Round or square bases in Mordheim?

Hi,

what do you prefer?
Round or spuare bases in mordheim?
And why do you think so?

Cheers´ Simon

I prefer square, because it's easier to define who can fight who.

Square bases are official for Mordheim.

You will find that if you use circular bases and others use square bases, the circular bases are easily swarmed in combat. I guess if everyone used the round bases, this would not be a problem.

I find that square bases also accommodate our Mordheim terrain better than circular bases do.

I tend to use the square bases for minis that I MIGHT use, given the opportunity , for WHFB. However, if given my choice, I go for a mix of circular 25mm & 40mm bases & 25mm square bases [eliminating those God awful, twinky little 20mm bases entirely ]. I like the way the circular ones look for a skirmish style game, although some minis for reasons beyond my understanding [as MANY things are ] JUST look REALLY good on square bases.

Caveat: I play [sometimes ] games with minis because of the way they look. The bases are a vital part of the overall apearance. SO...using bases that present the mini in the best possible manner is MORE important to moi than any possible advantages or disadvantages gamewise.

There, that's a pretty confusing answer.

My old gaming group all used round bases. We thought it made more sense as Mordheim is a skirmish game and square bases are only required for models that need to rank up. We were all using the same bases and had no problems.

However in recent years, some friends have moved away and those of us left found that problems arose when other players used square bases. Same reasons as have already been mentioned.

Thing is, the same problems arise with the multiple sizes of square base. Even 20 and 25mm bases can have a big difference on gameplay. That's where the universal 25mm rounds for everybody balances things out. Obviously, monsters/large creatures still go on larger bases.

Basically I prefer round bases, but everybody has to be using the same standard or things can get complicated.

Identity wrote:

Square bases are official for Mordheim

No. There is no official ruling for bases in Mordheim. It is not defined which shape (round, square) or size (20mm,25mm, ...) your minis should use.

It should, however, be obvious that since all official miniatures are based on square bases you'd use those. Also you should use the same sizes as for the Warhammer equivalents (Ogres on 40mm, Orcs on 25mm, humans 20mm,...). Why? Because this is standard you are least likely to encounter problems when playing with people outside your own gaming group.

I prefer square bases myself, for a couple of reasons. One, because it comes with the GW minis I buy, and I don't feel the need to spend more money on round bases. Two, a lot of my minis are used interchangeably between Mordheim and Warhammer, so I need them to be on square bases. Three, I just don't like round bases for some reason. Picked up a warmachine mini a while back and left her on the round base, just doesn't seem right to me is all.

I have to agree with cianty that, as square bases are more or less standard, you won't encounter many/any problems when playing with different people.

Round bases would make sense in a skirmish game, but GW should have thought of that before putting all their Mordheim miniatures on square bases

problem is... round ones look so much better when based and nicely painted... that's the reason I went with round ones, but... now that I want to include mordheim models in my WHFB army I realise the problems that poses...

Admin Tom wrote:

Round Bases
- more aesthetic (look much better!)

I beg to differ.

Games Workshop seems to be a bit "slow" when it comes to amending bases for their games systems. It would have been probably best if they had supplied their Mordheim minis with round bases.

Well, Lord of the Ring uses round bases. And just when you're used to that, they come up with this:

Cianty: WTF is that!?!? I've never seen anythinh so pointless in wargame, or is GW trying to sell twice as many bases?

As the book in the photos says: War of the Ring. It's their latest effort to squeeze some $$$ out of the Tolkien licence. I have no clue - from what I've read people seem to like the idea...

War of the Ring is a streamlined version of the LotR ruleset that allows larger points games to be played without slowing down the pace too much. The current LotR system starts to suffer at 500pts and above.

The movement trays are an easy way to move the models as a unit and maintain coherency without having to rebase all the models on square bases to rank up..

I am leaning more towards round bases. I don't know, it just looks better to me. As for the mini's being interchangeable for WHFB, I don't have that problem, as I've never played it, and don't really intent to. All my models are dedicated to Mordheim.

For battles, yes, they do tend to get swarmed easier, but that may work to the advantage, especially for those that have the skill to gain +1 attack per enemy model, lol. So, yes, either opponent can exploit is as a weakness, or boon.

I just based some Chaos Warhounds on round bases, and I must admit, they do look nicer than on the rectangular bases they came with!

catferret wrote:

War of the Ring is a streamlined version of the LotR ruleset that allows larger points games to be played without slowing down the pace too much. The current LotR system starts to suffer at 500pts and above.

The movement trays are an easy way to move the models as a unit and maintain coherency without having to rebase all the models on square bases to rank up..

Oh yeah.. that was the intend. I remember. Does seem like a logical since the LotR system seems to be better for smaller skirmish like games than for large battles. Seems like a good idea. Or, put differently, why didn't they do this right in the beginning? They probably want to get away from the common look of Warhammer regiments so they decided to go loose formation..

Chad hit the nail there. WTF!!?

Werekin.

Definately round bases. Mordheim is a skirmish game, and nearly every other skirmish game (Necromunda, Gangs of Mega City 1, Resolution etc..) has round bases.

I personally think they look better than fiddly little 20mm squares.

I was against round bases at first but they work.

As many has already pointed out, square bases will probably arise less objections out of your gaming group, AND you can use your minis for a WHFB army without trouble.

But I for myself think too that round bases actually look cooler for a skirmish game, and most skirmish alternative rules systems prefers round bases.

So in the end, it's entirely your decition (or the consensus in your gaming group).

Best wishes.

I think the whole LOTR business derives from the fact that the first edition (i.e. the fellowship of the ring) never was designed to embark large scaled battles, and was more focused on the skirmish events from the actual movie...

I believe I'm so used to the square bases with mordheim, round just feel queer. Also, the square line up nicer in close combat!

On the bases isue: I like to use square bases, but thats because Most of my warbands are a start for a WFB army (or the other way around )

On the LOTR issue: The game that is avaible now is a scirmish game, a mix of mordheim and wfb, and I think thay did that because they wanted to focus on battles like: Argorn fighting a bunch of ringwraiths to save a bunch of hairry footed hobbits . But a lot of people used to prefer big battles like the battle of helms deep, but that takes like a weekend to play! So I heard its gonna be a fast fun big battles game. I gonna play a game of war of the ring on monday at my local gw, I will let you guys know how it was

I personally prefer the square bases for the simple fact that it seems much easier to balance a figure on stairs and ladders that it is for round bases.

Not that you couldn't use round, but it just seems like I would have to adjust my terrain for round bases.

Square bases also come in more sizes than the round ones do, which I personally like. I always find it very annoying when a figure doesn't fit all the way on a base, but the next size up from the standard round base is fairly large one.

Other than that I dont really care, just as long as who ever I am playing is using the same bases I am.

Personally, I also prefer square bases.

The main reason is because I use plenty of round bases for my 40K armie(s), and I find the square ones a great alternative and they fit the 'fantasy' feel a lot better in my opinion.
The other reason is that the fantasy bases come in more sizes like HornedRat said, that's another reason why I prefer square bases over round ones for Mordheim.

Cheers!