/285s!

Mk1 ,you must be mistaking me for Ritter,he takes the cake for Infantry...
But thanks Cama ,and Mk1 its a pleasure to serve...

[Ritter]

Great Idea there JB.

I like the label idea - I have been struggling with some sort of temp ID tags for my Infantry for newbie wargamers who do not know the difference between a 1st line and a SMG squad for awhile now and yours looks sweet.

TR

[Theodore]

I use self-stick removable plastic letters from an office supply store for marking my stands. That also allows me to change what they are for games. I use Chadwick's First Battle rules scaled to minis. Infanty is classified according to their quality so you have Militia Infantry, Regular Infantry, and Elite Infanty. So I use 2 letters MI, RI, or EI to note their quality and the same stands can work for different quality troops.

[Pitfall]

I do something similar to JB, but instead of putting magnets on the bases, I use steel bases and put magnets on the infantry. It is a lot more work, but I already started doing it that way and it would look silly if I switched methods. Plus, I lean more towards desert terrain and magnets would look obtuse on a sand-colored base. A flat base also allows me to put atry and inf. support guns on the bases (they have magnets too).