Tuesday, October 11, 2022

Get The Lead Out!

Plastics.

My conclusion when I last visited this topic in the 2020 survey (see One Word: Plastics) was that there was a great future in plastics.  The 2020 showed that hard plastic figures were the most preferred figure material.  For me, the 2020 result was both a curiosity and a shock given my preference toward metal figures.

Did the 2022 survey reinforce the 2020 tendency of plastic figures taking the top spot in figure material preference or was the 2020 survey result a curious blip?  The 2022 results suggest that hard plastic figures continue to gain popularity.  Even I am yielding, somewhat, to hard plastic figures for at least one collection. 

What does the 2022 survey show for wargamer preference in figure material?

First Choice in Figure Material

When all survey respondents ranked their top choice in figure material, Hard Plastic came solidly into the top place.  For the 10,502 respondents answering this question, Hard Plastics garnered almost 54% of all of the responses as top choice.   Metals, coming in at a distant second place captured about 32% of the responses.  All other materials saw low single digit percentages.  To my untrained, metal-centric eye, the dominance of Hard Plastics as the preferred material still astonishes me.  Hard Plastics and Metals capture nearly 86% of all respondents' favorite material. 

Table 1
In an attempt to understand the drivers of these numbers, let's break these totals down by a selection of attributes.

Material Preference by Primary Interest

When responses are stratified by a wargamer's Primary Interest (see Figure 1), a wide chasm emerges.  68.3% of respondents classifying themselves as primarily Fantasy/Sci-Fi wargamers choose Hard Plastics as their first choice in material.  Metals is a very distant second at 9.8%.  A surprise?

For Historical gamers, Metals as a first choice in material dominate at 58.7% with Hard Plastics coming in second at 32.4%.  Historical wargamers still seem to prefer metal figures over anything else.  For the Mixed category, Hard Plastics are still first choice in 57.6% of responses with Metals in second place at 28.6%.    

Figure 1

Material Preference by Age Group

When breaking down material preference by Age Group, what does the survey show?

Figure 2 illustrates that the younger age cohorts heavily favor Hard Plastics.  The general tendency is that Metals preference increases with age at the expesne of all other materials.  Even in the 61+ age group, though, Hard Plastics are the first choice for almost 30% of the respondents.  Seems that the Hard Plastics category has a solid foothold across all age cohorts.  Notice that the youngest age cohort chooses Paper as first choice in about 13% of responses.

Figure 2
Material Preference by Collection Size

When one considers the expected tendency when examining the effect of Collection Size on Material Preference, what is a reasonable conclusion?  A reasonable conclusion might hold that older wargamers would tend to have larger collections and that older age cohorts may have come into the hobby when metal figures were more prominent than hard plastic figures.  Large collections take many years to accumulate.  As seen in prior year analyses, surveys suggests that older wargamers tend toward historicals and fighting big battles.  Larger collections, therefore, ought to tend toward metals.   

Figure 3
Do the 2022 results support those inferences? Yes, they do. 

The percentage of respondents choosing metal figures as a top choice increases as collection size increases.

Do the effects of Primary Interest, Age Group, and Collection Size upon Material Preference match your experience or intuition?

Now, there are other factors or attributes captured in the survey that could be brought into this analysis to extend the study.  What effects do figure scale, wargaming period, game size, game type, hobby spend, and gamer location have on material preference? What do you think the effect of these attributes have on material preference? Any? 

I leave those analyses for another time but would enjoy reading your thoughts on Material Preference and the drivers of this choice for you.

90 comments:

  1. There has been a greater availability of hard plastic sci fi kits than historical kits, GW have been making them since 1987,by contrast the first historical ones are firmly in this century, also GW stopped selling metal some time ago, so another reason for a lack of lead in the scifi/ fantasy branch of the hobby. Cost has to be the main driver, my recent purchase of Wargames Atlantic Napoleonic figures worked out at about 30p each, admitidly it was a bulk purchase but I haven't paid that for a figure since something like 1979, obviously comparable metal figures are now much more expensive. I also like how easy plastic is to convert, that's not to say I don't like metal figures, they're easier to prep generally, but a combination of the two is my preferred option!
    Best Iain

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    1. Iain, your assessment on the availability and evolution of plastics fits the survey results.

      When I entered the hobby, it was soft plastics for me, beginning with Airfix. Do you suppose a survey conducted in 1975 would have shown Soft Plastics at the top of the heap?

      Thank you for your insights!

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    2. 30p for a figure! Outrageous! My soft plastics come in at under 20p a figure.

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    3. Graham, where do you buy your figures?

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    4. Strelets infantry are 48 figures to a box which costs about £9. I should also add that the anatomical proportions of the figures are far superior to anything currently being sold in hard plastic or metal.

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    5. Are all Strelets figures useable for wargamIng purposes? I recall a few odd figures in the Airfix (or was it Italian/ESCI?) boxes?

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    6. In a cavalry box of 12 all are usable in my experience, and the 48 infantry almost always so. They very rarely, in the modern boxes, have completely unusable figures. Mostly you get four identical sprues. The only one with an issue recently was the British foot as they had too many grenadiers for my tastes, although quite a few of those had a quick conversion job and end up as fusiliers. And these days you can check the contents on Plastic Soldier Review and avoid any dodgy boxes.

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  2. Not a surprise really these days, certainly for the 28mm figure market, whether sci-fi or historical. Older gamers will surely have more lead and less plastic as the latter was not available as an option back in the 1970's. Certainly for me as a dedicated 10mm gamer, metal is the only option.

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    1. Thank you, Steve! Perhaps this is only a surprise to an old, metalhead like me who has his feet frmly planted in the past? Without a steady stream of current wargaming magazines arriving regularly, I often miss the latest trends in what is fashionable.

      Are you mdf armies 10mm or 6mm?

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    2. The mdf armies are classed as 6mm, but are closer to 8mm.

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  3. Steve kind of stole my thunder there - I was about to make the stunningly obvious response to the question you posed about scale and preference, Jon! Plastic is far and away dominated by 28mm (in the historical side, anyway) PSC do make 15mm plastic infantry but I am not sure if anyone else does - oh, I just remembered bloody Warlord and their "new" 13.5mm stuff - but smaller than that, I think it's all metal?
    Likewise for periods - so far, hard plastic covers a few of the popular periods, but there are many eras that still rely on metal to provide the figures required.
    I think the results on this analysis are probably the most self-evident/unsurprising of anything you have dug into, Jon. As Iain mentioned 99% of the dominant sci-fi/fantasy stuff is (and has been for a long time) hard plastic (in fact, I assume it is from that example that the Perrys and other early pioneers of historical plastics got their inspiration...) Younger gamers favour sci-fi/fantasy and they are also more inclined to get hooked into the "only one manufacturer is good enough to collect" psyche so it's no surprise they prefer plastic. It's not even price related really, because those 40K etc figures ain't cheap, even in plastic! I agree on all the advantages Iain has pointed out (although I was slightly surprised at his inference that Wargames Atlantic are cheap - they seem to be the priciest hard plastic around, to my way of looking at things - although that's going off topic anyway!)
    I probably prefer metal but the plastic figures are perfectly adequate, often have more different poses than metal ranges and are infinitely easier to do small conversions with - plus, they are much cheaper. I built up a Portuguese Division for the Peninsula using solely Warlord plastic infantry very cheaply, something like 8 or 10 18 man battalions - that would have been pretty pricey using Perry, Foundry or Front Rank metals!
    I believe metal figures will be around for a while yet and possibly forever, but as more and more plastic figures become available, I am sure they will become the dominant choice across all genres and ages. I also think 3d resin printed figures will start to make their presence felt to a much greater degree in the next few years...

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    1. Keith, Steve may have stolen your thunder but you followed up by bringing in the whole storm!

      Excellent summary of the state of the hobby with respect to material preference. Your rationale and explanations intuitively make sense.

      For me, these results, backed up by reader concurrence, lend validation to the survey.

      Thanks, Keith!

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  4. As a material, I prefer hard plastic, however, I dislike the assembly and for me, perfection would be a less dynamic figure and no assembly.

    I think for the Airfix generation, there is in any case a certain sentiment that comes when pulling a sprue from the box for the first time to explore it.

    I can see 3D printers giving coverage to a) the small scales in strips and b) doing single intricate specials for the bigger scales to enhance bases.

    I hate, hate, hate bendy spears and pikes, so unless the armies that use them have open cast hands for steel pins, I would stay away from those metal armies.

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    1. Thanks, Norm. Has your material preference changed over time? While hard plastic is your first choice today, is preference still evolving or have you settled firmly into the Hard Plastic camp?

      I am of the Airfix Generation but soft plastic holds little appeal to me. I remember the early days of painting soft plastics only to have the figures bend during play and storage with a resulting paint chipping and peeling. I am sure my prep and painting techniques were not the best. My results may have improved had I a better technique.

      I know some remain ardent fans of soft plastics. We will see what 3D printing brings to the table.

      I hate bendy spears and pikes too!

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    2. My preference for hard plastic has probably been reinforced by the growing ranges available. we should remind ourselves that it was only in 2008 that the Perry brothers brought this new fangled idea of hard plastic historical to the hobby and initially it was limited to the ‘safe’ exploration of ACW. At that time the future of the material was quite uncertain and success can only be viewed with more recent eyes, as most interests gat catered for.

      While I would prefer hard plastic, I am increasing disinteresting in building figures and so I find my attention being drawn to metal one piece casting in 28’s and also the Warlord plastic epic range, which is one piece plastic.

      Perhaps if HAT were more active on their one piece (slim) 28mm plastics, I might have a figure that ticks all of the boxes!

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    3. 3D printing will certainly have its place for one off's that aren't commercially viable to injection mould or cast etc. However from my perspective, the jury is out on their long term durability, even though the 'plastics' are improving all the time.

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    4. Hard to believe that the Perry ACW hard plastics were introduced back in 2008. Seems much more recent to me. Perhaps, they just were not on my RADAR at the time? You are not alone in wishing that HaT was more attentive to wargemers' interests. My buddy's plastic armies would be much lsrger if HaT produced what he wanted.

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    5. Steve, for those with access to 3D printing, one can produce huge armies for pennies. Well, at least that is what I have been told. Perfect for those on limited budget.

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    6. I agree about simplicity! The Warlord Portuguese are all marching ...four slightly different poses...and you choose the head and the backpack, from memory. Still allows nice variation but only a couple of parts per figure, compared with half a dozen for Victrix, of which I only have one box worth!

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    7. Keith, I cannot compare with the Vitrix vs Warlord Napoleonics but I have put together hundreds of the Perry WotR plastic figures. I think assemblying them not too fiddly. I actually enjoy the process.

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    8. Re bendy spears, can I re-iterate how well plastic broom bristles work. They flex without kinking and hold paint really well.

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  5. One other aspect relating to the "what you already have" and "scales" discussion is that a lot of longer serving gamers have armies that are of the 25mm/smaller 28mm size. Historical hard plastics are designed to fit with the more heroically sized 28mm. The more recent gamer in 28mm will find their plastic Perry's (say) fit alongside and metals from the same firm, allowing the less common troop types to be added in from metal to fit with a mainly plastic force.

    On a wider point, I think we will see 3D printed increase in "market share" in future in some scales and periods. I'm not sure everyone will be rushing out to get hi-spec 3D printers but certainly more "print on demand" offerings. Everything from mastering figures and inventory control could be streamlined by the process, making it viable start up business model in our small volumes hobby.

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    1. Anthony, great to hear from you!

      I agree that the Old Grognards built large armies from the "true" 25mm figures and smaller. I am no exception in that regard. I enjoy fighting large battles. Large battles require smaller figures or very, very large tables.

      Good point on the development of 3D printing. As the technology becomes more readily available, I expect to see this material gaining market share. I see 3D printing regularly for 10mm and 15mm WWII armor.

      One interesting side note on material preference and 3D printing, the survey suggests that 3D printing is more popular in the more, far-flung reaches of the world. That makes sense.

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  6. I prefer metal, and fit right into that 41-50 year old 2500-5000 figure demographic! I dislike having to put figures together before being able to paint them, so metal is always going to be better for that. That said, I have bought some of the new PSC 15mm figures to test, and they don't require me to affix spears or shields, so my objections may, ahem, melt away. Thanks for another interesting analysis! Cheers, Aaron

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    1. I am a confirmed metalhead, myself. Like you, I am expanding my material preferences to hard plastic for certain applications. Old Dogs can be taught new tricks!

      Glad you enjoyed the analysis. Thank you for your comment.

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  7. Accepting that the ‘hard plastics’ boat has already sailed, but I wish it had revolutionised the 1/72 (20mm) scale rather than 28’s ….. a much better fit for the domestic table, while still offering good modelling / painting opportunty.

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    1. Had hard plastic figures in 20mm been available to me when starting out, I may never have moved on. I always enjoyed my 1/72 and HO WWII gaming from the early days.

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    2. Yes I totally agree Jon. I have said a few times, the later Airfix stuff was beautifully sculpted and if they had been in hard plastic that easily took and held paint, I don't think I would ever have looked at Minifigs at the huge cost of 8p each ...plus postage! Current soft plastic collectors will now tell me I should never have changed!

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    3. If Graham (Trebian) weighs in on this thread, he will say you should never have moved on, for sure.

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    4. "You never should have changed". Go look at Plastic Soldier Review Website for the recent Strelets War of Spanish Succession figures.

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    5. I'm with Trebian. I have enjoyed rescuing my childhood Airfix WW2 figures from the loft and repainting them, and I hope they will not lose their paint this time - as they are handled more carefully, stored in proper boxes and not crammed into a tobacco tin at the end of the game like when I was a kid! I hope that with careful treatment they will be fine, and have invested in some 20mm Strelets reinforcements. I'd echo Norm, in that 20mm seems a much better fit for WW2 games where space is limited ( and 20mm/1:72 vehicles etc are much cheaper than 28mm/1:56!). I've had a few free sprues of 28mm hard plastics from magazines, and concluded that the 'hard' aspect of them is assembling the myriad of parts - too much like 'hard' work for me. Interesting post, thanks - and it certainly got people involved!

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    6. Thank you, David, for your comments. As I noted in another response to this thread, I have very fond memories of starting out in Wargaming in the early 70s with 1/72 and HO WWII plastics. I may try my hand at painting some Strelets and see how it goes.

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  8. Just wish the plastics assembled themselves. It is gonna be the winter of glue here, some 15 boxes worth to assemble!

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    1. Plastic assembly is not that bad, is it? Well, winters here are long so you have time.

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    2. Sort plastics come ready assembled. Just sayin'

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    3. Yes, soft plastics come assembled but so do metals.

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    4. And I beat you on price and the need for heavy duty boxes and shelving.

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    5. My lead-lined room doubles as a fallout shelter.

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  9. One metal Austrian battalion = three Perry plastic Austrian battalions. Doesn’t require much analysis. 😉

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    1. True but every decision does not come down to cost. Does it?

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    2. And if using 1/72 soft plastics you'd get about 9 battalions for the same money.

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    3. True but 10mm and 6mm likely offer similar savings.

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    4. I wouldn't say then that you are comparing like with like. The 28mm or 1/72 figure is large enough to see the figure individual detail, whereas smaller scales are more en masse. I have 6mm armies for grand scale things, and a lot of 15mm all in metal. No 10mm. Yet.

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  10. Interesting that the 20 and under have the highest interest in 3D printed figures. I wonder if 30 years from now it will hit 60% whilst the 61+ will still be building armies out of OOP plastic kits.

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    1. From friends having 3D printers, they say the cost per unit is very low. Perhaps the youngest cohort is drawn to this material primarily for cost?

      I know many 61+ wargamers building OOP plastic kits today!

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  11. Firmly in the ‘old fogey, play historicals, have metal’ camp. Mainly because there are no alternatives in my scales. 6 and 10mm.
    Regarding the cost, my preferred manufacturer still charges less than I paid per figure for 25mm 45 years ago.
    Wow, Blogger is letting me comment from my phone even if I can’t login. It only lets me comment on your blog from my laptop.
    Chris/Nundanket

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    1. Thanks, Chris! We are both firmly in the same camp.
      Good to see commenting is working from the phone.

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  12. Must admit I do still prefer metals, but can see the benefits in hard plastics, mainly due to costs. If plastics covered the periods and scale of my favoured period I'd mire than likwly switch

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    1. A fellow metalhead but it appears you are willing to switch.

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  13. Norm's comments sum it up for me, in that I too dislike the assembly and would much rather a less-dynamic single casting. Plus I much prefer the weight of a stand of metal figures, both from a tactile standpoint and because they are less likely to be dislodged.

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    1. I prefer the heft that a stand of metals provides. Just not the same sensation with a stand of plastics.

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  14. If I went to the Dark Side I would have no qualms about plastic , however being an historical player it has to be metal. I can afford them, like them and have no patience for building fiddly plastic.

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    1. Unless you count Perry WotR plastic figures as fiddly, we are in complete agreement.

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  15. Jon, your comment on a survey held in 1975 reminded me of when I ordered some samples from Scruby's Medieval range. Compared to the Airfix figures they lacked detail and were poorly proportioned. I would have voted in favor of soft plastic.

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    1. Isn't that the truth! I would pick Airfix soft plastics over many of the Scruby figures too although Scrubys had their own charm.

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  16. Like many I started gaming with soft plastic Airfix and was elated when I could afford my first metal figures. My own preference is for metal, although I have been experimenting with hard plastic. In the long run, I find plastics too much work. I want a figure I can game with. Not one I have to glue together before I can game with it

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    1. You are in good company! Thanks for the visit and the comment!

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  17. The increased acceptance of plastic figures comes as no surprise to me Jonathan. Had you asked me about them ten or twelve years ago I would have written them off as a gimmick and not the thing for me. My first hard plastics were bought in 2015 when I was asked to contribute a force for to a War of Spanish Succession game. I used the Wargames Factory (now Warlord Games) figures. I wasn’t particularly taken by the figures but they served a purpose.

    What really turned my head was when on the spur of the moment I bought some Wars of the Roses figures. Suddenly I saw the all the possibilities of lower costs and greater variety. Since then I have embraced the plastic explosion and of my many thousands of figures maybe a quarter or a third are now plastics. What it has done has allowed me to build divisions instead of brigades, bringing up new opportunities to try new things in my gaming. And they are lighter - no longer does the earth shift on its axis when I travel to play a game.

    I hear the comments about assembly, but don’t see this as a problem, although I must admit that I shy away from Victrix because if the sheer volume of bits to glue on. To my mind it takes just as long to clean up metal figures as it does to assemble plastics, and when you stick something on it stays. I also find repairs easier because I have not built up a HUGE stock of heads, hats and weapons.

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    1. Thank you, Mark, for your detailed response with a personal flair. Perry WotR plastics are what turned my head too. Still, we both remain glued to metals.

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  18. I fit the demographics well; 61+, huge collection, almost exclusively historical gamer, almost all 25/28mm, virtually all metal; I have at most a handful of plastics. I don't see that changing at this point.

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    1. I do not see that changing either, Peter. No 15mm figures? How did you resist for all of these years?

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    2. I tried 15 mm ACW perhaps 35 years ago. Didn't enjoy painting them, gave them away. The only 15 mm troops I have are the crews of my 15 mm Renaissance galleys. Sticking to 25/28 mm has simplified terrain for sure. If I were to do a smaller scale, which I don't anticipate, it would be 10 mm. I find 6 mm just TOO small for my tastes. Of course, todays 10 mm is probably close to yesteryear's 15's anyway! :-)

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    3. Sticking to one figure size certainly simplifies much. How did maintain the willpower to not expand to other scales?

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    4. Well, as above, I didn't like painting 15's at all, and 6mm - just no for me! At one point Barry was going to do AWI with 40 mm figures from Sash and Saber, and I said I'd go in on that, but he wound up painting one unit, deciding his painting skills weren't up to the larger scale, and called the thing off before I acquired any lead. It helps that I mostly use my own figures for both sides, and most of my gaming friends are also almost all 25/28 mm aficionados. Until the last 10 years or so, my inventory of unpainted lead was never that great, It has ballooned due to sales and kickstarters, but still modest by some standards! :-)
      I also have never seen the attraction of huge units in 25 mm - so my Napoleonic units are "only" 18 figures/infantry, 8/cavalry, and 6 - 8 gunners and 2 guns for artillery. Pikes aside, most Ancient units are even smaller, That helps moderate both costs and footprint on the tabletop!

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    5. Your Lead Pile is modest by some standards?
      Hmm. Did you have anyone in mind???

      Thanks for your continued 25/28mm history. Like you, I typically field both armies in whatever period I tackle. That way, I can play solo. Also like you, I do not go in for the humongous battalions. For horse and musket periods, 12-24 figure infantry BMUs suit me just fine. Since all of my 25/28mm ancients are based for Impetvs/TtS!, 12 figure infantry bases are the standard.

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    6. Oh, no one in particular (whistles while looking in no definite direction...)

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  19. If it ain't lead it's already dead, nuff said.😉

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  20. It would appear that as we become more of a grognard, we move metal more.

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    1. That is how it works for me although I have always been a lead pusher. Many of us may simply to stuck in time.

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  21. I love metal minis- but sometimes sticking them together and being susceptible to breaking is terrible! Gluing, playing and carrying plastic figures is another matter.
    Just yesterday I accidentally fell off a metal samurai model - a chip of paint on a dent on the helmet: / a tragedy to be repaired ...

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    1. Michal, I do not have many metal figures that require sticking parts on. When I do, epoxy makes a very tough bond.

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  22. Hard plastic all the way and twice on the weekends. Love it.

    Caveat; they either need to be stupid easy to assemble or come with good instructions.

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    1. What? Are all of your 15mm ACW armies plastic?

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    2. Oh, I was thinking only of 28mm. I’ve no experience with 15mm plastic. In that case I’d want metal. 😀

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  23. I prefer metal minis to plastic or resin, but with the ridiculous price of metal figures at the moment, I'd seriously have to consider dumping metal from now on.

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    1. Hey Ray! Is part of the high cost of metals due to the strength of the USD?

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  24. I've gone with whatever catches my fancy. Nearly all Napoleonics are 25mm metals, with a very few plastics to fill the gaps and a plastic Prussian army a friend was about to bin. Even that army acquired metal artillery and, a couple of weeks back, a couple of metal cavalry units.
    My only other metals are my Byzantines and friends, plus a 7YW Russian army I'm not sure what to do with.

    I do have a few WW2 metals - kits and troops - but they are mostly 20mm plastics. I have a sizeable force of WW2 German cavalry in 20mm metals though.

    The rest of my armies are plastics: 30YW (Revell), WoRoses (Revell), 18th Century Imagi-Nations (Airfix, ESCI, Revell, Italieri), ACW (Airfix, a few ESCI, a handful of Atlantic), 19th C Imagi-Nations (ESCI, Strelets-R), Sendoku (Zvezda) - all these soft plastic.

    Finally (I think) I have a WSS 'Imperialist' army in 28mm hard plastic. Wargames Factory. I actually quite like the figures - stately and formal looking, although I don't vary from the marching pose. This remains a work in not very much progress...

    Cheers,
    Ion



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    1. Thanks, Ion! You seem to be material agnostic and buy whatever strikes your fancy. That is a good policy!

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  25. As a member of the 60+ brigade, I too started off with Airfix soft plastics. The shift to metals was inevitable since the Airfix range was (still is) limited. The scale went down to 6mm so it was then metal by default. These last few years I got a few Perry and Fireforge plastics which are very nice though I hate their assembly. Still, to me nothing beats a well sculpted metal figure in whichever scale.

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  26. Thanks for the excellent analysis. I wonder what the results would be if we were able to compare preferred material and actual buying habits.

    For myself, (a fantasy and Sci Fi gamer) I would almost always prefer a metal figure. However, I most often purchase plastic figures for reasons of availability and affordability and am happy to do so. The same factors mean that I've probably purchased more figures made of either PVC or 3D printed this year than metal and that seems like a trend likely to continue.

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    1. Welcome, Karl!

      The survey captures buying habits in an indirest manner by including expected spending, figure scale, type of game, etc..

      From the analysis, it seems that Fantasy/Sci-fi wargamers prefer hard plastic. Interesting that you prefer metal. I suspect that 3D printing will continue to gain marketshare as quality and availability improve.

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  27. It seems to me, a recent convert to fantasy/ sci-fi games, that the price of metal figures is twice that of comparable historical figures. Perhaps that has some bearing on the choice of plastic over metal.
    Further more, even in the late'70s plastic was frowned upon as 'toy soldiers' as opposed to wargames figures.
    I think the resin figures are currently too brittle for general tt gaming.

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    1. Thank you for your comment and your insights. Cost is likely a factor in choice, for sure, especially for those with limited disposal income.

      In the late 70s, I knew not much about metal figures outside of seeing adverts in Wargaming magazines. At that time, all of my Wargaming figures were plastic.

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