Ah, yes, the heyday of miniatures, when there were lots more game shops and they all had shelves full of unpainted lead miniatures, from many companies. Even I, who have very sadly had to conclude that miniatures do not work for the gaming I usually do nowadays, look back with nostalgia. Especially when Gamer-Husband (GH), who still makes use of miniatures, buys a bunch and starts painting. One of the miniatures companies he patronizes is Reaper Miniatures, founded July 4, 1992.
Reaper makes several lines of minis, mostly for fantasy, such as their oldest line, Dark Heaven and their licensed Pathfinder minis. Some of the miniatures are for their own games – which I did not realize they had until now – such as CAV (futuristic ground warfare) and Cowboys & Gunslingers, but some could be used for other games in the same genre. The Chronoscope line is a grab bag of all sorts of non-fantasy minis – I saw cowboys/girls, steampunk, zombies, SF, supers, modern. The Bones line, their latest, are 25mm unpainted plastic fantasy minis, many of them re-issues from older lines. On some models the bases are larger than the map square(s) they are intended to sit on, which means scenarios with lots of figures close together may get pushed together (a problem common to most current minis lines, regardless of the maker).
Reaper also has two lines of water-based (Acrylic) minis paints. GH says they are very good, and are comparable with Citadel and other brands he has used. About half his paints, he estimates, are Reaper’s Master Series Paints. The painted minis look good.
Reaper products are easy to find, whether you are Team Brick or Team Click. An easy-to-use Store Locator can be found in the Vendors dropdown on the menu and their online store is well done. Every miniature has a clear photo and the sculptor’s name – which I thought was a nice touch. When you click on the icon to go to a particular line, at the top of the page is a clear description of the scale, material and whether minis are painted and/or assembled.
While we haven’t used that very attractive online store – yet – GH has done Reaper Bones Kickstarters and thinks they have been handled well and are a great value. The KS was to purchase the injection molding and other equipment used to produce the minis, which meant that the rewards would not arrive until long after the project funded – almost 9 months in the case of last year’s KS. However, Reaper was upfront about the timeframe and kept supporters informed. There were fairly frequent updates on the KS page and the company was responsive to the couple of emails GH sent. I am not sure what level GH contributed, but he received well over 100 quality plastic Bones minis, mostly fantasy, at a cost of $1.00 – $1.50 each. Going from prices for the online Bones minis, this was a discount of between $0.49 to $2.00 or so, depending on the mini. These were not exclusives, however; they are all available currently. He would do another Reapers KS, no question, he says.
Reaper’s products look good and are well worth your money if you game with minis or buy for someone who does. Check them out. Now is a very good time, since their Bones III Kickstarter is underway, funding on July 25 (5pm CDT). And it will fund. As I am writing, Bones III has only been live for a couple hours and has already gotten about fifteen times its goal!
Acknowledgment: Yet another shout-out to the Gamer-Husband, Mark Whitson, for sharing his experiences with Reaper and their cool miniatures
Linda Whitson
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