Saturday 14 September 2013

Arthur re-based again

Some years ago I finished reading the Cornwell Arthur books, just as Gripping Beast put out their pretty special Arthurian ranges. I assembled a couple of small WAB armies, based around Romano British and the GB German Tribes warbands.
I used the 'Fall of the West' WAB book - probably still my favourite. When James Morris' excellent Arthur supplement came out, reading of the Saxon bucklers etc, I found that my armies seemed rather anochronistic.. the Romano British and the later Saxons.. one side needed to move back or forward a hundred years or so.
Anyway. I only played a few games of WAB. Some time later, I decided to try out some other rules.. perhaps Neil Thomas Ancient and Medieval Wargames, or Impetus.. I re-based the whole lot onto unit-sized bases. I loved the look of this, being able to organise the units into little dioramas, huddled together in a shieldwall. For one reason or another though, I didn't really take to the rules for this period and I took a breath and rebased the whole lot again for WAB.

And then put them away.

Fast forward a year or so, I'm re-discovering wargames and I buy Dux Bellorum. The group I meet with also play Hail Caesar (I haven't tried it yet)..I recently resolved to get this lot rebased again.. back to the unit sized bases. As I got them out on the table, I despaired at the thought of tearing the figures off the bases again, and the resultant inevitable breakages and damage. However, with a bit of fiddling about, I've managed to avoid doing that altogether.


What I have done is to stick the WAB- based figures directly onto 120mm x 60mm unit bases. I've used dice frames from minibits on the rear of each base. This will be for recording hits etc in either Dux Bellorum or Hail Caesar. There are a few gaps here and there, but a bit of filler and scenic material will sort that out.



The cavalry units are on two bases for depth. I'm still unsure how to base the skirmishing types, but for now, I'm happy that I can soon once again use these much-loved figures. (Will probably be one army rather than a 'matched pair')

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