I suppose by the time a figure has reached a stage where it appears in an auction at Christies, play time is over and the figure is now a collector’s item. Too bad and sadly the fate for many a fine figure. Some figures were made to stand inside a jar. They stand stiffly at attention, all their finery on display with carefully hand painted detail. Others are meant for play and so many of these are collector’s pieces for having been ignored for some reason by an indifferent child.

Here you get a sense of the different world of the figure collector. Who would not be charmed by having a Village Idiot or Monty Monkey? And it is these kinds of figures that motivate wargamers. We want to pull them out of the jars and get them moving. Still, the notion of some executive’s suite laden in heavy oak and overstuffed leather chairs with a bright gleaming set of sparkling new Britains figures has a certain charm as if Citizen Kane had been reunited with Rosebud.