Yes, absolutely, "use base" addresses this problem... when it works. Older versions of use base (like the version that come with 5.005_03, which is what I'm still stuck on) do not work properly, unfortunately.

Granted, I'm not griping, because it looks like it's since been fixed... but also:

BEGIN { @ISA = qw( Foo Bar ) }
[download]

is really not that hard, either.