I’m starting to run my RPG soon, so I thought I’d go into Wargames Supply to pick up some figures — most of mine are from wargames like WHFB, 40K, Warzone, and stuff like that so are mostly unsuitable for character figures.
Things certainly have changed, as in the old days, I could rock into somewhere like Mind Games or Pendragon, and pick up any assortment of miniatures designed for RPGs — Ral Partha, Grenadier, and Marauder were available, although from memory Marauder were producing more LotR targeted figures. Now nothing. There are a few random figures available, but they mostly seem to be aimed at a specific game.
So I thought that my options might be to get some D&D ones made by WotC. The only options available were a starter set of what appears to be a collectible figure series — why the fuck they’d do that for an RPG is beyond my comprehension, but so are most things that Wizards do — and a couple of “boosters.” The starter was $40 and had 3 heroes, 1 baddie, and one dragon. So 3 figures I might reasonably expect to find useful. The boosters were $28, of which 2 figures in one of them might have been useful. And they were the worst quality figures I’d ever seen. Very very shoddy crap. There are rumours (that I’ve seen but not read in depth) that Wizards are canning their figures. Part of me thinks it’s a bloody good idea, but there’s a niggling part of me that wonders what (or who) will fill the gap.
Yeah, there’s a lot of stuff on eBay, but I like to be able to walk into a shop and have something to play with by the time I walk out.
OK, so the WotC figures weren’t an option as they’d work out to be about $15 a figure, and I’m not prepared to pay that for such low quality mass produced junk. So what are my options?
I had almost given up when I spotted a huge, and I mean fucking ginormous, box set of a board game called Descent: Journeys in the Dark for $157.. A bit pricey I thought, but I’ll have a look. Lifting it off the shelf almost gave me a hernia. Its contents included 20 hero miniatures, and 60 plastic monsters. Eighty furgin’ figures for under $160! That’s less than $2 a figure. Alright, so I have to paint them, but a) they look to be much better quality than the WotC figures, and b) they’re two fuggin’ dollars each. And I get a board game for free.
Yep, I’ll take it. I got me a wheelbarrow and I took it home (after paying for it of course).
