Old Glory “simply the best” NOT!

[pikeman]

I need some 28mm Stradiots for my Italian Wars collection. They are pricey, and shipping from my favored overseas suppliers makes them unaffordable. My hobby is on a financial shoestring!
So I bought the Old Glory PIL-08 Stradiot 10 pack.
I have never been a fan of this manufacturer. My primary scale is 15mm and I always found the OG figures rough, poorly cast and not well sculpted.
As a first time buyer of the 28’s, I expected them to be better. They are bigger, should have been easier to sculpt than the 15’s. Nope. Not at all! First, the horses are poorly done. They are just ugly, and some were malformed, badly cast, that were clearly rejects. Evidently they don’t care. Second, the horses and riders are mismatched. I expect they cheaped-out and used horses from another range. I have spent almost an hour with my dremel tool modifying both horses and riders to fit. They still don’t match up properly. I also dislike the lack of light lances.
Bottom line, theses aren’t a good product and confirm that there wont be any more OG products on my workbench.

[v_lazy_dragon]

OG definitely vary between ranges. I have had a few packs from different ranges over the years and never been terribly impressed. Generally sculpting is adequate but a little rough; posing very hit or miss (the notorious 'hey joe!' poses where the figure appears to be waving with a head facing in a random direction) and casting about average. I think their niche was 'cheap unit filler' before plastics were widely available.

That said, their Wars of Religion figures are less bad than some of the others

[fred]

Why didn’t you send them back for a refund if they are this poor?

Or does the USA not have distance selling regulations?

[SJWi]

I would echo v lazy dragon's comments, but add that OG's figure quality varies within ranges and even packs. I have some of their Celts. Some are very nice, others truly awful. Likewise a friend put a load of their Indian Mutiny Sepoys straight into the bin as many had "zombie-like" faces.

[Cat]

The big attraction has always been that they sell lead by the pound.  Some of the sculpts are pretty good, some are not.
 
I'll be ordering some of the brand new 15mm Spartacus range shortly, they look just as serviceable as the rest of their Romans and enemies, and the price as good as ever.

[carlos marighela]

I think it's fairer to say that some of OG's figures are acceptable, at a pinch and usually in the absence of anything else being available. Most are shite and a goodly portion are simply grotesque.

Vaguely anthropomorphic has always been their best description.

Good luck returning them. I don't know if you've ever witnessed the result of mild criticism of OG on another forum, when the owner chips in. It goes south very quickly and the owner goes ballistic usually in inder 30 seconds flat. I get the impression that Russ isn't given to any doubt in the superiority of his product. It really is a case of 'my shit smells the best', shit being the operative word.

[vodkafan]

The quality of sculpts definitely varies a great deal between ranges and even within a range, as others have said.  Some are very good in my opinion, and I have always been happy with the horses.   If you have a very large project to do, perhaps in collaboration with a friend or in a club, it can work out very economical to buy packs of filler troops in bulk where you share the cost, especially when not needing a whole pack contents for yourself. .
I do like that the head varients and interesting poses give some variety so I always check out Old Glory.
Others will disagree, and that's OK.
All my figures look shite after I paint them anyway haha. 

[mikedemana]

All my figures look shite after I paint them anyway haha. 

 

Hmm...forum discussions turned nasty? I wonder which forum in question that could be...    It wouldn't have the initials T, M, and P, would it?

I used to buy a decent amount of Old Glory when I was doing 15mm Ancients. They weren't bad, and they were what the local store stocked. As I try to buy local when I can, I ended up buying and painting a number of them. I also bought 15mm Minifigs from Wargames, Inc., which was based just down the road in West Virginia. I've since sold all my 15mm Ancients, apparently Cat has some of mine... 

Once I started getting into 28mm, the shortcomings of O.G. became more noticeable. I think that price has always been a leading sell point of theirs, though. What's the maxim? Quantity has a quality all its owns? As it is, I have a lot of O.G. in my unpainted lead pile, where it will likely remain except for an odd miniature or two that I may paint up. To each his own!

Mike Demana

[Will Bailie]

I have loads of OG in my collection, mostly from around 20 years ago.  Back then, OG was cheap so was a great way to fill out an army.  Quality of sculpts varied from not bad to atrocious.  In addition to being cheap, OG seemed to have almost any historical subject I was looking for, from ancients to medievals to Napoleonics and beyond. 

Nowadays, however, with more companies in the market, selling better sculpts and especially with plastics and 3D printing, OG's advantages are gone. I'm not getting rid of anything I've already bought and painted (sunk costs and all) but I don't foresee that I'll purchase any new OG figures.

Pikeman - depending on your modelling skillz, would you consider purchasing the Perry Miniatures plastic WotR light horse as a basis for converting into Stradiots?

[Leadjunky]

I have painted quite a number of their Italian Wars, Late Medieval, and ECW ranges and have found them some of their nicest figures after painting. I understand individual tastes vary.

https://sl.bing.net/epcjTJro7u8

[DaveCrow]

I have boat loads of OG 25mm figures. Most I like, but the cavalry I have from them definitely do not sit their horses well.
The "Hey, Steve!" poses can be an annoyance.

If you plan to buy a lot of them the Old Glory Army discount card is worth while, but you need to be planning to buy a bunch of figures to recoup the cost of the card.

I have found the 15mm Blue Moon to be fantastic.  the 28mm Blue Moon are stylistically odd and the large integral circular bases are a turn off.

A big frustration for me is that the photos of the 25s on their website are terrible!  Very hard to tell what you are actually buying.

[carlos marighela]

"A big frustration for me is that the photos of the 25s on their website are terrible!  Very hard to tell what you are actually buying."

Which I suspect is quite deliberate.

[TWD]

A big frustration for me is that the photos of the 25s on their website are terrible!  Very hard to tell what you are actually buying.

TBF it's quite an investment for a small business to take nice photographs of their products and we can't be sure this new fangled internet thing is going to take off.*




* I have been making this joke about wargame businesses for over 20 years now.

[Phillius]

I remember looking at those Stradiot from Old Glory from their UK outlet more than 25 years ago. In their naked metal variant they are quite ugly. So I chose not to buy them. Thought I would wait for another manufacturer to make some.

A few years later, still waiting for other manufacturers to get their acts together, I decided to bite the bullet and buy them from Old Glory. Still ugly when they arrived I gave them to a friend with much more talent than myself to paint.

When they came back, they were absolutely stunning! And, to be honest, when I get them on the table, they still draw plenty of praise from on-lookers, even against modern figures.

So although the figures are not nice, they can become terrific.

[Phillius]

Some pictures.