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In 1999, I had a marriage come to an end in what could be possibly the worst way that a marriage could end (worse than divorce).

But during the separation, I had an accident that put me in the hospital, and my wife stole everything I owned, which included about 10,000 miniatures, about ¼ of which were Citadel/GW miniatures from 1978 - 1994, with the vast majority of them being 1982 - 84 vintage Citadel (Original Beaky marines, Original Beastmen - then still Runequest Broo, Zoats, LOADS of Slann, The Master Molds for the early-80's Citadel Imperial Dragon, an Army each of their LoTR line from the 80s, I am not even Counting the Adeptus Titanicus and Epic 40K miniatures here, which included one of the very few Metal Original Warlord Titans).

But there were some features that would make the miniatures identifiable.

1) They were VERY well painted.
2) The 40K stuff was based such that the bases were grey and looked like Starship deck plating (these were the sloppiest painted things in the collection, as I stupidly did not mask off the bases to get properly straight lines).
3) the Space Marines were all black, and had a "Man-in-the-Moon" emblem for their chapter insignia.
4) The Fantasy miniatures were mostly based upon round, 1" styrene bases that has been filled with plasticize so that the miniature's base blended into the plastic base, and was then painted a dark brown with a green flocking. For older miniatures, they would be surprisingly regular sized bases (I used a machine punch to create them - a rarety for the 1980s).
5) All of the Epic 40K miniatures were based on the 20mm square bases, and would probably be accompanied by Vehicles from FASA's Renegade Legion game, Centurion. The Infantry would also be based 4 to a stand, and not 5 (except for some of the Space marines, and most of the Space Orks).


There are other identifiers, but they will stand out in any description to be used by me to identify actual leads.

And that is because I will be paying at least a three figure reward for any verifiable leads as to where any one miniature from my collection might be.

The Miniatures were originally stolen in San Francisco, and she sold them as a part of a Storage Unit in May of 1999, while I was in the hospital.

MB

Honestly, 15 years later you have very very little chance of ever finding them again. Your collection has probably been broken up, sold on ebay, stripped, repainted and resold at least once, probably much more.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but it's like when a person goes missing they say that after 24 hours they stop looking for a person and start looking for a body. You're really looking for a needle in a haystack here.

No harm in trying, but without photos or even a trail, the likelyhood of finding them is nil.

Though best case scenario, I'd say she still may have them in the back of a storage unit or in an attic. I'm constantly surprised how often that happens with stolen/misplaced armies, strictly because people have no idea what they are worth.

10000?! D:

I have one of the biggest collections out of our group, with about 15,000 points of blood Angels, and that's ONLY like 350 models. And that takes up my armoire, a few carry cases, and a reaver Titan sitting on the "undeployed/reserves" table in my game room.

I can't begin to imagine 10,000 models.

Did you outsource to a Chinese child labor factory to get them painted?

In all seriousness, good luck.

Why now?

If she didn't chuck them in the bin out of spite, then they have surely been sold, piece by piece, there is no way of finding them, any pictures?

Really, it's 2015 and you worry about it NOW ? It was 16 years ago. You're a bit past the Statute of Limitations. I would just chalk it up as a loss and move on.

BeAfraid wrote:
The Master Molds for the early-80's Citadel Imperial Dragon MB

Out of curiosity, how did you get your hands on that?

I imagine it involved Tom Cruise crawling through air vents and repelling out of a ceiling vent.

 Sammoth wrote:
Really, it's 2015 and you worry about it NOW ? It was 16 years ago. You're a bit past the Statute of Limitations. I would just chalk it up as a loss and move on.

Good for you.

The OP has decided to throw out a few lines of inquiry to see if he can dredge anything up. It doesn't cost him much to ask, and after all these years he obviously has reached a stage in his life where he thinks back on these things, finds he still wishes he could get them back and is making the attempt. I don't understand why anyone would think this is the place to give him advice in moving on. I'm quite sure that he had enough "moving on" when his marriage collapsed "in the worst possible" way and he's now through with moving on.

Such a big collection as that might have been bought as a single auction by an avid collector for instance. Its not beyond hope that he might get a clue here, especially with so many rare pieces in it.

I think asking your ex what she did with it might be the best place to start, you never know when its just been stored in the attic.

Wow, sorry for your loss.

I'm going to be Johnny Raincloud though and guess that worst case she chucked them, best case she gave them to some kid and they are fighting battles across the galaxy on someones kitchen table. In between those she might have sold them.

Triplegrin does make a good point and if your ex-isn't against talking to you it might be worth asking.

Man, sorry to hear that. But with the amount of reward you are offering have you considered hiring a detective instead?

I wish you the best of luck with your quest. Do any pictures exist of any of these minis?

angryboy2k wrote:

 Sammoth wrote:
Really, it's 2015 and you worry about it NOW ? It was 16 years ago. You're a bit past the Statute of Limitations. I would just chalk it up as a loss and move on.

Good for you.

The OP has decided to throw out a few lines of inquiry to see if he can dredge anything up. It doesn't cost him much to ask, and after all these years he obviously has reached a stage in his life where he thinks back on these things, finds he still wishes he could get them back and is making the attempt. I don't understand why anyone would think this is the place to give him advice in moving on. I'm quite sure that he had enough "moving on" when his marriage collapsed "in the worst possible" way and he's now through with moving on.

I by no means am talking about his past marriage. . I am talking about the timeframe to throw a question out there like this. I understand he is grasping for some answer. Let be real it's not a few years we are talking about 16 years ago. I just stated the truth like many others here have. Besides you would think the first person to ask would be his ex. Not some random strangers. That would be were I would start.

 Sammoth wrote:
Besides you would think the first person to ask would be his ex. Not some random strangers. That would be were I would start.

Unless she's dead or he can't locate her.

I'm sure the OP isn't a total moron; he's obviously aware that he's only got a very slim chance of anyone here actually being able to help him and if he were able to contact his ex about this he would have done so by now.

There's a lot of pessimism in this thread, and the opinion seems to be generally "Nah man, you should just give up." As I said the OP is aware he's got next to no chance of finding his stuff but it looks to me like he has given up on "giving up" - he's spent 16 years dealing with whatever hell he's gone through and maybe now he's looking around him and he's thinking he's got the time and resources to do a little hunting and offer a reward for info leading to his stuff. Captain Obvious statements like "ask your ex" or "she may have chucked em in the trash" aren't helpful at all.

Good luck to him, I hope he finds something - anything - from his collection.

angryboy2k wrote:

 Sammoth wrote:
Besides you would think the first person to ask would be his ex. Not some random strangers. That would be were I would start.

Unless she's dead or he can't locate her.

I'm sure the OP isn't a total moron; he's obviously aware that he's only got a very slim chance of anyone here actually being able to help him and if he were able to contact his ex about this he would have done so by now.

There's a lot of pessimism in this thread, and the opinion seems to be generally "Nah man, you should just give up." As I said the OP is aware he's got next to no chance of finding his stuff but it looks to me like he has given up on "giving up" - he's spent 16 years dealing with whatever hell he's gone through and maybe now he's looking around him and he's thinking he's got the time and resources to do a little hunting and offer a reward for info leading to his stuff. Captain Obvious statements like "ask your ex" or "she may have chucked em in the trash" aren't helpful at all.

Good luck to him, I hope he finds something - anything - from his collection.

You're making blind assumptions about him without knowing anything. Maybe if he took the time to tell us the whole story we would have a better idea. How do you or I know she is dead or he can't contact his Ex it's not like he stated any of that ? He only claimed a worse than divorce & a separation He also CLAIMED his wife stole everything. (I am not the only one who said to ask his EX). I never said / presumed that he was a moron. You did or at least how you took it. I am not a pessimist I am a realist. Why do you feel the need to pick on me when I am not the only one in the thread that said this ? It's not directed at you why do you care ?

 triplegrim wrote:
I think asking your ex what she did with it might be the best place to start, you never know when its just been stored in the attic.

Good luck and a hearty dose of sodium pentaholate in this endeavour!

Yep good luck to the OP, it is a long shot but they sometimes come off, I hope something turns up.

 Sammoth wrote:

You're making blind assumptions about him without knowing anything. Maybe if he took the time to tell us the whole story we would have a better idea. How do you or I know she is dead or he can't contact his Ex it's not like he stated any of that ? He only claimed a worse than divorce & a separation He also CLAIMED his wife stole everything. (I am not the only one who said to ask his EX). I never said / presumed that he was a moron. You did or at least how you took it. I am not a pessimist I am a realist. Why do you feel the need to pick on me when I am not the only one in the thread that said this ? It's not directed at you why do you care ?

You're right. I'm sorry. I was unnecessarily rude and my tone was uncalled for.

OP, why didn't you press charges? If you had acquired all those minis before your marriage, then they are not marital property and thus she had no right to take them.

BeAfraid wrote:
In 1999, I had a marriage come to an end in what could be possibly the worst way that a marriage could end (worse than divorce).........

Sod the toys; they're gone, what the hell does this mean?

Good luck OP, losing that many rare mini's must have been traumatic. The hopes are very slim, but I will keep my eyes open for them.

Also, as thechosen said, why didnt you press charges?

BeAfraid wrote:

The Miniatures were originally stolen in San Francisco, and she sold them as a part of a Storage Unit in May of 1999, while I was in the hospital.

If there are any posters here from San Francisco, hopefully they can point you towards any well-established clubs and game stores in that area that you can try contacting (also, you may want to try posting on some of the other major forums like BoLS, Warseer, B&C, etc., to spread the net even wider. If it was part of selling off a storage unit, and if they were not the main "selling point" for that sale, then there is every possibility that whoever bought the storage unit may have just chucked them for not knowing what they were (just toys to the uneducated) or given away to the buyer's kids and still treated just like toys. It's equally possible the buyer knew what they were (or knew where to go to find more about them), and, in that case, contacting the gaming "establishment" as mentioned above may help you find details of the sale. I've been in the hobby 20 years, and I know that if someone sold off a massive haul of 10,000 classic minis in my city, word would have spread and it would still be talked about by the veterans even today.

One last possibility: check the newpaper archives for the months following that storage unit sale for auction listings and such. Maybe even visit some of the auction houses that were in business back then and check their archives.

If you believe they were sold as part of a storage locker sale - likely an auction. Go to the storage locker facility and see if they have records of sale dating back to that year or if the facility hired an independent agent, try and find out who and seek out a record of sale from them. If records of sale are available, contact the purchaser.

Consider them lost to time, and you waited 16 years man ! A bit long to wait for something like this

 Trondheim wrote:
Grow a pair and consider them lost to time, and you waited 16 years man! A bit long to wait for something like this

Ya know what if he was in a coma for 16 years

 mechanicalhorizon wrote:

BeAfraid wrote:
The Master Molds for the early-80's Citadel Imperial Dragon MB

Out of curiosity, how did you get your hands on that?

I imagine it involved Tom Cruise crawling through air vents and repelling out of a ceiling vent.

He seems to have some sort of sculpting connections from his other threads.

perhaps he was in the industry before a terrible greenstuff accident hospitalized him.

Can we assume you murdered your ex-wife and that's why it has taken so long for you to get on the trail?

I'm sorry for your loss.

It does seem like a long shot at this point, but I wish you luck in finding them.

 Medium of Death wrote:
Can we assume you murdered your ex-wife and that's why it has taken so long for you to get on the trail?

She stole the minis, then he murdered her?

Did you happen to have a collection of vintage Dwarves?

Pre-slottas.