"Any Thoughts on Rice Armies? " Topic

Any Thoughts on Rice Armies?

We've discussed these, briefly, before…

link

I think I might try this. Not just because I'm cheap (though that would be hard to deny) or because I'm lazy (um…) or unskilled (enough already), but also because, frankly, from where my eyeballs are, several hundred scale feet above the battlefield, I expect soldiers would look like colored grains of rice anyway.

Plus, there are things I want to try that I just don' have the time to make proper armies for.

Anyone tried this?

Do you have to prime them before painting? Will the water in acrylic glues make the rice puff up?

Anyone have a recommendation for gluing rice grains upright to utility board? I'm thinking white glue or hot glue.

Are there whacky alternatives?

Should this be cross-posted in the Food board?

I just thought I'd bounce this around the collective experience before I try it.

I promise a report when I'm done…

Andrew

Holy cow…I must have eaten a 10,000 point army last night for dinner.

Andrew, even for you, this would be an odd project. Which means that you must do it.

Instead of rice, why not try Irregular's 2mm block. Not as edible, but more stable and still good for that bird's eye view.

Ditto for me! I've also been considering this for some time as a cheap alternative to microscale troops. If anybody out there has some experience and/or advice, I'd also like to hear about it.

Remember: 1/2 cup rice per two gamers…

How many angels can dance on the head of a rice soldier?

I like to use wild rice…prepainted minis!

At least we know that the dip technique works perfectly with these…

Great alternative for the dirt poor wargamer, heh.

When we're done joking around I need to figure out how to do cavalry. Maybe beans. The popcorn kernels are the officers (they have a good chef). I can use lasagna noodles for basing…

Seriously, how do I do cavalry?

Andrew

Next,Zulus to the northwest sir!FOUSANDS OF'EM(1X25LB bag)

This seems like a good idea, seriously! They look pretty darn good in those photos. Sure up close it will look like an army of horribly mutated troops, but from that distance it looks fine. Anyone thought of Ancients? I'm guessing wire for spears? What about shields? How would you get them to stant up, what kind of glue? Do you cut off the bottom or anything? How well would GW paint stick to rice?

JT

GW paint would stick to GW rice just fine. It is the cost that is prohibitive.

You could change scales just by soaking them in water.

Actually back in the day (very early 1970s) when I was in the upper New England area of the country, my first exposure to CLS Napoleonics was a guy who had used bolts and nuts for all the figures. All based on nice green painted wood stands, painted either red (British) or Blue (French). Short hex headed bolts (heads glued to the base) for infantry, and longer hex headed bolts wiith nuts mounted the same way for cavalry. Believe he used bolts for artillery also, but don't recall the details. Huge armies with lots of figures (smile).

Was actually very nice looking, cheap and very fast to prepare.

For really micro scale, why not by really, really coarse sandpaper and paint it. Then cut it into scale formation sizes as per the old "System 7" for Napoleonics.

Put me down for some Shrimp Chow Mein

Cav could be done hobby-horse style with another grain glued at about a 45 degree angle in front of the rider grain.

Or perhaps there is a small pasta that might work.

Split legumes for shields.

Or split (the other way) legumes with two half grains of rice glued on top for the rider and horses head…

I've never heard of that before but it's quite visually pleasing.

"You could change scales just by soaking them in water.
"
Hehehe

Try puffed rice for variety!

for cav I would suggest long grain rice on its side with maybe a piece of cous-cous(sp?) as it's rider

"GW paint would stick to GW rice just fine. It is the cost that is prohibitive."

Priceless, jizbrand….truly priceless!

Excellent bit of humour that…..

Freakin scale creap. Just when I finished my couscous army…

If you model a Finish winter army, you wouldn't even need to paint them.

A good idea. For big battles, your 2mm rice hordes would look much more like the real thing than 4 28mm figs standing on a base to be a regiment. For Cav, I've seen a long rice grain horizontally for the horse, and a dab of glue for the rider. Same for artillery horses without the rider. Guns also used a long grain for the gun & 2 short grains or a chopped grains for wheels.

Huh! He's got the wrong facing colours!

For cavalry- Maybe a really small elbow pasta with the ends glued down for a front and back set of legs, a rice grain broken into two, one half on an angle for the horse head and the second piece upright at the top of the elbow for the rider.

I thought the buttons were bronze that year.

Delicious!

Wouldn't the Napoleonic Austrians also be rather easy to do – not too much to paint!

Griefbringer

Just when you thought you had seen everything – - –

although to be fair, Griefbringer has a great point.

I thought wargaming was all about figures. Why not just do a board game. The day I resort to using rice would be the end. But I suppose we must respect other views.

"You can't march them up the centre, they'll be eaten alive!"

I did try this for napoleonics and for romans and barbarians. The problem is cavalry, artillery and spears and shields.

For cavalry you could try 1 grain on its side but slightly lifted at the front, say 25 degrees up, and then cut another grain in half for the rider.

Problem I had was spears and shields for the romans and then the napoleonic artillery.

Suggestions would be welcomed!

Somebody somewhere (yeah, I know how much that helps) did an article on using the "grabby-things" on women's hair rollers for 6mm troops. He even had a way to do spears, shields, and cavalry. Wish I could find that article.

In fact, this needs its own topic.

What about an Indian Army? Curried Rice? LOL

jeffrsonk: "Holy cow…I must have eaten a 10,000 point army last night for dinner."

Anybody having read the latest Larry Leadhead? ;-)

Griefbringer

Hey – why not try Lentils instead? I mean anyone can afford to do a rice army – but now Lentils are another story.

Been fooling around with rice over the last couple of nights. The problem faced is that the grains are all different lengths and all have different angled tips. Makes it hard to glue them down. Also they are very small.

What I then went to was match sticks cut into lengths of 6mm. This worked very well except they are hard to cut.

So then I looked at 6mm lengths of balsa using a 2-3mm square. Works much better. Not sure on cavalry or artillery yet but will keep you posted.

Allright, being the legendary creator of rice armies (The one seen last year at Crisis), I can supply some tips to anyone interested in building one.

email me at norrmeister %at% gmail %dot% com