Ranking top 5

[sansovino]

a very interesting question and huge amount of answers and rankings....

my ranking:
Plastic figures
1) Zvezda - all their sets were incredible good and historical precise sculpted, but unfortunatly they don´t produce any affordable and good figures - their small box-figures in new 3D-Design are mostly lifeless
- and Valdemar which makes resin- and not plastic figures
2) Revell - nearly all sets were outstanding, but they have finished to produce any figures before WW2
3) Italeri although a good third of their Napoleonics are bad and oversized sculpted, but they don´t produce any new figures besides reissues and game-sets
4) Waterloo
5) Strelets and Redbox for their new figures since 2015 and their policy to continue new sets of certain periods and conflicts - you don´t have to wait decades to get the wished opponents
6) Hät which has really the far biggest range of figures, but only 40 percent of their sets are outstanding sculpted - they have switched often their sculpture styles, plastic quality and figure proportions ... and have reduced painful the number of different figure-poses ...some of their best sets are given us a mission impossible to achieve straight arms or rifles ... and they let us quite often wait many years to continue their periods and themes. I am waiting for my Placenoit Project already 6 years to get their many years ago announced new Prussian Landwehr and French Line Infantry
7) Esci, Matchbox and Airfix which were a beloved part of my childhood and youth
8 Pegasus and Caesar which make really good figures but unfortunatly not for my choosen periods
9) Miniart and Emhar
...
99) Mars for the ugliest figures ever produced in 1/72 which have occupied very long one of my favourite periods, the 17th century, so only very few producers have produced any figures for this time - a curse which was only recently broken from Redbox

Metal figures
1) Art Miniaturen/Schmäling and Franznap
2) Frank Ziegler Miniaturfiguren and Imperial Modellbau
3) Hagen Miniatures, Fritz Figures, Daydream Miniatures, Schilling and Kamar
4) Tumbling Dice, Newline, Early War Miniatures

[sansovino]

Sorry, i have forgotten last night the most impressive creator of metal figures and some remarks...

the ranking has to be...

Metal figures
1) the sculptor Massimo Costa with different labels like Black Watch Miniatures whose figures are always out standing art works in realism and action
2) Art Miniaturen/Schmäling and Franznap
3) Frank Ziegler Miniaturfiguren and Imperial Modellbau
4) Hagen Miniatures, Fritz Figures, Daydream Miniatures, Phersu, Schilling and Kamar
5) Tumbling Dice, Newline, Early War Miniatures which are unfortunatly a little bit smaller than the others - mostly 20/21 mm and not 23/24 mm!

[sigtekorn]

I have burned cash left and right primarily on Italeri, Revell and Hät. Had I turned to this forum earlier I could saved myself some frustration.

Without PSR as a guide it's a complete gamble what you get in terms of quality.

Also I can live with the small historical inaccuracies but it's complete idiocy when the manufacturers have different perceptions of what the 1/72 scale is. Some models being thinner than you average runway model (I'm looking at you Italeri and Revell), and others looking like the size of NFL players (Italeri again).

But I guess some of the worst examples can be reworked as fallen

Thank you all for listening.

[DerkleinePUC]

Hello and MoinMoin,
the Underdog Brands that are hard to get are the most interesting. My period is everything between 1700 and 1815. So the Standard Brands are: 1 Zvezda, 2 ITALERI, 3 HAT, 4 STRELETS and 5 REVELL. Metall: 1 ARTMINIATUREN, 2 SCHILLING, 3 FRANZNAP, 4 HAGEN MINIATURES, 5 MARC CLAUS, LEGIO, SERGENT ARNY.
Metal and plastic and resin: THOMAS STEGMANN, FALCATA, WATERLOO1815, ESCI + AIRFIX, NAPOLEON from Spain, YKREOL, FUHRMANN FIGUREN, BUM and GERMAN, my personal favorites for War of spanish succession and Jacobite scots, GERMERSHAUS, ODEMARS, KAMAR, WESTFALIA, LW Generals, HINTON HUNT, EHMKE ART, WOGELIN/MABO, HECKER & GOROS, LEONID!!!, DER KRIEGSPIELER, MINIFIGS,
And the real rare: SURFEUR_FOU, Eric Bahlouli from France, every set just 1-5 times being made, GERMERSHAUS; FINE SCALE FACTORY, QUALITICAST, FALCON, INGO GOHLKE.
That is all I can remember tonight. Maybe I forgot some, maybe I ranked them wrong...
I hope I could give some hints.
Good night from Baltic sea coast under snow.

Patrick

[Carlos]

I think the answer can change as it is done to a war gamer who needs a lot of figures or colleagues who like to paint groups and then they need all the figures in the box to be as good as possible and those who work with one or two figures. that is my case.
I do not have a preferable brand, according to what I want to do, I go and look for the brand that has it better. I bought boxes of 20 bad figures just for a good one that I need.
Sometimes I buy a box of bad figures just because they are a bit smaller and can fit inside the vehicle I m doing.
Friends who play wargames may be will prefer soft plastic figures that do not break in the manipulation of the game and for that quality, sacrifice a little of detail, those who work in dioramas or static modelism will want it in hard plastic or even in resin and have the maximum possible detail.
Suggestion would be to look for the brand according to what one wants to do ...
But in the end we all end up buying a kit of everything because although we will never use those figures we love having them