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A couple of weeks ago I mentioned the old Citadel "Blister Boxes" syle of packaging over on the "do you recall your first miniature" thread and someone asked me what that was. I looked all over the 'net and could not find a photo of an intact example. Well, better late than ever, here is an unopened Blister Box that popped up on Ebay this week.

Anyway, Blister Boxes were a method of packaging that GW used in the late '80s and early '90s. I don't recall seeing them after about '92-3 or so, but I may be mistaken as it's been a long time. They were generally used for squad sized units of 40k figures and regiment sized units of WFB figures. They were also used for large multi-piece metal models in both the main Citadel and Marauder lines. For example my first Space Ork war trikes and the first Palaquin of Nurgle were packaged this way. This particular example holds a Space Marine Tactical Squad.

It's a horrible way of packing figures and it's one of the things that I'm actually glad is long gone. Keep in mind these things are hard plastic and (although you can't tell by the photo) they are about two inches deep. They were sealed with a sliding panel in the back that you pretty much could not open without breaking the back of the box. I used to literally use a screw driver to them to pry them open. They were an extremely wastful way of packing figures....and this coming from a guy who could not give a hoot about the whole "green" thing. But I suspect the biggest reason that GW dropped them was that they took up way too much in the way of shelf space compared to normal blisters.

Anyone else recall these things?

TR

I picked up an imperial guard squad in one of those back in the day.

Still have the box. I use it to store random stuff.

I've still got one. Front and back. My first squad of eldar guardians (Rogue Trader ones albeit) came in a box like that. A couple of guys with meltas and the rest with shuriken catapults, banner poles for all of them and bases. I think for like $12-$15. Anyways I use it to hold terrain gravel.

It may have been the first 40k thing I ever bought....don't quote me on that though. Alzheimer's a bitch...

Yep.
Picked up several boxes of eldar "guardians", IG troops and egg-on-legs sentinel boxes like that back in the RT days.

I still have a squad of marines identical to that box's contents, too.

I have to be honest, I do like looking through blisters and hope that they aren't removed entirely.

Really, the ones without a photo were even better, and there was something like a 'kid at xmas' feeling of looking through the racks and trying to find a particular model, or being surprised by something you didn't know existed. Ah, the rose tinted spectacles

Pacific wrote:I have to be honest, I do like looking through blisters and hope that they aren't removed entirely.

Really, the ones without a photo were even better, and there was something like a 'kid at xmas' feeling of looking through the racks and trying to find a particular model, or being surprised by something you didn't know existed. Ah, the rose tinted spectacles

Heh, that's exactly how I feel looking through the infinity stuff at my FLGS.

I think I bought a couple of old Blood Bowl teams in those, back in the day. They were pretty awesome. Got a whole team of a dozen or so figures for twenty or thirty bucks.

I had a few of them back in the day. A big thing of orcs, some marines like the ones in the pic, and I think an eldar dreadnought that had a tiny head instead of the big one, and it came with a little baby dreadnought buddy.. it was kinda like a wraithguard head on a 1-armed wraithlord

and I think an eldar dreadnought that had a tiny head instead of the big one, and it came with a little baby dreadnought buddy.. it was kinda like a wraithguard head on a 1-armed wraithlord

Ah yes. Ghost Warriors and Spirit Warriors. I don't recall which one was the dreadnaught and which the man sized robot model, and I'm at work so can't look it up in my 40k Compendium. They were kind of the forerunner to today's Wraithlord, as you might recall that back then the "big head" dreadnaught had a living crewman like other dreds.

If I can ever get enough of the little robots (I only have three right now) I'm going to field them as a "counts as" Wraithguard unit.

TR

Had a couple of those hard plastic boxes in the past. Some of the oddest packaging I've seen on miniatures (non GW) is where they've been vacuum sealed or something. The figure was placed on cardboard and then a plastic film sucked into it like its astronaut food. Last company I saw doing this was Mithril.

Huh. I think I managed to miss those.

A few weeks ago, I went to a local game store and picked up the Citadel Terrain Set for $110. It comes with 3x Citedel Woods a Citedel Modular Gaming Hill, a Citedel Gaming Hill, a Citedel Arcane Ruins and two tubs or grass flocking (winter and spring).