Making a kings of war army presentable (a guy that cant hobbies guide)

Ok after the gaming post last time, i decided to gain some motivation for my current huge hobby project and hopefully give people some tips along the way.
Having recently got into kings of war properly i was fed up ranking my models all of the time and my hobby shelves in the games room being a mess. I haven't finished yet but i'm at a place where i feel confident to share my elf army. Also id like to add a caveat here i'm an average painter at best with little time in my life and no motivation to create high end models, what the post is about is how to motivate yourself to paint to a 3 foot standard and how and what to get to make a multi-based kings of war army.

The elves i've completed so far

As you can see i have a fairly large collection (probably another 4-5k on this just elves tbh), and to motivate my self i wrote themed lists to include these models that i could test to see how they performed. I then began by making up the models that were in bits on my shelf such as chariots and drakons and cutting out some old hardboard i had at home with a stanley knife to see how the bases would come out.  This was a partial success but with the time involved and finish i got I ended up deciding to get laser cut bases from https://warbases.co.uk/ , I'm sure others are available but I had heard good things about this guy and certainly wasn't disappointed.



So the themed lists, I'm sure most people in the hobby like me have broken or half painted models or armies around, an example of this in my case was the wood elves i was bought 6 years ago, they had some paint on them and were based in a scheme different to my high elves from the old game, so firstly i had to remove all of them from the original bases.  Removing models from bases I'll warn you now is a laborious and soul destroying thing to do, models snap at feet and knees you have to glue stuff back together and I've found no magic trick, just clippers, a knife, glue, some tape for your finger and a lot of patience.
Its my opinion though that cohesive basing is everything, your army can be a very average standard like mine but if based cohesively it will look the business on the table.


some wild hunters from my force

So now what to put on what base, imho its important to leave your long term gaming options open, don't put hordes on horde bases as tomorrow you may want 2 troops, or a regiment and a troop, with this in mind i really considered my options when making my bases up making sure they would fit together when complete
 

so these guys can be archer/spear troops or regiments

 
or then again seaguard regiment or horde

my whole army is done like this and its the best advice i have to anyone multi-basing, unless you are creating an award winning diorama its best to leave your gaming options open.

So how to base, i have read a million posts from everywhere and some people (hats off to them) spend longer basing a model than i do a couple of regiments. This does not work for most family guys and imho is unnecessary unless you are wishing to compete for best army somewhere. I also feel this is where cost can be saved as well as time compared to anything I've personally read before.
So here's what i do, whenever i cut plywood on my bench saw i save the shavings in a microwave container

i then add the cheapest railway hobby ballast in the world

and make this mix

once my models are then all stuck to the base i then simply get pva glue, brush it all over the base and tip the microwave container all over the base which i sit in another microwave container, it takes minutes. This is compared to glueing sand, then painting sand, then drybrushing it, then adding tufts etc etc, over a large force you are saving days and serious money i have likely based the equivalent amount of models across systems of 40-50k KOW and that has cost me £6 in basing materials including glue.

Overall then i'd just like to share some more photos with you guys, and please don't feel you have to hobby my way at all, its just an idiots guide to quick cheap hobby and to let people know what im up to right now. Photo spam below just because :)  any comments would be greatly appreciated


palace guard


drakon riders


army left


army right