Chinese recasts of miniatures

Important announcement. 

I've received a lot of comments asking for the site that I used to buy this model. While I have happily supplied that information (and will do so in the future) to anybody who asks, please note that as of now, THERE ARE NO MORE WARHAMMER RELATED ITEMS ON THE SITE.

Now on to the article:

Today we're taking a look at a Chinese resin recast of a Warhammer miniature: Be'lakor, the First Daemon Prince of Chaos.

The first notifiable difference compared to an original miniature is the boxing. While GW (and other, high-budget companies) offer a nice packaging (a cardboard box with artwork on it), the recast arrived in a rough cardboard box, wrapped in bubble wrap. Simple, pragmatic, nothing fancy.

Assembly instructions included: none, whereas official miniatures include them in the box. Thankfully, this is a relatively simple model (there are no customization options, you can only assemble it in one way), so there's no way to get lost. Still, I wouldn't start assembling a, let's say, Flaming Chariot without some instructions.
Casting quality: depends on what we compare it to. GW plastic is much better, however, that's an unfair comparison, as this is a finecast model. I've never unboxed one, but here's a post about it from a fellow blogger: A painting chaos: Warriors of Chaos Be'lakor Daemon Prince (Finecast) unboxing

So unlike plastic, there are a lot of miscast remnants - a lot more than on the finecast model as seen above.

That being said, it was easy to cut the pieces off the sprue - they mostly broke off by themselves when touched, and only a wingtip got damaged.
I should also mention that the wings have holes in them, where the resin is really thin. This is the only thing that shows bad casting quality. Everything else, including fine details such as the chain mail, is perfect.

Spares: I got 2 sets of spare wings and 2 extra tails. No idea why - not like I'm complaining. So the broken wing tip does not count. I'm thinking of doing a conversion later on. Stick the wings on a unit champion or something.
Cleaning: went easily. It's a much lighter material than plastic, I was able to cut away bits and pieces easily with a hobby knife. Almost damaged it in some places though.
Assembly: the pieces fit perfectly and super glue worked on the material.

Painting: I only applied an acrylic white spray paint so far, but it looks OK, with adherence level comparable to GW resin/plastic.

... and finally, the price: 36% of the original! I have to admit that I caught some holiday deal and it isn't always this cheap. Also, shipping was around 7 weeks, and there was the hassle of going to the post office since I chose free shipping. But that's still around 1/3 of the original price!

Conclusion: if you're a purist, or have the means, or your local gaming community/shop forbids unofficial miniatures, etc then by all means, buy original miniatures. An original shop/manufacturer offers the best quality, not to mention complete security.
However, recasts seem like a viable option if you're willing to take a risk.

Buying miniatures on eBay

On my quest for cheaper miniatures, I've turned to the grandfather of used item trading: eBay.

The biggest incentive here is price. You can find miniatures at 10% of their original price, if you're lucky. You can also save effort by buying assembled or even painted miniatures, but this usually means a higher price. Pro-painted miniatures may get very expensive very quickly.

There are some downsides too, which I'll show you using these case studies:

1. daemon scrap lot (this is eBay slang for lots of pieces which do not necessarily match)

This was an actual treasure trove! For around 5 pounds, I got:

- Karanak + 2 flesh hounds. Though there aren't enough legs to go around for everybody, but I can salvage Karanak + 1 flesh hound, which would cost around 20 pounds

- some very badly assembled Daemonettes. I broke them apart along the glue lines and they mostly came free without damage. They just need to be reassembled. 10 Daemonettes = 18 pounds.

- 3 Flamers, but only 1 arm for all 3 of them. I'm thinking of running them without arms. These 3 models would cost 10 pounds.

2. assorted Daemonettes

- some primed, some assembled, some painted (badly)
- there was some effort in repainting them, but the 30% savings were worth it

3. Bloodthirster

- very badly painted (no, seriously, look at it!)
- This is an old metal model. The current model is much, much bigger, and also needs a bigger base, as per the rule book.
- A lot of effort needed for unpainting, assembling (some pieces came apart during transport) and repainting, but
- At 30% of the current model's price (including shipping), I'm not complaining.

4. Bloodletters, unassembled in original and unopened box.

40% savings. Is there anything to say?

5. Chariot of Tzeentch, unassembled in box.

This came out to be a bad purchase. The box has actually been opened, the herald model assembled on foot, and everything else put back in. The Flaming Chariot can still be completely assembled, I was just disappointed that the herald was missing. My plans were to build a magnetized kit that could be put together to form either chariot. Oh well, I haven't given up on this yet!
... And I still saved around 20%.

6. Daemon Prince

- In good condition. The model wasn't very well cleaned though and I had to do some after-scraping. Look carefully at the photos to discover the mold lines and sprue remains. This is much harder to do after assembly.

- This also made me realize what NOT to buy from eBay. The original model is fully customizable, with lots of body/head/arms/armor options. When buying an assembled model, you get what there is. Not sure how a power armored daemon will fit in a fantasy setting, I'll think of some back-story for it.
- Oh well, at half the price...

7. Masque of Slaanesh

- One of my best purchases, this was a metal model still on sprues, at half the price (including shipping!)

8. Chaos Furies

- These aren't actual Chaos Furies! I know now, but I didn't know then, and I assumed that they're older models (look at the bloodthirster...).
- These are actually models made by Grenadier Miniatures.
- All in all, it wasn't a bad purchase. These winged demons run well as Chaos Furies, they are well painted and involved a minimal effort in applying magnetized bases. Not to mention they came at half the price of the same number of furies.

9. Headless bloodletters

Nothing special, eh? Take a closer look.

The back of their heads and the spines on their backs are missing. This was the reason I saved around 60% on them.


Looking back at my eBay shopping spree, I would have done some things differently, but experience comes through trial and error (or by reading blogs, so be smarter than me if you start eBaying!).
Some practical advice:
- eBay is best if you play as Space Marines. There is a huge supply of used miniatures, in all imaginable states (unassembled, unpainted, badly painted, pro-painted, bits collection etc).
- assembled but unpainted miniatures offer the best price-effort ratio
- buying scrap lots is very cheap, and you can great deals, but a lot of effort needs to go into market research
- buying squads of basic troops / models that don't have many customization options is a good choice
- don't buy greatly customizable models if you want a personalized army
- establish a threshold (e.g. "I will only buy at max. 60% of the original price") and stick to it! Otherwise, it's easy to go wild.

Overall, I am satisfied with the things I bought - I saved a lot of money, at the cost of additional effort.
I am also happy with the way everything went down. I got to know my way around eBay, and the gathered experience will help me when I decide to sell stuff of my own. (So if I ever get tired of wargaming, my future collection of well-painted, magnetized daemon army is sure to bring a buck!)
Lastly, the defective/incomplete models which I've bought (bloodletters, flamers) made me research green stuff. One day, I hope to be able to sculpt the missing pieces!

Where to start your Warhammer hobby?

As soon as the Dark Gods of Chaos planted the seeds of wargaming in my mind, I started looking for a (rather) cheap way of starting up my hobby.

Let's face it: wargaming is an expensive hobby. Miniatures are of high quality, and you pay a lot of hard-earned cash for them. However, there are some ways of reducing costs.
My first step was to check out the official Games Workshop web store. The amount and quality of miniatures is dazzling! And the prices are, simply put, appalling.
As there are no official GW gaming stores around, I knew that I don't have to worry about using only official miniatures, so I started looking at forums in search of an alternative solution.
The first step was to look for another retailer of GW miniatures, which led me to Wayland Games. They offer a 20-25% discount on most miniatures and free shipping over 40 pounds.While that's still a lot, it's a much better starting point.
The second step was to look for alternative miniatures. In theory, you could look around until you find another supplier/game line with compatible but cheaper miniatures. I think that Empire players could find a lot of replacement figures (historical miniature lines), as well as Space Marines I guess. It's harder to find appropriate models for more specific armies however. Also, after some research, surprisingly enough, GW's prices don't even seem that high anymore. Another factor is that a lot of companies are US-based, and whatever you win on the miniature itself gets lost on shipping. In the end, I ended up with only one such purchase: Bugharoth (from Hasslefree Miniatures), which I'll run as a daemon prince.
The third step (as suggested on some forums) was to combine my 40k and Fantasy armies. As you may know, one is a fantasy setting, while the other is sci-fi. Not a chance? Ha! Ideas include: running fantasy Orcs as 40k (space) Orks (bows count as shootas) and running Empire gunners as Imperial Guard (just say they're a regiment raised on a backwater feudal world). Then there's the entire army called Chaos Daemons/Daemons of Chaos, which are 100% compatible. The only thing in the way are the bases (round vs square), but that can be solved by magnetizing. (I'll post about that later.) This got me sold completely, and soon enough I got my daemons army up and running.

This was it basically! Here's what I got in my starter order:

Now off to assemble and paint some of that...


P.S. For a crazy site with lots of ideas, visit 1d4chan. While it contains a large amount of coarse language and the occasional NSFW material, it is also a repository of factual advice and ideas about all aspects of the hobby, from assembling an army to tabletop tactics.