15mm Fantasy - size comparison?

[Munindk]

I've recently been looking into 15mm minies as a way to keep all my side projects more manageable, both in price and storage space.

I'm currently looking at Cobblestone barbarians, Khurusan skeletons and Essex miniatures for the non fantasy elements, but I've read that 15mm minies vary wildly in size and I'd like things to match up reasonably well.

From what I've been reading they fall roughly in 2 categories: true 15mm and 17-18mm. Is this correct?

Are there any good size comparison sites out there? Or, just anyone with knowledge of the 2 manufactures I've mentioned above?

[Jagannath]

That's right - with the added caveat of

 "true 15mm and 17-18mm" but also anything inbetween (and a bit bigger). If minis call themselves 18mm (like Eureka's fantasy range) you can bet that they'll be pretty big.

I mostly do sci-fi, so don't worry about scale massively (I'd only really worry if I was multi-basing and putting minis on the same stand). However:

Copplestone barbarians are meant to be big, tall and muscley. They're scale is pretty true, a touch big maybe, but they look big bigger than a lot of 15mm, particularly historical. It's right, but can look worng... if that makes sense? They're absolutely brilliant minis though, so if in doubt avoid other minis that don't fit and use the Copplestone.

Most of the Ral Partha daemonworld range will fit really well.

Essex are relatively small, not tiny - I use Essex civilians without a worry. I haven't seen the Khurasan skellies in the flesh (they look really nice in the pics on the site) but I'd be surprised if they didn't match the Copplestone well based on other Khurasan bits I've got.

I find Peter Pig too small. They're true 15mm.

Doesn't bother me, but it sounds like you might find Blue Moon too big (nont sure they do fantasy anyway actually).

Donnington New Era are a pretty good size (smaller than Copplestone, a touch bigger than Essex but of a very similar style so fit well). Older Donnington range is pretty small.

I'm a big, big fan of Forged in Battle - they're slightly taller (~17mmish) but quite delicate so don't look huge.

No easy answer I'm afraid but if scale really concerns you it's probably best to hover around the Copplestone-Daemonworld -Khurasan zone.

Lastly, don't be afraid of 'shimming' minis up a bit - the eye is a funny old beast and if the heads are at the same height you won't really notice, even if the shorter chap is stood on a little mound.

[Hobgoblin]

Most fantasy 15s seem to be a bit bigger than many historical ranges (or at least the older ones). Of the ranges you mentioned, Essex 15s tend to be fairly short and squat. For example, their 15mm orcs are quite small - but the matching 28mm orcs are huge. In the image below, there's a Copplestone barbarian at the back and an Essex adventurer at the front. As you can see, he's not radically different in height or proportion from the Demonworld dwarf next to him.



You can see a direct height comparison of the two here:



There's also considerable variation within ranges: I have some Essex skeletons which are quite tall and chunky. They work fine with Copplestone 15s, but would probably be a bit big-boned to be genuinely plausible.

I do think, though, that 15mm is quite forgiving of minor scale differences.

[Munindk]

Thanks for the replies, its a great help

I havent settled on any manufactures yet, though Captain Blood has made the Copplestone minies look amazing.

I'm not looking to multibase as I'll probably be playing skirmish games like Mordheim, Song of Blades and Heroes, maybe trying some Dragon Rampant if/when my collection gets big enough (and I think movement trays are the way to go for units).

If Essex are a bit small, could you recommend a company that makes regular humans, that would fit in with the Copplestone barbarians and other 15mm fantasy ranges?