What Do Treants, Gelatinous Cubes, Mimics, and Displacer Beasts Have In Common?

The latest D&D miniatures set, Monster Menagerie, is now here. From WizKids, check out some of these repainted plastic figures below. "In Monster Menagerie you will find a vast array of challenges for your heroes to overcome and allies to fight by your side. Face Bulettes as they use their powerful claws to tunnel through the earth when they hunt. Or the Gelatinous Cube as it scours dungeon passages in silent, predictable patterns, leaving perfectly clean paths in its wake. Or the Displacer Beast which takes its name from its ability to mask itself with illusion, displacing light so that it appears to be somewhere it is not."

(Apparently any article headline in the form of a question can be answered "no"; so I decided to rise to the challenge.)

Find it at WizKids here.

 

[mosaic]

Why does the paint on WotC minis (whether you're talking about the old WotC-produced ones or the newer WizKids ones) always look gloppy?

 

[Connorsrpg]

Hmm. I thought those here looked good. Cool pose on the displacer beast.

 

[Queer Venger]

Just bought these, gorgeous

 

[Olaf the Stout]

I like the look of the Mimic.

I’ve got more than enough DDMs from when WotC were producing them to cover almost all my needs. I think I might look through the WizKids D&D and Pathfinder mini releases to see if there are any monsters that I might be missing that will be worth picking up from a 3rd party seller.

 

[tomBitonti]

Mosaic, partly because the paint which is used is a very sturdy formulation, designed to endure handling. I'm sure that affects the ability to apply the paint.

In part because detailed painting is expensive. At least when the figures were manually painted, the cost was measured as the count of individual applications of paint.

I'm not sure nowadays, since (my understanding) the painting has been automated.

 

[mosaic]

Thanks.

And don't get me wrong - some look fine, really nice, even. But others - the werewolf, the pirate lady, the rhemoraz - lack detail and the paint looks blobby, too uniform in color, so almost cartoony. It always throws me when some sculpts/paints look good and others in the same set, not so much.

 

[Jhaelen]

Hmm. I thought those here looked good. Cool pose on the displacer beast.

+1. I also really like the treant - and that's one of the few D&D monsters I don't already have a good mini for.

 

[barasawa]

I hate random packs for RPG minis.
The set encounters in the adventure aren't random, and though the 'random encounters' are called random, they are actually an appropriate subset that fit the area and level. Random packs of minis aren't.
True, those look nice, but if I can't get the ones I need, it's a waste of money, of which I have a limited amount of.

 

[Radaceus]

is it just me, or are these old Ral Partha knock-off/molds?

I am currently on the opposite side of the planet of a hoard (in our groups game room) of Ral Partha Pewter about a few thousand of which I hand painted, and I am sure I painted that mimic, that female buccaneer, the umber hulk, the bullette, and the displacer beast; the spider and treant also seem familiar.

And as a note: We stopped buying miniatures , save for the random birthday/xmas gift, which is usually some massive thing or another, oh about 1996ish. Mostly (90%) Ral Partha in the collection.

 

[Greybird]

Randoms kill it for me, too. I have hundreds of miniatures. A majority of the pieces in this line I have absolutely no use for, but there are a few that would fill big holes in my collection. I could easily end up spending a hundred bucks to get three or four useful miniatures - that's just silly.

I'll wait and buy the singles from a third party.