Did Prepainted Minis Get You Into Minis?

[UngainlyTitan]

Used to paint minis with ok results but hated it. I stopped when I no longer had wargaming opponents locally. I used to do the fantasy figures between the historical.
Have a fair few of the DDM prepainted and will try and expand on these as budget allows.

 

[Jeff Wilder]

I always liked the idea of using real representational miniatures -- as opposed to M&Ms or whatever -- so from the time I was 12, off and on I'd buy a few metal minis, with the intention of painting them.

Unfortunately, every time I'd paint about 10 percent of them, and the rest would go unpainted. I'm too much of a perfectionist in painting, with too little skill. One mini would take me three hours, easy, and in the realm of moderate to serious painters I was probably in the 25th percentile with the finished product.

In 25 years or so, I completed maybe 30 minis to my satisfaction, and maybe two I was actually kinda proud of.

Then came DDM, and away went all those metal minis. Forever*. Thank God.

(* Unless they come out so I can commission a good painter to do them, which is possible.)

 

[frankthedm]

Discount bins for discontinued figs got me into minis.

With the ease of prepainted minis, and their initial low price back in the day... (something like $7.99?), there were a lot of buy ins.

I bought 2-3packs of mage knight, realized their rarity set-up was complete ass and avoided buying much more for quite a while. Eventually found the Paul & Judy's Coins and Cards web site when it was still doing Mage knight and bought singles untill they stopped carrying the clix games.

Did anyone find themselves going to unpainted metal figs after a while?

Yeas, many a metal fig has gone unpainted due to having cheap plastic figs ready for the battlemat.

Never stopped with the unpainted ones though because I enjoy painting them, and there are a lot of new companies out there keep doing awesome stuff.

I still buy a few though I really have slacked off from painting. I enjoy it, though I am easily distracted by the internet and videogames. Also having folks who seem unable to learn how to handle a hand painted mini in the game group sure isn't much of an encouragement either.

 

[messy]

yes.

doesn't this thread need a poll?

messy

 

[Gothmog]

One of the reasons I got into gaming was minis. I was over at a friend's house when I was 9, and his older brother had some old Grenadier and Ral Partha minis. My dad is a hardcore model railroader, so I always liked minis and building terrain and scenery. I was entranced by the minis, and asked what they were for. When I found out you could use them with gaming, I was hooked.

Over the years, I've accumulated probably 7000 metal minis, about a third of which are painted. I'm a pretty quick painter (1.5-2 hours for a "human sized" mini done carefully), and do a pretty good job at painting them (I've won a couple of painting competitions and do commission work sometimes when time permits.). A lot of my fun of prepping for a game is painting minis, and I find it relaxing- even with my busy schedule now, I try to paint 10-15 minis per month. I've used minis for gaming ever since I started, and while I've played without them, the minis have always been a part of the game for me. Oh, and using unpainted minis drives me NUTS- maybe its the perfectionist in me.

I have picked up a few boxes of the D&D minis, but the random nature kinda bugs me. I have bought probably about 100 of them on Ebay when I wanted a specific monster. I usually repaint and rebase the mini, because let's face it- mass produced and painted plastic minis usually look kinda crappy.

 

[Tuerny]

Yes. I have thousands, and have not looked back since then.

 

[WayneLigon]

Did anyone find themselves going to unpainted metal figs after a while?

Nope. I don't have the time or skill to produce lots of beautiful high-quality minis. If I can't do something truly wonderful then I'll settle for the decent-enough paint job the prepainted minis have without all the time and effort. I did the lead minis route back in the day when there was no real choice, and all I ever got out of it was wrist pains from packing around a huge chest of painted lead. When Cardboard Heroes came out, I abandoned lead minis almost completely in favor of those and counters.

 

[Serendipity]

One of the reasons I got into gaming was minis. I was over at a friend's house when I was 9, and his older brother had some old Grenadier and Ral Partha minis. My dad is a hardcore model railroader, so I always liked minis and building terrain and scenery. I was entranced by the minis, and asked what they were for. When I found out you could use them with gaming, I was hooked.

This. I think I *stopped* using minis around 1989 or so. (A matter of expense really, well that and largely moving on to things non-D&D.) My dad was into model railroading but my mother was into painting the 75mm heritage napoleonics by the time I got into gaming....so it was doubly reinforced.
Don't really have the space or the budget for them now. But very fond memories.
In any case, unpainted - and metal.

 

[frank_blankenship]

Yeah

Absolutely. I have really bad nerves and painting something that small is not a hobby it's a chore. Granted, the creativity involved is appealing but between my nerves and the additional price of paint etc.

Prepainted is the way to go! Thank you WotC.

 

[Wormwood]

The last time I bought metal minis was back in 84 or so. I discovered that I hated painting them and abaondened the entire business (which is ironic considering I ended up in a career as an artist).

Pre-painted DDI minis definitely brought me back as a collector, and made the transition to 4e a lot easier (since I had a suitcase full of minis to play with)