What age is the 'stopping point' for miniatures gaming?

[FifteensAway]

I started wondering at what age, in a very broad sense, people put down miniatures gaming with no intent to pick it up again?  Locally, we have a few gents in their earlier 70s still going but beyond that, no one.  Just curious to know if that is so on other parts of our little planet?

How this matters to me is that I'm past 65 now with a reasonable expectation to survive another 30 years (no guarantees, of course) so trying to time when to winnow down the collections for real.  This is besides a general need to wittle down for sanity's sake.  Apparently my grasp on said sanity isn't so great because I haven't reduced the supply much (very little and acquisitions have actually increased the quantity overall).

[freerangeegg]

The oldest regular player at our club is 86, and a good 50% are retired with no signs of wanting to pack it in, so I'm not sure there is a top age for gaming. I hope to keep going until they can use my lead pile to line the coffin.

[Golgotha]

Wargame till your dead...

[ithoriel]

My kids have threatened to bury me with my armies arrayed around me like the Qin emperor, so why stop? 

[Inkpaduta]

I have thought back this more in line with at what age does one stop buying and painting figures.
I can see playing for quite some time but at what point do I stop buying and painting things I might
get a chance to use.

[FierceKitty]

My kids have threatened to bury me with my armies arrayed around me like the Qin emperor, so why stop? 

As long as they plan to let you die first....

[Elbows]

I'm not near that point, but I can see the desire to paint/build/construct/modify disappearing long before the desire to stop gaming.  I know people lose coordination, eye-sight, etc.

But gaming?  Even with models you painted 20 years before, or commission painted, etc?  I don't see that running out.

[Hitman]

I hate these topics...so morbid!! My wife told me to stop building, painting,  etc.  and start gaming with my figures that are already to use. The worst part is that anyone that I know to game with is close to a 2 hour drive one way. I guess I could solo game...

My relatives all seem to have died off early...and I feel I am on borrowed time. I turn 60 this year, which is older than my grandfather by 2 years and many of my uncles who passed awY in their 50s...
😭😢🥺

[Cat]

I'm sure I could come up with some rules to make pushing up daisies more of a tactical challenge.
~ , ~

[DivisMal]

Wargame till your dead...

That’s the spirit!


Seriously: not really sure about the answer. I’d say, keep what you enjoy till the end. If you’re member of a club, the state in your will that they get your painted collections.
Projects you’ll never finished or unpainted stuff that’s been lying around for decades could be sold I guess, as I know from experience that your relatives will have a hard enough time when the point is reached, and might just throw it away. That way it reaches someone who enjoys it.

[FifteensAway]

I am heartened by the first response - and what I was hoping to hear.  And I agree that we can play beyond our painting/collecting portion of our life - even if only solo.  Thankfully, I live in an opponent rich environment though it is changing as I - and they - get older.  So, my current goal is to start developing a younger set of opponents to both keep an opponent pool in play and, hopefully, have their enthusiasm infect my later life.

For Hitman, longevity is absolutely relative but just because your family history is a bit dire that does not automatically mean you will have the same fate.  My late mother made it to 87 1/2 - a full five years longer than her nearest sibling and much longer than most of the others and definitely longer than her parents by a decade or two and she was a lifelong smoker with up to five packs a day habit.  My late father made it to 92 1/2 despite being morbidly obese, too many years north of 300 pounds.  Comparatively, I am in much better health than either of them was at my age which is why I stated I have a chance at another 30 years.  My concern is how long my memory holds together, my mom got hit with dementia the last few years of her life - my father was lucid to the end so maybe, maybe not.

As to preparing our collections for our own demise (not morbid, practical consideration - truly is), I have been assisting with a third disbursement of a deceased gaming acquaintance's collection and making plans is essential.  And I really need to do so myself so my wife won't be faced with something similar; she would be completely lost in the process.

I can say this, though: my proudest moments in this hobby has been helping those three surviving families and putting probably north of $16,000 US in their hands - mostly to benefit the deceased children.  And that with only a very small percentage of each collection being high quality paint jobs of good miniatures.  The greater concern - miniatures saturation in the marketplace.  Just how much can a given gaming population absorb before there is no room for more?  And at what point does that saturation crash painted miniatures prices.  Figures at the highest quality will have value but lower quality figures/paint jobs will have serious subpar value - if any value at all.  I am of the generation of mega-sized collections so this matters to me, for those with only modest skirmish sized collections, hopefully this will be less concerning.

Between now and the inevitable, I hope to enjoy my collections as long as possible.  At least those I retain.  And hope the same for others.

[sir_shvantselot]

That’s what we are! The “mega collection” generation. Like generation Z just with a miniature addiction

I’m in my 40s and ten year old kid has already been discussing plans for how to realise value of my collection once I’m gone. Proud of them in a way.

[Daeothar]

Almost a decade ago ( ) I started a topic on this very subject and some interesting thoughts were shared:

https://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=70119.msg851708#msg851708

As for how I view this now; I have not once considered stopping because of old age. To be honest, when I see the attendance at shows and conventions, the average age is already pretty high. This goes even more so for the model train community. And I fully intend to go on till the end too.

It's what I enjoy! I'm still almost two decades away from retirement, and I hope to be able to fulltime enjoy my hobby then.

When I was still a wee lad and played with my Lego's, I always had this question about the age limit; the boxes all said something along the lines of 'for ages 6-99' (many other toys did the same), so I wondered if it would be inappropriate to still play with my Lego's should I turn 100.

And early on, young me decided that that was just a guideline, not a law and I would continue to play with them. And I extend the same mentality to my wargaming hobby...

[Tactalvanic]

I was posting about this last night and stopped, went to sleep on it.

Daeothar's your thread came to mind which is why I stopped

I have said to others - why stop? Keep doing the things you like, and love, as long as you are able

It's the stopping that kills you.

Get involved, stay involved, game solo, do it all as long as its fun and where active, do it.

Yes, common sense, reality, etc are factors, but we are talking miniatures and gaming here so both common sense and reality have already left the building.

Should we add ?

 "never give up, never surrender"

 

[tikitang]

I'm just about to turn 40, but am very much a minimalist and hate clutter and large collections. As such, I don't have a mega-collection of miniatures (in fact, the very notion of that fills me with dread). I have, thus far, only ever collected the miniatures I needed for any particular project I've been working on at the time. If I abandon the project I also abandon the associated miniatures, by whatever means necessary. So far, I have abandoned every project I've ever worked on, except for the current one. As such, my current miniature collection is rather compact (it could fit inside a shoebox).

However, the idea that my relatives discover my miniatures collection after I'm gone, small as it is, and are left with an impression of what I was like as a person based on it, and also left with the decision of what to do with it, also causes me to cringe. So, I plan to bury this hobby before they bury (or more likely burn) me.

Really, I don't place a lot of weight or value in it; it's just a temporary distraction to keep the creative side of my mind busy, providing a little break from the tedium of work and adult responsibility, not something I live for. I am very much into it at the moment, but I don't know how long this will last. I've taken up and dropped several hobbies over the years, and I am open to the possibility that this will also fade at some future point.

I've seen several eBay sales over the years where the seller has said: "Clearing out my recently deceased Dad's game collection." I never want my children to have to be in that situation. By the time I'm gone, I hope I'll have done all that myself.