"What were your first metal miniatures?" Topic

Hinchcliffe medievals and Asgard fantasy. The details are lost in the mists of time.

A hinchdliffe Polish Lancer and a Cuirassier – all that the young guy had for sale and I was into Napoleonics (still am). Dreadful figures unfortunately – by that I mean I could not paint them well, and they needed a lance glued on, which I could not do as I had no good glues (mid 70's was not a time of superglue and quick dry epoxy).

Minfigs soon followed – far nicer to my mind. Still got them.

these days I see that Hinchliffe can be painted really well, but in those days I could not cut it.

SAE French Napoleonic Horse artillery and line infantry,
from the 1950's.

They've been 'retired' for a loooooooooong time !

Minifigs Middle Earth.

My Hinchliffe German 105s predated them though (and still in use!)

Minifigs 25mm 'PB Range' Seleucids in 1973 with 'telegraph pole' pikes (which I subsequently snipped off and replaced with florist's wire)…

I still have some of that original metal army but it no longer gets used. I added some 'A' Range Minifigs bought at the Southampton shop a year or so later.

Prince August cast your own, orcs and elves mould from Selfridges toy department on a holiday to London, must have been early 1980s. I remember the store had a huge display of ancient Eygptians that I fell in love with, that and the Britons RHA set.

Der Kriegspieler's 25mm AWI back in 1976.

Grenadier's box set of monsters for D&D. Man those orcs were awful!

Garrison ancients

Minifigs Napoleonics---weren't they 20mm to begin with? Then they went to S Range.

Hinchliffe Napoleonics--a luxury state of the art purchase then.

These guys…

The handful of Grenadier orcs were the very first from a yard sale in the mid-1980's, followed closely by the heroes. There was also an elf with an axe, but that figure is difficult to get to right now. Original paint jobs with the obvious later conversion on the one wizard.

Heritage LotR Hobbit Bounders. It tickled me to include one them on a HOTT hero element 25 years later… still wearing his original Testors enamel paint scheme.

Minifigs 25mm Late Romans and GHQ micro armor Shermans
and something German.Not sure which was first,they were
bought on the same day.

Minifigs 15mm ACW back in the mid-80s.

First Metal figures were: Scruby N-gauge Napoleonic (early/mid 70's) followed by Scruby 20mm ACW (for FPW conversions).

Minifigs/Alberken Austrian Grenadiers about 1968

1:1200 scale Gato/Tench class sub bought from Nathan R. Preston when they where still in Des Plaines, Illinois.(1970)

Wargaming
25mm Citadel: Fellowship of the ring
15mm Essex Huns

Bigger scales
Barton Miniatures: 90mm Landsknecht standardbearer

Minifigs 25mm Middle Earth & Imperial Romans
Garrison 25mm Sword & Sorcery
wow, that was a long time ago…

Scruby 9mm AWI in the early 70's. They lacked detail and that was to the good as you could "convert" them by simply painting on whatever detail you wanted.

Back in 1979 I saw an ad in Military Modelling for Citadel Miniatures. Thinking that they looked intriging I sent off for a handful of mixed adventurers and monsters.
Still got them, and haven't looked back since!

Minifigs- Aureola Rococo fantasy.

I think it was the three winged monkeys, or did they come slightly later?

Anyhow either Citadel or Ral Partha, can't remember which*. In a SF book store that also had some games, back in -79.

* And can't find them on Stuff of Legends. They are in the room with me, but on what shelf I don't know.

Heritage Caverns Of Doom and The Sorcerer's Crypt. Still have them with their original paint.

Garrison 20mm Ancients from the Northern Garrison – change buses at Harrogate – and Minifigs 'S' Range from the Train Shop Supermarket in Bradford.

Can't get 'S' Range figures vany more, but you should see my collection of Garrison 20mm…

Rob

Still have a lot of the stuff I bought as a pre-teen.

I had and sold/traded the Grenadier Imperial Marines boxed set. Would love to have that back, as well as the Grenadier Fantasy Lords Skeleton box.

Sold off, then subsequently re-acquired and painted Grenadier's Orcs of the Severed Hand.

Other standouts are Citadel's two-headed troll, and Ral Partha's bugbears and warriors of chaos. Just picked up an NOS RP Jabberwock last year to paint, always liked that figure but never owned it before.

w.

GHQ Micro Armour--the originls--with the wire barrels.

Minifig and Hinchliffe renaissance. Currently being wire brushed after being Simple Green-ed.

I love Religons little collection there!

Definitely Minifigs 15mm Russian syw pandours and cossacks and I bought 'em from Mal Wright

regards
dave

15mm Minifig French and Russian Napoleonics.

Wargame was Scruby 30mm Naps in 1960, I believe.

Larger figures, a few Britains and then 54mm Busslers, Civil War and Custer's 7th Cavalry.

Tom

25mm Hinchcliffe ECW figures in 1974.

Hinchliffe 25mm Napoleonics, when they first came out, from Gordon's Model Shop in Sheffield (long gone). I remember the excitement of the first cavalry…

28mm Col. "Iron Hand" Straken, an Imperial Guard special character that was a free after mailing in a coupon from a Boy's Life magazine. He came with a flyer full of 2nd Edition figures, and for the next six years I thought GW was the hobby.

Platoon 20 ( 20mm ) and Minifigs valley of the 4 winds 25mm circa 1981 .

Besides the toy soldiers?
Maybe 12 40mm flats in 1969…lots of plastics…then, after the Army –
Grenadier ECW, a couple of regiments of cavalry (featuring "Harry the Happy Horse") and several of foot… in 1976.

Phoenix small 25mm French and British (British Oficers shouting wewr fantastic!) and Peter Laing 15mm….(Tons of them)

Marco

In 1974, when I was 11, a friend showed me his older brother's made up game system. (In retrospect the force composition was based on chess.) I bought the same figures to make my own army; these were metal Normans in probably 20mm or 22mm not 25mm. Should dig them up to see if there's a manufacturer on the base bottoms. Infantry was 10 cents, cavalry was 25 cents. I did a LOTR diorama for a school project with them as Rohirrim, and a couple years later when I started D&D, I used them as extras until I had enough 25mm fantasy.

My first metal….. GHQ modern around 1980. Then WWII and space craft minis( battle line 3000(?) and Star Fleet Battles) followed by 15mm ACW minifigs.

Late 70's, picked from a box of loose miniatures at the local hobby shop for (I think) 25 cents apiece: two identical Ral Partha Evil Wizards, a soldier with a pike and another with a sword and shield. So I could use them with my recently acquired Metagaming microgame Wizard.

I painted them with my mom's acrylic craft paints. Who knew the trouble that would start. :-)

An old Citadel pre-slotter based Samurai part of the old range then some bugmans Dwarfs when GW sold lots of other games like a B&M store anyone remember the old GW in Manchester?

1977, Minifigs 25MM Napoleonic British Rifles. Why i parted with these I'll never know… I lament doing that.

Hey Henrix,

I guess these are those winged monkies….

link

The Lost Minis WIKI is a gold mine for old stuff.

link

Minifigs 95 Rifles. Wish I still had them. Had them send from the UK to Athens when I was stationed there in the mid 70s.

Scruby N- scale Napoleonic British Hussars were the very first true gaming figures. Large and Small Trolls from Minifigs mythical earth range were picked up early on.

Skytrex 1/300 Chieftains & T62s from Concorde Models in Aldershot.

Hi

Recast Airfix plastics (Malbrurian I think)using old discarded lead pipe, a small cooking pot and my mum's cooker – into plaster of Paris moulds (a la Featherstone's military modelling book).
I think I achieved about 20 figures before mould disintegration.
Painted up with a few Humbrol gloss enamel paints.

A Hinchliffe Polish Lancer and a French cuirassier

From a kid a few years older than me who acted as a local agent

From little acorns

Marc

Heritage 25mm Lord of the Rings.

1/1200 scale ships from Superior models, followed by GHQ WW2