Now, this may not be as irritating to others as it is to me, but I grow increasingly frustrated how female breasts are more often than not sculpted in females. What I mean that most of them look like they've had a 1/2-1 gallon silicone implants put on them.

Now, I'm not saying that I dislike big breasts or breast implants on general, but as most fantasy miniature games are set in somewhere between the dark ages and early 20th century (technologically speaking), it's "historically" incorrect to have silicone boobies there.

Perhaps I'm just pointing out something that most would find to be irrelevant, but here are a couple of reference images (probably semi-SFW).




And to drive the point home:




Again, this may not bother the rest of you, but I'd just like to point this out. Perhaps it's just a matter of painting.

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I posted this on Wyrd forums (and removed Malifaux-specific references to this thread), but I also want your feedback. How do you feel? Do you even care?

It's definitely not historically coherent, but most heroic fantasy pictures and comics have the same bias.

I think sculptors either imagine all role players are sex mad, or the sculptors themselves are sex-mad

Anyway, having big photos of boobs at work was quite fun, thanks for the references

I think it's probably a combination of A) the perceived need to exaggerate the characteristics of a mini for clarity, B) contour-accentuating paint jobs, and C) Hey, breasts! Neat-o!

Then again, perhaps it's done in the best interest of gamers. Psych experiments have consistently shown that looking at breasts puts people in a better mood (though the effect is greater on straight men and lesbians for some reason).

One of the things that I like about Sandra Garrity's work, she uses realistic proportions.



Julie Guthrie is not bad either.



But one thing that I hate is armor that bares the midriff - of all the places that you want to keep covered, that is it! (So much so that the placarte - intended to be worn over the belly and abdomen as part of an articulated breastplate was often worn alone, or with a buffcoat and tassets.) The heart and lungs have ribs. The gut? Nothin'.

There also the figures from Hasslefree - in particular the Libby figures. (Odd that the sculptor has a wife named that, eh?) Big woman, but not just by cup size. Their other females often do have generous proportions, but also have appropriate sag.



But yeah, there seems to be a lack of proportion in the hobby.

But then there is Boris Valejo and Julie Bell.... Who do modeling for each other, and look the parts. Sorry, an artist who paints broad chested barbarians and curvacious women should not be one! (After complaints about a Marvel cover of She Hulk lying on a towel she released the photo that she used as a model - herself, lying on a towel. With the exact same proportions....)

The Auld Grump

Actually... In the 3D world, I've had to look real hard to find women's clothing that didn't involve looking like the town hooker.

Seriously... No wonder there is so much screaming when the fighting begins.

Image deleted - Moderator

@Grump: someone told me that the Vallejo/Bell paintings were totally anatomically correct and I flatly refused to believe him. I agree, there's something wrong about such statuesque artists. It's like an edible chef.

While I agree that the minis are not historically acurate, How many people really make their fantasy minis historically acurate for the middle ages? When is the last mini you saw with scars from small pox or a armored knight only 5 feet tall with a realistic sized weapon?

We have an idealized version of minis, and sure the women don't look correct with a proper corset and shelf bra, but really do you want them to look correct? Minis follow fantasy art which seems to strongly feature imposibly buff men and curvy women. We vote by what we buy and honestly our dollars say that most geeks like that kind of stuff.

As my original post didn't mean to criticize the idea of sex selling, but as these threads tend to go that way, I'll give in.

What does this all mean about us, the consumers? I personally don't enjoy hack'n slash RPG's for the sake of being a bad-ass knight that can eat a dragon for breakfast, but a great many of us do.

That's also one of the reasons why I moved away from WHFB first (since I disliked the idea of playing buffed-up demigodlike heroes instead of playing units - which lead to lots of losses, since my opponents did't share my opinion and frankly I wasn't a good player) and then later from 40k, when I started to see the similiar phenomenon in 40k tournaments.

Then along came Confrontation, where the miniatures were pretty and generally sculpted a bit better, and even then I didn't choose the army with the biggest boobs or the biggest muscles. What appealed to me the most was that every model was significant - not just the general. After that it was Hell Dorado, where the fluff pulled me in and then Malifaux for much the same reasons.

But from what I've gathered, it's still a somewhat known phenomenon that the armies with the biggest muscles and boobs tend to be very popular amongst players.

Whilst typing this, a question formed. Can we, as RPG-players and miniature wargamers, be classified to distinct groups based on the games we play and the armies we wield? I'm not interested in playing the knight in shining armor that much (well, my best experience wielding the role was when the game was a parody of RPG cliches), I more enjoy the "one has to do the job he has been given, whether he enjoys it or not"-archetype. I don't prefer collecting female miniatures because they're sexy, I don't even have much of them and the few I've purchased have been either for practical value, sheer attitude of the mini itself, or just to parody the whole oversexuality of the genre.

I know I'm not alone in my sentiments and there is certainly nothing wrong about preferring to buy minis with big chested girls, but I'm interested in knowing whether there's a connection with the character types one plays or games one plays. I actually hope that this theory would prove to be false and most players couldn't be classified this way. But what if they could? Could it explain why people tend to take sides in discussions like this?