Kit-bashing Warbands

[Splod]

Hi all,

I've got a merry band of local gamers interested in starting Frostgrave, so I figured I'd splurge on a number of the various plastic kits available in order to share out the sprues for kitbashing.

What other medieval plastic kits are available that suit mixing with the Frostgrave Soldiers box?

Are there any kits that you would expressly advise against picking up due to limited use or poor compatibility?

Cheers,
Splod

[Baconfat]

Fireforge's Sergeants, 48 minis with crossbow, spears, swords, maces, and axes. 

Perry brother mercenaries are a good mix as well.

[Elbows]

Depending on the look you're going for...

Gripping Beast Hirdsmen match up perfectly with Fireforge Medieval kits.  Firefore Steppe Warriors is a good plastic kit but it's obviously Mongol-aesthetic.  The Perry plastics are all quite good but they scale oddly with some of the plastics.

Between Fireforge and Gripping Beast you have plenty o' kits, and then adding Perry's mercenaries, Foot Knights, and various other kits...heaps of options.  Add the Frostgrave plastics and the new Cultists when they ship and you've got an absurd amount of possibilities.

[Smith]

I made my first warbands using a mix of Fireforge stuff. As you'd expect, kits from the same manufacturer go together well, but they also go well with some Warlord kits (I used Roman veteran heads on Fireforge Templar bodies) and most of the Gripping Beast stuff (not for Frostgrave, but I had a fair bit of success combining Warlord Celt heads with GB Saxon/Viking torsos for a more fantastical look).

Something that might also be worth bearing in mind is that the Mantic zombie and ghoul sprues are also largely compatible - I made up some (as yet unpainted) cannibals by combining Fireforge men-at-arms and GB Dark Age infantry (the unarmoured ones) with Ghoul/Zombie heads and hand swaps to add weapons from GW Skaven clanrats (because I needed more cleavers than just the one on the Mantic sprue!). So, if you're after something a little more Chaotic Evil...

The Mongol kit from Fireforge was, hands-down, the most useful. Even leaving aside my penchant for Silk Road Fantasy fiction, the costumes it offered were perfect for a cold-weather warband:


Left and right: Fireforge men-at-arms heads and arms on Fireforge Mongol bodies - warm coats aplenty!
Centre: Fireforge men-at-arms head and body with Fireforge Mongol arms - long, thick-looking sleeves.

While the neck joints are a little different, I've also used Fireforge stuff with the Frostgrave plastics - they go together nicely, in my opinion. I've not got a photo at the moment, unfortunately.

[Rob_bresnen]

I have mixed Frostgrave, Games Workshop and Gripping Beasts very successfully.

[tyrionhalfman]

Check out Captain Blood's Westeros post in the fantasy board where he uses the frostgrave kits with a number of other manufacturers' plastic offerings which others have already mentioned.

My twopenneth would be to make sure your unarmoured (GB dark age warriors/arabs, FF Mongols, Wargames Factory fyrd/bondi) or light armoured (FF foot sergeants, Perry WOTR sets) bodies outnumber your chainmail (GB Saxons/vikings, FF templar/Teutonic infantry, WF thegn/huscarls) bodies as your starter warband will be more thug than knight heavy.

Another manufacturer not mentioned is Conquest Games' Norman infantry which come with a mixture of unarmoured, padded tunics and chainmail bodies, but the arm and neck joints are different to any other manufacturer so more surgery required to kitbash these. 

Ultimately it all depends what theme/ look you each want your warband to have, as the Arab/Mongol parts obviously add a very different look to the western medieval/dark age sets.

[Captain Blood]

Check out Captain Blood's Westeros post in the fantasy board where he uses the frostgrave kits with a number of other manufacturers' plastic offerings which others have already mentioned. 

http://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=62778.0

Honestly? You can mix any and all of them. By the time you've smooshed different bodies, heads, arms, weapons and equipment together, any minor variations in height and stature between the different kits vanish.
The only real point of difference between any of them is the neck joint - some are concave, some are convex, some are flat. A minimal amount of attention with a craft knife and / or the addition of a small blob of sprue melted with liquid poly cement, overcomes such difficulties in 30 seconds.

Stylistically, Fireforge, Gripping Beast, and the new Frostgrave sets, all coming from (I think) the same sculptor, have quite a lot in common: Some poses a bit bandy-legged; quite soft detail in places; GW-fantasy style outsized weapons to a greater or lesser extent - understandable for Frostgrave which is a fantasy setting; less excusable in the historical sets.

I've also used the Warlord ancients (also quite stylised, but in a different way). The Perry kits produce way more natural looking miniatures, and by far the best in terms of the sheer amount and variety of components, bodies and consequently the variation achievable. Plus they're just much better sculpts all round. Note though, that the WOTR plastics are by Michael Perry and the newer HYW plastics by Alan Perry, and there is a small but noticeable difference in style and stature between the two.

I haven't tried incorporating parts from the Agema or Conquest plastics yet, but check out Duff's brilliant Glorantha thread, because he has - Agema anyway.

Again, the interesting thing, which I hope you will see from my GoT thread, is that once you have kitbashed different parts together into your own unique and original creations, all the differences in style are submerged beneath the totally new character of the figures you have created. And with a coat of paint, the transformation is complete.

I haven't gone near Wargames Factory. Nuff said.

[Splod]

Right, thanks for all the awesome responses guys.

I reckon I'll start with a bunch of the Fireforge and Gripping Beast kits, mashed with the Frostgrave Soldiers. I've put out the request on Australian FB pages for spare sprues to get me started so that I don't end up with 200 odd spare figures from buying a whole box of each

Captain Blood: your work is incredible, and will be a magnificent inspiration to me. Thank you for the link to your thread

[Elbows]

If you have any friends planning to get in...I'd just each buy a single box...meet up and have a kit-bash afternoon filled with x-acto blade cuts and super-glued fingers.