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I don't really know....

The thing is, I had a hobby spurt in about 2005 and then another in 2012...

I want to say at least under $200.

I remember going to a Games Workshop and spending about £70 when I was younger on Tau and I still feel ashamed for spending that much as a kid, my family chipped in so I could have spending money too.

Then looking at the Flames of War stuff, I was going to think it would be really high but from what I remember I've spent like.... £50 on it? It was my own money though so I don't feel bad.

This year... I've easily spent £70....

Damn, I've spent more money than I want to have spent

Oh well, I'm going to try and make scenery for FoW to sell on Ebay over the summer, hopefully it will pay for the gym costs and give me some experience in scenery/terrain making.

Far far too much for what I actually have painted...

Between 30 and 50k. But bear in mind this is what I do for living, and I'm counting painting supplies, modelling supplies etc in that total.

I'm sorry, but I'm having a hard time believing 58 people on this site, voting in this poll, actually spent over 100.000 dollars on figures.

I end up in the $301-$1000 region.

When you consider that 40K alone has been around for 26 years and that Warhammer has been around for about 30, I don't find it difficult to believe at all. That's just over $3000 dollars a year. Or about £2000. I've easily spent £2000 a year on this hobby every year since my early twenties. At least, in those years where I've actively been wargaming rather than concentrating on pen and paper RPGs.

I guess it must be around 2500-3000. Which is pretty frugal for a period of 25 years (including a (so far not entirely finished) attempt to collect all printed rulebooks/expansions/codices since RT), I suppose.

Probably about $15,000 (bearing in mind I'm in the UK so that's more like £10,000).

Not much really seeing as I've been in the hobby on and off for the past 20 years. Works out at about £500 a year but most of that will be in the last 10 as I didn't have much cash as a child.

Would have been much less if I didn't constantly change armies every 5 minutes before I even use them. About 1/2 that would have been paid for by selling off one army to buy another as well.

Just by getting though half of my collection I'm already well over the $1000 mark and still counting...

Since Rogue Trader.....

1000-1500, probably closer to 1500 when It's dollars... the thing is... I have only just reached the point where I have a 1k army

On GW mini's and rules? Probably $3k easily.
On other mini's and rules? At least another $2k

On actual gaming (going to events, gas, hotels), another $1k easily.

Many hundreds of $$ on materials.

So we're up to $6-10k.

But that's over about 15 years on and off, so it's not that bad

I would estimate between 3,000-6,000. With 7 armies and 13 years in the hobby I don't think that is to bad considering the $/hr payout.

I think time in the hobby adds up. Multiple game systems. Toys that surround hobby.

I've been back in hobby for almost 10 yrs now. So 120 months x 200/month Budget is $24K.
Now add in 8 Gen Cons at $1000 for hotel over 4 nights per and 4 adoptions at approx same and that is another 12k.
Now...flight to a few tournaments when I was doing that another 1500.

Cases to hold my figures (pretty sure I paid off Romeo's mortgage) -
Storage racks
Display cases (500+ for a nice curio)
Reaver Titan and a thunder hawk
Terrain
Planning and personal outlay to run tournaments (they all aren't in the black at onset when you need to buy boards..terrain and rent space)

So.... For me not hard to get up to a biggish number.

Since 2007 on just 40k and fantasy including modeling supplies I have spent between 10-15k

To my reckoning, "I've" spent about ($290) since seriously taking up the hobby last year.
But if you include what other people bought me (Dark vengeance, scenery to start me off), you're looking at double that.

Ack. For some reason I misread the poll as asking how much I've spent this year, to which I replied $1,000 - $3,000.

I understand now it's asking how much have I spent in total. I am certain it exceeds $10,000, but I would be surprised if it is more than $20,000.

Around 700$

 Reaper Man 2020 wrote:
Over $10,000 probably nearer $15,000. I have been doing the hobby for 27 years though and I have a love of Forge World!

That's a lot, but 27 years is a long time!

Considering I own more than 1200 BattleMechs (let alone book material) before I even get to GW stuff, I'm in pretty deep. I'm guessing the 10k-20k range.

If it is only GW, that number is MASSIVELY lower. More than half of my GW is second hand and discounted.

If we add RPGs and attendant items, I might need psychiatric help.

I restarted by hobby back in 2009 with Space Hulk. Rough Estimate I would guess in the 4k range. I try to go cheap and buy mostly starter sets to paint.

I my self have spent around $1000-$1500 on my armies. That being said, I know a bloke who buys every thing imperial for 40k, and when he walks in to GW spends $300-$600 almost every time. His collection, although a lot of it is in boxes would probably be around $15000-$20000, it's unreal to see it all

17 years of minis, paints and hobby supplies. I'd guess $20-$30k, possibly more given that is under $2k a year, but I have sold a lo twice in that period due to moving between countries.

 Ashrag wrote:
Wow including Airbrush, Showing cases, Painting supplies and 17 years worth of miniatures, books, tools, etc ... not to mention especially looking for a flat with an extra room only for the hobby and furnishing it ... I'd say somewhere between 20k and 30k.

That number there scares me - please someone say that's normal ...

Hell, if you're going down that route including the cost of the hobby room then I'd comfortably hit the $50k+ range.

About 1500 in about a year. That's not including the Dark Angels army I bought for a friend so he could play.

10 to 15k..... Frightening. Forgot about paints etc when calculating as well. Been in this rackets over 20 years but at the same time thats crazy!

Have largely stayed off forge world until last year, but the horus heresy arrived and well.......

just over 1k

Where was the choice of, "I have literally given them part of my life!" for those of us that have worked for the Corp?
As it was I had to vote that "I did not want to think about it".
Seriously, I left GW-US in the late '90s with over a literal Imperial Standard ton(2,000lbs) of metal (getting close to a second) and who knows how much weight in paper, cardstock and plastic plus my polos, sweatshirts and other GW garb.

I had for:
WFB 3,500+pt armies: Empire, High Elves, Wood Elves (actually this was the wife's), Bretonnia, Dwarves, Lizardmen, Orcs, Chaos (Undivided - it was just breaking up into Beasts, Warriors and Daemons when I left GW), Skaven, Undead (Tomb Kings, Vampire Counts and Necromantic were all one army back then), Dark Elves and Chaos Dwarves.
Actually the last six armies were mostly for the OpFor in Warhammer Quest with a little bit cavalry and war machines added for the WFB battlefield.
W40K 5,000+pt armies: Ultramarine, Space Wolves, Imperial Guard (I was a serious treadhead), Eldar(actually this was the wife's again), Orks (2 armies - Snakebite-focused & Blood Axe-focused) and I had the five different Necron figures they had released at that point.
Blood Bowl: 34 teams - all nine of the third edition teams released before the re-release of Third Ed Blood Bowl, Gary Morley's human and norse teams two years+ before they were publicly released, most of the second edition teams, mixed teams of second and third edition figures, a converted Minotaur team including the three second and third edition figures, a converted Estalian team (plastic bodies with '90s Citadel/GW 16th Century-style helmeted Empire hand gunner heads), a converted Tilean team (plastic bodies with '90s Citadel/GW 15th Century-style soft hatted Empire crossbowman heads), a converted up a Lizardman team and so forth. Yes, I was called the "Blood Bowl Nut" at GW-US for good reason.
Warhammer Quest: had all the metal and everything paper, cardstock & plastic portals multiple times over what was in the boxes.
Talisman: Had everything for the Third Edition twice over. That way you have enough cones and such for 10+ players so you can have "big" games.
Man O' War: Had huge fleets for every race for this. GW's buying back or trading back of this product line from retailers expanded my fleets beyond logic according to my co-workers.
Space Fleet: Had nice-size fleets for every race. Only about half of what I had for Man O' War though.
Epic W40K: I had sizable armies for the SM/TL rules for Space Marine, Imperial and Orks with bits and pieces for all of the other armies. After the relaunch as Epic 40K, I had huge armies for Space Marine/Imperial, Eldar and Orks.
Necromunda: Large gangs for Van Saar, Orlock and Escher along with all of the Adeptus Arbites troopers, Bounty Hunters and Spyrers available at the time.
Gorka Morka: Only one Digga gang - I just could not get into this game. At US Games Day '97 I witnessed one of the biggest idiocies I ever saw at Games Workshop, and I saw several on both sides of the Pond. Staff members on one side of the Baltimore Convention Center yelling "Gorka!" at other GW staffers on the other side of the room, who responded with "Morka!" and then the two groups advanced upon each other until finally they were yelling in each others' faces. I excused myself quickly in the name of cleaning up or some other reasonable nonsense when this started and then watched it evolve, or rather devolve, from the distant sidelines. Almost as bad was Robin Dews' "Tanks are Sex! Tanks are Sexy!" chant on the roll out of Epic W40K. Ugh!
And then I had all of the Wargames Series games, Krunch, Blood Royale and a few other of the box games on top of all that.

I do not have everything still though; I kept two armies for W40K, a bit from Necromunda, the rules from Gorka Morka, the various old box games, just a sizable amount of WFB and all my Warhammer Quest stuff to make Warhammer Quest work well, I retained all of my Talisman Third stuff (still want another whole Dragon's Tower {can you believe the prices people want for even a worn copy of that supplement?!?}) and then I could not bear to sell any of my Blood Bowl guys.
I sold off a fair amount of figures in the few years after I left.
I was not in a positive frame of mind about GW when I left GW; I will leave it at that.
I might have gotten rid of just over half especially to one of the game dealers on-line that specializes in the Out of Print; I got some serious trade cred on other company's game materials with Aaron after sending him two large cases of GW stuff.

Additionally, I left GW before Battlefleet Gothic, Inquisitor, Warmaster, Mordheim and LOTR/Hobbit came about and before Blood Bowl came back about in Fourth Edition and later so I have little-to-nothing from these games.
That does not mean I have not bought any of the newer figures of Blood Bowl for even more BB teams (gee, I did not add ten more teams using those figures - uh uh) or been very liberal dipping into the Mordheim collection for Warhammer Quest characters.
I do have to admit I have picked up nothing for Third Edition or later 40K (perfectly happy with Second Ed), but I have dipped a bit into the newer WFB figures collections for Warhammer Quest despite staying contentedly with Fifth Ed WFB ruleswise.

Not sure if I would be in favor of a new edition of Warhammer Quest.
On the other hand, I would be right behind a re-release of the old game with additional characters and adventures!

Well, have I revealed just how nuts I am by this point?
Any way, we all have to have a hobby, right?
Do not get me started on BattleTech, BattleTroops, Crimson Skies or any of the other dead or comatose games I play.
Or even 1970s Airfix figures and my self-made wargaming rules for those and more back then.

Yes, I am an "ol' fart" that plays with toy soldiers and have done so for decades!

I never, never want to know!!!!

 DouglasJB wrote:
snip

BattleTech ain't dead Just getting the gears going again. New rules set recently released if I recall and a lot of talk of a redo of the starter box

Hi doc,

It is nothing like it used to be in the '80s or early '90s.
Much simpler, but not simple, back then.

I hope you are enjoying your current BattleTech experience though.