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Annual Production of 1/72 (22mm) scale plastic soldiers, 1958-2025
- nippoo 11mo agoThe author (and many others) assume that quality 3D printers are expensive, as a throwaway note in the last sentence. A plastic soldier set is on the order of $20, and collectors will often purchase dozens. A Bambu A1 mini (which is sufficient for the level of detail needed for these figurines) is about $200, which breaks even after 10 sets.
- awesome_dude 11mo agoSorry to nitpick at your math, but the breakeven point will be (slightly) higher - factor in the plastic, electricity, and designs (plus any failures)
- throw3e98 11mo agoAt 22mm scale the cost of filament is basically negligible (literally pennies), but yes, you would have to either buy STL files or make them yourself in Blender.
- dragonwriter 11mo ago> At 22mm scale the cost of filament is basically negligible (literally pennies) Even assuming no losses, just by volume, something like $0.10 per figure, and packs of 1/72 scale figures that retail for $20 are often a 20-50 figures.
- throw3e98 11mo ago0.10 per figure is a order of magnitude+ overestimate. The paint will cost significantly more than the plastic.
- s08148692 11mo agoIf someone is printing their own rather than buying official models I don't think it's safe to assume they're buying the digital assets
- throw3e98 11mo agoMost people I know buy STL files from MyMiniFactory because the cost of the STLs is already a tiny fraction of the price of buying models at the local store. We spend more on the paint to paint the figures than we do on the digital files. We also like supporting the artists - they often have cheap subscription based models where you get access new files, plus their back catalog if you stay subscribed for a certain period of time or at certain tiers. Often the artists are solo artists that you can, like, hang out with on Discord and chat directly with. The exception might be Russia, there's a big 40K hobby there and they're cut off from buying stuff due to sanctions and the terrible state of the economy.
- throw3e98 11mo agoAn A1 Mini requires a smaller nozzle, a customized profile, specific filament, and quite a bit of work in Blender and the slicer to successfully print 32mm figures (approx. 1/56 scale). Even those larger figures aren't anywhere as good as the quality of injection molding you get from a Games Workshop, Archon Studio, Wargames Atlantic or Bandai kit. You typically need an SLA printer for that - which requires PPE and ventilation due to the hazardous materials. I don't think my A1 Mini would have success trying to print at 1/72 at the same detail as an injection molding process. I've done 28mm figures on it, but it was a lot of work and had a high failure rate. more info: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7pBUk8AvJ8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7pBUk8AvJ8, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldkW5nXRXN4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldkW5nXRXN4
- PunchyHamster 11mo agoBetter comparison would be prices in various 3D printing sides. But either way, margins for some companies like mentioned GW are huge
- markild 11mo agoA bit besides the point, but an FDM printer is definitely not good enough to reproduce these somewhat convincingly. That being said, a cheap-ish resin printer will probably do the job, and they are generally in the same price range.
- sho_hn 11mo agoPlease don't resin print at home, especially if you have kids, unless you really know what you are doing. And by that I mean professional experience handling hazardous materials and provisioning a work environment for them. The internet is rife with influencer content that makes these look OK and "not that dangerous", along with people who want to believe that rather than face buyer's remorse. It's more dangerous than you think. It's messier than you think. The process steps are more ennui than you think. If you don't respect it you will make unsafe mistakes out of lack of knowledge, or impatience, or lazyness. This shouldn't really be consumer gear. You can also fuck up on health and safety with FDM printers, but the default beginner lane (printing PLA in common colors) is a lot less risky on zero knowledge entry.
- OldOneEye 11mo agoI agree. Kids or animals. Specially dogs that are mindless brutes. I've been 3d printing with resin for a long time before I had my dog. Now I don't do it, unless I can be sure that I can have the dog out my printing room for several days straight, for the water-washable resin to solidify on the sun after usage, and all the different after-print steps that have to be taken care of. It's also annoying to clean the plate, and deal with the resin bottles when you stop using them. There's no easily accessible infrastructure to dispose of the waste from the printing process so if you become lazy, you end up creating toxic hazards for anyone in the community. Not a good outcome at all. Still, safe 3d printing brings me a lot of joy, specially to prepare board games sessions with friends and neighbours. Printing, painting, etc. You just have to be responsible and civic and do the right thing. There's a safe way to handle this stuff, but you have to be very disciplined about it. Animals and kids complicate that big time.
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- dragonwriter 11mo ago> A Bambu A1 mini (which is sufficient for the level of detail needed for these figurines) is about $200, which breaks even after 10 sets. $200 for a printer does not break even at 10 sets if the sets are $20 unless the cost per unit printed is $0.
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- brulard 11mo agoAnd time of the operator is $0 per hour as well
- bigstrat2003 11mo agoWhich it is. Unless you would actually be getting paid for that time (which you wouldn't in most cases), the opportunity cost is $0.
- szundi 11mo ago[dead]
- wdb 11mo agoYou get paid in happiness of having and doing a hobby that brings peace and joy :))
- beng-nl 11mo agoWell said. I’m often nonplussed at these calculations of some fairly high hourly rate that we seemingly all should be able to command at will at anytime in unlimited supply. Well, I can’t.
- dragonwriter 11mo agoIf you would otherwise be doing anything with positive expected utility in that time, the opportunity cost is >$0. The fact that the analysis can be carried out in monetary units (because we don't have a good direct measure of utility) doesn't mean that receiving money itself is the only source of utility that needs to be considered.
- BoredPositron 11mo agoNeed another napkin?
- pettertb 11mo agoNote that this is not Warhammer (and its competitors, like Warmachine). This is 22mm historical stuff, an entirely different genre.
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- pjc50 11mo agoInteresting that this charts by _sets_, not total production volume. I wonder what the market is like. I'm vaguely aware of Warhammer as a hobby, that's adjacent enough to my social media that I can "see" it, but not people buying miniatures. Does it sit adjacent to railway modelling? Are people making dioramas of Waterloo still? .. a quick check reveals that OO is 1:76, so they wouldn't quite be right.
- qznc 11mo agoThis site is about "historic" stuff only. No Fantasy or SciFi, thus no Warhammer. If you want to this historic wargaming hobby in action: https://www.youtube.com/@LittleWarsTV https://www.youtube.com/@LittleWarsTV
- cracki 11mo ago1:72 means to shrink 6 ft into 1 inch.
- 1313ed01 11mo agoThere are many 1:76 sets as well, even if 1:72 is more common. Anecdotally, wargamers do not use those minis much. Some older gamers started out with playing more or less improvised wargames using 1:72 (mainly Airfix) figures in the 1960's or so, or playing games like Fewtherstone's wargames perhaps, but it is rare to see them now. Historical minis as a whole are less common now, but those that still play either use metal figures or figures from more wargame-specific companies (usually using more common game scales like 10mm, 15mm, or 28mm). Most 1:72 ranges seen on that site (that I spent many hours on) are not that great for gaming. Lots of useless poses that are more for dioramas (or as kids toys maybe?). For gaming you need more just simple infantry walking or firing in some kind of good combat pose, but you often only get a handful of those in a set of 40+ figures, so it does not become very cost effective. Many poses look good, but not what you probably want to build armies for a tabletop.
- hakfoo 11mo ago1:76 is a very popular scale for model railways in the UK, so I wonder if they design figures for that audience, then paint them in fatigues to expand the market range. The US preferred 1:87 historically. English 1:76 and American 1:87 trains run on the same size track, but the English models are typically built slightly over-size because their smaller bodies wouldn't fit a good motor easily.
- jansan 11mo agoI did not know that this was a hobby for adults and I find it interesting that the one kid's toy if the other person's collectible. When I was in primary school in the late 70s we used to buy lots of 1/72 scale soldiers on second hand markets and had buckets full of them. Great battles were fought, and we lost lots of them, because we often played in the garden and we apparently were really good at camouflaging those tiny soldiers. For us they were just consumables, but it seems that we had the same Airfix soldiers that collectors buy today.
- Macha 11mo agoYeah, I would have assumed that the volumes purchased by kids outweighed collectors by a ton and so the peak would be in the late 90s to coincide with Toy Story 1 and 2
- phantasmish 11mo ago22mm is a lot smaller than the standard “green army men”.
- 1313ed01 11mo agoArmy men came in various sizes, and one of the most common one was always close to 1:72, or at least that has been the case since the 1980's. I remember one of my friends had larger, maybe 40mm army men, but my collection was only the smaller size ~1:72/22mm. Same sculpts and colors. Various random no name toy brands.
- phantasmish 11mo agoThe green army men of Toy Story and (for example) the Army Men video games were (searches) 1:35. The ones that were that shade of green (or a particular shade of tan—gotta have the other side) and in those poses with those exact sculpts, that every toy aisle or toy store had (in the ‘80s and ‘90s, in the US) even if they did also have others.
- rvba 11mo agoWhere? World? Chart unsigned? (I think number of sets issued, but you can produce 100m soldiers in 5 sets and 1m in 500 sets...) Website does not work on mobile..
- Aurornis 11mo agoRegarding the 3D printing comment in the article: The cost to get started is no longer very high. A $200 A1 Mini with a $13 0.2mm nozzle can produce impressive detail. Example I found from a Google search: https://www.reddit.com/r/BambuLab/comments/195ehda/first_few_miniature_prints_with_the_a1_mini_2mm/ https://www.reddit.com/r/BambuLab/comments/195ehda/first_few... The quality won’t satisfy the hardcore collectors but it’s good enough for kids to play with. The experience of printing them is fun too.