What started you on this hobby? (May have been done before)

[Amazon warrior]

I started in a similar way to Liz, just much more recently! (About 3 years ago, in fact.) My boyfriend got me into RPGs, and we used the plastic D&D minis for characters if we had a significant scrap. There wasn\'t one that matched my character well, so I took myself off to t\'internet and stumbled into Reaper, which had just the kinds of things I was looking for. I had already checked GW\'s ranges, but been rather underwhelmed.

I got me a handful of figures and one of Reaper\'s learn-to-paint box sets, got to it and discovered it was fun. Shortly after that I found Rackham and then CMON.

And yes, I do seem to be accumulating sad, unloved and unpainted minis at a rate of knots! In fact I bought some just the other week, despite the fact that currently all my painting gear is in another country on the other side of the world and I might not see it for a year. Travel may broaden the mind, but it certainly limits painting time!

 

[Quareni]

Well, I started out not with minis, but with scale model ww2 plastic airplanes (inspired by my father who had loads of books on the topic and a fair collection of planes himself). Having painted for a number of years, I was introduced to minis by a friend who had some of those ancient beaked SM lying around. I went and bought my first mini shortly after, and when I started in high school and met a group of roleplayers, my minis all of a sudden served a purpose which really motivated me. Later, however, I moved to Copenhagen for studies and therefore left the RPG-group, so to have some kind of focus to my painting, I started on my first WH army. Since then army-painting has been my approach to minis, but since having discovered CMoN last year (a bit late, I know) I am beginning to think about doing more minis for display rather than gaming. But old habits die hard...

 

[Aidan K]

Originally posted by lizcam

Got a question, how many of you have hundreds of unpainted minis sitting around in forlorn groups talking about how you neglect to paint them? I do. They keep me awake at night with all the noise. And my hubby keeps bring more home. I will NEVER get them all painted.

Yes, in packets, bags and boxes. Loose on shelves, under my bed etc. Yet i still buy more!! More ideas than time i think is my problem.

 

[giganticdark]

On a cold and dark winters day in my hometown, when I was very young, my father took me to the town centre and showed me a shop. The shop was down a dark alley and the light from within glowed invitingly through the victorian panel windows. As we drew closer I could see small jewel-like objects in the windows, my dad lifted me up so I could see better. There staring back at me were the most beautiful models I would ever see. Greek warriors, egyptian chariots, Carthaginian war elephants and all other wonders of antiquity. I was too young to realise but these were probably 54mm historical models and although I primarily work on fantasy and sci-fi models, nothing will ever shake those memories of that shop window. I never actually went into the shop and it has now long been demolished and built over countless times. It\'s now thirty years later and I am still modeling, sculpting and painting figures, entering competitions and always trying to improve my techniques. I love this hobby and will do it as long as I can and, for me personally, it\'s all thanks to my dad and and a shop window.

 

[Larre]

I started because my bro got a box of classic Chaos Space Marines. then I thought it was cool and I got myself a box of plastic beastmen. and untill last fall I was mainly painting armies, but after that I have almost only been painting display minis.. I have now been painting for 6 years

// Larre

 

[philologus]

I first started as a little lad with painting crude figs for RPG uses. I never had a lot of extra money for minis and no one I knew played wargames. Like Highbulp Billy, I got back into the hobby a couple years ago with the advent of the LOTR range from GW. Then after finding CMON I started to purchase and paint other ranges. Now my wife and kids are hooked as well.

 

[OrkBoy]

My brother\'s friend had been playing with his older brother\'s discarded stuff and convinced us to start playing WH40K about 3 years ago. Afterwards we had a dabble in WHFB but the majority of gamers have 40K stuff so we had to play 40K. Despite this though I have 2 Fantasy and only one 40K army ...a bit weird but there you go! I have been painting for around 3 years I suppose, mainly armies (Orks,Orcs and Ogres).

 

[HerrBishop]

A couple of years ago, Heroscape came out. It comes with 30 painted minis and I thought it would be cool to try and repaint some of them. I have now accumulated at least one of every expansion that has been released, plus a couple of Master Sets. Yet, not one of them has been repainted. I bought a box of Moria Goblins and a couple of paint pots and proceeded to paint some of those minis. From there I went on to the Battle for Macragge box set, but found I don\'t have tha patience to try and paint a full army. Since then, I pick up a mini or two (or more) here or there, mostly GW and Reaper. I have a few Rackham minis, but they are just too intricate for me to paint. I would love to try more brands, but if they don\'t sell it in my area, I don\'t get it. One of these days I will start ordering from the Internet as there are so many awsome minis that I am missing out on.

 

[wiccanpony]

I blame an ex-bf for hooking me and I would curse him soundly but I sure another women is doing that even as I type. :twisted:

 

[Arkzein]

Played with little plastic toy soldiers for as long as I can remember (you know the ones, few pence for a bag of them) Typical wee lad with my cars, action men and soliders. Must have been all of five or six years old when setting them up with friends and throwing stones at them with rules like needing to hit the bagpipes guy 3 times and if you broke one you win straight off. lol

Moved onto something with dice and darts instead of stones, recall loving seeing the holes made on tanks the longer we played with them, or having long range battles the length of the garden hurling the darts down with artillery on buildings made of little firewood blocks as men moved 30cm a turn trying to get to the base. Aged about 10 even used BB guns! working through long campaigns with papaer, records and stats and such. Started painting with enamels when I found folk actually painted things like scale model planes.

Then in secondary school I found there was something called a Wargames club and had my eyes opened, made what I\'d been up to seem silly in comparison, but felt like I\'d found something I didn\'t know I\'d been looking for. That was 12 years ago and I haven\'t really looked back. (Mind you even now I have a soft spot for those games with darts if I could find someone equally nuts enough to play me across a 50 foot \"board\". *laughs*)

 

[treide]

I loved the D&D modules and Monster Manuals as a kid. Never really played the game much, but really enjoyed reading about the different races, creatures and settings. At some point I realized there were miniatures, so I bought and painted some (poorly, even relative to my current efforts!).

I put them down for high school, college and the rest of my schooling and early adulthood.

One day my wife and I decided we needed to come up with creative hobbies, as I was wasting too much time on the computer. I remembered my box of old minis stashed in a drawer, pulled them out, and thought to myself \"I can do better than that!\". The saga continues!

 

[sparkey]

my best friend introducedme to the hobby... now he has a mohawk (-:-

 

[Manus]

Bought some of the first D&D stuff that hit Denmark in the late 80-ties and a couple of minis, around the same time I played HeroQuest, ManOwaR and Spacehulk - and painted some of the minis for those games. A couple of years later I started in high school........

Originally posted by Quareni
and when I started in high school and met a group of roleplayers,

(oh yes - remember those days, hammerclaus?)
and after high school I got into WH, Mordheim and now finally 40K.
After I found CMoN painting is somehow funnier again. Not just armies - but painting