"What are your favorite Old School miniatures..." Topic

that are still in production today? Define 'Old School' how ever you like. For me, 1985 will be an arbitrary cut off date. Here are some of mine. All 25s.

Ral Partha Sudan range.

Rafm had a French F&IW colonial marine reloading that I think was great.

Hinchliffe Byzantines.

What's on you list?

Hinchliffe Renaissance Polish. The Winged Hussar is magnificent!

Ral Partha Zulus. Fought them yesterday!

RAFM Soldiers of the Queen.

Hinchliffe American Revolution

What I know as Hermitage 15mm Nappys

If you mean Heritage, they are not in production.

Miniature Figurines (MiniFigs) of any time period but especially Colonials, 18th Century tricornes, and Medievals. I have plenty including a few that I got recently from the UK before all the increase in postage costs.

And agree with John about the Ral Partha Colonials, but include their Medieval figures.

Jim

Hinchliffe Napoleonic and American Revolutionary War

Ral Partha AD&D figure line. When their contract ended with TSR, they had to destroy all of the molds and figures they had left in stock. They were very nice sculpts.

Sadly, I had limited discretionary cash, so I only managed to buy a very few of them before the contract murder of the product line… They made a fantastic Wolf-powered Goblin Chariot with crew. I had one painted, and I did game with it a few times, but I sold it off for a charity fund. The charity fund collapsed, so I kept my monies, and I began re-building my armies with new mini's. :-( Cheers!

RAFM are technically kaput.
BUT the molds etc were acquired by Ral Partha Archives, or some name like that. Apology for poor memory.

EDIT: Ral Partha Legacy. Historicals are lagging a bit in the Resurrection.

I've always been very fond of the later, more robust, 25mm MINIFIG Napoleonic figures, especially the French Imperial Guard Grenadiers.

Ral Partha Legacy has been doing a pretty good job if getting the Rafm stuff back into production, but I find the prices rather eye-watering.

15mm Mini Figs
15mm Mikes Models Renaissance line*

* Still available as "special order" from Essex.

Airfix.

Hinchliffe Napoleonic.

@79thPa
Yeah. &5 for a "true 25mm" figure when the molds and masters are done is a bit insane.

So, TECHNICALLY, they're still available, but definitely priced out of my pocked.

1970s 1st gen Ral Partha 25mm Armored Orcs (Tom Meier), back in production at Ral Partha Legacy. My very first 'big army' purchase of 100 some figures when they went on clearance sale in 1976 to make way for the 2nd gen.

As for prices, cost of metals have been soaring for quite some time now, mould making ain't cheap, and 1970s prices sure aren't coming back! Nostalgia lines are niche, and certainly won't be selling in the volume they did during first run. So I don't begrudge RPL trying to make a living while keeping the old goodies alive as a labour of love.

1st gen, 1st wave, Ral Partha Battlemechs, 1986 — and definitely Old School mechwise. Some still in production with Ral Partha Europe.

1985 was primarily the original Battledroids minis, now OOP, but also one of the very first marketed as Battletech and still in production — the venerable Flea came out in 1985. And currently have 14 of those marvelous Fleas serving in my Alpha Strike battalions now.

Hinchliffe Napoleonics are my favorite, followed very closely by Connoisseur.

Ral Partha legacy gets my vote.

Mini Fig 25mm Napoleonics. I have about 10,000 painted but not played with since 2015 anniversary of Waterloo game :(

Scruby/Historifigs followed closely by SAE.

Hinchliffe for me, albeit they are all still in production. As for specific ranges, ECW, AWI and SYW are probably my favourites.

Heritage 15mm Napoleonettes although I have a real soft spot for Minifig 15mm strip Napoleonics.

Airfix.

Surens and Staddens.

Another vote for Hinchliffe! I had the honour to get a tour round his factory in Meltham (Huddersfield, UK) and meet him, lovely chap and great figures!

Are Lamming still available, technically?
If so, I like them. But only if they pass the "still in production, somewhere" criterion.

15mm Minifigs Dark Ages and Crusades ranges. Just bought a bunch more last week.

Never did metal 25mm, or whatever it is now called, and don't have much love for Airfix figures, though I did use quite a few in the early days (mid 60's). Switched to 15mm at about the time half decent stuff became available and then 6mm, 2mm and 10mm.

None of them get any nostalgic feelings from me.

Yes Heritage Napoleonetts
My Prussian guard, some Russians are those

Pretty much all the naval ranges by Valiant (ancient galleys, Armada period, Napoleonic sail). The sculpts date back to the 1970s, but when the castings come out okay (rare these days), the miniatures are still a delight to behold. I wish they'd produced a full line of Renaissance galleys to go with the galleons and galleasses, and an ADW range in the same sculpting style as the Napoleonic range.

As an aside: I actually think Valiant's old Stardate 3000 spaceships are my favorite spaceship miniatures, but I've never seen them on any gaming table anywhere. OTOH my opinion isn't worth much – I don't paint or collect spaceships, and I only play spaceship combat when conscripted by friends.

- Ix

John, some Lammings are still available, not all by any means. A quick internet search will find the firm. The same firm does QT and early Dixon

I keep seeing Hinchliffe Napoleonics listed. I had no idea you could still get them. I would really like to have some of the guns. Where do I get them now?

If 1985 is the "cutoff date" for Old School, I really liked Essex 100YW, and WOR figures. Had whole armies of them.
Still fantastic figures.

A second for Essex figures. All ages.

@Yellow Admiral, you have to order them direct.

Hinchliffe, through Lancashire Games.
link

15mm Frontier Miniatures. Soooo much goodness.

Holger Eriksson GNW figures
link

Ral Partha Colonials.
link

Airfix 10th Hussars and Highlanders. Great memories.

Is Old Glory considered old school?

15mm Frontier Miniatures.

I have a lot of the Frontier 15mm AWI figures, and I wish that either:

1. I didn't; or
   
2. I could get more

They don't look like anything else I can get, and they're uncomfortably bigger or smaller than my other options, so I can't really expand existing units. Maybe someday I'll combine 2+ Frontier units by partially repainting some of the figures and just build whole new units from other brands to replace the units I combined out of existence.

I feel the same about the old Washington's Wars figures (and the related Medieval line, Swords & Soldiers). They were really nice looking figures, but extremely small, and nearly impossible to match with anything in production.

Ral Partha Colonials

Hinchliffe Byzantines (my 1st Ancients army). I have bought some since they are still available.

Heritage Lord of the Rings figs. Also still being sold although pricey to buy in bulk.

Heritage 15mm Ancients. My 1st 15mm Punic Wars armies. Still have them and they are painted.

Ral Partha 25mm Fantasy Orcs, Dwarves and Elves. Some of the best sculpts ever made! 15mm Fantasy range. Also great sculpts!

Gzg 25mm SF figs and vehicles.

Denizen 25mm Ventaurans and Federation figs. Great stuff and rereleased.

Grenadier 25mm Fantasy range. Elves, Dwarves, Orcs and more. The Wood Elves are beautiful!

Thanks.

John

@Yellow Admiral, you have to order them direct.

From where? Is this the site?

Mega Miniatures is another vote for me. They were still making metal (lead or pewter?) mini's when they went out of business, selling most of their molds.

They sold a catalog of their mini's, listing who bought each of their molds, but the Fire Giant figure I really wanted more of, wasn't found in the catalog, at all, let alone who bought the molds… GRRRrrr! They had some truly great fantasy figures, and they were all metal. They went out around 10-20 years ago, but their figures were "old school" to me. Cheers!

Ral Partha for colonials and Heritage for goblins.

After on and off dwelling on this today, I will settle on:

Minifigs 15mm Napoleonics
Ral Partha 25mm Fantasy
Superior Models Starfleet Wars space ships

15mm/ Empire/ Heritage Napoleonics.Minifigs 15mm 3rd generation (with 8 sided oval bases.
25mm Ral Partha Colonials

Heritage 15mm

25mm Scruby Napoleonics
25mm Hinton Hunt/Heritage Napoleonics
25mm RAFM Colonials

Ral Partha 25mm Fantasy Orcs, Dwarves and Elves. Some of the best sculpts ever made! 15mm Fantasy range. Also great sculpts!

Agreed! Also on my list:

Gzg 25mm SF figs and vehicles.

Denizen 25mm Ventaurans …

Grenadier 25mm science fiction, including several Traveller ranges.

RAFM Traveller 25mm and ships.