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Apart from some amazing ebay grabs back around 2003-2005, the most recent one was going into one of the seven charity shops in my local town (not a large town, excessive number tbh) and finding three GW boxes on the shelf behind the counter.

They where open, but not cleaned/touched obviously just looked at, and all there. Got a metal GUO for £10, a metal WoC Nurgle Lord on steed for £5 and a metal Lotr The Necromancer for a fiver as well.

I've been meaning to sell them or trade, but I've been distracted of late so they are still on my shelf.

Landspeeder $23 ($50, $80 for the Vengeance)
10 NIB Assault Marines $26 ($55)
10 NIB Tac Marines $16 ($62)

Prices in () are the GW RRP prices at my local store.

When you live in Australia believe me, those are incredible bargains!

Gentlemen, I have a story to tell, of the Deal of all Deals, to not be seen again in my life. Lo, it was not I who acquired this Deal, but I did bask in its Glory.

This, my friends, is the Box of Many Armies.

/end dramatic writing.

Alright, so this begins last year, I have a mate who constantly stands vigil over craigslist for any noteworthy deals. He came across one posting for "box of warhammer, assorted," with no listed price, and a picture of two normal moving boxes full of a jumble of 40k.

Curious, my friends sends them a message, asking for a few closer-in photos. They provide them quickly, and while he can't make it specifics, he knows there's a lot of stuff in there, but it's not in the best shape. So, he offers them $150, they say sure, and he goes to get it the next day.

So, he brings these boxes home, and it takes 3 days to sort through what's in them. This box includes, but is not limited to:

31 vehicles, including 6 leman russ tanks, all the old kits

Full armies of roughly 2000 pts of:

Necrons
Tau
Eldar
Sisters of Battle
Guard (much more than 2k, likely 4-5 in total)

Partial Armies of between 500-1500 pts

Orks (including 5th deffkoptas)
Brettonians (because why not?)
Chaos Space Marines

Noteworthy bits included:

1x RT era Sentinel (dubbed "The Egg")
Metal everything, all pre-finecast characters and special units
25 Steel Legion
Over 200 guardsmen in unassembled bits, mostly modern Cadians, but plenty of Catachans, and some 2nd ed. metals
11.5 Chimeras in bits
2x Storm Ravens

This would sound like a steal, but it had a few catches:

Hot Glue. Every single assembled model was was assembled with hot glue
Paint. Every model was horribly painted, eye-searingly so
Every assembled vehicle had every single upgrade glued on to. Basilisks with heavy stubbers, hunter-killers, dozer blades and camo netting ahoy!

Considering there's thousands of points in there, and hundreds of individual models, my friend invested in a sonic cleaner, and after almost 1 year of it being in near-constant use, and enough simple green to provide a comfortable environment for a full-grown beluga, everything has been stripped, traded, sold or re-purposed. Almost everyone in our group has some part of the Box of Many Things. It gave, and gave and gave for almost a year, and has entered a semi-mythological place, its story to be passed down from generation to generation.

And lo' so doth the tale of the box of many armies end.

*that was a fun story *

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Best one was an old Tyranid army box (the one with the Ltd. Ed. Lictor) that had been sitting in the store for a year, maybe two, and the staff were desperate to get rid of it. Friend of mine (on my behalf) talked 'em down to less than half price.

The best part? This was a GW store.

They just cut the Australian price in half for you because they knew you'd still at least be paying the same price as the rest of the world.

I went to a train hobby store near my house to pick up some pieces for a display board once (first time going there) and found 4 boxes of tactical marines for $5 each. Apparently he bought them from GW around november for holiday season, and no-one bought them. I play eldar, but I bought them, then sold them to a friend for $25 a box. Instant profit!

Best deal ive got? A 1500pt daemon force, unpainted for free

Another good one.

So we all have that dude in our FLGS who just wastes money, buys a new army only to sell it a week later, right? Well the flavor of the month for him this week was Chaos Marines, he bought $150 worth of marines and about $75 worth of paint for his new paint scheme, but, then he didn't like the army one day and was also hungry. Needless to say a friend of mine got all that stuff for a $8 sub that he bought with a gift certificate. Win.

Also from the same guy I also got $100 worth of dystopian wars stuff for $5. Right now I'm trying to trade it for some stuff

A FULL old deathwing squad for 20 cents.

including Cyclone, assault cannon and HF.

I have picked up a whole army of 1987-90 metal dwarves from eBay for £60 if memory serves me. It included all of the original Dragon Company and Bugmans regiments of renown, all of the white dwarf models to that point, Felix and Gotrec and about 60-80 other assorted Imperial dwarf models, plus 3 cannons. Basically my dream army from when I was 11 (in '87) but could never afford back then - even at 50p a dwarf!

More recently I keep going into a Hobbycraft store near me that has been selling FoW and GW stuff at 20% off (pretty normal for a good uk discount) then using vouchers for a further 25% off. As a result of this I have a huge pile of SM and IG kits that are destined for a Tyrants Guard army and a Chaos Marine army, plus armoured and infantry armies for FoW Russians, Germans, USA and Britain.

The down side to that is that in two years I have managed to build and paint a British armoured company the rest is in the loft.

I have also used the same vouchers against their clearance items (50% off) and picked up the Mines of Moria, a Baneblade and some old Necrons and Tau boxes for a pittance.

My best deal was a while ago...
My mate at the LFGS, was selling some 'odds and ends' to focus on his Magic the gathering card game hobby.

For £10 I got.

A £30 cantilever tool box.

Firefly rule book ,(with 45 army lists in!)

5 complete 1/300th scale armies (Heroics and Ross white metal.)

German Eastern Front Heavy Panzer Kampfgruppe1943.
(26 tanks 17 half tracks , 12 artillery, 20 infantry bases, 5 air craft.)

Soviet Tank Corp 1943..
(34 tanks, 10 armoured cars, 10 trucks, 20 infantry bases, 2 rocket launcher batteries.4 AA trucks.)

American Combat command 1944.
(29 tanks , 12 half tracks ,18 infantry bases 2 armoured cars 9 jeeps 4 tank destroyers, 2 AA half tracks.)

British Guards Armoured Regiment 1944.
(36 tanks, 10 half tracks ,4 carriers, 4 anti tank guns,14 infantry bases,and 3 typhoons)
(At the time these minatures would cost about £150 new!)


Also Shako rule book, and about 150 minis ,which I sold for £10...

I got a hammernator squad and an AoBR sergeant for £5, 20 guard for £6, a russ for a fiver and 4 guard HW teams for £3. I'm sure you could say I was rather chuffed.

Not as good as some others on here, but I picked up an old Warhammer starter set (6th ed? The one with Empire and Orcs) for 99 cents. The seller was local and was charging WAY too much for shipping, like $20 to ship just a couple miles. I contacted him and asked if I could do local pick-up instead. He said yes, I was the only bidder, and one dollar later I had some funky models!

I like doing that on Ebay

Last night, I found my high elf warmaster army.

and 2 circa 2003 dwarf slayer doom seeker models.

all tucked away in a box right under my nose for months! surprises i left myself 10 years ago I suppose.

bammmmm!

not wargameing but i did get it off one of my gameing mates . airsoft m16 fully pimped out got it unseen for £80 he had built it last year used it once and couldnt remember what was up with it , got it and have just worked out it would cost over £750 for me to get the parts new :]

 MajorStoffer wrote:
Gentlemen, I have a story to tell, of the Deal of all Deals, to not be seen again in my life. Lo, it was not I who acquired this Deal, but I did bask in its Glory.

This, my friends, is the Box of Many Armies.

/end dramatic writing.

Alright, so this begins last year, I have a mate who constantly stands vigil over craigslist for any noteworthy deals. He came across one posting for "box of warhammer, assorted," with no listed price, and a picture of two normal moving boxes full of a jumble of 40k.

Curious, my friends sends them a message, asking for a few closer-in photos. They provide them quickly, and while he can't make it specifics, he knows there's a lot of stuff in there, but it's not in the best shape. So, he offers them $150, they say sure, and he goes to get it the next day.

So, he brings these boxes home, and it takes 3 days to sort through what's in them. This box includes, but is not limited to:

31 vehicles, including 6 leman russ tanks, all the old kits

Full armies of roughly 2000 pts of:

Necrons
Tau
Eldar
Sisters of Battle
Guard (much more than 2k, likely 4-5 in total)

Partial Armies of between 500-1500 pts

Orks (including 5th deffkoptas)
Brettonians (because why not?)
Chaos Space Marines

Noteworthy bits included:

1x RT era Sentinel (dubbed "The Egg")
Metal everything, all pre-finecast characters and special units
25 Steel Legion
Over 200 guardsmen in unassembled bits, mostly modern Cadians, but plenty of Catachans, and some 2nd ed. metals
11.5 Chimeras in bits
2x Storm Ravens

This would sound like a steal, but it had a few catches:

Hot Glue. Every single assembled model was was assembled with hot glue
Paint. Every model was horribly painted, eye-searingly so
Every assembled vehicle had every single upgrade glued on to. Basilisks with heavy stubbers, hunter-killers, dozer blades and camo netting ahoy!

Considering there's thousands of points in there, and hundreds of individual models, my friend invested in a sonic cleaner, and after almost 1 year of it being in near-constant use, and enough simple green to provide a comfortable environment for a full-grown beluga, everything has been stripped, traded, sold or re-purposed. Almost everyone in our group has some part of the Box of Many Things. It gave, and gave and gave for almost a year, and has entered a semi-mythological place, its story to be passed down from generation to generation.

This. Just this. Gentlemen methinks we have the winner

You sir are a god

Found a guy selling off some armorcast baneblades, and Titans (eldar and imperial).
All were new in the boxes with the instructions and adverts for inquisitor magazine still with them.

Picked up a reaver with every arm option for $250 canadian.
Then sold it to pay for a FW Warhound.

Not really a 'deal' considering I think I payed original retail, but a guy off Bartertown just sold me the FoW Sting of the Scorpion box set for $100 NiB. It's long out of print now, but it has a full British LRDG and SAS raiding army in it, which is just so cool. They go for anywhere between $160 and $300 on eBay nowadays!

Just thought of one of my best scores ever. PIcked up a 1960's Tiesco Del Ray electric guitar from a homeless fellow for $1.40 and a container of rice pudding. I wanted to pay more, but when I went to my wallet it was nearly empty. The guy took pity on me and pretty much gave it to me. Luckliy I was on my way home from grocery shopping so I was able to sweeten the deal with some rice pudding.

In rough shape, but it has a stable neck and working hardware. My dad has it now for repair and refinishing.

We actually had a swap meet at our flgs. My big find was:

Land Raider Redeemer
2 Whirlwinds
1 Ironclad Dread
1 Regular Dread
1 Finecast terminator Libby
30 Terminators of various ilk
(at least 5 THSS, 6 LC and then a mix of power weapons on bolters, as well as 6 CMLs)
1 Terminator Chaplin.

All for $155.

2 x Anghor Prok (Limtied Edition GD UK Kroot Shaper Model)

Got them together for £15 on Ebay, one is in its packet still sealed the others packet is burst but it is unbuilt/unpainted.

These are usually £30-40 each, I've seen some at £50+.

Score.

I've got two:

1. My buddy texts me and says he needs to get rid of his Warmachine stuff, and quick. I know he's got a lot, so I say sure, if the price is right. Before I tell you the price, he had:

The full Cygnar line including a Stormwall, a Storm Strider, and two new in box plastic jack kits. It's was about 300-400 points.

A 250 point Khador army with every caster including Vlad3

A 150 point Circle Orboros army based on warpwolves and Tharn models.

A Privateer Press BattleFoam bag.

For a total of $200. I promptly pulled the few pieces I wanted and sold the rest on eBay for a total of around $1400.

I got an Innistrad booster box for about 45-50 bucks. and I pulled some sweetness. So as far as Money: The Wasting goes, I'd consider that a score.

I got a full CSM squad, Catachans, Noise Marines, Vampire Count Crypt Ghouls, and the Chaos Spawn apocalypse set for €110.

So basically half-priced, brand new goods!

The shop owner doesn't normally sell Warhammer, he's just selling them for another shop y'see.

Someone was selling a large Tau force for $600. The only thing I wanted from it was some hammerheads and broadsides, but he was unwilling to split so I took the whole thing thinking I could sell the remainder myself.
It turns out there was nearly 7000pts of Tau - about $4000 Australian retail. Bargain! I sold about half of it for $800 (so $200 cash AND half the product in profit) and now have enough to fill out my army with the maximum of every single unit combination I could want.

I might have one that takes the cake..

2 years ago.. summertime.. The wife and I went to a garage sale and there was a box of stuff with a piece of paper that said "make an offer" taped to it.

I found among other broken bits of 40k I.G. stuff.....

An ArmorCast Eldar Phantom Titan....minus the head.

I asked the Mom ( i assumed ) if she had the rest and she said that was all she could find and "just get it out of here"

I offered 25 bucks for the whole box and she took it. There were tank bits and sprue pieces and lots of metal catachans but alas, no head.

I went on e-bay and found a recast for 45 bucks.

Armorcast Phantom Titan-- 70 bucks..

Not bad eh?

Complete set of BfSP dwarves, 6 spider riders, 3 spiders and the troll for £5.90 including postage.

The goblins I swapped for some night goblins I needed with another player, the troll netted me £5 and the dwarves £20.

2 trolls and a snotling base for a fiver, sold the trolls for £5 each still have the snotlings atm

All the gorkamorka rule books for £8 win

Never have gottena great 40k deal, but I collect Lego and got a crazy deal on CL from a guy selling off his collection from when he was a kid got 2 classic knight castles and almost all the forestmen sets. It was awesome.

I got the Skullz Ltd. Ed. Adeptus Mechanicus unit for US$180 from a fellow Dakkanaut. Considering that they were going for £200-£250 at the time in eBay, it was a good deal.