Friday 15 November 2013

Base Urges.

This guy's spotted the chopper...
but where is he?
The zombie apocalypse will take place in our urban centres, the city streets will witness the mass transition of humanity into undeath...

With this in mind I've been scouring the growing selection of urban style resin bases on the market.
There's an excellent selection of many common urban paving styles that should work together with a uniform paint job.

I want to achieve a generic modern urban look as the overall base theme with contemporary street furniture; paving, kerbs, grills etc. Add to this a dash of urban disrepair and damage to tie into the post-apocalyptic feel. Humanities initial resistance of tanks and nukes legitimately opens up the world of 'war torn' bases; at least that's my excuse!

I'd also like to achieve a variety of suggested environments from suburbia to the high street, car parks, play grounds, motorways and shopping centres, covering both the freshly abandoned and the utterly decimated.

Looking beyond the urban base there are numerous scrap yard and rubble themed bases that could provide a cool urban waste land counter point to all that regular paving. There are some cool industrial / sci-fi ones out there that could also spice things up. There's always the grave yard option of course, I don't think I'll be able to resist picking up or making a few!!

The themed basing could be used to visually define different groups within the horde, kind of like factions / units with their own specific environments. A minor subtlety but the horde would look pretty cool displayed with the zombies sprawling across a detailed and characterful landscape.

I'm looking for round bases in a good variety of sizes from 25 - 120mm + to have a composite horde of individuals, small groups and seething mobs.

Of the many manufacturers available, the following sites offer products that immediately fit the brief.

Antenocitis Workshop have a great selection including some generic modern paving slab 25mm bases in 3 slab sizes both flat and with assorted kerbs, grills and covers.

616 designs have a small square cobble size paving with damage that complements the smaller size Anenocitis paving .

Micro Arts Studio produce some excellent near future bases with litter and street paraphernalia.

Escenorama have a cool contemporary urban range in 25,40 and 60mm with lots of nice litter and detailing.

Tiny Worlds have an excellent damaged tar mac set in 25, 40 and 60mm.

Dragon Forge have the best selection of larger urban bases, 25, 40, 60, 80 & 120!! Really nice bases with great detail.

Anvil Industries have a City Rubble range in 25, 40 and 60mm.

To add to the theme of urban squalor Black Cat Bases have some street litter, wheelie bins and bin bags and a couple of rats! They also have some nice tools, (axe, hammer, wrenches etc) as props for bases, abandoned in terror or dropped perhaps in a valiant last stand. There are some nice zombie mechanic miniatures out there too and a tool of their trade, discarded at their feet would be a narrative touch. Thinking about it, a work tool could make a decent replacement for the scythes and fantasy weapons on various miniatures that I need to convert.

As an old skool zombie 'purist' I don't want these zombies to retain enough intelligence to use any tool or weapon meaningfully. I'll accept a severed limb (most manufacturers offer one) inadvertently used as a blugeon or an item they used to defend themselves with before turning and still clutch onto in rigor mortis!!

Anyhow the time has come to consider basing some of these rotters up so a point and click shopping trip is on the cards.

Any suggestions or ideas on themes, ranges and manufacturers would be totally appreciated.

Time to hit the streets!!


5 comments:

  1. Sounds good or you could use some milliput and sculpt whatever you like

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    1. Too true! I'm still experimenting with green stuff at the moment and there will definitely be some custom additions to the basing. However I am readily seduced by off the peg solutions and many of the bases out there are just too sweet to pass up :)

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  2. Awesome, thanks for the list. I've mostly sculpted my own bases (miliput or green stuff) but having used some resin here and there, I've seen how superb they can be, especially when doing so many zombies!

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    1. Thanks Zombie Ad! I have nothing but total respect for all you hardcore DIY modellers out there and I'm sure the time will come when I turn my hand to making my own bases too. The bottom line for me though is getting a massive horde on the table so beyond the actual zombies I'm taking every short cut I can! :) The range of bases out there is pretty impressive and the quality of many of them is far beyond what my abilities and time could match. Having said that, before this project I was a pre-paint junkie (the shame) so who knows where the DIY bug will take me next!

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  3. Sounds good or you could use some milliput and sculpt whatever you like
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    ReplyDelete