"When NOT to use ebay" Topic

I'm sure there are many reasons to not use ebay for selling or buying but in particular I am just going to put it out there – don't use it to fill out your rank and file troops cheaply from someone's used collection.

I'm interested in playing War of the Ring. I've been looking to purchase larger sized collections as you can often get a deal on them. However, after just a couple of purchases, while I see I have plenty of figures, so many of them are so poorly painted or broken and in need of repair that I can't help but think I would have been better off just getting the figures unpainted and doing it myself. Seriously – some of this stuff I would not have paid for had I seen it in real life. Photos can be deceptive.

Hopefully I can resurrect enough of these figures to have made it worth it. Some are getting dipped in a gentle paint remover. Some are destined to become casualty stands only! Some I'll have to rebuild weapons for. Seriously, how many broken swords and spears can a person be expected to rebuild?

Oh well. Next time, I'm doing it the old fashioned way and painting my own damn figures and taking good care of them.

I've been burned twice. I am better for examining photos and deciding what is a good job and what is not. I mostly shop for unpainted lead on Ebay now. It is cheaper and i am satisfied with my own skills. Plus they can be based the way I want them based.

Sorry to hear you had a less than satisfactory experience. Hopefully you can get enough figures serviceable to make the purchase worth your while.

John

It is a risk, I have had a few, again WOTR stuff, however I have had some great bargins, and none of the bad stuff has/will go to waste, casualties etc.

Much also is dependant on the photos, we have recently bought 2 x dressers, not for my little men tho! and they are worth far more than we paid for them, purely as we took a bit of a risk on photos that, frankly, did not do them justice.

Tally Ho!

Nothing beats the hands on tactile experience of a real shop (or trade stand at a show). Sure EBay is cheap (sometimes) but until those little suckers arrive you never know what you're really buying. Trust me; I've been burned several times, and not just with miniatures.

My EBay motto is "Expect to be disappointed". Low expectations are nearly always exceeded.

BigLee
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in my experience best to buy still in blisters only, or from "know" good suppliers, been caught out by recasts in the past.

When I buy from ebay I buy unbuilt unpainted items. I find it far more bothersome to fix the problems that someone else has created so it is worth it to pay somewhat higher costs.

I have a policy of no used LOTR/WOTR mini's, as the weapons are too easy to break even in a foam minis case, just going to and from the game store, much less across the country/world in a box- no matter how well you try to pack them…

Funny…I am slowly building out my LoTR forces almost exclusively on E-bay and have had nothing but great luck. Frankly, I have only ever been burned once and it was by a TMPer who was going to paint my armies. He took my figs and my money and I never got either back. Lots of excuses then illnesses then silence, silence, silence.

The trick is finding reliable vendors who take good photos and stand behind their stuff.

Just to add something more to the other side of the scale, I've had some truly amazing painted sets from Ebay. The Silver Helms I won were truly brilliant, likewise the Confrontation Griffins where I was the only bidder, a well painted force for less than the cost of the metal.