When I was 21 I sold off my extensive Ancients miniature collection in 15mm. I have regretted it ever since. I am now 59 and have never sold another "Painted" miniature!
I’m slowly getting rid of all my 28/32mm scale collections, to focus entirely on 6mm and 10mm. My ‘storage space’ is full and I just don’t seem to play games like Warhammer and Bolt Action etc any more. All of the associated terrain at this scale takes up so much space.
For historicals it’s only really happened for me with 28mm First World War. I started building a force a couple of years ago and lost interest/had lots of other things I preferred doing, so after completing a couple of squads mothballed them. I revisited it last year with the announcement of a weird WW1 set of rules so I bought more figures. However, anticipation was greater than realisation and within a month it was all on eBay. I have no regrets apart from getting caught in the hype. If I did do the period again it would be with nothing bigger than 15mm figures. I have bought and sold a fair few figures and rules as samples though before committing to a full project. Once again no regrets. Sometimes you have to see the things to know if it’s what you want. Pre Internet of course this and shows were the only option.
I`m in quite a slump atm. Actively selling long dead projects, luckily not a heavey investment in mnis, but looking at historical projects to go. Age has a factor I know.
Theirs a bit of butterfly in all of us and sometimes, despite our best intentions, reinvesting projects that we probably shouldn't have touched with a barge pole 🤣
Big Lee, I'm shocked. Such heresy! No period should ever be abandoned ... ever! We as a community are pathological creatures. All projects must have a lingering unknown, a 'will I or won't I' continuing aspect to them. All sales are regretted. All goods given away missed. I'm 61yo and, despite the ongoing ridicule from my wife & family for 'playing with my toy soldiers', I refuse to give up anything.
Lol. My family are resigned to the fact that I am ridiculous... And I embrace that description 🤣. As for my existing collection I won't be selling anything. I will occasionally purge the lead mountain, but nothing painted is leaving my grasp ever again.
A noble sentiment indeed Big Lee. I'm 61yo and I've made the selling mistake a great many times. However, never say never. I had a chap here doing gardening. He has little money and one day he brought his 10yo son, who saw my war game room and was in awe. I owned a 100 figure strong space marine company (the first I ever painted) and he loved them. They are the 1990's era models, I haven't touched them this Century, he loved them, so I gave him the entire company. Dad's do that and you strike me as a man of similar sentiment.
Yes I have the same ridicule, until I show them the rule books and the books I read for the research on my given period. Especially when I pull out the big tomes.
You're a brave man; Napoleonics can be a major 'rabbit hole' to go down (I should know, I'm still down it), & there are any number of tunnels that lead off it 😉😄
I’ve sold off a number of projects over the years, and haven’t regretted much of it. But, as my painting speed and time have been declining, I am growing more reluctant to do so, as I don’t fancy replacing a project if I decide it was a mistake. I’m bumping up against my storage limits, which makes it easier to decide not to buy things in the first place.
Hi Lee; congrats on the milestone subscribers, pleased I got in during the early days - so much has been discussed since then. Once I left college & my mates all went their own ways, I decided to mothball my armies due to a lack of opponents, but having the space & it was quite some years before they again saw the light of day. If I had flogged them off, It would have cost considerably more to reinstate my collection; very glad I chose to do that. In the fullness of time I found new opponents & the collection resumed it's rightful place (after a bit of a facelift etc) as well as surprising many new opponents that I had hung on to my armies where they had disposed of theirs & were finding it expensive to build new ones. I have found /written rules which suit our group & don't chop & change, so the game systems have remained stable & we run cycles through the various periods so things don't get 'stale'. I had always kept to a fixed number of periods that held my interest, so my collection isn't as widely diverse as some peoples, but has become quite extensive over the years. Wouldn't like to try recreating it now, as it would bankrupt me.
My long dormant (failed) corps level 15mm Waterloo project is the reason why I decided to stick to ONE era (mid-18th century) when I began the fictitious Grand Duchy of Stollen project back in 2005-2006. I'm interested in, and tempted by many eras, but time, space, slow painting output, and, of course, available funds mean that (for me at least) focus on one era and generic scenarios is the way to go. I still have the painted (and unpainted) Napoleonics in storage, and might one day still do something with them, but for now it's 18th century all the way. Really enjoy your channel and have found your blog too. Always a pleasure to see new posts on both.
You're a rare thing, most wargamers I know can't help themselves and end up playing lots of periods. At least your other stuff is stored and ready for a second life at some point in the future. Thanks for the kind words about the channel. Its much appreciated 😊
When I joined the Army I sold off my 25mm Napoleonic and 25mm ECW and replaced them with 15mm armies as they were easier to move between postings and such. I have since had Warhammer and Warhammer 40K and other armies whilst serving and then gone onto other stuff. When I latter move onto a narrowboat space again became an issue, so I sold of most of my 25/28mm stuff and got 10mm Napoleonic and ECW armies to use for big battles on smaller tables. But I have still kept the original 15mm ECW and most of the 15mm Napoleonic armies that began back when I joined was in the Army even though I lack the space to use them all.
Don't get me wrong I love the site of 28 millimeter miniatures on a games table. Something quite spectacular about a huge Napoleonic game in that scale. The most people just don't have the space, so you're not alone. Downsizing to smaller scales makes a collection much more manageable. My 6mm collection in 28 mm would fill the house!
When I moved house I bitterly skipped two full sets of warhammer , which included 2 lots of Orcs & Goblins & 2 lots of High Elves, plus several characters & cavalry, and loads of army books (someone thankfully pulled them out of the skip, so I hope they’re having has much fun as I had with them 😃). Also about 30 excellent painted (not by me, but from a member of the Halifax Wargames Society, who sadly passed away a few years ago) 28mm Wargames Foundry Pirates ( I did save a few), plus a few 20mm Russian & German WW2 figures and an assortment of vehicles. I’ve vowed from that day to never throw away any more of my troops. Because recently we’ve converted the loft to gain access to it, so my faithful troops can be stored (and hopefully never forgotten) in peace there.
Yes when we first looked at where we are now, I realised that space was at a premium, so things had to skipped. So I had to be brutal with my collection, as I have over 150 board games which I definitely didn’t want to throw away. Fortunately I was allowed a corner of the spare bedroom. Now I have access to the loft, they live up there now and the spare bedroom is now my painting/ modelling room. With a compromise with the misses on buying a folding table and chair and a fold out bed in case anybody wants to stop over night.
Have a single army for several old out of production armies i have played and loved. But only having one army makes it hard to find another player, so always have atleast two armies for each period/game. That way it is easy to pull out a couple of armies for a game.
Hey Big Lee! Great topic & Thanks for the update! I STILL have the very first miniature that I ever painted. It is currently sitting on top of my computer monitor. Granted... it looks like a wounded slug riding a Water Buffalo... but it is a reminder of just how far I have come in the Hobby since I was a MUCH YOUNGER wargamer! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! Hope you have a great time at the convention. Enjoy!
That's brilliant, I've now idea what happened to the first models I painted. They were for D&D back in the 80s. A must have been given away or thrown away at some point which is a great shame. Don't get me wrong the painting was awful, but like you it would've been good to see how far I've come.
Never ever thought about selling anything. Back then I had Miniature Wargaming with the 4th Ed. WFB abandoned. This was also due to starting a family. When our oldest was 6 I stumbled across GW stuff in a toy store. Acquired the new rules - 6 Ed. - and dug out the old figures from the cellar. Back on the track. Since then I have started many periods, mothballed them, brought them out again and so on. No project is ever truly finished. You can improve every project, right?
What a sacrilegious suggestion! I'm very glad that during fallow times I didn't succumb to any faint temptation to clear stuff out and I'm still using Airfix 1/72 scale figures from the 1960s and haven't ever felt like abandoning any era of gaming. I play across 3 broad periods, sometimes in 1/300 too and only my 1/32 scale figures are in storage, due to lack of space.
Moving to Australia from the UK 20 years ago was a driver for rationalising my collection. I had 1/200 forces for the WW2 desert campaign which went to a bring and buy, other items, mostly unpainted, got given away. Time consuming was going through the piles of magazines and pulling out articles I wanted to keep and putting into binders! PDFs would have been easier if they had existed back then!
I've been 'rationalising' my magazine collections as well. Copying anything I think I need and giving away the rest (some went to a local GP surgery, some given to friends). Most of them are available as PDF's so nothing is truly gone.
The only project which I've given away was a completed Stormcast army for Games Workshop's Age of Sigmar. It was fun to paint but I didn't have an opponent and wasn't painting a 2nd force. I don't regret it and I hope its found a good home.
One way to look at it is to keep it open, and you only add projects and models as the need arises. So, you never truly "quit" a project, unless you got a very specific goal in mind (I want to make the entire Easy Company company historically accurate, I want an entire 1st Company of Ultramarines etc). But on the topic of quitting the hobby? I can't imagine that, even as I have given up on my local area providing me with any gaming opportunities after trying for 2 years. However, on that I will look to the future when I eventually move to a larger city and borrow a phrase; "Mercenaries never die, they just regroup in Hell".
I view my miniature collections as an investment, as when I have had a enough of the period, money from its sale can be used pay for another project (not always wargaming may I add)
I've bought armies to paint and sell then regretted it. I've given armies to my younger brother and regretted it. I've sold units that I've regretted selling. I did stop gaming medieval in 15mm, selling off Simone de Montfort and Duke de Warrene armies, the principal figures being pro-painted and the rest by me also a Mike Models Successor army. Really, they are the only ones I don't regret selling. The daftest thing I did was selling some 6mm Napoleonics to someone in the US. Presenting the cheque, I was told it would cost more to process than the cheque was worth!
A problem is that I bought too many miniatures over the last 20 years or so. Not enough time to paint them all. These days I'm offering unpainted minis to my friends on the basis of, "You paint them and you get to keep them." That's working pretty well.
Lack of space is an issue that seems to come up time and again in the comments. I'm glad I focused on mostly 6mm and 15mm early on, or I would have run out of space ages ago.
I have done this so many times, Fow, the 15mm I eventually got rid of when they went plastic, only later to play a 15mm game using 2FL rules, which made the battle go from a backyard to a town(s), within a countryside. I decided NOT to do 28mm, found 20mm, in WW2, and WW3, it proved the best option between the two, but I attend shows as dealers sell just 15mm or 28mm, still my building and modeling has improved (in my opinion of course), tight dice all.
My world War II stuff was a flames of War and while I'm never gonna play that game again, I wish I hadn't got rid of it because I could have reused or rebased some of my stuff for other games systems.
The biggest regret I have, is selling off my Vikings (about 60 individually based). We played Pig Wars and then it was no longer the "In Thing", so I sold them all off. A couple years later Saga came out and then second edition, so I had to start over. I had sold them to one of my current gaming friends so they occasionally hit the table. I often comment, "those are some nice minis!" I have sold off some other painted minis, and have never looked back. I guess it all comes down to the era. After my Vikings, I would be really had pressed to sell off my WW2, or ACW stuff.
I have sold nearly every project I ever started. The reasons can depend - I feel out of love with the period, did not like the ruleset, or was unable to find an other player with the same interests. I dont really look back with regret when I sell the project, as I am happier with it gone rather than have it cluttering up the house and taking up space.
I quit a few years ago due to a personal issue with a member in our group. Sold most of my models and got into other stuff like golf, cycling, Airfix kits etc. Miss some elements of it and have kept hold of some items like 1/3000 warships but they will probably end up being sold.
When GW shelved Warhammer Fantasy, I gave my brothers my armies. I should have shelved it, not for now, but for using with other rule books. I try to be disciplined with my buys and projects. For example, my Warlord Roman legionaries and my Arab gripping beast army are older sculps, but I still use them,even if there are better, newer sets.
I gave my WFB undead army to a friend when we started playing others games. I'm not sure ai would have played with them again, but I still regret giving them away.
I tend to keep anything that I have painted myself. As a serial 'unplanned project collector' over the years most of the stuff sold on is unpainted or gifted/swapped with mates (some even finding its way back home!). I am repurposing some 15mm Wars of the Roses DBA armies to Test of Resolve rather than move them on. Ubiquity is my watchword! Sellers regret? To many times to remember!
Before joining my local club many years ago, i had a 15mm ecw (i was into re-enactment of the period) ,i found out no one played the period so i sold it and moved into a period that there was a few members (napolionic). Atfer a short period i left the room (had a fallout with a leading member) and sold all of my Austrian army and moved to a group that played a number of periods. I have no regrets, although, since then my armies and periods have changed over the years, my only regret is that friends made, have moved on and know my interest is more of a butterfly and the few gaming friends are far between and less (with little interest in a particular period)🤔☹️.
I recently did a hard reset of my miniature hobby at the start of the new year. I sold all the miniatures I owned and started over. Why did I do that? A number of reasons. Space being an issue was a big one. The fact that I had numerous scales which made having terrain a pain to manage. I also don't have anyone to game with so I have to provide all sides to play. I made the decision to hard reset and stay in one scale from now going forwards and that is 15mm. I made the determination that I am not so much a gamer anymore and I am a hobbyist who just enjoys painting miniatures from time to time. I replaced miniature gaming with hex and counter traditional wargaming. I am now going forward with just doing 15mm ww2 for Command Decision and I intend to extend to the age of musketry for Volley and Bayonet. I also want to do a life long project of building a Roman legion for the early Imperial period.
I was going to say 'I bet that was a hard decision' but it's clear that you had a very fixed plan in your mind and have made your peace with that decision. I'm sure many wargamers wouldn't be able to do the same, I take my hat off to you. 🎩
@@MiniatureAdventuresTV It was and it wasn't. I was at peace with the decision to sell off the miniatures. I can say that I had a plan and I stuck to it so far. I picked up a holy grail hex and counter game that I otherwise would never have been able to purchase. I realized I can get my gaming fix with hex and counter games and be able to jump from period to period instead of having to constantly buy and paint miniatures that will take years to complete before I could even play. I think the fact that I have no one to game with made it an easy decision to bring back things that I can enjoy solo. Maybe one day I will have people to game with but until that day I have to trudge on solo!
I gave up on Warhammer Fantasy and sold my Bretonnian Army. I held onto some stuff but lot of it went. I regretted selling some units due to LION/DRAGON RAMPANT now providing a decent set of rules for these figures. But Warhammer Fantasy I do not regret leaving behind.
6mm moderns back in the 1990's - Some regrets now as I had the reserve unit I served with in miniature. 15mm ancients went a few years back - no regrets as 6mm just looks better. I while ago, I was given a small collection of various game starter sets via our local buy nothing group. Some, like Cruel Seas have been kept and added to, some like 1st ed Gangs of Rome are useful as generic ancients/fantasy figures, some like 40k Marines were passed on to someone who would appreciate and use them, and Conquest - Last Argument of Kings - I tried to give away but no takers. This last might wind up as Turnip 32.
I have sold off so many collections its hard to remember, but a rough list: 1/72 WWII 15mm British Peninsula 15mm Napoeonic Dutchy of Warsaw 15mm Napoleonic French 15mm Napoleonic Austrian 25mm Mid Imperial Roman 25mm Severan Roman 25mm Alexandrian Macedonian 28mm WWII French 28mm WWII Blitzkrieg German 28mm SYW French 28mm SYW Prussian 15mm SYW Prussian 28mm Williamite Wars Irish 28mm Napoleonic French 28mm Napoleonic British 28mm Napoleonic Prussian 28mm Napoleonic Wurttemberg Most of these sales were to fund the next project that took my fancy or because I became fed up with the project. Others, more recently, were following a downsizing house move. I turned 70 in February and it has dawned on me that I can’t really carry on as a wargaming butterfly like this. I have therefore decided to limit myself to projects I primarily enjoy painting and so have a chance of completing. Do I regret selling? Not really, it was more a case of recycling to fund my addiction and the temptation posed by better rules, better quality figures and models and my insatiable appetite for something new to paint!🤣
Wow that's quite a list. But it seems your primary enjoyment comes from collecting and painting so selling their view to fund your addiction as you put it is probably not a bad thing for you. 👍
Started painting ecw, did 6 figures and went mmmh! Now sitting in the loft, but unlikely to get rid. Best sit on it and within a few years , you will be able to get rid at similar cost you bought it for 😅
I sold one of my Warmachine armies glad it is gone. Been thinking if it gets big again. I might try and sell the other one. Though i keep thinking i could finish painting it.
The very fact you have more than one army for this game suggests a level of commitment and investment. Don't be too hasty though. As with most big decisions the old adage "decide in haste, repent at leisure" applies!
@@MiniatureAdventuresTV I have more then one army left from the game. Though it did nuke one of the factions i was playing. Its no biggy. I have other games i play.
There are several points to be made here. First a game is OVER when it comes down to who moves first. Consider Tic-Tac-To. Whoever moves first WILL win. In chess the White player has an extraordinary advantage. I was once playing one of those games that takes forever and has ten players. (Civilization I think) We were at a hobby shop. We were on turn two. *TWO* A kibitzer walked by and calmly announced that I would lose on turn twenty. In a less extreme example I play DBx games. I'll take an army from the lists until I have mastered it. I can then foresee the outcome of any battle. Hurray for me but it becomes boring. In my early days of gamming, I would choose an army or period for all the wrong reasons. (Who hasn't watched She Wore a Yellow Ribbon?) So, I would happily paint up the armies only to realize that the game period wasn't all that much fun. I have two very large WWI armies. There's nothing quite as enjoyable as marching into machine gun fire. Nowadays I'm very careful about the armies I start. Solo gamming is an EXCELLENT way to experiment with rule and periods. I play with cardboard counters to try things out. Something you can't do with a group. My current aim is to paint figures that can blend into more than one period.
Yes, Cardboard counters is something I have done as well. Its a great way to figure out how to base an army and test the rules at the same time. All before spending a penny, and avoiding all many of hassle later when you realise you've made the wrong choices.
Interesting question and topic. Now a question for you Lee. As we are both mature gentleman but my later life has been quite chaotic with job losses, retraining at uni in my 50s (I'm 58) and now trying to fiscally to recover is it worthwhile exploring that question "Is it time to quite wargaming"? I ask myself as I am gamer of 45 years, in that time you name it I have done in terms of periods, incl GW, mass collections and so on. As I struggled to survive in the last 15 years and lot of that has gone to the point now I am pretty much at scratch and starting again but everything is so terribly expensive especially for those of us down in the southern ocean (NZ), so i now struggle to get motivated and while the heart and dreams go oh lets do that, (think 15s, 10s and 6s with a few resin larger models thrown in) I now ask myself why bother. I tend to keep to myself due to hearing loss, depression and managing head trauma from a car accident but still "aspire" to be a gamer yet reality confronts me week in week out. I'm even struggling to finish a 57 figure, 12 element Forged in Battle SLave Army, silly I used to be able to churn that in weekend now its like hmm. Therefore is it time to "GIVE UP GAMING??". PS: Yes we are all butterflys 8-)
Cant think of anything wargaming I have sold and regretted. However had my car stolen with a large 15mm ACW Union and confederate army in the boot. Like to listen to wargaming videos when I'm painting. Great update.
The car was not cheap, a convertible and I went down to a mini afterwards lol using the insurance money as a deposit for a house. I was basicly living in the car at the time and the boots contents in clothes and warganing stuff was still more of a loss to me, as insurance did not cover them or the time I had spent painting them.
Never really sold off anything apart from some old Airfix figures back at school. I tend to keep projects going on the back boiler as interest waxes and wanes. Classic example is Trajan’s campaign n Dacia which I started back in 1979 with a school friend. Off to university and we continued building the armies (WRG at the time) then after uni I moved abroad which put the joint effort on hiatus. I resurrected it around 2005, sadly with my old mate well off the radar. I now have two large 15mm forces which are both “just about” finished! Have recently replaced the original Dacian cavalry from 1980;with some more modern castings! Soon they will ready to take the field - or will they? 😂
I sold my WW1 airplanes for Wings of Glory and don't regret it, even though I'm getting back into it a little bit. Gave away my WW2 airplanes and don't regret that. Air wargames just don't do much for me.
Judging from the howls of GW fans this week, the time to give up is when a company says you can no longer play with the models they sold you. Of course this isn’t likely to happen with historicals. For other genres the more sensible response is to play miniature-agnostic indie games, or remain happy with an older edition, and never to play in a store or event run by a company that dictates which brand toys are allowed.
I've been watching some of those videos as well. I have a little bit of sympathy but at the same time it shouldn't come as a shock to anyone Games workshop do this. I haven't played any GW games for decades. One of the main reasons was I was fed up of the rulebook changed and the codex changing. and a whole army or a large chunk of it either being Retconned or in one case having to rebase the entire army to fit the new style that they wanted us to use. 25 years later and nothing has changed.
I often wish I'd never sold my huge painted and never played 15mm armies for WWII, DAK & Brits. What an idiot!! And my 15mm Mexican-American War figures too. Which a saw at a bring and buy a few years later in the same box I sold them in for double the price I sold them for.........Sigh!
When I was 21 I sold off my extensive Ancients miniature collection in 15mm. I have regretted it ever since. I am now 59 and have never sold another "Painted" miniature!
And I bet it still burns all these years later. Been there, wish I hadn't done that!
@@MiniatureAdventuresTV it still burns. I still haven’t repainted the Macedonian army though I own the minis!
I’m slowly getting rid of all my 28/32mm scale collections, to focus entirely on 6mm and 10mm. My ‘storage space’ is full and I just don’t seem to play games like Warhammer and Bolt Action etc any more. All of the associated terrain at this scale takes up so much space.
For historicals it’s only really happened for me with 28mm First World War. I started building a force a couple of years ago and lost interest/had lots of other things I preferred doing, so after completing a couple of squads mothballed them. I revisited it last year with the announcement of a weird WW1 set of rules so I bought more figures. However, anticipation was greater than realisation and within a month it was all on eBay. I have no regrets apart from getting caught in the hype. If I did do the period again it would be with nothing bigger than 15mm figures.
I have bought and sold a fair few figures and rules as samples though before committing to a full project. Once again no regrets. Sometimes you have to see the things to know if it’s what you want. Pre Internet of course this and shows were the only option.
I`m in quite a slump atm. Actively selling long dead projects, luckily not a heavey investment in mnis, but looking at historical projects to go. Age has a factor I know.
Theirs a bit of butterfly in all of us and sometimes, despite our best intentions, reinvesting projects that we probably shouldn't have touched with a barge pole 🤣
Big Lee, I'm shocked. Such heresy! No period should ever be abandoned ... ever! We as a community are pathological creatures. All projects must have a lingering unknown, a 'will I or won't I' continuing aspect to them. All sales are regretted. All goods given away missed. I'm 61yo and, despite the ongoing ridicule from my wife & family for 'playing with my toy soldiers', I refuse to give up anything.
Ah, I completely agree with you! 👍
Lol. My family are resigned to the fact that I am ridiculous... And I embrace that description 🤣. As for my existing collection I won't be selling anything. I will occasionally purge the lead mountain, but nothing painted is leaving my grasp ever again.
A noble sentiment indeed Big Lee. I'm 61yo and I've made the selling mistake a great many times. However, never say never. I had a chap here doing gardening. He has little money and one day he brought his 10yo son, who saw my war game room and was in awe. I owned a 100 figure strong space marine company (the first I ever painted) and he loved them. They are the 1990's era models, I haven't touched them this Century, he loved them, so I gave him the entire company. Dad's do that and you strike me as a man of similar sentiment.
@@peterixon8708 I would sah, that's charity, a different thing than selling for money. Even with the possibility to spawn a new thank full gamer. 🫡
Yes I have the same ridicule, until I show them the rule books and the books I read for the research on my given period. Especially when I pull out the big tomes.
I hope it’s not time for me I’m nearly 70 and only just decided to start Napoleonics. The project is the Peninsula war 10mm.
You're a brave man; Napoleonics can be a major 'rabbit hole' to go down (I should know, I'm still down it), & there are any number of tunnels that lead off it 😉😄
I’ve sold off a number of projects over the years, and haven’t regretted much of it. But, as my painting speed and time have been declining, I am growing more reluctant to do so, as I don’t fancy replacing a project if I decide it was a mistake. I’m bumping up against my storage limits, which makes it easier to decide not to buy things in the first place.
Hi Lee; congrats on the milestone subscribers, pleased I got in during the early days - so much has been discussed since then. Once I left college & my mates all went their own ways, I decided to mothball my armies due to a lack of opponents, but having the space & it was quite some years before they again saw the light of day. If I had flogged them off, It would have cost considerably more to reinstate my collection; very glad I chose to do that.
In the fullness of time I found new opponents & the collection resumed it's rightful place (after a bit of a facelift etc) as well as surprising many new opponents that I had hung on to my armies where they had disposed of theirs & were finding it expensive to build new ones.
I have found /written rules which suit our group & don't chop & change, so the game systems have remained stable & we run cycles through the various periods so things don't get 'stale'.
I had always kept to a fixed number of periods that held my interest, so my collection isn't as widely diverse as some peoples, but has become quite extensive over the years. Wouldn't like to try recreating it now, as it would bankrupt me.
Appreciate the shout out Lee, hopefully see you at Salute!
I hope so too!
Congrats on 3K plus subscribers, Lee!
Thanks so much!
@@MiniatureAdventuresTV You got it, Lee! Thoroughly enjoy your channel!
Sellers regret has hit me hard before. It takes months to paint an army, best to keep them!
My long dormant (failed) corps level 15mm Waterloo project is the reason why I decided to stick to ONE era (mid-18th century) when I began the fictitious Grand Duchy of Stollen project back in 2005-2006. I'm interested in, and tempted by many eras, but time, space, slow painting output, and, of course, available funds mean that (for me at least) focus on one era and generic scenarios is the way to go. I still have the painted (and unpainted) Napoleonics in storage, and might one day still do something with them, but for now it's 18th century all the way. Really enjoy your channel and have found your blog too. Always a pleasure to see new posts on both.
You're a rare thing, most wargamers I know can't help themselves and end up playing lots of periods. At least your other stuff is stored and ready for a second life at some point in the future.
Thanks for the kind words about the channel. Its much appreciated 😊
When I joined the Army I sold off my 25mm Napoleonic and 25mm ECW and replaced them with 15mm armies as they were easier to move between postings and such. I have since had Warhammer and Warhammer 40K and other armies whilst serving and then gone onto other stuff.
When I latter move onto a narrowboat space again became an issue, so I sold of most of my 25/28mm stuff and got 10mm Napoleonic and ECW armies to use for big battles on smaller tables. But I have still kept the original 15mm ECW and most of the 15mm Napoleonic armies that began back when I joined was in the Army even though I lack the space to use them all.
Don't get me wrong I love the site of 28 millimeter miniatures on a games table. Something quite spectacular about a huge Napoleonic game in that scale. The most people just don't have the space, so you're not alone. Downsizing to smaller scales makes a collection much more manageable. My 6mm collection in 28 mm would fill the house!
When I moved house I bitterly skipped two full sets of warhammer , which included 2 lots of Orcs & Goblins & 2 lots of High Elves, plus several characters & cavalry, and loads of army books (someone thankfully pulled them out of the skip, so I hope they’re having has much fun as I had with them 😃). Also about 30 excellent painted (not by me, but from a member of the Halifax Wargames Society, who sadly passed away a few years ago) 28mm Wargames Foundry Pirates ( I did save a few), plus a few 20mm Russian & German WW2 figures and an assortment of vehicles. I’ve vowed from that day to never throw away any more of my troops. Because recently we’ve converted the loft to gain access to it, so my faithful troops can be stored (and hopefully never forgotten) in peace there.
Sometimes its necessary to downscale, and from the comments here the main reasons are moving home or lack of space (or both!).
Yes when we first looked at where we are now, I realised that space was at a premium, so things had to skipped. So I had to be brutal with my collection, as I have over 150 board games which I definitely didn’t want to throw away. Fortunately I was allowed a corner of the spare bedroom. Now I have access to the loft, they live up there now and the spare bedroom is now my painting/ modelling room. With a compromise with the misses on buying a folding table and chair and a fold out bed in case anybody wants to stop over night.
Have a single army for several old out of production armies i have played and loved. But only having one army makes it hard to find another player, so always have atleast two armies for each period/game. That way it is easy to pull out a couple of armies for a game.
Hey Big Lee! Great topic & Thanks for the update! I STILL have the very first miniature that I ever painted. It is currently sitting on top of my computer monitor. Granted... it looks like a wounded slug riding a Water Buffalo... but it is a reminder of just how far I have come in the Hobby since I was a MUCH YOUNGER wargamer! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! Hope you have a great time at the convention. Enjoy!
That's brilliant, I've now idea what happened to the first models I painted. They were for D&D back in the 80s. A must have been given away or thrown away at some point which is a great shame. Don't get me wrong the painting was awful, but like you it would've been good to see how far I've come.
Never ever thought about selling anything. Back then I had Miniature Wargaming with the 4th Ed. WFB abandoned. This was also due to starting a family. When our oldest was 6 I stumbled across GW stuff in a toy store. Acquired the new rules - 6 Ed. - and dug out the old figures from the cellar.
Back on the track. Since then I have started many periods, mothballed them, brought them out again and so on. No project is ever truly finished. You can improve every project, right?
After selling my world War II stuff and regretting it, I have come to the same conclusion. No project is ever finished, just paused.
I gave up on 1/72 Naps for 28mm. There in storage.. and I wasn't too deeply in.
What a sacrilegious suggestion! I'm very glad that during fallow times I didn't succumb to any faint temptation to clear stuff out and I'm still using Airfix 1/72 scale figures from the 1960s and haven't ever felt like abandoning any era of gaming. I play across 3 broad periods, sometimes in 1/300 too and only my 1/32 scale figures are in storage, due to lack of space.
Lol. I'm determined, come what may, my existing collection you staying with me to the end. I'm not going to be selling anything again.
Moving to Australia from the UK 20 years ago was a driver for rationalising my collection. I had 1/200 forces for the WW2 desert campaign which went to a bring and buy, other items, mostly unpainted, got given away. Time consuming was going through the piles of magazines and pulling out articles I wanted to keep and putting into binders! PDFs would have been easier if they had existed back then!
I've been 'rationalising' my magazine collections as well. Copying anything I think I need and giving away the rest (some went to a local GP surgery, some given to friends). Most of them are available as PDF's so nothing is truly gone.
The only project which I've given away was a completed Stormcast army for Games Workshop's Age of Sigmar. It was fun to paint but I didn't have an opponent and wasn't painting a 2nd force. I don't regret it and I hope its found a good home.
A bit topical as GW seem to have Retconned a lot of that range just recently.
One way to look at it is to keep it open, and you only add projects and models as the need arises. So, you never truly "quit" a project, unless you got a very specific goal in mind (I want to make the entire Easy Company company historically accurate, I want an entire 1st Company of Ultramarines etc).
But on the topic of quitting the hobby? I can't imagine that, even as I have given up on my local area providing me with any gaming opportunities after trying for 2 years. However, on that I will look to the future when I eventually move to a larger city and borrow a phrase; "Mercenaries never die, they just regroup in Hell".
Not by choice, was clearing junk to the tip and bag of boxes for the bin got confused with two fully painted armies in 28mm.....
Oh no.... I feel slightly queasy 🤦♂️
I view my miniature collections as an investment, as when I have had a enough of the period, money from its sale can be used pay for another project (not always wargaming may I add)
I've bought armies to paint and sell then regretted it. I've given armies to my younger brother and regretted it. I've sold units that I've regretted selling. I did stop gaming medieval in 15mm, selling off Simone de Montfort and Duke de Warrene armies, the principal figures being pro-painted and the rest by me also a Mike Models Successor army. Really, they are the only ones I don't regret selling. The daftest thing I did was selling some 6mm Napoleonics to someone in the US. Presenting the cheque, I was told it would cost more to process than the cheque was worth!
A problem is that I bought too many miniatures over the last 20 years or so. Not enough time to paint them all. These days I'm offering unpainted minis to my friends on the basis of, "You paint them and you get to keep them." That's working pretty well.
That's a good idea. I've been going through my lead mountain and giving away stuff I know I'm never gonna paint.
I can foresee my biggest issues in future being lack of space and too much ambition. The first one being the more severe aspect.
Lack of space is an issue that seems to come up time and again in the comments. I'm glad I focused on mostly 6mm and 15mm early on, or I would have run out of space ages ago.
I regret selling, or giving away, all miniatures I’ve ever disposed of.
I have done this so many times, Fow, the 15mm I eventually got rid of when they went plastic, only later to play a 15mm game using 2FL rules, which made the battle go from a backyard to a town(s), within a countryside. I decided NOT to do 28mm, found 20mm, in WW2, and WW3, it proved the best option between the two, but I attend shows as dealers sell just 15mm or 28mm, still my building and modeling has improved (in my opinion of course), tight dice all.
My world War II stuff was a flames of War and while I'm never gonna play that game again, I wish I hadn't got rid of it because I could have reused or rebased some of my stuff for other games systems.
The biggest regret I have, is selling off my Vikings (about 60 individually based). We played Pig Wars and then it was no longer the "In Thing", so I sold them all off. A couple years later Saga came out and then second edition, so I had to start over. I had sold them to one of my current gaming friends so they occasionally hit the table. I often comment, "those are some nice minis!"
I have sold off some other painted minis, and have never looked back. I guess it all comes down to the era. After my Vikings, I would be really had pressed to sell off my WW2, or ACW stuff.
It's a difficult decision, and judging from some of the comments here, often regretted.
I have sold nearly every project I ever started. The reasons can depend - I feel out of love with the period, did not like the ruleset, or was unable to find an other player with the same interests. I dont really look back with regret when I sell the project, as I am happier with it gone rather than have it cluttering up the house and taking up space.
I quit a few years ago due to a personal issue with a member in our group. Sold most of my models and got into other stuff like golf, cycling, Airfix kits etc. Miss some elements of it and have kept hold of some items like 1/3000 warships but they will probably end up being sold.
That's a sad story. 😢
When GW shelved Warhammer Fantasy, I gave my brothers my armies. I should have shelved it, not for now, but for using with other rule books.
I try to be disciplined with my buys and projects. For example, my Warlord Roman legionaries and my Arab gripping beast army are older sculps, but I still use them,even if there are better, newer sets.
I gave my WFB undead army to a friend when we started playing others games. I'm not sure ai would have played with them again, but I still regret giving them away.
I tend to keep anything that I have painted myself. As a serial 'unplanned project collector' over the years most of the stuff sold on is unpainted or gifted/swapped with mates (some even finding its way back home!). I am repurposing some 15mm Wars of the Roses DBA armies to Test of Resolve rather than move them on. Ubiquity is my watchword! Sellers regret? To many times to remember!
Before joining my local club many years ago, i had a 15mm ecw (i was into re-enactment of the period) ,i found out no one played the period so i sold it and moved into a period that there was a few members (napolionic). Atfer a short period i left the room (had a fallout with a leading member) and sold all of my Austrian army and moved to a group that played a number of periods. I have no regrets, although, since then my armies and periods have changed over the years, my only regret is that friends made, have moved on and know my interest is more of a butterfly and the few gaming friends are far between and less (with little interest in a particular period)🤔☹️.
Difficult finding a group that's diverse enough to accommodate everybody's interests.
I recently did a hard reset of my miniature hobby at the start of the new year. I sold all the miniatures I owned and started over. Why did I do that? A number of reasons. Space being an issue was a big one. The fact that I had numerous scales which made having terrain a pain to manage. I also don't have anyone to game with so I have to provide all sides to play. I made the decision to hard reset and stay in one scale from now going forwards and that is 15mm. I made the determination that I am not so much a gamer anymore and I am a hobbyist who just enjoys painting miniatures from time to time. I replaced miniature gaming with hex and counter traditional wargaming. I am now going forward with just doing 15mm ww2 for Command Decision and I intend to extend to the age of musketry for Volley and Bayonet. I also want to do a life long project of building a Roman legion for the early Imperial period.
I was going to say 'I bet that was a hard decision' but it's clear that you had a very fixed plan in your mind and have made your peace with that decision. I'm sure many wargamers wouldn't be able to do the same, I take my hat off to you. 🎩
@@MiniatureAdventuresTV It was and it wasn't. I was at peace with the decision to sell off the miniatures. I can say that I had a plan and I stuck to it so far. I picked up a holy grail hex and counter game that I otherwise would never have been able to purchase.
I realized I can get my gaming fix with hex and counter games and be able to jump from period to period instead of having to constantly buy and paint miniatures that will take years to complete before I could even play.
I think the fact that I have no one to game with made it an easy decision to bring back things that I can enjoy solo. Maybe one day I will have people to game with but until that day I have to trudge on solo!
I gave up on Warhammer Fantasy and sold my Bretonnian Army. I held onto some stuff but lot of it went. I regretted selling some units due to LION/DRAGON RAMPANT now providing a decent set of rules for these figures. But Warhammer Fantasy I do not regret leaving behind.
6mm moderns back in the 1990's - Some regrets now as I had the reserve unit I served with in miniature. 15mm ancients went a few years back - no regrets as 6mm just looks better.
I while ago, I was given a small collection of various game starter sets via our local buy nothing group. Some, like Cruel Seas have been kept and added to, some like 1st ed Gangs of Rome are useful as generic ancients/fantasy figures, some like 40k Marines were passed on to someone who would appreciate and use them, and Conquest - Last Argument of Kings - I tried to give away but no takers. This last might wind up as Turnip 32.
Ancients in 6mm, I can only agree they look better by far :)
I have sold off so many collections its hard to remember, but a rough list:
1/72 WWII
15mm British Peninsula
15mm Napoeonic Dutchy of Warsaw
15mm Napoleonic French
15mm Napoleonic Austrian
25mm Mid Imperial Roman
25mm Severan Roman
25mm Alexandrian Macedonian
28mm WWII French
28mm WWII Blitzkrieg German
28mm SYW French
28mm SYW Prussian
15mm SYW Prussian
28mm Williamite Wars Irish
28mm Napoleonic French
28mm Napoleonic British
28mm Napoleonic Prussian
28mm Napoleonic Wurttemberg
Most of these sales were to fund the next project that took my fancy or because I became fed up with the project. Others, more recently, were following a downsizing house move.
I turned 70 in February and it has dawned on me that I can’t really carry on as a wargaming butterfly like this. I have therefore decided to limit myself to projects I primarily enjoy painting and so have a chance of completing.
Do I regret selling? Not really, it was more a case of recycling to fund my addiction and the temptation posed by better rules, better quality figures and models and my insatiable appetite for something new to paint!🤣
Wow that's quite a list. But it seems your primary enjoyment comes from collecting and painting so selling their view to fund your addiction as you put it is probably not a bad thing for you. 👍
Started painting ecw, did 6 figures and went mmmh! Now sitting in the loft, but unlikely to get rid. Best sit on it and within a few years , you will be able to get rid at similar cost you bought it for 😅
I sold one of my Warmachine armies glad it is gone. Been thinking if it gets big again. I might try and sell the other one. Though i keep thinking i could finish painting it.
The very fact you have more than one army for this game suggests a level of commitment and investment. Don't be too hasty though. As with most big decisions the old adage "decide in haste, repent at leisure" applies!
@@MiniatureAdventuresTV I have more then one army left from the game. Though it did nuke one of the factions i was playing. Its no biggy. I have other games i play.
There are several points to be made here.
First a game is OVER when it comes down to who moves first. Consider Tic-Tac-To. Whoever moves first WILL win. In chess the White player has an extraordinary advantage.
I was once playing one of those games that takes forever and has ten players. (Civilization I think) We were at a hobby shop. We were on turn two. *TWO* A kibitzer walked by and calmly announced that I would lose on turn twenty.
In a less extreme example I play DBx games. I'll take an army from the lists until I have mastered it. I can then foresee the outcome of any battle. Hurray for me but it becomes boring.
In my early days of gamming, I would choose an army or period for all the wrong reasons. (Who hasn't watched She Wore a Yellow Ribbon?) So, I would happily paint up the armies only to realize that the game period wasn't all that much fun. I have two very large WWI armies. There's nothing quite as enjoyable as marching into machine gun fire. Nowadays I'm very careful about the armies I start.
Solo gamming is an EXCELLENT way to experiment with rule and periods. I play with cardboard counters to try things out. Something you can't do with a group.
My current aim is to paint figures that can blend into more than one period.
Yes, Cardboard counters is something I have done as well. Its a great way to figure out how to base an army and test the rules at the same time. All before spending a penny, and avoiding all many of hassle later when you realise you've made the wrong choices.
Walked around salute in 2008...thought ''What the ~uck am i ding here''...never been back....im done with gaming now
Interesting question and topic. Now a question for you Lee. As we are both mature gentleman but my later life has been quite chaotic with job losses, retraining at uni in my 50s (I'm 58) and now trying to fiscally to recover is it worthwhile exploring that question "Is it time to quite wargaming"? I ask myself as I am gamer of 45 years, in that time you name it I have done in terms of periods, incl GW, mass collections and so on. As I struggled to survive in the last 15 years and lot of that has gone to the point now I am pretty much at scratch and starting again but everything is so terribly expensive especially for those of us down in the southern ocean (NZ), so i now struggle to get motivated and while the heart and dreams go oh lets do that, (think 15s, 10s and 6s with a few resin larger models thrown in) I now ask myself why bother. I tend to keep to myself due to hearing loss, depression and managing head trauma from a car accident but still "aspire" to be a gamer yet reality confronts me week in week out. I'm even struggling to finish a 57 figure, 12 element Forged in Battle SLave Army, silly I used to be able to churn that in weekend now its like hmm. Therefore is it time to "GIVE UP GAMING??". PS: Yes we are all butterflys 8-)
Break? Sure. Quit? Neeeeeeveeeerrr
👍
Cant think of anything wargaming I have sold and regretted. However had my car stolen with a large 15mm ACW Union and confederate army in the boot. Like to listen to wargaming videos when I'm painting. Great update.
Ooo i bet that hurt. I could accept the loss of my car (its an old banger now anyway) but the loss of miniatures would probably bring me to tears.
The car was not cheap, a convertible and I went down to a mini afterwards lol using the insurance money as a deposit for a house. I was basicly living in the car at the time and the boots contents in clothes and warganing stuff was still more of a loss to me, as insurance did not cover them or the time I had spent painting them.
Never really sold off anything apart from some old Airfix figures back at school. I tend to keep projects going on the back boiler as interest waxes and wanes. Classic example is Trajan’s campaign n Dacia which I started back in 1979 with a school friend. Off to university and we continued building the armies (WRG at the time) then after uni I moved abroad which put the joint effort on hiatus. I resurrected it around 2005, sadly with my old mate well off the radar. I now have two large 15mm forces which are both “just about” finished! Have recently replaced the original Dacian cavalry from 1980;with some more modern castings! Soon they will ready to take the field - or will they? 😂
You seem to be employed that you started painting these armies in 1979 and still played with them yet 🤣. Now that's what I call a completist. 👍
I do my best 😂🎉
I sold my WW1 airplanes for Wings of Glory and don't regret it, even though I'm getting back into it a little bit. Gave away my WW2 airplanes and don't regret that. Air wargames just don't do much for me.
Judging from the howls of GW fans this week, the time to give up is when a company says you can no longer play with the models they sold you.
Of course this isn’t likely to happen with historicals. For other genres the more sensible response is to play miniature-agnostic indie games, or remain happy with an older edition, and never to play in a store or event run by a company that dictates which brand toys are allowed.
I've been watching some of those videos as well. I have a little bit of sympathy but at the same time it shouldn't come as a shock to anyone Games workshop do this. I haven't played any GW games for decades. One of the main reasons was I was fed up of the rulebook changed and the codex changing. and a whole army or a large chunk of it either being Retconned or in one case having to rebase the entire army to fit the new style that they wanted us to use. 25 years later and nothing has changed.
I often wish I'd never sold my huge painted and never played 15mm armies for WWII, DAK & Brits. What an idiot!! And my 15mm Mexican-American War figures too. Which a saw at a bring and buy a few years later in the same box I sold them in for double the price I sold them for.........Sigh!
We've all done it from time to time. Lesson learned, you won't do that again!
Not watched it yet, but I bet the answer is no!