I have a real love of old miniatures. I'm not entirely sure why but I think it's somewhere between the enjoyment of looking back on a (perhaps perceived) simpler time and giving long forgotten miniatures a new lease of life. Throw in the availability of miniature agnostic skirmish games such as the Rampant series and the 'Weirdo' heartbreakers and the stage is set for these miniatures to once again, or as is often the case with second hand miniatures, for the first time, take to the table top.
One Christmas not all that long ago I was perusing the Facebook group 'The Emporium of Rogue Dreams: Old School Gaming'. On the group, a chap named Andy Cook posted a brilliantly painted miniature that could only be described as a space crocodile with a lasgun. Andy had painted it superbly, I particularly loved the colour scheme, weathered armour, and the miniature itself was awesome.
In the comments section there was a discussion about the origin of the miniature and Andy said he thought it was a Saurian from Folio Works. I immediately embarked on a miniature meander.
A visit to the Miniatures Workshop took me to the Folio Works section. Folio Works, so Miniatures Workshop tells us, was founded in 1990 by Ian Bailey and Gary Chalk (of Lone Wolf illustration fame). They published a set of fantasy wargaming rules called Fantasy Warlord along with two ranges of supporting miniatures which were subsequently taken on by the excellent Alternative Armies and are still available here.
They also produced a line of miniatures to support a sci-fi rule set called High Command. Whilst it appears this rule set never saw the light of day, the miniatures did and ownership of these castings moved from Folio Works first to Mayhem Miniatures and then to Kennington Miniatures who eventually became SHQ Miniatures. My meander, therefore, took me to the SHQ Miniatures website where I found the High Command range for sale, albeit without any pictures of the miniatures.
Seeing that the Saurian Militia were available I ordered the complete set which comprised troopers (one of which, it turned out, was Andy's miniature), some power armoured troops and a command pack. There were also some intriguingly named 'Space Ratten' so I ordered those too. Each of the miniatures was customisable with a separate weapons sprue. Once I'd cleaned them up a bit, I took Andy Cooks' fantastic paint job as my muse and set to painting my first Saurian Militia! The first results of which are below (two troopers and two officers with power swords).
Next up will be the power suits and then the Space Ratten. I'll then be looking to pick up some more of the High Command range, there is also a Human Earth Guard contingent, and get some battles under way by using the Xeons Rampant rules.
In recent developments, by the way, SHQ has shut down since I started writing this post (it's been sat in 'work in progress' for a while...) and the High Command range has, once again, moved on and is now with Grubby Tanks. Grubby is currently updating his site but he has details on there about ordering the SHQ/Kennington range by emailing him.
Happy meanderings all!
