Topic: Movement Tray and Bases

[Vauln]

Movement Trays and Bases,

Your advice is most welcome...
First, take into consideration that most of my painted miniatures are not on finished bases as of the start of this thread.
Second, understand that I have recently started collecting a second army.

Magnetic on not?
I have been having this internal debate for some time now. It seems the best bet is to just buy the GF9 magnetic bases and re-base most of my miniatures. Alternatively, I could buy rare-earth magnets and simply make all the bases I currently have magnetic. Or I could just say 'frack-it' and not use magnets at all.

Horde!
How do you manage Horde Formation? Do you have two trays side-by-side or one large tray? How do you manage reforms?

Source
Where do you get your movement trays? Do you make your own? There are several sources of movement trays and some of them are very good.
http://www.litko.net/ is one.
http://www.games-workshop.com/ is an obvious choice. Unfortunately they only have the modular bases now. 
Looking for GF9 has come up a little dry, guess they have discontinued? You can still get them third party though.

Scenic verses Minimalist
Should I take the time to make the edges of the movement tray fancy and 'scenic' or just paint the edge the same as the base edge? As some have pointed out thick edges can be a problem when figuring out measurement, when charging do I measure from the base edge or the movement tray edge? Tray edges differ from manufacturers, is there supposed to be a standard? What happens when I have two movement trays side by side (see horde formation above) and am hit by a stone thrower? Is that half inch taken into consideration? Some people can be very persnickety about these things.

I will be making a decision on this soon, just need a little advice.
Thanks!

[Syn Ace]

My figs are magnetized - just glued some rare earth under the bases.

I made a bunch of different bases of different sizes 5x3 5x4 5x5 etc. Gives me flexibility -- two 5x4 and I've got a 40-man unit that can easily go bus or horde. I usually just measure from the edge of the base. Just clarify with your opponent. If you have 2 bases side by side, it shouldn't cause an issue, but if it is iffy, just say 'hang on a sec' and overly the edges of the bases. As far as scenic or not, it's up to you.

[The Ol Perfesser]

I don't magnetize my bases. 

I use one large base for hordes

I make my own from Basswood

I go minimalist.  I like the base to be as small as possible so that I can measure from the base edges and it doesn't significantly alter game play.

[SorenJ]

I use magnets from here to superglue under bases:
http://www.supermagnete.de/eng/S-04-02-N

I ordered metal movementtrays from here, but you could cut yout own sheet metal into appropritate size. Notice the relative small bend on edges, just enough to keep the minis from going over the edge.
http://shogunminiatures.com/shogunminjaturessteeltrays.html

[Noght]

I use the GW modular trays, with thin metal gorilla glued on them.  Spray the whole thing Dark Angel green.  Multiple sizes available.

Magnetized minis. Minimalist bases.

[BBorN]

I second shogun miniatures. I got my movement trays from them and they work great with my rare earth magnets that I glued to the bases. He even threw in a few magnetic bases he has and they work very well. I'm actually considering buying some from him for my empire army as I go through and paint everything. However to your specific points :

Magnetic or not:
Unequivocally yes. I cannot tell you how much easier it is to transport and set up my army for play. Only annoyance at times is that the rare earth magnets are so strong the glue sometimes doesn't hold. Small price to pay for the overall ease of use during gameplay and set up/transport

Horde:
I use two bases side by side, enough for a horde of 50-60 models. It is made easy to do this with the minimalist trays such as shogun miniatures as they have a side without the lip to make it easier to keep models close. This makes it very easy to do reforms from horde to bus. Even when it comes to cavalry I opted for multiple 5 wide bases to make it easy to field smaller or larger units and reform quickly. Turning those bases sideways makes it very easy to go 6-7 wide cavalry.

Source:
If I haven't beaten this to death enough shogun miniatures all the way. Very inexpensive and good quality metal. Plus if you decide later to go with more scenic movement trays, they fit very nicely into GW trays and I would imagine other trays as well(haven't used other trays though)

Scenic vs Minimalist:
This is really up to you. My personal goal is to have my bases scenic they interlock and overlap so to speak - since my movement trays are so thin - I really wouldn't need to do anymore than paint them and it wouldn't look out of place. Key here though is to know what you want. If you have nice bases with huge movement trays it's going to look odd. However if you have nice bases and the movement trays are minimal ( talking about thickness here) just paint then and you're fine.

As for figuring out what's hit and where to measure from, check with your opponent before hand. I usually measure from the movement tray because it's quick and easy. Some prefer the base. Just check first in the grand scheme it doesn't matter. Now if you choose to go with thicker more scenic bases and you want to move around between horde and bus, just leave one side open so when your shift they still fit nicely together without that 1/4 inch gap between them.

Good luck to you!

[zifnab0]

I use the GW modular trays, with thin metal gorilla glued on them.  Spray the whole thing Dark Angel green.  Multiple sizes available.

Magnetized minis. Minimalist bases.

This.

I also applied this product after a primer coat.  It's not actually textured paint, just chips of paint that make it look textured.

Oh, and I bought 500+ rare earth magnets from some guy in China for $10.  I stick a small piece of greenstuff between the magnet and base, but it's probably not required.

[Philhelm]

My luck, I'd be in a hurry and forget to test the magnets so that some of the miniatures would be repelled from the base.

[BBorN]

My luck, I'd be in a hurry and forget to test the magnets so that some of the miniatures would be repelled from the base.

Won't happen on a metal base

[Vauln]

Thank you all for the advice, I will make the decision in the next couple of days.

[Dosiere]

Magnetizing my Warhammer miniature trays and bases changes my life.  I highly recommend doing it if you game with any regularity.

I'll pipe in a few things I learned the hard way:

1) Use appropriate sized magnets.  I can't stress this enough.  Many people use magnets that are way too large and/or powerful for their miniatures.  They should stay put under normal circumstances like gaming but should also pop off easily without taking the whole tray with them.  I settled into using just two sizes for under the bases.  One for plastic infantry sized models and one for metal or cavalry sized plastics. 

2) If you make your own, I highly recommend contact cement for gluing the sheet metal to the wood or plastic backing material.  It's nasty and gooey, but it's advantages are perfect for this application, the primary one being a nearly instant bond of the two materials when you push them together.  Also, the amount of super glue needed to make dozens of large trays would quickly become expensive. 

I use it for magnets on the bottom of miniatures as well, since you don't have to mess with the drying time or brittleness of super glue.  Applied correctly, it's awesome stuff.

[Noght]

http://www.kjmagnetics.com/products.asp?cat=17

I use ZD1 for Metal infantry or 25mm Infantry
I use ZD4 for 20mm plastic infantry. I use 4 of them for Cavalry (each corner) or will use the sheet magnet glued to the base.