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No we have a lot more that are okay, I sold some on ebay for quite a bit recently. There's a strong market for pre-slottas, the trick is to identify what you have exactly and people will bid high.

I have some really characterful figures though, excellent D&D adventurers.

Howard A Treesong wrote:

Guardlard01 wrote:

That's not enough, we have them in originals boxes/blisters, or in plastic storage boxes, but they were together in a large wooden cupboard. The chemicals released go through everything. First they go black, then they crack and crumble and turn to dust.

Thats terrible news Howard. How many did you lose?

Well my parents were collecting them from when I was young. But I would say that several dozen crumbled to nothing while we have loads more that are black but hopefully not beyond use.

it does seem dependent on the alloy in individual figures, sometimes in a box one will rot and another will be untouched.

Wow... whatever that chemical is, it sounds pretty potent. Useful info if I encounter any old wood furniture. I remember GW used to make minis in lead, then they switched to white metal - do you know if it affects both?

I attempted a game of D&D with a friend a few months ago. My father was an avid D&D player ever since the pen and paper version ( although I can't get seem to get him to play recently) so I am familiar with the pre-Wizards of the Coast version.
My friend though, thinks the game started with Wizards of the Coast, pre-painted flimsy plastic miniatures and all.
The game went as well as you might imagine.

Guardlard01 wrote: I attempted a game of D&D with a friend a few months ago. My father was an avid D&D player ever since the pen and paper version ( although I can't get seem to get him to play recently) so I am familiar with the pre-Wizards of the Coast version.
My friend though, thinks the game started with Wizards of the Coast, pre-painted flimsy plastic miniatures and all.
The game went as well as you might imagine.

Yeah, those WoTC figures are garbage are VASTLY overpriced. Personally, I pick up Ral Partha, and Reaper models for that. And quite often, since I play Minotaurs alot I build my characters from my Chaos Beastmen.

But hey, thats what kids like. fething plastic.

I think it affects only lead. Tin miniatures can tarnish, but I think this is just a discolouration, it's not corrosion that will eat the figure.

It's an issue with solid hardwood furniture; oak, cedar where acidic compounds are released from the wood and are likely to affect things stored within it.

This applies to modern furniture too, but a lot of the cheaper furniture from IKEA these days is composite wood pulp and fibres, so it's not proper solid wooden furniture so I think this is okay, it's not full of chemicals in the same way. Storing them on open shelving or a way that allows some ventilation is good, putting them in the bottom of a stuffy heavy oak chest is bad.

TheNewMexicanGeneral wrote:Tronzor could i reccomend picking up some two part miliput. Its usualy pretty cheap and if you just fill the bottom of the model with it it will add a nice bit of wieght. Albiet no where near that of a pewter model but deffinatly enough to make it more solid.

Fortunately I have been ebaying and trading for a lot of the stuff I like, so I have a great collection of metals, including my IG army that is coming together. I had thought of doing that with Green Stuff, which I think is very similar to millput (I've never used the latter). The cost of doing this could get quite expensive. I'm toying with the idea of just creating scenic bases with actual stones on them for the weight. Might give the millput/GS option a try too.

Thanks!

I know this is vastly off-topic but I still can't believe what Hasbro has done to D&D. A toy company producing D&D! Its madness. And those miniatures are just a slap in the face to any gamer who has actually put a brush to a model.

I had to get that out of my system

For those that have not seen the blight, this is what lead rot looks like when father nurgle casts his eye over your collection.

Goodnight sweet prince, and may flights of beholders sing thee to thyne sleep.

Whoa.

Your poor minis...

Tronzor Its vastly cheaper than gs for example i bought a 4 oz brick for 9.99 whereas for the same price you only get 20 grams of GS and the miliput is great stuff to work with. SOrry to go so far OT like that. But I do believe metal minis while nice are over all harder to work with and wiegh a ton. My father has a all metal SM army including tanks and its a massive even trying to carry them any where lol.

I recognize that damage. That's definitely furniture stripper. That would have done it to any metal, not just lead. It's actually a strong base, not an acid. You'll get the same effect if you leave models in oven cleaner for a few weeks.

Rented Tritium - you referring to my picture? That figure has never been painted or stripped.

Howard A Treesong wrote:Rented Tritium - you referring to my picture? That figure has never been painted or stripped.

And I never indicated it was

Just that it's chemically the same as damage from stripping badly. It has been exposed to the fumes of furniture strippers and conditioners.

I LOVE METAL. Yeah, pinning sucks, but w/e.

These days I typically avoid metal. I've been mini painting for 15 years. I almost always repose, re sculpt, and kitbash any piece I do beyond troops, and metal is just too hard to work with; sawing, pinning, reposing, it's just a pain working with metal. And when it comes to detailed pieces finecast seems to hold it's shape better. I also tend to paint to a high level of detail, lots of highlighting, osl, etc., and prefer a very thin varnish seal applied by airbrush. I HATE losing detail due to varnishing and in my experience metal just requires more for adequate protection.

And MAN I don't miss the flash, I got a few orks back in the day where I literally couldn't tell where the flash ended and the mini began.

I admit I like the heft of my older metal figs, but that is literally the only benefit I see in metal.

That isn't to say I dislike metal. I like my metal pieces, and I still buy them on occasion, but overall I think they have been surpassed in almost every way.

Always liked a metal mini, never had a problem converting them and always thought the effort was well worth the work.

Paper clips, ftw. woot!

I do like the feel of a metal mini though. If I had it my way the new stuff would be in metal too but I can live with plastics, metals are becoming too costly these days. On my plastic stuff I go as far as throwing a steel washer on the base to add a little anchor/weight to the piece.

Nowoo, words cannot describe how impressed I am with that Necron. Very good work.

Metal:
-Feels good, nice heft to it without having to add to it.
- Super strong when pinned.
-Easier to take a part than plastic.
- More expensive material for the money.
-Characterful models from the past not cookie-cutter.

Plastic:
-Easy to cut or shave.
-Glues together far better than metal.
-Sharper lines but undercuts are not as good.
-More plentiful accessories.
-Not really seeing it being any cheaper...

They really are just two ways of doing the same thing.

Talizvar and others pretty well sum up the pros and cons of metals and plastics.

When I was building an IG army, I loved plastics and their convertability. Now that I'm doing the non-GW thing, I love the great ranges of metal models and thier unique sculpts and poses that you don't get from plastics without lots of converting.

As to the OP, I've not heard alot of Metal hate, but what there is seems to come from either GW fanboys, or simply folks who are more recent to the hobby and aren't as familar with metal.

People simply tend to be negative toward what they don't understand or are not familiar with.

A lot of 40k players like metal models. Some just like the better detail on Finecast.

Beats me.

When I started, most of the wargaming stuff was metal.
If you wanted to covert anything, you LEARNED the skills required in order to do so. End result, is that to us metalheads, converting metal is no more difficult than converting plastic.

For those who did not grow up with metals and then transition to plastic (or those who just started in plastics), they don't have the skillset or tools required to work the metals (and in many cases, are also unwilling to learn them) because plastic is soooo much easier.

Just because something is easy does not make it better.
Just because something is hard-to-do does not make it worse - but the satisfaction we get from pulling off a conversion from a metal model will often be greater than the feeling from doing the same to a plastic one.

I do anyway. I find it much more satisfying to have to work at something to get a result, than just slap bits together and spooge superglue over them.

Elitist, thank you very much.

The detail is not better on finecast, it is the same just a lighter and easier to work with material.

I still prefer metal, though I started with plastic than transitioned over to it, the weight of it just seems to make it more worth it. Though there are some models which should never have had metal in them such as the fire prism and the zoanthrope.

I find them heavy, hard to convert, annoying to put together and generally railroaded to a single pose.

chromedog wrote:
Just because something is easy does not make it better.
Just because something is hard-to-do does not make it worse - but the satisfaction we get from pulling off a conversion from a metal model will often be greater than the feeling from doing the same to a plastic one.

That's like saying using a stove is not better than making fire out of two sticks because easy =/= better.

It's elitist to think like that.

Assembly for metal has always been much more difficult for me compared to plastic. Plastic I can just shut my brain off, have fun with any variation or combination, and produce a whole army in a few hours. Extra bits are easy to put on at any time I like. Metal is a pain and you gotta work with what you get. They fall apart on me extremely easily and sometimes it takes hours upon for me to get 1 metal model sturdy enough to attach the next part to. My Fiend of Slaanesh took 3 days to assemble, mostly because the tail was such a bitch. Plus the glue I use for metal crusts on my finger in a far more annoying fashion.

Basically, plastic all the way. Screw nostalgia.

first i couldn't stand the metal mini's for the hardness to convert and the painting is a lot harder on metal IMO so I thought a miracle had happend when finecast came out.. now I would love to see the metal come back.. I'm happy to have bought enough metal minis for a while to paint so I don't have any highpressure need to buy more finecrap..

I wouldn't want an entire metal amry.. weight, converting, glueing,painting.. i prefer plastic over metal for the core army.. I said plastic, not resin

Frankly, I dislike the metal minis over plastic for the following reasons: 1) I've put incredibly heavy varnish on them & certain spots are still prone to chipping (Pedro Kantor, I'm looking at the fingers on your power fist); 2) certain ones have been a royal pain to assemble; 3) they don't lend themselves to converting near as easy as plastic; 4) they cost more than plastic models most of the time.

I am fairly fond of metal models. I find if they are designed properly, they keep their value much better. If there's faddly bits, this goes right out the window, even then, the models have a nice heft to them. I agree that they are much much harder to convert than plastics, but, thats also why i like them; they keep their value and maintain their original condition better than plastics (re-sale value. Im always elated to find metal models because I find they strip easier)

Plastics are great for conversion, have oodles of parts, and the ease of access to parts means you won't be upset if something goes awry as readily as if something bad had happened to metal.

Initially I hated metals with a seething passion, the only time that passion kicks in is when the designer was an incompetent numpty, knocked a few beers back, and decided to make a terribly imbalanced model in metal (I am glaring at you with a seething hatred chaos raptors and flying night lords. seething hatred). I hate finecast more than metals and plastics combined though, I hate the cheap quasi-plastic arguments they give because I feel cheated that they don't give me the chance to actually customise the model, which is what I see the biggest advantage to plastic.

starsdawn wrote:
That's like saying using a stove is not better than making fire out of two sticks because easy =/= better.

It's elitist to think like that.

Did you even bother to read my post?

The satisfaction derived from doing something is proportional to the amount of time and effort put into it. A plastic conversion is easy and yields minor satisfaction.
A metal conversion, because it takes more effort, will yield vastly more satisfaction, simply because.

Besides, Elitism is everywhere. Get used to it or get over yourself.