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How the heck do you manage all the models?!

Yes I have, I've sold off a number of WHFB armies; sold off a good number of WH40K figures too, some of which I now regret.

malfred wrote:Have you been collecting stuff for 15+ years?

How the heck do you manage all the models?!

Yes I have.

I have a two bedroom apartment.

I only need to sleep in one room.

Yes, and a lot are here at my home in Mass, and the rest at my moms house where I grew up in IL. My uncle has been doing this going on 30 years now, and he has somewhere in or around 50k+ unpainted and 15-20k painted in his house (he makes mid six figures so he has the space of course). I often joke he could make a store front with just what he has in one of his closets.

I rented a storage unit.

22 years, and my gubbinz are all over the place!

Yes. 24 years or so.

I don't buy EVERYTHING.

Losing a couple of boxes of stuff back in 1995 thinned out the pile as well. It's taken me until last year just to replace most of what I lost (GW).

It's why I have a basement. One of the conditions I put on the wife when we bought a house: Has to have a basement, and the basement is mine.

I moved to america, and sold most of my stuff then, though i still have a few aaaancient models (like my rogue trader daemonette.. uuugly, but kinda cute..


I got back into 40k 3 years ago and am a total plastic krak addict again

Have a dedicated room in the basement for modeling.

Also got storage shelves from the hardware store to stick all the various army bags I own. All armies are in bags.. nothing on display...

Only 14 years (5 of which inactive) but the past 3 I've been making up for it.

I share a 3 bedroom apt with the girlfriend, and its all about boxes, separating stuff into like groupings.

That said, I only have a vague idea of where some things are, with some falling through the cracks, to the point where I know I bought it, but where it went, is a bit of a mystery.

Close to 20 years. I have only ever played Marines. The other armies I dabbled in (Tau and Eldar) were sold off. I now have a basement that houses my stuff. I really do not have as much as others. About 5 to 6000 points of Space Wolves, 4500 points of Crimson Fists and a whole bunch of Grey Knights when they hit.

malfred wrote:How the heck do you manage all the models?!

I keep everything in storage cases / boxes / organizers / bags. If I can't store it effectively, I don't build it.

I have labeled model cases for each army, so if I want to play Guard, I simply grab the "Guard" boxes. If I want Eldar, I grab "Eldar".

Unbuilt stuff is grouped into 40k, WFB, etc. and labeled accordingly.

And it all lives in one corner of my room.

Being able to find stuff keeps my sanity higher.



Oh, yeah, I sell / trade stuff that doesn't fit in my master plan, and try to limit the amount of random "cool" stuff I get. Plus, I run a consolidated toy / gaming budget, which sharply limits the rate of growth.

I keep all my built forces in there own case. Unbuilt, or armies being repainted, are stored in boxes under and around my work desk.

I can lay my hand on any given model in any given army in a couple of minutes. It's the bits I have a time with. I have a bits...shelving unit? Anyway, even though I keep it organized and clutter free some still escape my grasp. Last night I spent an hour looking for the Forgeworld Grey Knight brass etchings I got some months ago, as I'm finally getting around to doing my Grey Knights up for the new release. That was annoying.

Been collecting for about 20 years, simpy put, pile of models + exploded bomb= mess. lol

or orginised chaos I like to think.

H.B.M.C. wrote:

malfred wrote:Have you been collecting stuff for 15+ years?

How the heck do you manage all the models?!

Yes I have.

I have a two bedroom apartment.

I only need to sleep in one room.

This, plus my parents' loft.

Similar to many people here, I keep everything in cases - nothing goes on display. To the level where, if it doesn't fit in a case, it doesn't get bought. Hence my complete lack of drop pods and valkyries...

Similar with terrain - I have two big white ikea tubs - if the terrain won't fit in the tubs, I don't build it.

I have twelve KR Multicases, holding a total of 8 finished armies. I then have two big plastic tubs full of all my unpainted models, in bags sorted by army, and the two tubs of terrain. All this lives on a big set of shelves in a storage cupboard in my flat.

I keep all of my marines and IG arranged in neat formations across the front of my bookcases which cover a whole wall. But, I'm about to run out of space and I'm not sure whether to buy a dedicated glass cabinet with lights, or burn some books!

Organization is first. Next is selling stuff that I don't use or will not ever get to building/painint. Finally, (up until very recently), there is little impulse buying to ensure I don't have stuff that will sit around never being used.

Yes I have, and the answer is that most of it is stashed at my parent's house. But I've had to sell a fair bit to get through the bad times during my education.

My parents have been collecting for over 30 years. The house it crammed with stuff on ever surface, cupboards and boxes and tins are chock full of them. Mostly for my parents it's plastic model kits, thousands of which fill the attic, and 54mm figures which fill tins and boxes. They'll never paint this, I'll never paint this. One day I'm going to have to go through it all and get rid of it. There's all that an the fact that they must own about 20,000 books or something ridiculous.

That's why you can't *move* in my parent's house.

Yep, but have never sold a thing. Left a copy of the original Mighty Empires box somewhere but still have everything else.

When I moved to my current house I turned the box room into an office which is filled with gaming boxes, with a little bit of space for a PC. I build a 7' high shelf system along one wall to hold it, but there are still half a dozen archive boxes in the loft.

I recently started to organise it all but there are still about 3 Leman Russ boxes with loose metal minis in them after I stripped them a couple of years ago. No space for a table though.

I've been collecting stuff for 35 years.

I've never kept everything. Stuff has disappeared from a number of causes including forgetfulness, deliberate chucking out, and organised sell-offs.

For example, I once had a substantial 15mm Napoleonic army, and a good collection of Vietnam skirmish figures and models in 20mm/1:72nd scale. I sold off both of those because I knew I wouldn't use them again.

I hated to get rid of a lot of the stuff but you have to be realistic about what you're ever going to use. I knew that most of my boxed wargames would never get played, so it was better to sell them to someone who would play with them.

I don't put anything on display, unless you count boxed games and rulebooks in book shelves. All the models are packed away in tool boxes and the like. Most of it is packed away in a large closet. Naturally there is a substantial amount of unassembled stuff, and my plan for 2011 is to economise by working through that rather than buying a lot of new stuff.

I haven't got any army carrier boxes, though I'm thinking about it now, for ease of carriage if I haven't got my car.

The depressing side of all this is that it sounds like we get to a certain stage and than start nesting. I thought only women did this but it seems thaat Wargamers do too!

Its the mothering urge- 8 million little grey orks call me mommy. er actually not so much with that .. more 'oi, you what? '

What I no longer use I get rid of. I gave my three fantasy armies to my nephews and traded off my Space Marines for a pile of Mordheim back in the day.

18 years. I have a collection of storage solutions. Projects in the works go in rubbermaid containers (18"x24"x7" deep) that stack easily all the way to the cieling. GW cases and other foam solutions for armies that see the tabletop. 100' of custom shelving for larger pieces, WIP, supplies and tools. All of this, including two 8'x3' folding tables and two large desks and a workbench take up about 500 sqare feet of my house.

God, people collecting for longer than I've been alive. GEEEEZZZ OLD PEOPLE. LOL (no offense ofc.)

11 years for me :(

I tend to spend about 4-500 a year, but I also usually sell an army to pay for a large part of that.

I've got $450 in paint, $100 in brushes, 2 current armies for WFB, a crap ton of tools and more bits left over from the last 10 years than I care to think about.

I use Sterilite plastic drawer sets from wal mart for most of my stuff. Moving every few years has been a challenge though as this hobby isn't very portable.

This year I'm looking to add a home table and 2 armies to the collection. Yay for tax returns!

My miniature collection is essentially divided into three piles. Working On, In Storage & To Be Sold.

This latter pile has amounted quite a large sum of cash in recent months... which of course is recycled into more miniatures

About 20 years for me, on and off. Luckily enough one of the criteria that was in place when the wife and I were house hunting was that I got a dedicated man-room. Fortunately we found a 4 bedroom house for the right price and so the smallest of the bedrooms became my gaming room.