On Minis and Convention Parties

 

Lately, for reasons, I've been a bit nostalgic about my early (non) gaming days. I remember hanging out with my one friend in middle school that had slung dice before....and more importantly, had some game catalogs he brought to rural Bumfuckistan Iowa from "the city".

I remember just pouring through those catalogs and while I cannot recall who put out the catalog I clearly remember the line-art drawings of the miniatures inside. I remember making little checklists of these Ral Partha and Grenadier minis I wanted, not that I ever got them.

Looking for these particular catalogs/graphics has been a fruitless endeavor, but I have discovered a couple of cool websites specifically for looking at these old minis, namely the Lost Minis Wiki (Minis Workshop) and DnD Lead.

When doing my quick down & dirty research I did discover that I can still get some HackMaster minis if I wanted them from Iron Wind Metals. 

I'm pretty sure I was at a GenCon (might have been Origins) party where Iron Wind Metals was throwing an epic room party to celebrate something.....a successful Kickstarter campaign maybe? My memory, for a couple reasons, is fuzzy, but I remember getting a few (older) Ral Partha minis, a large cup-full of loose weapons, and a kick-ass knife. Evidently one of the guys behind the party owned a knife company as well and rumor was he was something-military-that-I'd-normally-call-bullshit-on. Thing was this "thing" was a rumor about him and not something he was pushing. Anyway we're having fun, bullshitting, and he mentions he spent some time in the same bit of turf overseas that I had. After giving me a nice, way-too-expensive-for-my-taste smoky Scotch I told him in that overseas turf-language "Stop, or I'll shoot". It was a phrase we not only had to memorize, but carry around on a card.

That got me a laugh and some more bullshitting. I had a great time and thanked my host by giving him one of my challenge coins. Actually the one from my 1st duty station 'cause that's the one I had on me. He was moved and had his girlfriend go and get "the good stuff" from his room, the good stuff being a $5K bottle of Scotch. Beautiful hand-blown bottle and hand-carved wooden carrier. Can't tell you how it tasted because I declined.......because my palate is not sophisticated enough and the Scotch would have been wasted on me. I think he understood because he got me another shot of the smoky stuff (not normally my thing, but the smell......so good) and handed me a large box of knives for me to take my pick. Not sure if it was a good idea to give someone in my state a nice knife.......but I still have it and I've been working on improving my palate.

I know I started talking about old minis and went to a Con party gift, but you know....that's what happens when you start to get all nostalgic. I kind of warned you in the 1st sentence of this post.