Greetings!

Yes, I know the technology has been out for awhile now, particularly the 3D Resin Printing. Still, I am curious about your views on the 3D Resin Miniatures, as well as newer *Hard Plastic* miniatures, produced for Frostgrave and the like. In both cases, I think that the scale and dimensions of detail are quite excellent. Price points have gone up a bit, certainly, though when I look at some of the older miniatures I have from Wizkids, Nolzure's, and even Reaper Miniatures, many of the miniature models from just a few years ago look...pretty uninspiring in comparison.

I even bought some metal miniatures from Reaper Miniatures as recent as last year--and when I look at similar miniatures in Hard Plastic now, like for Frostgrave, or Resin Miniatures I have recently purchased a few months ago, it definitely has made me wonder, "What the fuck are they thinking?"

What has been your recent experiences with miniatures? What do you think about the apparent upgrades in detail and other qualities?

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

I've seen some of the newer ones and the recurring thought is... "overwrought".

Theres actually too much detail on some of the newer models to the point its an increasing nuisance to paint them. Or the pieces have so many fiddly bits that it makes painting them a nuisance. Sometimes both.

I compare them to older models from the late 80s to 90s and they come across as better looking somehow.

I feel like the late 90s was probably the best time for mini quality vs fiddly balance. Pieces could be complex. But they were not too complex, usually. But they also sported alot of fine detail. Heartbreaker and Reaper come to mind right off. Though both did better with metal at the time. Same for Games Workshop minis. Right on the cusp of the eventual hard downhill dive GW seems hellbent on.

I liked the crazy though oversized Rackham Confrontation minis. The minis alone made me want to create campaigns in their world. I picked up their Confrontation game just on the offchance I would one day convert it over for TTRPG play... but never did. Those figures were works of art tho.

Today - I'm getting back into minis and I bailed just as Reaper started its Bones program using plastic. I've come to realize I'm not a big fan of the plastic minis. I try to go metal as much as possible. Plastic is cheaper, but it feels cheap and flimsy. It's *not* that big of a deal to me, but it's something I consider. Since I'm in the mode of buying army builders - orcs, goblins, etc. going plastic is easy.

For PC/NPC figures? I'll stick to metal.

A friend of mine got some 3d printed stuff - and its undersized, and feels soooooo brittle. None of have broken yet, but fuck, I'm terrified to handle them.

Reaper is my primary go-to. But I'm open to other lines.

Quote from: SHARK on October 25, 2021, 05:18:06 AM
I even bought some metal miniatures from Reaper Miniatures as recent as last year--and when I look at similar miniatures in Hard Plastic now, like for Frostgrave, or Resin Miniatures I have recently purchased a few months ago, it definitely has made me wonder, "What the fuck are they thinking?"

I bought some Reaper Bones recently at the same time I went on a resin-buying spree (there goes the savings...) and I agree, I had a bit of a WTF? feel - even after spending ages boiling & cooling the bendy plastic, they still look a bit crap compared to many of the new resin minis.

Some resin minis are overwrought, too large, too expensive, but there are some great designers making some great stuff. I love these guys for instance https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/255098487684

Those look awesome! But 32mm is kinda big isn't it?

Edit: I see you can have them done in 28mm. Got any pics of the ones you own at that scale?

Quote from: tenbones on October 25, 2021, 10:53:59 AM
A friend of mine got some 3d printed stuff - and its undersized, and feels soooooo brittle. None of have broken yet, but fuck, I'm terrified to handle them.

Can't they scale it up if they wanted to? Just put it all in at 150% or whatever?

Quote from: tenbones on October 25, 2021, 01:24:18 PM
Those look awesome! But 32mm is kinda big isn't it?

Edit: I see you can have them done in 28mm. Got any pics of the ones you own at that scale?

I think I bought the 32mm ones, and yes they do look oversized. I'd recommend 28mm scale to fit with most traditional manufacturers, though 32mm can be good for deliberately oversized stuff eg angels & demons.

I've only seen a few 3D printed figs at the table. They were thick and easily bigger than 28 mm. That's a hard pass for me.  I'm guessing if you print your own, you can adjust that.

Most of my collection is metal, but I've recently started shifting to plastic, both Reaper Bones and hard plastic. My primary reason is that transporting metal figures without damaging them requires expensive carrying cases, and they get heavy to carry. My hope is that plastic figures, being so light, can rattle about in a simple box without harming each other. Time will tell. My current project is hard plastic figures for Middle Earth role playing. That will be my experiment. If I can carry them about in a simple shoe box, I will bid good-bye to metals.

As for upgrades in sculpting detail, I am not impressed. I like them easy to paint and have no use for detain I can't see when held at arms-length. Whenever possible, I use figures sculpted for historical war games rather than high fantasy. They look better to me than figures cluttered with bits that I often can't identify and certainly don't want to paint.

I find the slightly oversized figs a good choice for PCs if you're more concerned with visibility on the table than strict realism.

The biggie for me is generally fig-to-base ratio. A lot of newer figs seem to love poses or designs that significantly overlap their 1" bases... which means you can't always run another fig up base to base because parts overlap.

I tend to refer to them as "display" figs as a result, and much prefer "play" figs whose poses may not be as dramatic, but can have 6-8 other figs surrounding it without one being in danger of tipping the other over (or forcing a rotation change in games where facing is important).

This looks interesting. Thoughts?

Next Level Miniatures: Dragon's Hoard Miniatures Vol. 1
For Rappan Athuk
28m, high quality resin, no need for primer


https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/nextlevelminiatures/next-level-miniatures-dragons-hoard-miniatures-vol-1?ref=discovery&term=dragon%27s%20hoard

As long as it's close to scale and fairly accurate in appearance, I prefer bargain miniatures.  No reason to spend a fortune on toys, for playing make believe.  I don't even bother painting the unpainted ones; beyond possibly highlighting the blades on their weapons, or their fangs and claws.

I agree with Omega in that some of the newer figs are a bit over the top. I think Warhammer and Warcraft have had an influence on figs that have definitely moved them away from "traditional" to more outlandish. But it also depends on the brand, and even lines within the brand. I don't mind some complexity; thinking of really old figs from Grendier and Ral Partha from back in the day, today's figs not only have more detail but they tend to have more dynamic posing. One thing that I don't like is how inconsistent scale tends to be. We had scale creep from 25mm to 28 to 32, but it's all over the board these days. There have been some figs that I've skipped buying because even though they looked good they were too small compared to most of the figures I already have. Anyway, time for a wall of text!

My thoughts on some of the newer lines/brands:

• Reaper Bones (original): I was full bore into the first two Bones Kickstarters, but I soured on the figs after awhile since the original Bones material has so many issues - lack of detail, rubbery-ness, hard to take primer. I do like this for larger figs, like giants and dragons. The detail is good enough and more importantly, they're way lighter than if they were metal (I've got an old Grenadier War Giant: https://www.nobleknight.com/P/2147590172/Special-Edition---Battle-Giant, and it's either pewter or maybe even lead, and it is HEAVY). But for humanoid-sized figs it's terrible.
• Reaper Bones Black: This is pretty good; way better the the original bones since it's more rigid and holds detail better. Not as good as metal, but pretty decent and relatively cheap. Bones USA is similar but supposedly different and better; I don't have any USA figs yet so I can't say.
• WizKids: The price is right but the quality varies. Better quality than Bones Original, but has similar detail issues with humanoid-sized figs.

As for resin figs, I've become very enamored with them as of late (though I'm not in a hurry to print too many since I've got a huge backlog of unpainted figs as it is). Without the overhead of physical production and inventory (the only real barrier to entry is learning to use something like Blender), the market for sculptors of resin figs has exploded over the past couple of years. Mostly fantasy, but a lot of modern, sci-fi, and western as well. Some random thoughts:

• The quality of resin sculpts varies, but there's an awful lot that are rather "chunky". I don't know if this is a relic of when people started making figs intended for filament printers or what, but I'm not a fan (though it works well for dwarf figs ). There's plenty of sculptors not doing that but it seems odd how many still are.
• A few years ago I said that printable figs would meet or exceed the quality of cast miniatures in at least 5 years. I underestimated, as I think we're at that point already, particularly with 4K and now 8K resin printers. Many match plastic miniatures (like Bones Black) right now, and others match metal.
• Resin is getting more popular but there's still a lot of overhead to deal with: getting supports right if you have to add them yourself, the precautions you have to take with the resin due to its toxicity, and the post-printing process (removing supports, washing, curing, etc.). All of that is slowly getting better (i.e.; you can buy wash and cure stations instead of making your own, less toxic resins and better filtering are becoming more common, printers are improving with auto-leveling, etc.), but it'll be awhile before resin overtakes buying figs at the store. Or a different printing technology may supplant it (something like sintering perhaps). I'm sure it'll happen, but what form it takes, I'm not sure.
• Supports are an interesting issues with resin prints. Optimal supports are a bit of an art form; you can have Chitubox or whatever slicer generate auto-supports, but often these are overdone and even then still miss a few areas. A lot of sculptors will skip supports and claim that "every printer is different" as an excuse (despite the fact that almost all resin printers work exactly the same way). Companies like Fat Dragon and Printable Scenery make it as easy as possible to get successful prints for their FDM models, and is part of the reason why they dominate the FDM terrain market. It behooves the resin sculptors to be both good businessmen as well as artists like those two companies if they want to be successful.
• Pet peeve: There are sculptors out there who don't even test print their models. Not common but I've heard that from a couple of them. Sorry, if I'm paying you money for a model I expect that you've at least test printed it yourself. I'm also preferring you pre-support the fig, but at least make sure you've printed the damn thing.
• The biggest drawback to resin figs is their fragility, but it depends on what resin you use. It seems like this is something people are still working out. Some will mix resins to get more durable results, and there's at least one company that's making a resin specifically targeted for printing miniatures. I see this as a short term problem that will eventually be resolved.
• Pricewise, resin figures often aren't a better deal than if you bought a hard plastic fig in the store. The rationale is that you can print as many as you want, but often you're not going to print more than one, so unless it's something very particular that you like, you might be better buying the physical fig. Kickstarters and Patreons are an exception to this (ex: I support the Avatars of War Patreon for $4/month, and for what I get it's an incredible bargain).

The pictures below illustrate a couple of things I've mentioned. The Not Sean Connery fig on the left that I need to finish assembling somewhat fits that "chunky" thing I was talking about (though he's a cool fig so I can overlook that). The paladin on the right I printed and painted for a friend (the base was pre-made); the quality of that one I think is on-par with plenty of cast plastic figs and even some metal.

Quote from: Kanyenya on October 25, 2021, 09:52:01 PM

• Pricewise, resin figures often aren't a better deal than if you bought a hard plastic fig in the store.
  

I've been buying them off Etsy & Ebay. Prices vary a lot for the same designs, so well worth shopping around.

Quote from: Omega on October 25, 2021, 05:54:32 AM
I've seen some of the newer ones and the recurring thought is... "overwrought".

Theres actually too much detail on some of the newer models to the point its an increasing nuisance to paint them. Or the pieces have so many fiddly bits that it makes painting them a nuisance. Sometimes both.

I compare them to older models from the late 80s to 90s and they come across as better looking somehow.

I feel like the late 90s was probably the best time for mini quality vs fiddly balance. Pieces could be complex. But they were not too complex, usually. But they also sported alot of fine detail. Heartbreaker and Reaper come to mind right off. Though both did better with metal at the time. Same for Games Workshop minis. Right on the cusp of the eventual hard downhill dive GW seems hellbent on.

I agree. I got into Sisters of Battle last year, and picked up the Hive War box set, and am amazed at how overdesigned a lot of GW minis have become. Intricate assembly parts that interlock like a jigsaw puzzle, creating lots of (IMO) uneccesary gaps. Tiny details that break off easily and are then lost in the CARPET OF DOOM. Overhanging details that make painting difficult, and parts that make partial-assembly-painting difficult and not worth the effort.

And the CAD designs lack the character of 80's and 90's physically sculpted minis.

I'm hoping it's a phase we'll get past.

I personally am a fan of 3d printed minis for several reasons, but recognize some of the limitations mentioned above.

The good:

They are CHEAP to print. I have subscribed to a number of different patreons who supply monthly assortments of themed minis. For anywhere from $5-$20/month you can get a selection of minis for nearly any game. Of course heroic fantasy is by far the largest. there are also free sources like thingiverse. However, the quality can vary widely. With even a cheap resin printer, and the files, you can create hordes of minis for cheap.

Customizable PCs can be created through sites like heroforge. This allows players the ability to create their own characters for the table, but the .STL file for $9 and print. These will be the most expensive minis on the table, but allows the players to create the character they envision, not finding a mini that kinda sorta looks like it.


The bad:

The minis are not as solid as metal minis, or even plastic like the reaper bones series. Unless you buy special flexible resin, a good hard drop can shatter a lovingly painted mini.

The minis of course take far more time to create. first you have to get the minis to print properly. As youre learning this can take a while. Then once the file is printed, there is clean up involved, especially with supports.

So I guess in summary, it depends on what you want, the amount of time you have to print and paint minis, and your budget. 3dPrinted minis as a hobby can be a ton of fun, one I personally enjoy. But of course YMMV.