I Got A Lovely Bunch Of Cheapos

March 14, 2022

I Got A Lovely Bunch Of Cheapos

The Op shop in a neighboring town rang me a couple of days ago to say they had toy soldiers for me so I thought I better keep them interested in case they ever get anything collectible. I made the twenty minute drive, itself a slightly expensive thing these days.

As expected, they were not especially collectible and they were usual army men. Even so, it is interesting to see variations and I am also going through a faze where I convert them for imagi-nations, sf and fantasy.

I was pleased to get a nurse, even though a smaller scale than I would have liked, as I had never seen the figure before.

I have seen the bigger versions of these before. These are the 40mm versions. The weapons had warped in design and with the helmet styles reminded me of retro humanoid aliens so I am going to paint them as Little Green Martians, maybe in silver suits. The far right figure is the nurse, which i had never seen before.

It is unusual to find a female 'army man'. At first i thought she had a pistol but I think it is a bandage or maybe a syringe still in packet, or maybe she is going to attend to her 'woman's issue'. I don't know but it is my favorite figure in the lot. I think I'll actually paint her as a human army nurse, maybe as an Asian to further explain her small size if I use her with 54mm figures. Wither her small nose she does actually look East Asian. The hat is unusual. I'll probably paint it white with red cross but I could paint it black to represent a fur hat.

Size compared to Britains artilleryman.

I like the copies of Matchbox as I can paint them up and use them for various periods from 19th century through to 20th century as they are going to be alternate time line or other planets where human society has technologically regresses and is building back up. I am going to use them in my SF warlord game. These figures are 50mm or a bit less.

The modern infantry have become more common. I have seen these kind of figures converted to Vietnam War. I have painted some up as Americans in the Gulf Wars. The interesting thing is that this style with the 'Fritz helmet' has become the dominant style in many countries including China, Russia AND Ukraine. I am planning to make them into Ukrainian troops and maybe Russians. The main difference between them is color patches and yellow arm bands on the Ukrainians.

The front left figure has really deteriorated in quality of mold. However the withered helmet actually is starting to resemble a Prussian style so I might actually convert him as such. Most of the figures are actually quite well sculpted. The main drawback is the ends of the rifles snap off very easily. i could replace them with wire but that is a fiddly job.

The vehicles are undersized for my chosen scale. They would be good for 40K conversions, especially for Orks but I have enough of those already. The machine guns pull off and I might add them to my spares box. The jeeps are not bad and I could have used these a couple of years ago when i was making mercenaries in 1960s Congo.