eBay: THE Citadel Giant, 2021 edition

 Holy Deep Pockets, Batman! Someone shelled out $1,600 GBP ($2,270.64 USD) for this complete in box copy of THE Citadel Giant. I mean, just look at it. All the pieces, unpainted, unassembled and in the original box. Color me jealous, for sure. And since we're talking about a miniature (heh) that is nearly 40 years old, limited to 1,000 models, and originally sold for $25-30 GBP, this is just going to keep going up, up, up in price.

Congrats to the new owner, I'm sure this bad boy will be a centerpiece in your collection.

eBay: THE Citadel Giant

DISCLAIMER: This is not my auction, I but thought it was worth noting.

This auction appears to be (and the reason I say appears to be is because I do not see any pics of the contents) for a complete, NIB Citadel Giant. You know, THE Citadel Giant. The starting bid is $850 USD and there is already a bid on this huge hunk of lead. Makes me wonder if any other deep-pocketed collectors are going to join the fray?

Ral & Partha's Excellent Adventure (or Guam and Back Again)

I've mostly been buying single figures or small lots here and there for the past couple of years, trying to fill holes in the collection and generally avoiding large lots - the lead pile is already huge and I really don't need to make it bigger. But an eBay seller recently had a dozen or so lots of old-school goodness, and a few were just too tempting to take a pass on so I went ahead and bid on several, and ended up winning three.

What caught my eye in two of the lots were some Citadel AD&D minis, specifically four bugbears and six norkers. The rest was a great assortment of Heritage, Citadel, Grenadier, and a smattering of Ral Partha, Superior, TSR, and others. I've long desired to replace my Heritage bugbears and ogre that our first DM absconded with decades ago. And now that our new 3.5 FR campaign has kicked off and we are once again 1st and 2nd level, I decided my DM would benefit from a new batch of old low-level monsters to throw at us. I'm nice that way.

Citadel AD&D Bugbears

Citadel AD&D Norkers

Heritage ogres. Yellow one needs a medic.

Heritage bugbears, how I've missed you so!

That's when the fun started. I won two lots on January 23rd, and the third on January 28th. The third lot was in my hands on January 31st, perfect condition, no worries. The first two lots, shipped together, should have been at my house by the 27th, but that did not happen. The USPS decided my minis needed a vacation, so they sent them to Guam and Hawaii. WTF??? I copied & pasted the tracking history at the end of the post. You can see that the package left Missouri on January 24th, and was en route to the west coast. The last "In Transit to Destination" was on the 27th, and then nothing until the 31st when it shows up in Guam. From there, it heads to Hawaii, and then finally to Washington.

I was excited when the tracking info showed that the package was on my doorstep on February 5th. I opened the front door to find that there was no package after all. Are you f*cking kidding me? My guess is that it was delivered to a neighbor's house by mistake, as I have had items that weren't mine delivered to me by mistake in the past. Sure enough, today - two days later - the package shows up on my doorstep. Finally!

The box was pretty beat up, not a surprise considering it traveled in the neighborhood of 13,000 miles instead of the expected 2,100 miles. I said a quick prayer to the lead gods and opened the package. The seller had very creatively packed the miniatures into four plastic ice cube trays, and wrapped each one in bubble wrap. This should have been good enough for the anticipated domestic trip, but alas did not hold up to the rigors of pan-Pacific travel. A handful of minis where rolling around loose in the box, having been dislodged from their ice cube tray nests.

After unpacking and taking inventory, the final tally was six broken minis and two missing minis. The broken minis can be repaired, but the missing pair (a couple of Baaz Draconian warriors from the TSR Dragonlance box set) are gone forever. I hope they ended up in Hawaii, so they can enjoy the sand, surf, and sun. I don't know how USPS managed to drop the ball on this one. It's not like the zip codes are close (98072 compared to 96913), so I guess we'll just chalk this one up to human error.

After I have a chance to sort through these beauties, I'll be selling the leftovers in much smaller lots on eBay or Facebook. They all deserve a good home, and not just sitting around my hobby room in a plastic bin with all my other lead orphans.

• Delivered, Front Door/Porch
• Feb-05-2018, 17:38 PM, WOODINVILLE, WA 98072

• Out for Delivery
• Feb-05-2018, 08:20 AM, WOODINVILLE, WA 98072

• Sorting Complete
• Feb-05-2018, 08:10 AM, WOODINVILLE, WA 98072

• Arrived at Post Office
• Feb-05-2018, 05:30 AM, WOODINVILLE, WA 98072

• Arrived at USPS Regional Destination Facility
• Feb-04-2018, 22:04 PM, SEATTLE WA NETWORK DISTRIBUTION CENTER

• In Transit to Destination
• Feb-04-2018, 12:57 PM, On its way to WOODINVILLE, WA 98072

• In Transit to Destination
• Feb-03-2018, 12:57 PM, On its way to WOODINVILLE, WA 98072

• Departed USPS Regional Facility
• Feb-02-2018, 23:57 PM, HONOLULU HI DISTRIBUTION CENTER

• Arrived at USPS Regional Facility
• Feb-02-2018, 18:21 PM, HONOLULU HI DISTRIBUTION CENTER

• In Transit to Destination
• Feb-02-2018, 12:45 PM, On its way to WOODINVILLE, WA 98072

• In Transit to Destination
• Feb-01-2018, 12:45 PM, On its way to WOODINVILLE, WA 98072

• Departed USPS Regional Facility
• Jan-31-2018, 21:45 PM, BARRIGADA GU DISTRIBUTION CENTER

• Arrived at USPS Regional Facility
• Jan-31-2018, 00:38 AM, BARRIGADA GU DISTRIBUTION CENTER

• In Transit to Destination
• Jan-27-2018, 12:07 PM, On its way to WOODINVILLE, WA 98072

• In Transit to Destination
• Jan-26-2018, 12:07 PM, On its way to WOODINVILLE, WA 98072

• In Transit to Destination
• Jan-25-2018, 12:07 PM, On its way to WOODINVILLE, WA 98072

• Arrived at USPS Regional Origin Facility
• Jan-24-2018, 20:07 PM, SAINT LOUIS MO DISTRIBUTION CENTER

• Departed Post Office
• Jan-24-2018, 17:04 PM, BALLWIN, MO 63011

• USPS in possession of item
• Jan-24-2018, 12:20 PM, BALLWIN, MO 63011

Citadel C28 Fire Giant aka Darth Maul

I do love the Citadel C28 line of giants. There are 9 different bodies, 10 heads, and 8 weapons according to the CCM wiki, so it offers the discerning collector a chance to mix and match to their heart's content. As soon as I had this particular C28 giant in my hands, I knew exactly what it was going to be: I give you Darth Maul, fire giant.

I mean, come on, how could I NOT paint this guy up as a fire giant with red head spikes? I briefly toyed with the notion of giving him some red face paint, but quickly decided against it. It's OK to use Darth Maul as a creative inspiration, but I didn't need to go all the way.

Darth didn't come with a weapon, so I made him a placeholder axe out of various bits. The haft is way too long, so the proportions are out of whack. But it will do for now until I am able to replace it with something more suitable (I think the C28 sword or mace would do just fine).

You can see some nicely painted C28 giants on Orclord's SOL page (along with a veritable treasure trove of giants and many, many other creatures).

New Painted Galleries on SoL!

Prompted by recent discussions on the Yahoo Citadel and Grenadier collecting groups regarding to paint or not to paint vintage miniatures, OrcLord has posted some new galleries of painted Citadel minis, including Judge Dredd, some oddities & rarities, and of course my personal favorite: GIANTS!!!

They are all great examples of nicely-painted vintage lead, although the giants are proving to be rather inspirational as I am actually making quite a bit of headway as I paint up a large batch of my own vintage giants for the gaming table. I hope to post pics of the completed minis later this month.

Meet The New Lead, Same As The Old Lead

Another batch of giants hit my desk last week. I'm keeping 4 out of 21 for myself; the rest have been sold or will be sold in the near future. A second lot saw 2 more giants adopted, as well as some RP 11-series that would have otherwise cost waaay too much individually. Look for some Dark Sun minis to hit eBay in February or March, as they made up the bulk of that lot that I'll be selling to help recoup some lead funds.

The highlight of my latest acquisition is the Citadel/RP Giant Half-Troll Champion shown above. I have lusted after this bad boy since the mid 80s. Another fine example of outstanding work by Tom Meier - the armor is ornate yet not over-done, the pose dynamic and not physics-defying, and the feathers on the helm just work for me. He'll get painted up this year, for sure!

This Chronicle/Citadel Fire Giant was an added bonus in the same lot. I have to admit, it took me a hour or more of poking around the Intertubes before I secured a positive ID on him. Hard to know where to start looking when a mini has no hallmark or ANY sort of stamp, code, etc. Once the paint was stripped from him, all of Nick Lund's handiwork was laid bare for me to take in. Just a nicely done mini on all fronts.

Take a good look at the pic of his back, and then the zoomed-in view. Oooh, some trophies hanging from his belt - gruesome fun! It got me thinking (always dangerous) on just how enduring many of these old school sculpts are, packed with personality and just begging to be painted.

Now don't get me wrong, I love the new stuff as well as the old, just in different ways. Take for example some recent giants from Reaper: Werner Klocke's Vanja, Fire Giant Queen; Derek Schubert's Frost Giant Princess; and Ben Siens' Skorg Ironskull, Fire Giant King. All three sport common features - the huge Final Fantasy-style weapons, an embarrassment of detail, and the kind of "oomph" that makes an impact around the gaming table when placed upon the battle mat. I hope to one day paint at least one of these beauties.

And how could any fan of old school lead not be impressed by the folks over at Otherworld Miniatures? Their G Series of giants are pretty much the pages of the Monster Manual come to life in miniature. Don't get me started on BS5, aka The Otherworld Giant, though. I might start foaming at the mouth and babbling about merits of which head variant to use. If anyone at Otherworld wants to hook me up, I just might have to add a Sponsors section to ye olde blogge.

I guess it really boils down to what I grew up with. As far as pure collecting is concerned, I favor the 70s/80s (and sometimes 90s). But when it comes to the question of "what do I need to add to my game?" then there is no clear favorite. Whatever looks best and costs less works best for me.

The Tragedy of McDeath

"Something wicked this way comes."

Something wicked like a pair of minis that would set you back for over $300 USD if you happen to collect rare Citadel minis!

Check out this auction for King McDeath and this one too for Lady McDeath from the Citadel set The Tragedy of McDeath.

I track a lot of auctions just out of curiosity, usually to see where they end at. When I saw this pair approaching $100 each, I had to start poking around the various lead sites and wikis to find out more about them. The end result is that each time I learn a little bit more about various minis and manufacturers, I feel a little less like I'm just stumbling around in this hobby.

Back to painting. There's a drow warband that MUST be finished by Friday!