Thursday 6 March 2014

Mix or match?

Since the arrival of the new Dwarf book, I've started digging through my stockpiles of Dwarfs. People that know me will probably not be surprised that there were slightly more models than I remembered. They're a real mix in terms of age, with some of them dating from well over 20 years ago. It will be interesting to see how they all come together.

Speaking of which, I've been trying to work out how best to go about planning and assembling my units. I had originally assumed that I would simply group the models of similar appearance together, but this would result in a number of units with very similar, static models. The Clone Wars, if you will. I might be able to convert some of them a bit to add some variety, but Dwarf models are not that dynamic and there would be limits to what I could do. 

The alternative is to deliberately mix the various eras of models between units - spread the identical models out as much as possible. This would give each unit a little more dynamism, but it would come at the loss of a coherent theme for each regiment.

So I guess I need to decide, do I mix things up or do I keep them grouped in nearly identical units?
Here we have our candidates, from left to right: Fantasy Fighter, Multi-pose Clansman, Skull Pass, Single Pose and Old Metal.

The picture above shows what I am talking about. The numbers are roughly as follows: 

  • I have about 40 of the Fantasy Fighter guys, who have a combination of 2 different heads and weapons. 
  • I have about 40 of the multi-pose guy, most of which are not yet assembled. 
  • I have about 50 Skull Pass warriors including several command groups. 
  • Thankfully I only have 10 of the old single-pose guy, who would be very hard to convert beyond a weapon swap. 
  • The old metal guy is almost a place-holder. I have about 20 of these guys, and they vary wildly in appearance as you might expect from looking at the Imperial and Norse Dwarfs of yesteryear. Even if they just roll around in a unit by themselves, there will be no lack of variety in their unit. But they could be used to break up less varied plastics.
So I guess I am looking for some opinions. Do I mix things like crazy and try to turn every unit into a rabble unified only by colour schemes, or do I launch Attack of the Clones?

I should point out that this is purely for Warriors regiments. I have more specific models for the specialised stuff, including Longbeards.

15 comments:

  1. mix for the win!

    I do not know if you have seen my unit of imperial halberdiers, but I always thought that mixing different edition miniatures gives charisma to the units. All these dwarfs should stay together :)

    I leave a link for you to see my unit mix of several editions:

    http://kanoablog.blogspot.com.es/2014/01/recios-de-boris-alabarderos-imperiales.html

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  2. Mix them, it will create a lot more individualism within the groups! :) The paint schemes will take care of unit coherency ^^

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  3. My vote would be for mixed units - I've got a couple of units of the old metal Imperial Dwarves myself and the multitude of weapons looks good.

    Fluff-wise, I like the idea that 'Warriors' are just ordinary dwarf clansmen who have been summoned to defend the hold (and so use whatever weapons they have), compared to the more uniform weapons of the 'professional' dwarf soldiers (Hammerers, Ironbreakers etc.)

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  4. Mix is for sure the best way. My friends Dwarf army is filled with a variety and it makes it so much richer.

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  5. Thanks everyone, it certainly sounds like mixing is the way to go!

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  6. Mixing all the way. I think it would highlight the "differences" in the model too much to have them as one block.

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  7. How many warriors are you likely to run anyway. Throw the monopose edition away and cut the fantasy fighters off the slots to give more variety of position in the units. Probably also throw away the BFSP ones too as they are crap to paint and common as muck still.

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    1. Well I don't think I will be throwing anything away. I might focus on some of the more interesting guys, but I will continue to lie to myself and say that one day I will paint it all...

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  8. I would mix them up, adds a nice variety to the army.

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  9. Keep it all together. Dont mix. :)

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    1. Hahaha a lone voice in a sea of mixers...

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  10. Mix them up and claim they are iron breakers

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  11. Group and mix. Put the new multipart and skull pass dwargi in units, since they are basically the same style and a bit boring. Then get all the old chaps with the big noses and goofy old Warhammer sensibility, all the fantasy fighters, all the metal guys and the single pose chaps, and put them into units. This will achieve both variety AND cohesion as figures of similar age and appearance will be in the same units. Dwarf figures vary greatly with age, and the 7th edition rerelease did change their 'look' a lot, so they don't really fit in with the older stuff.
    Heed the words of the hippo. At the back of your knees, you know he's right.

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  12. Puddingwrestler has the right approach here - I face similair choices with my historical stuff as Im using 3 different ranges to build units- it comes down to building the right theme with each and picking models to support that.

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  13. Yep agree totally mix them up - great to see someone with a lot of older models. I always liked the older models (2nd from left) thought they were solid and fun looking gutted I sold off the 30 or so I used to have.

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