Warhammer Fantasy Battles on a BUDGET! - Old World Empire Army Buyer's Guide

00:00 How to Make a Budget Army
03:57 I Talk About Fillers
07:00 My Army!
08:58 The Money Breakdown

Here's a link to all the kits I talked about in my video. NOTE: I AM NOT SPONSORED BY ANY OF THESE FOLKS! Also, I'm definitely going to be buying Old World models from GW. If we want Old World to stick around, we need to vote with our wallets. That being said...

Here's my hobby Instagram!

And my Patreon!

[JamesHodden-rkks]

But seriously, if you want to do Brettonians on a budget, Fireforge miniatures are your friend.

The Tuetonic Knights are a budget option for Empire armies as well.

[Vasily_Kotickovitch]

In general, there is no reason to worry about the _success_ of the “return of the old world.” It is quite obvious that this will bring GW the same profit as any other their product.
Even without community participation! Simply because everything that GW produces is instantly grabbed by scalpers, resellers and other speculators. 🐈‍⬛

[chriswalls]

I am currently building an army to be used for Old World and Hobgoblin. I am using Pike and Shotte Starter Kit, a headpack from Sludge, and MDF bases. Over 80 models and still cheaper than 2 Freeguild boxes.

[mysteriousstranger]

As an armored combat nerd, the idea of making a bretonnia army with super historical minis is such a cool idea that I will be doing very soon

Edit: Good God Perry minis look so good. Definitely buying when I can

[Bluecho]

I'm really glad someone is talking about Unit Fillers. It's a crazy underappreciated "tech" in the hobby, that doesn't get discussed that much anymore. At least not in modern Warhammer, on account of rank-and-flank until now going the way of the dodo. Perhaps once the Old World drops, we'll see people rediscover it.

Personally, I think Unit Fillers _could_ work in round-base games. By way of gluing multiple round bases together into a cluster and using that as an oddly-shaped regular "round" base. (A way you might glue them together would be to use wood craft sticks or possibly sprues to bridge the gaps on top, and keep the whole thing rigid and together). From there, it's a matter of creating the diorama as normal.

(I'm planning on adding "round-base" filler for my undead army. Like taking one of the extra skeleton bodies from the Wargames Atlantic kit, sticking four spear arms onto the sockets, and creating a kind of spear-legged, quadruped skeleton spider. You know, to hang out in the middle of my other skeletons. Maybe make two, with one using a cow skull.)

Back when I first learned of Unit Fillers, I did a trawl of old forums where people talked about them or posted pictures. Accepted practice/etiquette during the WHFB days - to the point it got repeated almost word for word over multiple years and across forums - is that a Unit Filler should comprise a third of the total unit size or less, be situated in the center of the block (so you can easily "make change" with models already removed from the back row), and make sure the filler is always more creative than the unit it's replacing (no low-effort filler, as it betrays your interests are _singularly_ on being cheap).

So a unit of dwarves where 90% of the block is made of (a) big rock/rocks, with no flairs, is kind of scummy. Whereas a few bases worth of a lovingly rendered forge, or some dwarves drinking (even passing out) next to kegs, would be good. It shows you actually care about how your unit looks.

(Although that doesn't mean your Unit Fillers need to be particularly ground-breaking or original. No one who has tried building a Vampire Counts army will blame you for sprinking some spare arms erupting from headstone ground into your big blocks of zombies. Ain't nobody got time to paint 80+ Zombies _per unit, _ least of all in 8th edition).

[SiliconSicilian]

I encourage new players to get in any way they can. WHFB was a great setting and system. The teasers have been pretty good so far and GW will keep supporting if they sell the books. Obviously, they want to sell models too. Even old players are going to buy new models if GW does this right.

[JasonChapa]

I just wanna say this video is awesome.

[TimelessGamingUK]

I don’t remember ever seeing unit fillers in the 90s. Units were much smaller back then so they weren’t really needed. It was in the 6th-8th era that massive blocks of troops became the norm. I think they can look good when used sparingly but that pic of of the night goblins looks awful imo as it doesn’t reflect the actual unit anymore.

[darnokx]

Looking forward to more of these, well done!

The Statetroops at about 01:15 are from the mid 2000s (and indeed terrible sculpts!). Their previous version from the late 90s were done by the Perries, and mix well with other 28mm historicals like the ones you have shown.

[barteklazurek]

There's a lot of historical minis or 3d prints that can be used to build Empire. One of the cheapest army

[johnoneill]

Excellent vid. Lovely models with nice differentiating tidbits throughout with greenstuff. A1 bud 👍

I got the Landsknecht starter army on sale for €98 (normally €121) a while back meself. That's 96 pikemen, 24 Zweihanders and 24 Arquebus/crossbows. It also comes with command options and a few metal officers.

I also bought a box of the Wargames conquistadors and Perry foot knights and mounted men at arms.

It all goes very well together in my eyes. And I don't even want to imagine what it would have cost to get the same amount of men via GW and their prices.

[intzbk]

Most of my Empire miniatures are going to be from Battle Masters but I did purchase the Pikes and Schott line for the greatswords and gunners. Currently working on my Tomb Kings and I'm eagerly anticipating the WGA skeleton chariots. Reaper Miniatures also has some nice models for heroes and the like. Most of my Witch hunter and Sisters of Sigmar Mordheim teams are Reaper minis.

[ThePitofSidLord]

Empire is not in 1600s pike and shot, it is 1500s landsknecht.

[Cynidecia]

I'm building Araby as empire. This is helpful for me as its technically empire. Im using Gripping beast Arabs, Perry minis Afghans and some others.

[jakobo]

Good video, would be good to see you updating this project.
My main concern with the alternative mix approach is that in the end, miniatures will not look cohesive within the army. The different sculpting styles show even if you paint them with the same scheme. It will be hard to even match them in the same scale.

[generalharold]

I love custom models for Warhammer Fantasy. You inspired me to kit-bash my own Kislev and Cathay army!

[Rschaltegger]

I went also to WL for a small(ish) Empire army. English Civil war guns look right, even the mid 17th century outfit seem possible for old world.
However for Bretonia, most alternative sculps are small in size compared to the OG GW ones. Fire Forge makes an alternative line, inc Pegasus Knights but the helmet's sculps look...not to my tast. On the other hand I got a box of Berber infantry to add some Araby Vibs to my new Bretonian Army for Old World, those sculps look big enough compared to Bretonnian sculps.

[AnHourOfWolves]

Excellent work on those and assembling all the miniatures. I think part of the reason why GW moved away from those lines is because of all of the plastic historicals available. The only potential issue is with scale... I know Perry and Wargames Atlantic were relatively small compared to the old GW stuff, right? Enjoyed the video, thanks for posting!

[thatScoutdog]

I am so glad I stumbled onto this video

[евгенийяковлев-яш]

Great video, thanks for inspiring. Im bought big box Warlord's royal kings army, its about 140+ models and one box with foot knights to make proxy Greatswords, just guys in plates with some 2h wep swords poleaxes and warhammers