Tips & Tricks #14 : Cheap Miniatures (and an adventure idea)
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- čas přidán 2. 02. 2021
- This is a different kind of video for me - but it's something I wanted to try out ...just for a bit of a change :D
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Since I've been asked this a couple of times I thought I would make a pinned post.
So, when searching on ebay I will generally search the 'wargames & roleplaying' section for 'sprue' ...here's what shows up when sorted from cheapest first:
www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=sprue&_sacat=16486&_sop=15
Furthermore, here is a seller I've used in the past (though you can get some of them cheaper than this if you search around - but it serves as a good starting point to see what's available):
www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Adventurers-Soldiers-28mm-plastic-figures-new-multi-listing/382924711228?hash=item592817653c:g:n~EAAOSwSv1Xkj25
and
www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Dark-Ages-Medieval-Plastic-Sprues-Gripping-Beast-Conquest-WGF-ETC-plastics-NEW/382924710415?hash=item592817620f:g:9GwAAOSw0e9Ur8B8
(oh ...and these links are UK based - but like I say, they're good examples if nothing else ;) )
Board game stuff has sometimes showed up on ebay broken up into miniature lots. So you can always search ebay by board game name then sort by price to see if there are any small lots of miniatures.
oh I love this type of content from you. Cheap minis, and a free encounter? Heck yes! The only way I could think to make it any better, might be showing us this little adventure and minis on your own patented papercraft terrain! Well done mate, looking forward to more of these vids!
I did think about setting up some terrain to show the final crypt - but the video was getting a bit long (and my workspace is a mess) so I decided against it. Kinda regretting it now :)
@@CrookedStaffTerrain even premade terrain! You dont have to show it being built necessarily. Could link to a previous build video! Whatevs, this new content is keeping your channel fresh but still familiar
Wow! I love your painting and basing style! Your miniatures look amazing.
Thanks :)
I used to like selecting monsters at random (to make a random encounter table with appropriate common, uncommon and rare monsters), and then think up adventures too. Good times!
Wow Kris! Not only are you a papercraft wizard, you're painting skills are A++ Great job and Thanks!!
Thanks. I'm at a standard that I'm happy with (re: painting mini's) - but half of it is still pretty basic techniques.
This vid was GREAT! Nice paint job on all the figures. I like the adventure walk-thru and how you used your textures. I'd like to see this format every once in a while. I hope you do it again. I like how you tied it all together.
Thanks :) (as has been said in another comment - I should have set up the final room with my 2.5D terrain, and included a picture of that. Oh well, maybe next time :D ).
Great advice,buying sprues can leave you with a good mix of sweet bits for ur bits box too.
Yeah, I'm probably gonna make a little treasure pile out of the spare weapons and things :)
Loved the adventure part specially. Hope you can bring more of this in the future.
That's the part of the video that I was worried about the most :o
@@CrookedStaffTerrain I think that the adventure part gives us an extra motivation/inspiration to do the minis part, so it is both entertaining and useful.
@@zombielandiii2711 Good to know :) :) :)
@@CrookedStaffTerrain It was very helpful and shows off a way of thinking about encounters I had not considered before. (Monsters first)
@@anthraxhehehe It is a bit of a back-to-front way of going about it - but it is something I like to do from time to time (especially if I've just got my hands of a bunch of new mini's :D ).
Great change of pace fir this video. Really enjoyed it. Good mini encounter. As soon as i get my printer fixed. i might try to create one your boxes for this. Well done. Keep up the good work!
Thanks. Glad you enjoyed it.
(and yeah - you should be able to make everything on the map with the existing 'print & paste' stuff)
Do more of These Mission examples, keep Up the good Work!
Well, I'll have to see how things go (as I'm not sure if this video is going to be all that popular - as it's not really anything new or original :S ).
@@CrookedStaffTerrain I thought it was great. This would probably be a lot more work, but it would be awesome to see your adventure laid out with your paper terrain and minis, as well as the digital map.
@@timparks9833 I should have made the final room at least ...oh well - maybe next time :)
Brother, this video was super cool.... I already have a ton of minis and everything... But super cool on showing a "Mini Session" using the miniatures... Loved it
A mini mini session if you will :) Glad you enjoyed the vid :)
Absolutely worth the wait! Thank you also for the dungeon at the end. Your work is appreciated.
No probs. Glad you enjoyed it.
Frostgrave adventurers make for great low level characters that will fit lots of different classes.
Indeed (I have several individual sprues from Northstar ...and am considering picking one up for their new 'demons' too :) ).
I loved this video, great idea. I often try to create adventures based on the new terrain I have crafted or modified over time, so doing that with recent minis acquired is good inspiration. I'd like to see more videos like this! Very nice paint jobs. It would be nice to see what other combos of figurines you could make with affordable sprues and what kind of stories emerge!
Thanks ...and yeah, I do like to dabble with other kinds of videos every now and again (though terrain will always be my main focus) - and I have a couple in mind that I'd like to get around to sometime this year if I can :)
Great vid, and adventure idea too
I bought a box of the Warlord skeletons back when I first got into miniature's. I was actually looking for bones and stuff for terrain pieces and found the box of 90 skeletons with the metal necromancer for $60. I had to go for it and it gave me plenty of skeletons to build and use as skeleton enemies, as well as plenty of bones, weapons, and shields for terrain.
Yeah, they seem especially good for that kind of thing.
@@CrookedStaffTerrain Something I haven't done, but thought about. If you ever want to try sculpting a miniature. Just use the greenstuff over top 1 of the skeletons, using it like an armature. It's already the right size, and would literally give your miniature a skeleton.
@@davinci3259 I'm afraid my sculpting skills (with greenstuff) are pretty much confined to filling gaps and making rocks :)
Quite a bit of my inspiration for encounters, and even adventures, comes from miniatures as well. Thanks for sharing your process with us.
No probs. It's not something I do all the time ...but it is another tool for the toolbox (so to speak :) ).
Selling yourself short with that simple encounter design - it was excellently thought up. Especially the puzzle!
Glad you liked it :D
Fantastic paint job on all of those figures, and your bases are next level!
Thanks :)
I don't play DnD, but this was very inspiring 😊
I did a couple videos about wargaming lines that are good for D&D. Oh the days of "bits"! Sprues are very good deals when you can find them!
Yeah, I think we're lucky right now - as a lot of manufacturers are making plastic models at the moment (it was mainly just GW when I was growing up) ...and the fact that you can get a ton of individual sprues on ebay nowadays is perfect for us RPGers.
Also, I'll have to dig through your back catalogue to find the videos (or I may have already seen them ...I have been subbed for a while :) ).
Fantastic! You really get a lot out of a few sprues, especially by diversifying the paint jobs and the plan for how they might get used. And a fun little adventure as well!
Well, I don't think there's any new ideas here ...but I thought it would be nice to put it all into one video - as it's a technique I like to use from time to time :)
Now you just need to make the map pieces and box to put them in like you did last time.
P.S. I'm totally going to steal this adventure. 😁
If folks are interested I might do a basic write-up ...and supply the puzzle as a printout (I'll do a poll or something in the next couple of days over on the community page).
Impressive work..!
:) Thanks!
Very cool video!
These are looking great
Cheers!
Your painting skills are amazing!
A lot of it is just learning the techniques, and a fair bit of practice/patience.
@@CrookedStaffTerrain You make it look WAY easier than it is!
You should do a whole video on how to build an encounter!
I'm not sure I'm the right person for that kind of thing ...but it is something to think about :)
You are dating yourself with the Jason and the Argonauts reference.... So am I recognizing it....Good Vid, very approachable stuff and the minis look great.
Thanks. And to be fair, that film was old even when I was a kid (still loved it though :) ).
Excellent video!
Thanks Joe!
Simply awesome! They turned out great! And what a clever little puzzle; I might steal that one...
Steal away :)
Great ideas! I'm going to try picking minis and thinking of adventures around them.
Yeah ...it kinda forces you to use a limited monster palette so to speak ...but I find the challenge of tying it all together kinda fun (though I am a little strange :) ).
Your miniatures look great and your adventure idea was amazing. Well done!
Glad you like 'em :)
I still have older GW skeletons but if I were after some today then I'd probably go for the fairly new Oathmark ones.
I have a sprue of those too (they do look pretty cool) ...you can see them in the video at one point ;)
The only reason I didn't paint them for the video is because they have rags and scraps of armour that would take a bit longer to paint.
Now that I think about it, I have way too many skeleton sprues (mantic, warlord, northstar, wargames atlantic, some old GW stuff too) ...hmmm... I may have a problem ;)
Very good video indeed.
Cheers!
See I like buying and building a full box and creating different equipment options. Especially if they actually have different in-game stats. And if I can also use them in a Wargame, such as Frostgrave or Rangers of Shadowdeep, as well then it is even better.
Yeah, if you're also into war/skirmish games, then this video probably isn't of much use :) (as I say, it's geared more towards the role-playing crowd ...as we generally don't need regiments of similar models ...well ...at least not all of the time ;) ).
That being said, I have been building a small army for Oathmark ...so I've been picking up model sprues from all over the place - to get a rag-tag orc/goblin force :)
@@CrookedStaffTerrain I have found that creating a variety of models tends to lead to a lot of ideas. Like assembling a group of skeletons with Hoplite style weapons and armor inspiring an encounter with a small phalanx of skeletons defending a mountain pass towards a long abandoned city. Or a zombie in samurai armor who seeks a worthy adversary to end his undeath.
Great job! I liked the concept, the paint job, and of course putting it all together. Wrapped up all nice and neat. Just need a nice red bow. ;)
Thanks. I do think that it's sometimes a good idea to try other ways of writing adventures (like letting the miniatures dictate the story in this example) ...just to see where it leads :)
Good info but I especially liked the scenario at the end. It really inspired me to try to put something together. Thanks.
No problem. Glad it was useful :)
great idea!
Thanks. I'm not sure how useful it is outside the UK - but it is something I like to do (I have amassed quite collection of these individual sprues ...now I just gotta paint them :S ).
I discovered multi-part plastic kits during quarantine and was blown away at how much more affordable they were than my Reaper miniatures. Awesome video!
Side note: could we get a video on how you base your miniatures? They're fantastic.
I agree :) less than £1 a model for a proper miniature (i.e. not a repurposed toy) is a great price if you ask me. And 5 or 6 of a particular type is a good number too.
Oh, and yeah, I might do a video on basing in the future ;)
This is brilliant. So many videos like this are US focused so it’s nice to see a UK focused one. With the sprues you showed in the video what were the sizes of the bases? This is always the most important thing for me when purchasing minis as use strict 25mm² squares.
I've used mdf bases for most of these* ...and all the 'human' mini's are on 25mm circles.
The giant spiders are on 45mm circles ...and the others (smaller spiders, victims, corpse) are on various oval shapes.
*I've got lots of these lying around (in various shapes and sizes), that I get from ebay, or Warbases, or similar.
@@CrookedStaffTerrain thank you. I will definitely be looking in to these minis.
Please make more like the print and play Goblins!!!
I have a few ideas - but I generally use regular mini's most of the time ...so they're not very high on my to-do list I'm afraid.
Thank you a lot!
No probs. Hope it helped!
Great stuff. New sub. Thanks!
Thanks for the sub. This video isn't my usual content - but I do like to mix things up every now and again :)
@@CrookedStaffTerrain yes, mate. All good! I liked your style!
@@CrookedStaffTerrain just been watching your 2.5d playlist. It's fantastic. More than happy to purchase these files at 76p a pop! Great stuff. Just about to print off my first set of floors, walls and doors now! Excellent work I love it!
@@jahvyn Well, they're all 'pay-what-you-want' so you can grab them all for free if you like (just put a zero in the little box).
(yep ...I'm a terrible salesman :) )
@@CrookedStaffTerrain pa ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. You are indeed!
More than happy to pay for your hard work.
I'm envy people in US/Europe, you guys have chains of gaming store with miniature and stuff 😭
You can still use e-Bay. the games stores are often expensive.
@@Liofa73 Yeah ...all these were ebay purchases. But we are a bit spoiled over here (right now I actually have a FLGS in my hometown for the first time in ages ...not that anyone can visit it at the moment ...for obvious reasons :( )
Nice Video!
Did you do the bases yourself?
Thanks ...and yeah (they're mostly glued to cheap mdf bases)
:-D or if you are totally NOT skilled in painting: make tokens :-) buy some round wood tokens, glue a picture on top and then an epoxi sticker on top
This might seem a little silly, but what sort of search terms do you use in eBay etc?
I've just made a pinned post with a few links :)
@@CrookedStaffTerrain A pinned comment on this video? Perhaps I'm being a numpty but I don't see it!
@@figrollin For some reason it 'unpinned' when I edited it. It should be pinned again now (fingers crossed).
@@CrookedStaffTerrain perfect! Thanks!
What search terms did you use to find these smaller amounts of miniatures that you still have to assemble? I'm having some trouble. It's a great idea!
Just searching for 'sprue' in the 'Wargames & Roleplaying' section usually works well.
Plus, here's an example of one seller I've used in the past (though you can get them cheaper by searching around):
www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Adventurers-Soldiers-28mm-plastic-figures-new-multi-listing/382924711228?hash=item592817653c:g:n~EAAOSwSv1Xkj25&var=651590567586
(but it's a good example to use - as it shows you a lot of stuff that's currently available)
@@CrookedStaffTerrain Thank you so much! Love your stuff :)
Edit: with the word "sprue" I found quite a lot immediately, thanks!
@@roozz33 no probs :)
Was ... was that a Battle Beasts reference?
;)
i havent found any of those figures anywhere... maybe bc i´m from europe not uk?
Possibly. Since recording the video, and speaking to folks in mainland Europe, being able to buy 'single sprues' appears to be a lot more common here in the UK.
That's one of the reasons I made this next video (using reaper bones models):
czcams.com/video/-iw3IYH2NuY/video.html
...as those should be a lot easier to get a hold of :)
Your prices are somewhat off there, the bases weren't included in the costs while the majority of the other options include them (save for Reaper Bones).
And the Warlord skeletons are a reuse of the older Wargames Factory ones with the price upped on them...and they're kind of fiddly and fragile as minis, but great for terrain embellishment and basing pieces
Yeah, as I say, I make some assumptions in this video (i.e. that you are already a mini's painter ...and, as such, you already have most of the other stuff) ...but even so, the mdf bases I use only cost £0.06 for a 25mm/1" base ...and the mini's themselves actually cost a total of £14.05 (again, I made a £5 per sprue generalisation).
However, I have had a few questions about my basing technique - so I might cover all that in more detail in another video :) (not sure when that will be though).
And yeah, I dunno what happened to Wargames Factory (I have a few of their models) ...and like you say, they are a bit fiddly/fragile - which is why I need to assemble some of the Wargames Atlantic ones that I mentioned (as they look a bit more 'chunky' ;) ).
@@CrookedStaffTerrain Wargames Factory was bought up by Warlord...or at least that's what seems to be the case, and Warlord was supposed to get all of their things back out that they could (Some of the licensed stuff went elsewhere such as the Eisenkern and other Dreamforge stuff now being made by Wargames Atlantic), there are several that aren't out again despite years of waiting. I keep wanting their amazons to come back out...
With the bases cost, I tend to use the Reaper/Base Boss ones for the most part with minis, mainly because I tend to like having a thicker base to prevent some issues with people picking them up by the mini rather than the base. (And I've been repurposing the WizKids unpainted bases that are included with those for some scatter terrain pieces). I'd also had some MDF bases that ended up causing other issues due to game night issues with stuff getting on them or soaking in.
Been using war game and skirmish game miniatures for D&D for years now. I play the Birthright campaign setting so lots of armored humans is great. Oathmark, Fire forge, Perry miniatures, V&V miniatures, all are roughly in scale with D&D's offical miniatures.
Yeah - now that folks split the boxes (and sell the individual sprues/frames on ebay) - that has been especially useful for us RPG folks.
Well, I say useful ...it's also been a bit addictive (you may have noticed that when I was throwing some examples on the table there was Othmark stuff, Frostgrave stufff, stuff from Mantic, Wargames Atlantic, etc.) :)
Another trick I've found is using larger scale miniatures as giants. In my games I have a more realistic art style when it comes to humanoids so using larger viking miniatures for frost giants and Roman Legionnaires with sculpted on beards as fire giants. Miliput does a fine enough for beards. 54mm and up seems like a fine size miniature for giants.
@@h347h I've seem some (Tehnolog?) mini's that work well for that kind of thing (i.e. 54mm orcs as ogres, like you say) - though I've not picked any up yet (I am tempted though :) ).
There is a Russian based company called Tin Soldiers that does metal 54mm historical "dark ages" warriors of various centuries and cultures and that's who I have used. For generally around $9 US for a single figure. When you look at prices of giants on the second hand market on eBay it isn't all that bad.
Very cool video!
Thanks :)