20mm WW2...endangered species?

[forrester]

Suddenly it seems several ranges are no more are are on a hiatus.

Adler discontinued hopefully finding a new home.
SHQ bought by Grubby Tanks but not on his website yet, and anyway he says he's retiring in a year or so.
EWM website is being rebuilt.
Armourfast gone.


Still got AB, and Rapid Fire range, and PSC though their kits can periodically go out of stock.

Is everyone getting old all at once?
Is the future in 3r prints such as Butlers?

Fortunately Ive just about got what I need, but theres always room for another whim.

[Tom Dulski]

 I have often wondered why any one  would choose 20mm when there are so many 28mm options. Also 28mm is easier to paint.

[fred]

28mm vehicles are huge, and expensive. Even 28mm figures are pretty big, which makes most ranges and distances in rules look very compressed.

20mm has a long heritage going back to Airfix kits and figures, so many people have lots of existing models in their collections.

20mm figures tend to be very naturally proportioned - whereas 28mm tend to be more chunky / caricatures.

Many people (including myself) will say 20mm tanks are big compared to 15mm/10m/6mm/etc. So as with much of wargaming it comes down to personal preference, and what type of game you want to play.

[carlos marighela]

Given the wealth of 1/72 kits and diecasts, the continued availability of plastic figures and the fact that premium 20mm ranges like AB are expanding I can't see a demise of 20mm WW2 any time soon.

[armchairgeneral]

The AB 20mm range is reason enough to do WW2 in this scale 

[Adler]

I have often wondered why any one  would choose 20mm when there are so many 28mm options. Also 28mm is easier to paint.

Ill dispute the easier to paint and as for quality the vast majority of 28mm sculpts Ive handled are frankly grim.....
Then again when ranges vs table size is an issue why go for a scale that increases the footprint?
And yes Im biased

And Adler still going until the New Year when the ranges go off to a nice new home, details will go up later this month.

Adler Miniatures
L. Locke

[SJWi]

I must admit that although some of my mates are converts to 28mm WW2 I just don't see the point. Vehicles are expensive, buildings have huge footprints and weapon ranges tend to be artificially curtailed due to table size. I much prefer 20mm but in fact find 15mm a more satisfying scale from a ground-scale perspective, and if starting from scratch today but probably opt for that scale.     

[black hat miniatures]

I think that there is still plenty around in 20mm WW2.  Ranges will be passed on - though I did put a big order into Peter when he said he was selling SHQ...

I much prefer 20mm for WW2 over anything else (I have tried 28mm and 1/35 in the past) and a lot of my figures are original Airfix...

[carlos marighela]

It's purely a matter of taste. I don't know if 28mm is any easier to paint but for many of us it remains possible to paint.

As for 28mm ranges, well some of them are top class. I'd put the Paul Hicks sculpts from a number of ranges up against anything produced by Tony Barton and to be honest when it comes to post-war/moderns, a poorly supported genre, I've yet to see anything that is even as good as the old Matchbox paras.

Footprint? Yes, absolutely the footprint is larger. That said, most WW2 and modern 28mm games tend to be skirmish affairs, section plus through to company (-). Many of the 20mm games I've seen and pretty much all the ones I have played have been at a much larger scale, typically battalions or brigades. At which point the issue of footprint becomes moot. The very availability of cheapish 20mm vehicles compared to 28mm sees more of an armour heavy focus and quite often you witness the wall to wall tank effect.

Cost of figures and terrain is probably the biggest drawback.

Like most people my age, I started with Airfix and Matchbox plastic figures and tanks. My tastes changed and I went along a not atypical path of 25mm, followed by 15mm for horse and musket games as it became the thang. When I returned to WW2 it was in 6mm before starting to collect the 20mm gems that are the AB range. Some cruel bugger got me into 28mm and I've got so many of the damn things it would be pointless starting over. Never saw the point of 10mm or 3mm but hey, to each their own. It's purely a personal taste affair.

That said, if I had my druthers and if someone had produced decent 20mm moderns when I had started (nobody has to this day) I'd happily have gone down that path.

[V]

I have often wondered why any one  would choose 20mm when there are so many 28mm options. Also 28mm is easier to paint.

Because we may want well posed, animated and historically accurate models?

I'm not fond of the 28mm plastic gorilla's available. The only ones worth looking at are Perry and Hicks sculpts in 28mm. Hopefully the Victrix plastics will be good.

Far more in 20mm options than any other size and, frankly, they just look better than many 28s on the market.

Also far easier and quicker to paint too.

[V]

I've been told '20mm is dying' as regularly as I'm told historical wargaming is dying out. Generally once every couple of years.

The sheer volume of 1/72 new kit releases certainly shows that side is booming. The likes of PSC recently released loads of 3d printed options as well as suggesting a return to new hard plastic kits in 2025 for 1/72.

The mass of releases from AB would suggest that for them, 20mm WW2 is not dying off... but generating enough revenue to pay for entire new ranges to be sculpted.

The futures bright, well is for me anyway... cos I'm very happy with where 20mm is these days.

[Cholmondely Percival IV]

I’m wondering whether anyone has built any of the 1:72 kits by Vespid. I received a 38T Hetzer today, having recently purchased a Comet 1a and Centurion Mk. V. Due to their demanding nature - they aren’t primarily wargaming models, it’s fair to say - and personal circumstances, I won’t be starting any of these in the near future but I’d be interested to know what others may have done with them.

For those who are unfamiliar with the range, they are highly detailed kits, with individual wheels and tracks in hard plastic that need to be attached in sections, like 1:48 or 1:35 kits, so, as I said, demanding in terms of time and patience. In terms of detail and moulding they appear to be of at least equal quality to Dragon or Revell.  They all come with a fret of etched brass and - uniquely in this scale, to my knowledge - a brass gun barrel, considerably enhancing their value when one considers that these normally have to be bought from after-market suppliers. Admittedly these factors are generally of more relevance to diorama builders and self-conscious ‘scale modellers’ than wargamers but for those interested in taking things a step further they are definitely worthy of consideration.

[sir_shvantselot]

I’m wondering whether anyone has built any of the 1:72 kits by Vespid. I received a 38T Hetzer today, having recently purchased a Comet 1a and Centurion Mk. V. Due to their demanding nature - they aren’t primarily wargaming models, it’s fair to say - and personal circumstances, I won’t be starting any of these in the near future but I’d be interested to know what others may have done with them.

For those who are unfamiliar with the range, they are highly detailed kits, with individual wheels and tracks in hard plastic that need to be attached in sections, like 1:48 or 1:35 kits, so, as I said, demanding in terms of time and patience. In terms of detail and moulding they appear to be of at least equal quality to Dragon or Revell.  They all come with a fret of etched brass and - uniquely in this scale, to my knowledge - a brass gun barrel, considerably enhancing their value when one considers that these normally have to be bought from after-market suppliers. Admittedly these factors are generally of more relevance to diorama builders and self-conscious ‘scale modellers’ than wargamers but for those interested in taking things a step further they are definitely worthy of consideration.

Crikey, Mr Cholmondely. Why would you subject yourself to that? I was thinking of picking up the Pegasus Tiger 2s in 1/72. They come in about ten pieces each 🥹

[V]

Vespid are stunning kits though... but more for the modeller-gamer than the wargamer!

[TacticalPainter]

20mm flies under the radar because show games and the wargame press prefer 28mm, so it’s easy to get the impression 20mm is ‘dying’. That might be so, except the plethora of manufacturers would indicate the opposite. Someone is buying it, and I’m one of them. The others above are the same. Just look at how many posts there are in this forum alone related to games or collections in 20mm. They probably exceed those for 15mm but no one is suggesting 15mm is dying.