"What makes a great wargames' figure?" Topic

There will be a lot of personal preference in response to this question which should, I'd imagine, produce a fairly diverse response.

I'd like to get the ball rolling by suggesting:

1. historical accuracy. Is every button, no more no less, in place?

2. size. Is it perfectly in tune to its stated scale?

3. heft. Is its proportions in keeping with its height?

5. sculpting. Does it have all the finely worked detail you could ask for?

There'll be others but I'm going to go for what is probably a sub-set of 5.

6. hands. Are they well modelled or shapeless blobs?

I say this because whilst this isn't the only feature I look at (!!) I think you can tell a lot about a figure's sculpting by the skill in which the hands are modelled.

7. Can I afford an army of them for battle units?

8. If skirmish can I base them on the shape/size base I want? (Not slotta base)

9. does the figure design not limit the shape/size of the base I can use?

Considering the vast piles of unpainted lead everyone has, I would say ease of painting. Can't help but think that when I started everyone had minifigs blobs, but painted minifigs blobs. Now everyone has finely sculpted minis, with every detail sculpted, and nobody seems to have the time or ability to paint them.
That's why I like Front Rank, chunky, well defined details, easy and quick to paint.

Easy to paint and looks good when you are done

That just about trumps everything

As to details (shapeless blob hands/painting) I suspect it varies depending on size/scale.

Nice looking hands might be more important in 28+mm figures than in 3 mm.

Character. Old Glory's certainly show evidence of rushed work but they have character, period hair, varied poses. Any one of them won't win first prize anywhere but collectively they are a splendor to behold when painted well. Especially Alsop's ACW and Napoleonics. In fact most of their Napoleonics in either scale are pretty good.

No question on my part it's well cast figures and a sculptor who is painter friendly and by this I mean easy to paint the figure with nice smooth raised surfaces. Examples would be Front Rank, Coppelstone, Artizan, Renegade, Some Foundry, Aventine plus some others with similar styles and make.

Christopher

I think Tony Barton is best qualified to answer that. He seems to specialise in well-proportioned figures portrayed in accurate kit and believable poses. They also paint very well indeed provided you have the talent (or are prepared to pay for it).

I'm ticking pretty much ochoin's list.

Phil

Availability.

If the figures are out of production, or only available from one obscure dealer in some back-of-beyond location with abysmal postal support, then no matter how magnificent the sculpting the figures are pretty-near useless.

I think we already had the best answer-- Tony Barton!

10, Painted and based
Reason?..It all comes to nought if the best figure is hiding in a miniman mountain.

Particularly for skirmish or small level games, I like my figures to be dynamic. I get that real warriors take smoke breaks or pop behind a tree to urinate, but when I paint Vikings, I want my berserks to look like a bunch of screaming, raging guys rushing to dismember their foes.

Yup, Feet up now, I know what you mean: some of the nicest figures I own totally intimidated me and remain unpainted many years later.

Grelber

10. Reasonably active poses (not hyperactive).
11. Good variety of poses available.

4. seems to have gone missing.

I shall propose, since it wasn't numbered above, but was mentioned, nice, realistic, action poses (drat, miniMo listed it as 10 and 11).

Okay, 4. is still available.

So, 1 – 6 (and possibly 4), plus 10 and 11.

12. It looks equally good on its own and in a unit of dozens.

when I paint Vikings, I want my berserks to look like a bunch of screaming, raging guys rushing to dismember their foes.

… if we could just leave my in-laws out of the discussion for a moment …

4. It evokes something about the character of the engagement it is in.

It looks like what is supposed to look like.

It's easy to paint.

1. Cheap

2. Strong enough to stand being dropped on the floor

3. All in the same pose (pre-twentieth century)

4. Does it take an inkwash and a drybrush well

5. Does it look vaguely like what it is supposed to be

6. I do not need to stick the d**n thing together