coolyork | 17 Jun 2014 6:20 a.m. PST |
Thought this might be fun . I started gaming in 1972 and the first figures I orderd and or painted were either Scruby or early 25mm Mini Figs . Mark |
Cheriton | 17 Jun 2014 6:23 a.m. PST |
December, 1965, purchased Scruby 30mm Napoleonics at his "shop" in Visalia, California. Cheers, |
Son of MOOG | 17 Jun 2014 6:27 a.m. PST |
I started in 1989 and my first painted figures were my Mikes Models English Civil War armies
..they are still on campaign too! Tom |
Wackmole9 | 17 Jun 2014 6:29 a.m. PST |
July 1972 Airfix French Foreign legion vs Desert Arabs |
JimDuncanUK | 17 Jun 2014 6:29 a.m. PST |
Probably around 1962 or 1963. Figures would have been Airfix Civil War plastics, very badly painted. I was very jealous of a school chum who could paint much better. My first metal figures were Spartan hoplites, probably Garrison. I know where they are, in a friends game room, I sold them when I moved to other periods. |
Light Horseman | 17 Jun 2014 6:30 a.m. PST |
Not counting the Airfix plastics I collected as child and other plastic soldiers ordered off the back of cereal boxes, my first taste of lead was when I mail ordered some 25mm Hinchliffe British Napoleonics in 1975. I've been addicted ever since. |
PiersBrand | 17 Jun 2014 6:31 a.m. PST |
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Pictors Studio | 17 Jun 2014 6:32 a.m. PST |
I would guess about 1985 and they were Citadel Gnolls. |
ACWBill | 17 Jun 2014 6:33 a.m. PST |
1974-5 – painted 9 GHQ Shermans which I still have. |
John the OFM | 17 Jun 2014 6:35 a.m. PST |
I started gaming with Avalon hill around 1966 or so. I think Gettysburg was my first game. I did not get into minis until 1973 or so, and that would be Minifigs Republican Romans. |
Rich Bliss | 17 Jun 2014 6:37 a.m. PST |
I started board wargaming in 1979 with Tobruk I was introduced to miniatures in 1985 by Greg Novak with a Johnny Reb game. First miniatures panted were 15mm Martian Metals Traveller figures for role playing in 1980 First miniatures painted for a wargames were some Sikh infantry by Ral Partha. |
rbargs | 17 Jun 2014 6:40 a.m. PST |
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45thdiv | 17 Jun 2014 6:41 a.m. PST |
1977, Lizard's Grin space alien. Then on to Viking and Saxon. Maybe they were minifig or heritage. Don't recall. |
Ron W DuBray | 17 Jun 2014 6:47 a.m. PST |
1975 painted my army men :) and the plastic knights the same size. I gave them all away years ago. |
aegiscg47 | 17 Jun 2014 6:49 a.m. PST |
Around 1976 when I found a set of rules called Angriff at the local game store and a few boxes of plastic miniatures from Atlantic. |
Stosstruppen | 17 Jun 2014 6:51 a.m. PST |
Hmmm started board gaming around 1976 I bought Hitlers Last Gamble by West End. Miniatures started after the Army 85-86. First ones were 15mm ACW Minifigs and Stone Mountain. All downhill from there
. |
Happy Little Trees | 17 Jun 2014 6:53 a.m. PST |
1976. Airfix figures, probably Highlanders. |
RavenscraftCybernetics | 17 Jun 2014 6:56 a.m. PST |
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ironicon | 17 Jun 2014 6:56 a.m. PST |
Basically the mid-60s for painting and for serious gaming the mid-70s with Napoleonics (Mini Figs) useing CL+S. |
chuck05 | 17 Jun 2014 6:57 a.m. PST |
Started collecting figures in 1979. I didnt start gaming with them until 1989. |
Prince Rupert of the Rhine | 17 Jun 2014 7:02 a.m. PST |
1983 – someone gave me some 25mm Vikings which I think were Essex. I then went and bought some Minifigs Vikings and Saxons from a shop called Past Times in the east street centre in Southampton. That's were I discovered Citadel Miniatures and got into fantasy gaming. Didn't start painting until I was older my mum painted all my early miniatures with Humbrol enamels (well I was only 9 at the time). |
vtsaogames | 17 Jun 2014 7:02 a.m. PST |
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Great War Ace | 17 Jun 2014 7:04 a.m. PST |
November 1973. McEwan (aka Reviresco) were my first medieval troops (Normans).
Very rough miniatures, even for the day, but he was local and immediately available. That is the very first war game mini I painted. (And, we've done this topic before, and I've shared this pic before. Not that I think that's a bad thing, or I wouldn't bother participating
.) |
79thPA | 17 Jun 2014 7:19 a.m. PST |
Probably around '74 with 1/72 plastics and a set of Charles Grant rules. |
Doug MSC | 17 Jun 2014 7:30 a.m. PST |
My dad would buy me the latest 54mm Marx set every Christmas and I started painting them way back when I was 10 yrs. old in 1957. |
Dynaman8789 | 17 Jun 2014 7:33 a.m. PST |
I started gaming in 1978 or so but that was boardgames. Started buying my own miniatures in 2006 or so – GHQ then 15mm assorted. I had played with another group's miniatures in the early/mid nineties. |
Great War Ace | 17 Jun 2014 7:33 a.m. PST |
Well, if you're going to count the very first plastic toy that got Testors/Pactra paint applied to it, my first "miniature" is lost in the mists of time. But likely it was a knight of some sort. I do remember painting up large (120mm?) plastic knights that I found at a Kress's that was all too briefly open in my home town. I would have been 11 or 12 at the time. But I didn't start war gaming with written rules until '73
. |
Bill McHarg | 17 Jun 2014 7:35 a.m. PST |
First started boardgaming sometime in the mid-60s when my father bought my brother and I a copy of Blitzkrieg. I first started miniatures gaming in about 1977, and the first figures were minifigs Greek slingers, the ones that came in s strip. I used enamel paints and didn't prime them. They looked awful. :) |
Broadsword | 17 Jun 2014 7:37 a.m. PST |
Back in 1977, with Grenadier goblins. |
corporalpat | 17 Jun 2014 7:41 a.m. PST |
Started painting my Marx and Airfix figures along with model planes about 1964ish. Started board games with Battle Cry, Broadside etc. Did not discover metal figures and organized wargaming until about 1975 when I discovered Heritage Napoleonics and LoTR figures at a hobby shop (I was looking for model RR stuff). |
Eclectic Wave | 17 Jun 2014 7:41 a.m. PST |
1976 – Starfleet Battle Manual – Star Fleet Heavy Cruiser and Klingon Battle Cruiser. |
Rogues1 | 17 Jun 2014 7:43 a.m. PST |
Boardgames and D&D in 1975/76. Historical Miniatures 1985. First figures I painted were Essex 15mm Scots (still have) – thanks Kurt. First game I ran 15mm ACW – classic Fire and Fury – Thanks ACWBill for the coaching. |
Old Contemptibles | 17 Jun 2014 7:50 a.m. PST |
Historical Boardgames – 1972, all the usual suspects, AH, GDW, SPI etc. I thought miniatures were a step down from "real historical simulations" boardgames. They were like playing with toy soldiers. Historical Miniatures – 1979, Started with ACW. Empire/Heritage 15mm figures. Still have all of them. Somewhere in the mid to late 1980s I switched to Friekorps 15mm ACW. Now I hardly ever play a boardgame, most of my efforts and money goes to miniatures. |
Martin Rapier | 17 Jun 2014 7:50 a.m. PST |
I was still at junior school so I reckon 1970ish, first proper rules being Charles Grants 'Battle', Airfix figures of course. First boardgame was AHGCs 'France 1940' a few years later. |
Frederick | 17 Jun 2014 8:02 a.m. PST |
1967 – first gamed with Airfix ACWs, unpainted (loved those rusty red gunners), first painted figs were Airfix French Napoleonic line infantry |
Cyrus the Great | 17 Jun 2014 8:03 a.m. PST |
1967 and it was Airfix WWII and Roco/Roskopf Minitanks. |
jdeleonardis | 17 Jun 2014 8:06 a.m. PST |
Good post. 1985 or so, GW 40K Space Marines. |
Some Chicken | 17 Jun 2014 8:09 a.m. PST |
Fairly sure I started in 1971. I had been been a (very bad) Airfix kit modeller for a while and then discovered one of Don Featherstone's books at the local library. Those were the days. Before that I remember playing WW2 in the garden using Airfix figures and kits (Japanese infantry and Panther tanks on one side painted all over gloss black; not sure what the opposition was) and very primitive home made rules (you move one figure; I move one figure. It took forever to get nowhere) We were lucky to a local model shop which sold Minifigs 25mm figures but somehow never had what you wanted in stock. With a burning desire to recreate Waterloo, I bought what they did have and my first painted unit in metal was therefore a regiment of Royal Marines. Boardgaming started just after that with Avalon Hill's Richtofen's War. Not such a great game in hindsight, but it seemed fantastic at the time. |
Intrepide | 17 Jun 2014 8:10 a.m. PST |
1969 or 1970. A friend had a clutch of unpainted Roco tanks, WWII and Cold War. My first painted minis were either Airfix WWII Russians or Union ACW. I can't remember. I think it was Russians and I still have one. First metal figures were a box of Donnington Norse Irish from Johnson Hood, years later. |
Tom Reed | 17 Jun 2014 8:11 a.m. PST |
I think I played in my first wargame in the spring of 1976. Iwas invited to play by Greg Novak and thrown right into the thick of an ACW battle. Not long after I started painting 15mm ACW, the old Heritage figures. |
Dan Wideman II | 17 Jun 2014 8:18 a.m. PST |
1983. I had been building plastic models forever (as long as I remember) and had gotten a discounted set of the airfix Normandy diorama with some plastic infantry, a Sherman and a Tiger. Mrs Best (of Best hobbies) asked my dad and I if we had ever heard of people playing games with these models. We hadn't, but it sounded awesome. Later that year one of my dad's co workers mentioned D&D. We joined their gaming group (I was 10) with him and his kids. That led to me locating grenadier figures. They were the first minis I painted specifically for gaming. I just found them while I was doing a spring reorganization of the basement. THey are now on display in a glass case in the game room. It reminds me of where I came from. As far as historical gaming goes, that takes another year or two. In about 1985 my parents and I were working as volunteers at the Experimental Aircraft Association convention. We met our soon to be friend Tom there. My mother mentioned that I built models and played games. Tom was a Napoleonic gamer. The next day he brought in a couple hundred painted minifig 25mm Napoleonic Prussians. I was hooked. It was fate that I found a copy of Stuart Asquith's guide to wargames in the fly market (EAAs version of a flea market) for $1. USD Within weeks my friends and I had taken all the pieces out of Axis and Allies, Conquest of the Empire, and Fortress America and were playing with the simple rules in Mr. Asquith's book. The rest, as they say, is history. |
kidbananas | 17 Jun 2014 8:22 a.m. PST |
Started gaming in 1982 and the 1st minis I painted were some Ral Partha Orcs (I think) |
20thmaine | 17 Jun 2014 8:33 a.m. PST |
Aside from the usual Airfix figures, which would have started about the age of five or six, my real move up to "proper" wargaming was Skytrex WWII in 1/300th, very quickly followed by Minifigs wonderful first SF range (loved the robots) and Spaceship combat with Dave Rotor's Galactic Warfare rules and the Minifigs metal spaceships and the Davco Resin ones. Then, as soon as I'd read the LOTR I became a nut for the Minifigs ME range (the first ever Tolkien figures)
then the SS range (Conan's Hyboria) and gladiators (with the incomprehensible Paragon rules). And 15mm minifigs medievals and
.and
. After that I really got going with a return to Airfix for WWII and Ancients (supllemented by Atlantic) and ACW. I still have unfinished setups (I don't like to call them projects – that sounds too much like work!) from that era
. Ah well, it's been fun so far. Mostly. So, to answer the question : 1976, Skytrex WWII 1/300th |
Bob in Edmonton | 17 Jun 2014 8:34 a.m. PST |
About 1977 with the donation of a bunch of Airfix ACW guys from an older gentleman down the street. I then repainted these figures multiple times as the paint kept flaking (curse you tester's enamels). First proper games with rules and opponents--maybe 1980 with (unpainted) Matchbox WW2 figs with two kids who lived on the same block. |
Doug em4miniatures | 17 Jun 2014 8:47 a.m. PST |
1969 Hinton Hunt Brunswickers Doug |
pzivh43 | 17 Jun 2014 8:56 a.m. PST |
Board gaming since about 1968. First miniature game was in Seattle in about 1978 or so---microarmor WW2 games. Some CinC or GHQ tanks were first thing I painted. First figure wasn't til about 1985---25mm for the famous Alamo game. Mike |
jrbatso | 17 Jun 2014 9:01 a.m. PST |
Board gaming since 1962. Played a couple of miniature games at Pacific Origins in 1981 Started miniatures in earnest in 1997. First figures painted were 15mm Minifigs for ACW. |
Rick Priestley | 17 Jun 2014 9:14 a.m. PST |
Proper wargame with rules and all – 1971 (Charles Grant's Battle Practical Wargames) – and the models painted for that were Airfix Russians and Roco Minitanks (just like in the book!). |
DontFearDareaper | 17 Jun 2014 9:23 a.m. PST |
Started playing and collecting Avalon Hill wargames in 1972. My first miniatures were some Hinchcliffe Napoleonics in 1974 followed in short order by C&C and GHQ microarmor. Dave |
Random Die Roll | 17 Jun 2014 9:23 a.m. PST |
It was 1976
I can't remember the rules but I could get my hands on all the Marx figures I wanted--factory was local to me and many relatives worked at the factory |