What are the best armies to proxy now that SG is (mostly) gone?

[Stormwind]

When asking about Araby forces, I was very impressed with the photos on the Tridente website for potential Araby proxies:

http://www.tridentebologna.it/index_E.php

And it got me wondering which armies would be the easiest to build using 3rd party units.  Some individual units like crossbowmen for the Empire would be easy to get models for - but then the Griffin and Steam Tank and Grand War Altar would be much trickier and need some scratch building or searching far afield to get something that wouldn't quite fit.  There's a couple of "ratmen" ranges but I think they look pretty unconvincing as Skaven!

Whereas the options for Elf troops and cavalry I think are passable.

At the moment I think the most replaceable line up would be Bretonnians - so long as you made it clear which kind of cavalry was which... But how to buy Pegasus knights without paying £30 for 3 from the ancient Man o War range?

Just thought this might be a good topic, especially to encourage any new players that all is not lost...

[kyussinchains]

Pegasus knights are available from eureka minis, they will be "officially" released in about 2-3 months

There are lots of dwarfs available from eureka, irregular, pendraken, magister militum and kallistra, easily enough for an army, also good ranges of orcs from pendraken, kallistra, copplestone, magister militum

I'm planning a chaos army using a mix of beasts and chaos dwarfs from eureka

Kallistra have a good range of undead too

Tbh with a little creativity most races are do-able with minis from alternative manufacturers....

[Stormwind]

Oh yes!   I love the Eureka Chaos Dwarves!

I look forward to seeing the pegasus knights, I'd love to have a Bret army.

[kyussinchains]

might be worth shooting an email to fighting15s they are the UK distributor of eureka minis, if anyone can get the pegasus knights, he can (otherwise you can order them direct from Oz, but I think minimum shipping is something ridiculous like $23AUD)

[athensfantasy]

I made a list of fantasy 10mm manufacturers on my blog:

http://www.athens-fantasy.gr/2013/07/warmaster-miniatures-in-the-post-gw-era/

There is a lot more option if you look into historical miniatures to recreate
Empire, Brettonians, Kislev and Araby armies by the way.

It would be really interesting if some of those companies would start covering
the gap in the market by expanding their ranges.
Ideally they would get in touch and split the races between them so as to
minimise duplicate effort.

And certainly the community should support Kickstarter projects or Eureka's 300
club (where people can request custom miniatures to be produced as long as there
is enough demand for them). they could even package them in suitable army packs
that would make it easy for new players as well.

I am hoping there are enough existing players out there that want to keep the game alive which would give
those companies some meaningful business?

[kyussinchains]

Having acquired some of the pendraken dwarf range, I will say that they're up there with GW, quality wise, really characterful sculpts with some nice detail, they're very reminiscent of older GW dwarfs to my eyes, much more big noses, leather jerkins and tabards as opposed to everything being made of metal and covered in runes and other viking imagery

The irregular minis dwarfs are not all that bad, although the batch I have suffers from quite a bit of flashing, they're more of a match size-wise to the larger pendraken sculpts than the eureka/copplestone/GW ones, and they are all basically the same models with a few details changed, I'll probably use them, but there are better options available for similar prices IMO

Eureka anvil dwarf minis are superb, really good quality and a perfect match for GW scale-wise, shame they're so expensive really!

[wellspring]

I made a list of fantasy 10mm manufacturers on my blog:

http://www.athens-fantasy.gr/2013/07/warmaster-miniatures-in-the-post-gw-era/

There is a lot more option if you look into historical miniatures to recreate
Empire, Brettonians, Kislev and Araby armies by the way.

It would be really interesting if some of those companies would start covering
the gap in the market by expanding their ranges.
Ideally they would get in touch and split the races between them so as to
minimise duplicate effort.

And certainly the community should support Kickstarter projects or Eureka's 300
club (where people can request custom miniatures to be produced as long as there
is enough demand for them). they could even package them in suitable army packs
that would make it easy for new players as well.

I am hoping there are enough existing players out there that want to keep the game alive which would give
those companies some meaningful business?

Totally agree here.

I had a 300 club entry for bears a few years ago.

Manufacturers looking to take advantage of GW's exit from the market should be careful to be scale-compatible with the GW figures. Eureka and Copplestone do a wonderful job with this; some other lines tend to be a little oversized.

One plus: several of the original Warmaster sculptors have since left GW and might take commission work creating a new line. Obviously, we want to avoid intruding on GW's IP, but what we're looking at are figures that are generic and not tied specifically to the Warhammer setting. GW owns Seekers of Slaanesh, but they don't own warriors on pegasi, bears, magic carpets, or elves. Even a few of these unique units, plus the historicals already out there, and you can build pretty much any army.

[athensfantasy]

I will start mapping warmaster troop types into existing miniatures that are available today.
I plan to publish this on my blog for reference.

Anything that does not map could be fed into 300 club or as a list of "opportunities" for 10mm manufacturers.
Spot on about the size of the miniatures, Eureka and Copplestone are compatible with existing GW armies so could be used to expand new armies as well.

We would need to prove that there is a real market for this and a serious community behind it to make it tempting for sculptors and manufacturers.

[Stormwind]

That would be fab, Athens, I have been looking around but there's still no "like for like comparison" anywhere on the web that I can see. 

Kislev Axemen are actually really unique and I can't find a good equivalent. =-<

[athensfantasy]

So here is a first step. The High Elves army and a non exhaustive list of alternative miniatures that can be used to compile a 10mm army for warmaster.

http://www.athens-fantasy.gr/2013/07/high-elf-warmaster-with-non-gw-miniatures/

happy to receive suggestions on things to add.

[kyussinchains]

You seem to have missed the eureka giant eagles from your list they make perfect giant eagle proxies

also I hear people saying the 18mm dragon from Eureka is quite nice, although no idea how big it actually is....

[athensfantasy]

updated, thanks!

Anyone ordered from the Australian GW website with delivery in the UK?
I wonder how customs would treat miniatures and how much one would pay for postage..
I might create some whishlists and see how the postage is calculated on their web site.

[Stormwind]

I have investigated it.  To get 10 blisters costs about £50 in shipping and tax, from what I remember.  From NZ it's £70.

[athensfantasy]

I have contacted Eureka and they responded with the obvious - e.g. they are happy to produce any mini as long as there is demand. The best vehicle of course would be the 300 club as long as we can build some critical mass.

I am thinking that there are some quickwins for the armies that can be largely be represented by historical miniatures.

E.g. Araby  - one can build the core with historical figures for medieval Arab armies. If Eureka would produce the Djinn and the flying carpets etc then the whole army can be built easily without conversions etc.

[Meraklis]

just a small question; could you elaborate on the "300 club" thing?

cheers!