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I got into miniatures via my Mum when she brought back Heroquest on her way back form university when I was four years old (a long time ago) then that got me into space crusade and space hulk and that got me into Warhammer and Warhammer 40k. Which i then stopped when I was about 16 years old (got distracted by women and also my friends stopped playing) I got into miniatures via the first bones kickstarter which propelled me into Deadzone and others.

So how about everyone else?

Started with getting a few minis for characters in D&D. Snowballed from there. Been collecting and painting off and on for 25+ years now.

That's why I bought kickstarted bones, I was picking up minis for table top rpg's I got into doing rpg's with mini's when I married and started an rpg group in states

Walked into a comic shop that also sold minis, there where some painted second hand DA tac squad in a case. I thought they where so cool, so i saved up went back they where still there and bought them. I had no idea it was a Game at the time so i started to make up rules and stats. I did this for three months, when i found out it was a game and many people played, my mind was blown. Since then I've been back and forth on 40k, bad dice luck is a instant killer.

it is though I still have my original 3rd edition dice they must be loaded or something, because with certain flip on the dice you cold get 5 or 6 on them easy

Inferno Magazine (borrowed from a friend), Guant's Ghosts novels, Vassal 40K, Ebay, FLGS 40K night.

Having written that down, I just realized to what extent GW doesn't appreciate the multifarious ways in which it gains customers.

Of course, I have moved off of GW products since then, but that was due to the ways GW treats its extant customers. In the intervening time I purchased a slew of GW products.

I watched some friends play Necromunda at a local game shop. Fell in love. That branched to 40K, Mordheim, and Battletech. I loved the miniatures, the assembly and painting, and the showing off!

I got tired of the price hikes and rules changes so I dropped out of the GW world and stuck to RPGS. That is until I saw Dropzone Commander, and fell in love. I'm thinking about also branching out to Warmachine at this point.

I was lucky I came into a lot of models before I stopped playing 40k and when came into playing with models apart from grey knights there isn't anything apart from rles that grab me

Moved to Nashville, TN and by chance wondered into the GW inside the Opry Mills mall.

The rest is history.

Heroquest. Had a friend who had it, then we all pretty much got Space Crusade. Then onto Epic (when it was still called Space Marine ) and 1st ed 40k, 2nd ed 40k in a big way, called it a day when 3rd came out as it just wasnt the same.
Broke into RPGs for a few years before coming back to the fold with Warmachine during Uni, then another break before i moved to Rushden where the Phoenix Gaming Club drew me into its clutches with Bolt Action.
I now play mostly BA but dabble in Infinity, Dreadball, Dystopian Wars and a whole load of other stuff.

Started with Grenadier Models miniatures for the Traveler RPG in 84 or so (still have a bunch of these lead miniatures laying around). Then Ral Partha miniatures for D&D and Star Fleet games in 85 or 86. Then the worst thing happened, a friend of mine showed me his Space Marine army around 88, they were looking for opponents in their Rogue trader games so I decided on Orks. God I still hate how powerful SM were back then, I rarely won a game. But the army was fun to play and so I have been collecting them ever since. Stopped playing heavily around the beginning of 4th edition and tried a little 6th edition.

What brought me back into actually playing war games again was Warmahordes, Firestorm Armada, infinity, X-wing and all the new games. A wonderful renaissance in gaming.

Cousins introduced me to 40k and Necromunda; didn't actually start playing myself until 4 or 5 years later but I always found it interesting. Now I play 40k at home with my partner (whom I got into the hobby muahaha).

I first got into it based on an ad in Dragon magazine. I saw the minis and order out for a catalogue throught he mail. That is where I got my 1st Edition stuff. Through the mail.

Now, I play a lot of different stuff but my main joy is making my own games and developing/revamping dead games.

I got HeroQuest for a birthday, about 10 or so and played the life out of it. Then one of my neighbours got Blood Bowl and 2nd Ed 40K which we played all the time too.

The my parents bought me the 2nd Ed 40K box after I'd painted some Airfix Napoleonic artillery I'd bought to show how seriously I'd take it. Got that, loved it, got some friends hooked and even started up a gaming club at school, though it was mostly 6mm WW2 as that's all the budget would allow (40K was still too expensive back in 1997).

Discovered girls, dropped out of hobby. Got into Heroclix at uni due to flatmates, dropped out again after moving out. Then aged about 25 I found the Warlord Games forum and joined up, then bought a Celt army box to assemble/paint of a Christmas, and then it all spiralled out of control from there when my old gaming friend saw them and suggested we got back into 40K which we did. Thankfully I manged to sell off most of my unused WHF/40K stuff for more than I paid at the time (since it was 10 years later) which then let me invest in all my current stuff without feeling too guilty

Now even though I don't play that much (maybe 1 or 2 games a month on average) I still enjoy painting whatever random bits I stumble across from the unbuilt mini's drawer (mostly steampunk, pinup and Scribor Christmas minis).

Got in through some mates who played "moderns" in 20mm back in the 80s. 'Cold war gone hot' stuff (this was all prior to the wall coming down in 1989).

Went from there to Battletech, thence to 40k, dabbled in WHFB for a bit and went through a swathe of other SF miniatures games where the new one displaced an old one (so two games were my alternates, new one comes in and swaps out an older one).

I'm currently on WHFB (again) and Infinity. Still have a chunk of the 40k and battletech stuff but no desire to play either.

I had some board games with more detailed miniatures I really enjoyed - Hero Quest, Dragonstrike, etc...

Getting into the hobby itself and into 40k though, funny enough I was introduced to it at a Magic: The Gathering tournament.

I was playing in a tournament and to pass the time the judges were playing Warhammer 40k inbetween answering rules questions or disputes.

The tourny had a lunch break in it and I went over and marveled at all the terrain and miniatures. It was 2nd ed 40k Tyranids vs. Marines. They answered my questions about the game and shared some stories of past games and the lore, and let me fondle their painted minis.

I was hooked and convinced a friend of mine to go in halves for the 2nd ed starter box. I took the orks for myself (I still have them!)

Soon as I saved up money for my own army I got Tyranids, it's the first thing I saw of the game and I love the idea of xenos that just go around devouring everything.

for me, a CCG was a gateway drug for miniatures

It's funny how girls distract for a bit happened to me and I stopped until I got married then bam rpg (with my partner)dragged me back, I didn't sell my space marines I did my SOB's though for money towards furniture

i walked into the Historical Models shop 30 years ago, looking for some more helicopter models to build and blow up...
for a ten year old with illegal Mexican fireworks that's normal, right???
i saw some of the original Citadel Chaos Dwarfs in a blister pack, and knew i wanted to paint them...
when Space Marines came out a couple of years later, i was hooked for life...
still never been a gamer, but painting has always been my passion...
nothing has ever been able to replace it, though surfing is just as much of a necessary part of my happiness in life...
girls come and go, but there is always more to learn with painting and modelling...

cheers
jah

My first foray into minis was when i walked into a local Hobby Town 20 some odd years ago because they carried D&D books.... and they didn't have any new adventure modules (yeah... remember those !? ).... so with 20 bucks burning a hole in my pocket i picked up this boxed set of really beautiful samurai warrior minis.

That was it. I wasn't a mini gamer, but i was hooked on the painting and assembly. THe next trip i noticed that they had these awesome looking but weird models for a game called "Warhammer".... so i bought a metal doomwheel, and painted it, and it sat on my shelf for a year or two until i had a friend that was interested in trying this new game called Warhammer 40k.

That lasted a few years until college when i gave up mini gaming to drink and chase tail mostly... several years after college when my barhopping days were (mostly) behind me, i picked the hobby back up as a game shop opened up the next town over. Got very involved into competitive warmachine and hordes, spent 3 years as one of their rules development infernals and playtesters, and then got a bit burnt out and retired from that, shortly thereafter stopped playing PP games (combination of burnout and playgroup dried up... great games, just was too over-involved in them for a while, became like a job). Almost became a playtester for Dark Age and Wyrd and Wrath of Kings games too... but decided against it. I'd had enough of my hobby being a job. I was really enjoying gaming again and to turn it back into a labor instead of a labor of love just didn't seem like a good idea.

Played Malifaux, Dark Age, Infinity and a host of lesser known games with some friends, and meanwhile, started up a retro campaign of mordheim... which is where the warhammer fantasy bug bit, and bit freakin' hard. That's been my mainstay for the last... hell... 5 years ?

No plans at all to stop again. I'm 35 and mini gaming is my vice. I'm actually considering picking up malifaux again to have as a skirmish game to play with friends when we dont have enough time for WFB, and i might even dabble back in WM/H to teach my son a good quality skirmish level game as he loves the models and is interested in the hobby aspect of it.


-- Haight

Started with the Lord of the Rings miniatures magazine as a child. Collected and painted a little they were good value and worth the pocket/paper round money and it was fun to play on the floor with coke cans and whatever else we could find as scenery. pretty sure we tried to create a book helms deep at some point. After a while I stoped collecting the magazine due to lack of funds and I have no idea what happened to those models.

I was watching lord of the rings with the girlfriend about two years ago and was reminded of the models I used to paint. I picked up some paints and models second hand on ebay and got back into it.

Didnt really stick with much LOTR stuff as I realised how much it went up since I was younger and that realised I was mostly interested in character models. I collected some 40k stuff and painted a little but when my flatmate pointed out that even with what I already spent I would have had to purchase a fair bit more to get a standard size points force I got heavily put off. Reading through the rules put me off even more.

I got into mantic as a cheaper alternative to GW, love the Mantic undead and considered picking up an army of them but I started getting into historicals after that and its where most of my interest lies. Read the Kings of War rules and liked them a lot, the fact that I can make an histroical fantasy army using the Kingdoms of men list appeals to me a lot. Most of the Mantic models I have picked up including Deadzone have left me disappointed. Their hard plastic stuff is mostly good though and they do make good rules.

At the moment I have three main interests.

28mm Samurai for Kings of War, Ronin and other games

Love Samurai Armour and history so I got into Samurai pretty heavily. Being able to let my models do double duty as a Fantasy army and a historical army is very appealing to me.

15mm ww2 for flames of war etc

I have wanted to do ww2 for a while, originally I was going to get into bolt action and even bought a box of models and the rulebook. However I really don't think that 28mm is the size for tanks and other vehicles both in terms of scale and cost. 15mm is a much better size for a vehicle heavy game. I have this problem with 40k too.

28mm Sci Fi for infinity.

I was largely uninterested in sci fi after disappointments with 40k and deadzone but I love the Infinity stuff and the focus on smaller scale skirmishes with 10 or so models per side. The price I like less though.

wargame factory sells some good samurai guys

This started my space marine addiction

Into:
Saw some wargames figures at "Games Paradise" in the mall. Hooked.

Got back into.
Had been dabbling off and on with wargaming many times over the years, but when I met two guys and we started playing Song of Blades and Heroes it led to a club. Now we've been meeting every other week for about 4 years and I've gamed more than in the previous 15.

kalonjacarl wrote:
wargame factory sells some good samurai guys

Thank you for the heads up. I do have a box of each of their samurai and ashigaru. They are alright and a cheap way to build up a force but I just don't enjoy either the painting or assembling of them tbh I may end up getting rid of them or using them as casualties etc. They just don't compare to something like perry sadly. I wont buy any more of the WGF stuff and would happily pay the extra for some Samurai from steel fist or Perry over picking up more of the WGF guys.

Started to play fantasy in 96, got a few games in on active duty., went several years without playing, sold it all in 2012, got back in 2014 when a friend said "Oh, ever play 40k?"

lol, I wanted to play Warmachine, but NO ONE here played. I became a PG and changed that so now I am buried in models from both games.

So I got into gaming back when a friend picked up 40k 2nd ed for Xmas, back some 19 years back. First proper purchases for me were for Epic Space Marine, but then I branched out into 40k, Necromunda, and really every game GW did until about 2002. At that point I was at uni, joined GW to work part time, worked for them for 3 years before quitting. Never once bought anything for LotR.

While working for GW, Warmachine was released, and so we had an after hours staff gaming night playing that and Confrontation. Also picked up the Rackham game, Hybrid, back then.

Once I quit GW I was heavily into RPGs, as wargames (well GW) was far too expensive, even on discount as a student. I got back into minis properly just the last or so with the release of the IKRPG and so I got my Warmachine figures back out, and have since collected some 5 different Warmahordes armies, and also got Hybrid back out of storage and have finally played it properly and spent the last 6 months finding the extra minis for it.

 dr_ether wrote:

While working for GW, Warmachine was released, and so we had an after hours staff gaming night playing that and Confrontation. Also picked up the Rackham game, Hybrid, back then.

Heh so you played warmachine in a GW store? Awesome 'heresy' lol

Got Battlemasters for Christmas one year. Then a few years later tried painting a few figures for some reason with some Testors paints that I had but never used when I was building model kits as a kid. Then bought a box of Epic Knight Paladin plastics and painted one. Then saved up Christmas money and got the 40k 2nd ed box. That was probably in 1996. Ever since I've been obsessed with minis. Rarely ever get to play, but I've been through 40k 2nd and 3rd, WHFB 5th, 6th and 7th, Warzone 1st, Gorkamorka, Necromunda, Mordheim, Malifaux, Infinity, etc.

I bought Necromunda & 40k at a garage sale.

Went over to my friends house one day and saw him, his brother, and their neighbor playing a game of 40k. Tried it out and was instantly hooked.