I know this is a bit early, but I just want to get some ideas going.

I'm sure I'm not the only one here who paints the bases different colours for each faction. I've settled on grey for Imperial, brown for Rebel and green for Scum. To be exact, in case anyone's interested, I'm using Citadel's Mechanicus Standard Grey, Steel Legion Drab and Death World Forest.

Now, with the three Jabba's Realm heroes all being Scum in skirmish, this is going to cause a bit of a problem at least for someone who plays both modes. Buying a second set of figures would of course solve this, and it could be fun to paint a slightly different look for the characters depending on the faction, but for the moment I'm trying to look for something else.

Right now I'm thinking that unless I can come up with an elegant solution, I'll probably end up doing them brown since campaign play tends to happen slightly more often for me, and campaign is what I'm more likely to play with new players so then I wouldn't have to explain the whole deal to them.

But something in between might be cool if it's done right. I thought about doing a two-colour base in various patterns – split down the middle, stripes, checkered, some sort of camo or mozaic thing... – but those are all a bit out there and would probably just look silly. Painting the floor of the base one colour and the edge another might work, but I'm not sure. One final idea I had is painting them brown with the Mandalorian skull icon in green across the base (or perhaps the other way around, though the Rebel symbol would probably look wrong in anything but red), but again, it probably needs to be tried out before you can really say anything.

Anyone else have any thoughts?

You can already include rebel figures into Mercenary armies with Temporary Alliance. How do you handle that now?

But I use multiple colors anyway, and depend on the figures being recognizable and the base color only differentiating groups of the same models. I have grey, sand, red, white, green, and a few pastel colors for Bespin.

Buy two sets. You then get two Rancors (awesome) and a second set of heroes you can paint-up as mercs (different color scheme and all).

You can already include rebel figures into Mercenary armies with Temporary Alliance. How do you handle that now?

But I use multiple colors anyway, and depend on the figures being recognizable and the base color only differentiating groups of the same models. I have grey, sand, red, white, green, and a few pastel colors for Bespin.

Huh, I never even thought of that Temp Alliance thing. Fair point. To be honest though, I guess my main quibble is more of a conceptual than practical one, meaning that it's the idea of a dual faction figure messing with my little system rather than the fact that there might be differently coloured bases on the same army.

And really, I just wanted to see what sorts of things other people are doing – who knows, I might change my whole thing up one day. I kind of like the whole bunch of colours thing. How do you decide yours for each group? Terrain or the general colour scheme of the figure, I'm guessing?

Buy two sets. You then get two Rancors (awesome) and a second set of heroes you can paint-up as mercs (different color scheme and all).

That was my first thought as well, but I'm not sure if I can justify spending all that money just for that. Would be awesome though.

I would argue that, in the campaign, they're still mercenaries. They've just been hired by the Rebellion, or share some common goal.

I would argue that, in the campaign, they're still mercenaries. They've just been hired by the Rebellion, or share some common goal.

I think that is a good assessment as well.

it's the idea of a dual faction figure messing with my little system rather than the fact that there might be differently coloured bases on the same army.

And really, I just wanted to see what sorts of things other people are doing – who knows, I might change my whole thing up one day. I kind of like the whole bunch of colours thing. How do you decide yours for each group? Terrain or the general colour scheme of the figure, I'm guessing?

It started as terrain thing, grey and sand and red for the three Stormtrooper groups. One of the Probe Droids I painted white, so that one got a white snowy base also (grey and red for the other two). It later turned out great choice with most of the Return to Hoth figures naturally getting white bases (Leia, Echo Base Troopers, one HK Assassin Droid pair, SC2-M, Wampas - the elite just has some gore dripping).

The bases of the rebel heroes are dark grey, the bases of most allies are sand/beige. Imperial and mercenary uniques and elites have reddish bases. Some non-unique mercenaries have green bases. As an exception Wookiee Warriors have green mossy bases. The Bantha Rider is walking on sand regardless of being elite.

The Bespin Gambit tiles are pastels, so Lando's base is light blue, and Wing Guard bases are pinkish, the groups differentiated by uniform color (green and blue). Ugnaughts use the grey / sand / red scheme.

Edit: My figures are 'based' as well, because I'm not happy with straight-up painted bases. I also don't want to paint the outside rims of the bases. Wood glue, sand, and some with appropriate terrain such as rocks (Tusken Raiders, one Stormtrooper group, a few others) and mossy ground (Wookiee Warriors, Hired Gun - with real moss but painted and coated for durability).

I would argue that, in the campaign, they're still mercenaries. They've just been hired by the Rebellion, or share some common goal.

Yup. They are mercenaries, not really double-faction. In the campaign they are recognized as the main characters regardless of their base colors. They are played by the rebel players, but it remains to be seen how rebel-minded they are in the campaign.

I would argue that, in the campaign, they're still mercenaries. They've just been hired by the Rebellion, or share some common goal.

That's a very good point. Clearly I hadn't thought this through enough.

Paint for skirmish. It won't be confusing in campaign.

Paint for skirmish. It won't be confusing in campaign.

To be clear, I don't think it'll be confusing in either case. It's obvious enough which miniature is which so you don't really need colour-coding for that, I just find it fun figuring this kind of stuff out. But yeah, I am now leaning towards thinking of them as mercs that happen to have hero sheets.

The only color coding of bases I've seen is to distinguish between elite and regular

That's why there are figures instead of tokens, the figures represent different characters or troop types not jus factions

I'm color coding bases to distinguish deployment groups. When playing my two units of elite Stormtroopers, they have different colored bases.

My figures of one faction are painted in similar colors. Empire is all black, white and red. Rebels are light, mid and dark Brown. Mercs are mostly black and white.

Gideon is a staple as well in merc armies as he is in rebel armies. I have two core sets. Therefore I have one Gideon dressed in brown and one dressed in black and white.

Maybe use the Opportunity go the extra Mile and give the Heroes and Unique Figures of all Factions awesome bases (I followed Sorastros Tutorial and used http://shop.microartstudio.com/tech-bases-round-25mm-5-p-1150.html).