Listening to a wargaming podcast yesterday, the topic was discussed whether you should sell miniatures of projects that have finished and will probably not used again.
I have been painting miniatures for at least 30 years, but never sold any that I have painted myself. Over the years, I have painted many miniatures for games we used to play quite lot at that point in time, but are now sitting idle in my wargaming room.
A good example are my Full Thrust spaceships. All bought and painted in the 90s, but I think it has been 15 years or so since we have played a FT game. So, what to do with them? Hold on to them for nostalgic reasons, knowing that they'll probably never see a gaming table again? Or passing them on, then regretting it several years later? Or simply consider them as trophies and mementos of gaming days long gone?
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| My drawer with spaceships. They saw quite frequent space combats, but now have been sitting idle for almost 15 years. |
A dilemma unsolved at my end. I need the space back but I have rarely not regretted a sale eventually - I figure that I liked the genre enough once it will do so again later on.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, I have a box of space ships untouched for at least 15 years too :-)
It's indeed a dilemma. I still have plans for grand campaigns in all sorts of periods, but time is running out sooner or later.
DeleteI have a whole bunch of stuff that I would simply prefer to give away, only nobody seems to want it :-)
ReplyDeleteIt is of course old stuff, in some cases dating back to the 90s, and some of it is badly painted. None of it is well painted. I think I might be able to sell it to Oldhammerers or other grognards online, but really, I don't want to bother with ebay & shipping hassles, certainly not post-Brexit. So for now it stays boxed up.
One of the things I've done with old boardgames is simply to give them away for free through a local charity shop or so. But with miniatures that's much harder. Miniatures are very much a 'personal' project, not always to the liking of fellow wargamers, even if interested in the same period.
DeleteI'm not sure they would actually want old metal miniatures. I did see some boxes of esci 1/72 plastic napoleonics in the local charity shop recently though :-)
DeleteMaybe I'll just put a big give away post on facebook someday in one of those selling groups.
Yes, as I said, wargaming miniatures are too 'specialized' for donating them to a local charity shop. It might work for generic plastic toys or boardgames, but not miniatures.
DeleteI've sold off many armies over the years and only once have I really regretted it- so much so that I have started that particular period over again. Sometimes I get bored with a period- as I did with Dark Ages warfare and also the ACW(still have both collections but want them sold so I can buy some different toys!) sometimes I want to do a period in a different way so for me the dilemma is a bit different but still a dilemma.
ReplyDeleteStarting a period again after having sold armies of that same period, that's hard-core wargaming! :-)
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