A standard base is a stage. A hollow base is a pool. Instead of a flat top, the interior sits 3–5mm below a raised perimeter rim, forming a shallow watertight basin across the entire footprint of the base. That single change turns your base into the most striking technique in the hobby — a model wading through a swamp, sinking into a tar pit, or striding across a frozen lake — without the fiddly, leak-prone dam-building that resin basing usually demands.

The rim is the dam

Pour two-part epoxy, UV resin or water-effect gel straight into the recess. The raised lip contains the pour and it self-levels to a clean, flush finish. The single most failure-prone step of resin basing — building a temporary dam from tape or plasticard and hoping it doesn't leak — simply isn't there. And because the floor is a closed, watertight 1.4mm plate, there's no sealing step and no resin creeping across your desk. It is leak-proof out of the box.

What hobbyists make with them

The recess is a blank canvas, not a pre-cast scene. Glue your model to the floor, paint the basin, and pour:

Swamps & bogs — murky green-brown tinted resin, model sunk to the ankles. The classic.
Rivers & coastlines — clear or blue-tinted resin with gloss-gel waves on top.
Lava & magma — paint glowing cracks on the floor, pour orange-red tinted resin over them.
Toxic sludge & tar pits — fluorescent green or gloss black, with a few bubbles left in on purpose.
Ice & frozen ponds — clear resin over a cold blue floor, snow paste banked against the rim.
Deep mud & texture — thick basing pastes, ballast and snow contained at full depth, finishing flush with a clean paintable edge.

Larger sizes (100mm and up) double as self-contained mini-diorama trays for display painting, RPG centrepieces and scale-model vignettes.

Specifications

Total height	5mm — standard wargaming base profile with a bevelled edge
Recess depth	3–5mm depending on size (40mm & 50mm Square: 3.6mm)
Floor	Closed, flat, 1.4mm thick — watertight, sits flush on the table
Material	PLA plastic, FDM 3D printed
Design	CAD-designed to OBS standard footprints; every size has its own technical drawing — see the gallery
HS Code	3926.90 [CONFIRM against existing OBS listings]
Country of Origin	United Kingdom

Exact dimensions for the size you choose are shown in the technical drawing in the product gallery.

The full range

The widest hollow base range available anywhere — 53 size and shape combinations, from 20mm troops to 200mm display monsters. Theme a single hero or an entire army.

Round	20, 25, 28, 32, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100, 110, 120, 130, 140, 150, 160, 175, 200mm
Square	20, 25, 30, 40, 50, 60, 75, 80, 90, 100, 110, 125, 130, 140, 150, 175, 200mm
Oval	50x25, 60x30, 75x42, 90x52, 105x70, 120x92, 150x95, 170x105, 180x140mm
Rectangle	50x25, 60x30, 60x40, 75x50, 100x50, 100x60, 150x100mm

Available from single pieces up to 50-packs on common troop sizes — choose your size and quantity above. Larger packs carry a better per-base price.

Part of the Open Basing System

Footprints follow OBS standards and the classic 5mm bevelled profile, so Hollow Bases are full members of the ecosystem — they rank up in OBS movement trays, work with OBS converters, and sit on OBS display extenders. From the side, a hollow base looks like any other base on the tabletop. From above, it's a scene. No hobbyist should be locked into one base size, one shape, or one manufacturer's idea of what a base should be.

Which game does it fit?

Footprints follow industry-standard wargaming sizes, so they slot straight into the games you already play. As a quick guide: 25–40mm rounds suit infantry in popular 28–32mm sci-fi and fantasy systems; 50mm-plus rounds and ovals suit characters, cavalry and monsters, with ovals matching standard large-kit footprints; 20mm and 25mm squares and the rectangle sizes suit rank-and-file fantasy (Kings of War and similar) and historical wargaming; 25mm and 50mm rounds cover Dungeons & Dragons and RPG grid play (a swamp-sunk troll makes an unforgettable encounter piece); and 100–200mm sizes work as display bases, dioramas and scale-model vignettes.

Pro tips for the perfect pour

Pour thin layers. Two-part epoxy cures with heat. Keep each pour shallow and let it cure before the next — you avoid trapped bubbles and protect the PLA from cure heat. One or two pours fill the recess.
Scuff the floor first. A light sand of the recess floor gives resin a mechanical key; cured resin can pop free of very smooth surfaces. Paint the floor before pouring — the colour reads through the resin.
Expect a slight meniscus. Resin in a lipped basin sits fractionally higher at the walls. That's physics, not a fault — a thin final gloss layer or water-effect gel levels it perfectly.
Two-part versus air-dry. Two-part epoxy gives the result in one go. Air-drying water effects shrink as they cure and need several applications to fill the recess — both work, just plan for it.
Tint with inks and washes. A single drop of ink or hobby wash colours a whole pour. Build depth across layers — murky swamp green, cold lake blue, sickly toxic yellow.

Honest, like always

These are FDM 3D prints. Fine layer lines are visible on the rim and sides — they disappear under primer and paint, and the recess interior ends up covered by your resin or texture anyway. Hollow geometry isn't possible in our injection-moulded ABS range, so if you want a glass-smooth finish on a flat base, the ABS bases are the better pick; for a resin pool, this is the tool for the job.

PLA doesn't love heat, so deep single epoxy pours can soften it — thin layers avoid this entirely and give better results anyway. Each base is printed fresh to order, which is how we can offer all 53 sizes without compromise.

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Bases Trays And Converters - Items tagged as "Hollow bases"

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