Why isn’t miniatures gaming more popular?

I’ve spent the past couple of nights painting minis for our next Frosthaven scenario, which apparently is going to see us go against a lot of elemental powers. Kasul was sitting next to me at the kitchen table, painting a new Malifaux crew. It was a quiet time, with the cats joining in to help in their own special way from time to time.

Both of us, as we painted, were seeing our minis come alive. With each layer, we’d show the other, and bit by bit, Kasul could see what I saw, and I began to see what he was seeing. Today we’re playing Malifaux up at the new card store in South Windsor, and my daughter is going to come by and give it a shot. Probably Monday, depending on how bad the blizzard hits, we’ll see the Frosthaven minis on the table. They’ll have already been fighting in my imagination.

You don’t need to source and paint minis to play Frosthaven. The game comes with hundreds of cardboard standees. I just do the minis because it’s fun. I like bringing these little guys to life. My painting slowly gets better with each one I paint, too, which is a bonus.

Malifaux, though, well, you need the minis, if you’re playing in person. Those people who play through Tabletop Simulator and other digital tabletops don’t need anything, really. But if you show up at a shop to play, you’re going to notice that everyone else there has a case full of minis. It’s a lot of up-front investment to play a game that maybe won’t stick with you. (I’ll point out that Wyrd Games has a new 4th edition starter set that includes two fully-assembled (albeit unpainted) crews, cards, markers, Fate decks and everything two players would need to immediately sit down and play a game of Malifaux).

So let’s take a look.

Not a fan of social interactions

I mean, this is fair. I sure don’t look forward to being social, most days. Having to go to the office three days a week already makes me a nervous wreck. Spending a day with strangers doesn’t help. Before I got into Malifaux, I’d see people playing miniatures games, largely Warhammer 40K (WH40K), and I just had zero idea what was going on. But I had to appreciate the craftsmanship. Their minis were usually pristine and it was easy to see the passion.

Miniatures players are well aware that their hobby is opaque to outsiders. As a consequence, they are, by far, the friendliest gamers you will ever meet, as a whole. There aren’t a lot of women players, unfortunately, but we’re out there if you look. The people you meet while wargaming will become friends. Wanna know how to make friends as a gamer adult? This’ll do it.

Expensive

I mentioned above that Malifaux has starter sets. Since I don’t play any of the others, I can’t speak for them, but I would be shocked if this wasn’t a thing for all of them. It just makes sense. Someone wants to play? Buy this and start playing.

But the first taste is always affordable. WH40K is expensive. Malifaux, Marvel Crisis Protocol, etc, have smaller crews and are generally less expensive, but they aren’t cheap. However, these models are often traded, or sold when a player moves to a new faction or a new game entirely. Kasul has on at least two occasions just bought a bunch of minis off of FleaBay for pennies on the dollar.

Hard to Learn

I don’t know if I’d agree with it. Even WH40K isn’t that tough to learn. The real difficulty is getting good. I think it may have been six months after I started playing Malifaux before I started winning regularly with my Foundry crew. Moving to December, same thing. And now with Performer — guess what — same thing. If you’re new to a minis game, your opponent will likely help you out, which can feel condescending if you take it that way, but more because they know your team and want to help get you to a place where you feel good about what you do. Selfishly, because they probably want more people to play with.

But, if you go into any sort of competitive gaming expecting to win consistently from day 1, you’re likely to be disappointed.

Hate painting

Do you hate painting? None of the minis game require the minis to be painted. I’ve played against (and with) unpainted minis, many times. That said, some tournaments may require models to be painted, but your local game shop probably just wants you in the store.

Painting can be expensive. There’s the paints themselves, the brushes, primers, learning the techniques. It takes a lot of time, and if you’re just starting out, you may not be able to make the mini look like what you want it to look. Gaming conventions usually have mini painting seminars and free painting areas where they give you minis, brushes, paints and experienced painters and let you practice as much as you like for zero cost.

Takes a lot of free time

Yeah, it really does. If your days are already bursting with activities, adding a hobby that requires a lot of preparation and then spending hours in a store actually playing the game probably isn’t the best plan. But on the other hand, maybe this is a nice change of pace and a reason to get out of the house?

If you read my posts about mini painting and gaming, you maybe have at least a little curiosity about the hobby. Find your local game shop. Go by when they’re doing WH40K or some other minis game (maybe Malifaux!) and ask questions. Might find you like what they’re doing.