I just didn't dig Chainmail all that much. I bought a starter pack and while the quality of the minis was nice enough, I really disliked the pricepoint since it was only a skirmish game, and especially disliked a lot of the molds and the number of pieces they used. Honestly, they could have molded a lot of the minis wholly but chose to break them up, for what I can gather, no apparent reason. Add to that that apparently retailers were made some big promises as to how popular Chainmail was supposed to be and also, from what my LGS owner said, some hefty requirements for inventory (a lot of which he still has, even at over half off MSRP) to get into it. Also, Chainmail failed miserably in that it didn't stick to the original game plan which was to release the skirmish rules and then several months later, release a mass battle systems compatible with D20/D&D. I mean come on, that was a no brainer, but they managed to mess it up.
Not to mention, when Chainmail came out I was just learning to be a father, had a new job and not as much time to paint, much less drill and pin all these friggin' models... Frankly, the D&D Miniatures line with its prepainted plastic minis is right up my alley. It's cheaper, it's much simpler, and my skills with a brush and ink abilities can fix anything that doesn't pass muster. Honestly, that's not too many of the miniatures. Some could stand a little drybrushing to add some depth but they look better than 3 folks in my gaming group can manage. Frankly, I don't get the complaints... Reaper isn't out of business and GW and Rackham minis look prettier every new release (well, I dislike the new Cold Ones and think the Saurus are sort of dumpy). Oh, and I think WotC will improve in quality, as time goes on and the folks in the sweatshops.. er I mean factories get more used to painting them and WotC learns more about molding them.
