V is for Variation on a Theme

I've pointed out before that two board games in particular (Monopoly and Cludo) have become marketing vehicles for the parting of money from fools, but others (Risk, Axis & Allies) get the multiple-version treatment, today it's back to Cludo / Clue.

With pop-culture dominating the non-work sphere of western or developed-world existence we will return to both as often as I find them in charity-shops - not being a fool, I wouldn't be seen dead paying-full for any of them, even if they did a Terminator Risk in 20mm with artwork by Moebius and figures sculpted by H. Geiger!

Un-boxing is easier as a .gif; there's a lot in here and it's been expanded to eight players, with three supports and 12 rooms, an expensive way of making a slower and more complicated version of an old favourite.

Endless (or 32?) alternate set-ups, but I think the positioning of the entrance hall/lobby may limit that choise-total, each is a separate card and there are some plastic crosses (x marks lots of spots) and magnifying glasses (which like the cracker-toy novelties do actually work!) that can be liberally sprinkled about the place like a fantasy games-master setting rat-traps!

The figures; only reason I care about the existence of any of these re-hashes, the three supernumeraries are the ones with square bases, the eight player-pieces get round bases, all nicely sculpted with parquet flooring - which matches . . . err . . . none of the rooms!

They are reasonable for 25/28mm gaming, and with the Victorian air, would suit Steampunk or the HG Wells/Jules Verne/H. R-Haggard anchored stuff, or even Edwardian 'Hardboiled' stuff.

Ably assisted - as always - by my late assistant, little did she know that 31 days later she would be joining the 99.9^r% of everything that ever lived, a message hidden there for the meat-faced loons who don't think we've entered the most serious existential-threat phase of our evolution? She is sorely missed.

M is for My Busy Bot's

It was only the other day I was saying that appart form a couple of earlier sets and the Transformers, I'd pretty-much caught-up with the Phidal 'My busy book' figure collections, and what happens? Next time I'm in a charity shop ('bout 3-weeks ago) I find the Transformer set!

Two-quid-fourty-nine seems cheap, but actually it's only about half that which TK-TJ Maxx have been retailing them at (are still; this is a contemporary set), I prefer to find my charity-shop Phidal's around the 99p/£1.50 mark, but; it was mint, and it does get us closer to the total aim of all sets ticked-off!

Actually, from the odd figures that have been coming-in alongside the books over the last three or so years, it's a fair assumption that I still have at least two of the earlier Superhero sets to find/complete, several Disney figure sets including at least one more 'Princesses' set and quite a few of the other movie brand-licensed sets, Minions, Incredibles, something with insects, a couple of Monster Inc. sets &etc, so we'll still be returning to them for a while yet!

This is one of the rarer sets in having ten items rather than twelve, but this seems to be a growing (budgetary?) trend as the other 10-count sets are contemporary, while sets with much larger-sized figures from a few years ago are always 12-count sets, while these were not that large and therefore rattle about a bit?

Dismissing the micro-vehicles (which - like the robot figures - don't actually transform) leaves us with a bunch of six robots which while 'micro' as Transformers, are fine for sci-fi scenarios of the Terminator type in 54mm - bargain!

And I'll reiterate a point I've made before (just to annoy a few people who need annoying occasionally) while the Airfix figure is sitting there . . .

. . . Airfix produced 33 sets in 54mm (if you include both sets of British paratroops and the 'styrene track-officials and race-goers), it took them nearly 30-years to get them all out and more than half of them appeared in the latter half of that production-window.

While Phidal have been going since . . . around 2006/7 I think - going on the dates on the bases - and we have already got 30 entries in the tag list with little duplication (one Frozen set stared twice I think), with up to a dozen (or more?) still to find? And - some of those tags are including two or more sets!

So when people bemoan the state of the hobby, they are missing the point that while the stuff they had as kids in the 1950's or '80's might not be there (actually it is, just hideously expensive and aimed at them - only if they're earning the mullah!), the genre, the 'play-point' is as healthy as ever.

Anyway; that's the Transformers, what next?

T is for Two - Follow-ups

A couple of things which pertain to recent posts, or maybe not so recent in the case of the second item, but which can go together for an eclectic post!

I was very impressed by Brian's pictures of the Charles W. Morgan (I nearly wrote Henry!) the other day and he sent a couple of uncropped/cheat shots to show how they are done. This one shows how he got the horizon shots, and it was simpler than I'd imagined, he just held them up to the sky!

While here Brian's using natural light to get those atmospheric shadows. I can't get these results outside with my little Nikon's, I have to find shade, use a tripod and then employ flash, yet still get quite smoky or flat shots (as the recent and forthcoming board-game pictures attest), if I tried this kind of shot (without flash) they'd be blurry.

I used to get better outdoor results with the old Fuji Finepix's, but they were also the least robust and shortest-lived of the five cameras I've had now, and six I've used since 2007, so it's a 'swings and roundabouts' thing with these digital cameras and you just have to try and see!

Meanwhile I managed to score these from Mike Harding, who always seems to find interesting things. Three FFL from somewhere, when I got the other one (below) a while back (Plastic Warrior Show 2019) someone suggested Argentina I think, but I'm now wondering if they might not be JSP or their Portuguese suppliers (Injectaplatic) as they are that same stiff 'Macau' PVC?

And there's clearly at least two colourways, I wonder if there mightn't be blue ones turn-up at some point, If they are Injecta'/JSP the three poses would make sense, as that is how they sold the slightly smaller Romans, one mounted and two foot per card?

I have no evidence either way, but will put both names in the tags for now. Taken from Timpo, obviously, but probably from hollow-casts, the binocular guy wasn't produced in plastic by Toy Importers?

H is for How They Come In - Eclectic Lot!

I haven't managed (read; wasn't bothered-) to get up to town for a couple of weeks so these are from about three weeks ago? And only a few pieces from three different shops, to make an eclectic group of odds!

The lightweight foamed-resin flamenco dancer and the china fairing of a Wellintonian officer were from British Heart Foundation in Farnborough I think, she being similar to the Reamsa one, he needing a plume-repair, the three little ones were from a rummage-tray in Scope while the ELC knight (another one!) was a shelf-jobbie in BHF Fleet.

From the other side! It's all grist to the mill, literally, the amount of stuff out there means that no one can have everything, but the wider the net is cast the bigger the picture that can be drawn-in!

All marked Hasbro, the hound doing a Ghostbusters impersonation came in only the other day - hence my grabbing the two boys when I saw them - either from Charity or from Peter or Chris, I can't remember now, but it means I've probably only got the two girls to find . . . maybe some 'monsters'? That is; evil, humourless, money-grubbing, local conservative types dressed as monsters!

I love the magnified eye painted on the glass!

Later the same day - err . . . no! The Hound is doing a Sherlock Holmes impersonation, it's Shaggy who's channeling the Ghostbusters!

H is for Hungarian Herdsman Hurls Hose

I only have the sellers word for this being Hungarian, but there's no reason to not believe that he is until otherwise informed by better or more empirical data, given as how he arrived from Hungary yesterday, with Hungarian postage, tax-form an'all!

When I saw him I thought he might be a copy of a Pecos figure as scale was hard to judge and I didn't bother looking it up, it was going for a song so I just grabbed it! He's actually a copy of the generic MPC pose; cavity 118, which was issued as a cowboy among others.

While the rifle (oversized) fits one hand and the belt is definitely ex-MPC, the pistol has too-big a grip to fit in the ring-hand so may be of an other origin and the 'iron bar' or hose he's about to crack someone over the head with seems to be a polyethylene scrap taken from the lip or lid of some container and probably has nothing to do with the original figure! Although it might be the chewed end of another rifle?

The base lacks the usual MPC markings so it would seem to be the knock-off and when the MPC turn up (garage!) I'll compare him with the hand-up guy - if I have him? Accessories on the right, and it's Hungary in the tag-list!

Nice to see - later the same day - that 'Dan Morgan' was paying attention!

R is for return to Ra, Ramses, Wrapped Wraiths and the Republic of K&M

And this time Mummy is included!

When I posted these the other day I had been labouring under the impression I had been sent 'both' rival sets (by Peter Evans - many thanks) for what would have been a comprehensive showing, but as I was editing them up, I realised there was a third set, which I had missed and while I mentioned it in the blurb then, I thought I'd better get one to compare.

Midway between Safari's Toob and the header-carded bag of the current Wild Republic set we looked at a couple of months ago, this sliding blister with backing card contains ten items which are also halfway between the content lists of the aforementioned sets, with the obvious difference that this set contains two full-sized (to the sets figures) mummies, one a Pharaoh the other more ambiguous, and capable of being a child in larger scales.

All bar the Tut' death mask are clearly marked with the parents K&M like the astronauts, and quality of paint and sculpting is better than the current set and equal-to or even slightly superior to the Safari set. Note that the Isis / Maat figure's wings were glued-on upside down in the factory/finishing location.

Comparisons with their own replacements (lower left) and Safari's effort (upper right) reveal that the pyramids and sphinx might have influenced Safari (rather than the other way round as I might have assumed), certainly the K&M ones are slightly larger and better sculpted.

The internal comparison is more interesting for - as well as being unmarked - the newer set has a very slight loss of detail on things like the detailing of the surface of the sarcophagus, or the muzzles of the two standing gods, but parallels are there under 'the glass', so it would seem K&M pantographed their own set to make duplicates of the five items carried-over to the newer iteration?

Painting has also and obviously been simplified on the newer set. The wings being loose on the previously purchased newer set and upside-down on the newly-arrived older set, meant I could have them all off and studied before gluing them firmly back, correctly in place with plumbers PVC pipe-weald!

The older set has studs on the wings location into dimples in the back of the godesses arms, while a reversal has the newer girls wings drilled through to take studs from the backs of her arms.

As the older one has better paint and a dais to kneel on, she will - henceforth - be Isis, while the red-winged junior (?) Maat (or Ma'at) can supplicate on the floor before her!

News, Views Etc . . . Vectis - Late September

Another month, and harking back to the similar August post, New Zealand and Singapore are now clear of Covid, while our stats go up and America tops the 200,000 mark with no real sign of a slow-down or effective management

This week's Vectis sales (missed one yesterday; mostly Matchbox die-casts) sale details are as follows

Lot 5756 (mostly Oxford Diecast)

 

Thursday 24th September 2020

Specialist Sale Featuring The Doug Osborn Matchbox & Dinky Collection

Sale starts 10:00am

"The Specialist sale to be held on the 24th of September features The Doug Osborn Matchbox Dinky collection, 477 lots of boxed and unboxed models. The collection includes pre-production Trial models, unreleased, unpainted and unusual variation models, plus, promotional variations, R&D Staff Signed models, colour trials and code 2 models. The collection also includes Gift Sets and pewter models, plus collection books, reissues, and Atlas Editions. The sale will also include 67 lots of Matchbox Yesteryears from the Matchbox Retailer Collection and further items from other vendors including Matchbox, Dinky, Corgi and others."

Online and Download of Catalogue

Lot 6344

Thursday 25th September 2020
Toy & Model Train & Railway Sale
Sale starts 10:00am

"The Model Train sale to be held on the 25th of September starts with almost 200 lots of OO Gauge British Outline from Hornby, Bachmann Lima and others, and includes a Single Owner Collection. The sale continues with HO American Continental Outline, N Gauge, Hoe, Hornby Dublo 2-, and 3-rail plus Xrail and Acho. The sale will also include Wrenn, Triang, Triang TT, OO Gauge Kit/Kitbuilt, Live Steam, and O Gauge from Hornby and others; the sale will conclude with Books, Magazines, Catalogues & Railwayana and our usual good selection of General Trains."

Online and Download of Catalogue

All -

"Please note the AUDIO and VIDEO on the VECTIS PLATFORM has now been restored.

You should be able to view and hear the auctions as normal. Please refresh your screen if you are unable to see the Auction. (Ctrl-F5). Many Thanks for your understanding while we resolved this issue."

Bids can be placed online, prior to, or live during the auction, via telephone or commission.

There are no additional charges for using the Vectis platform to bid. (Invaluable bidders incur an additional charge of 5% from Invaluable).

Due to the ongoing situation these dates may be subject to change.

COVID - 19 RESTRICTIONS

Please note there is still NO viewing, or attendance in person at these Auctions.

Absentee bids can be emailed to admin@vectis.co.uk, or placed via the Vectis or Invaluable website, up until 2 hrs prior to the auction commencing.

ON THE DAY OF THE SALE, LIVE BIDDING is available on www.vectis.co.uk or www.invaluable.com, or TELEPHONE BIDDING can be arranged.

For telephone bidding please contact Vectis prior to the day of the auction. We will arrange for you to be involved live via telephone on the day of the sale. We will call you two or three lots prior to the lot being offered for auction. There is no charge for telephone bidding.

SHIPPING

Please be aware there is still a slight delay with our current despatch times.

Our packing team have been working hard to catch up with the 5 weeks closure we experienced in March/April.

When we re-opened in April we did so with a skeleton staff, we are now back to full capacity and they have been working tirelessly to ensure your parcels are packed as quickly and professionally as possible; the team are now currently packing and despatching August Sales.

We thank you for your understanding and patience in these unprecedented times.

COLLECTION

If you wish to collect items, we would ask customers to first call and pay for their purchases. Ask for a collection appointment date and time. This will allow the packing team to prepare your items and have them ready for you, reducing waiting times.

PLEASE ENSURE YOU WEAR A MASK WHEN COLLECTING LOTS (UNLESS EXEMPT)

Thank you for your understanding.

Contacts

Vectis Auctions Ltd.
Fleck Way,
Teesside Industrial. Estate.
Thornaby,
Stockton on Tees,
TS17 9JZ

Tel: +44 (0) 1642 750616
Fax: +44 (0) 1642 769478

Unit 5A
West End Industrial Estate
Witney, Oxfordshire
OX28 1UB

Tel: +44 (0)1993 709 424

Email: admin@vectis.co.uk

T is for Tha, tha, tha . . . That's not all folks!

Just a quickie to clear a recent acquisition; over in Farnborough a couple of weeks ago and found one of the charity shops had opened (they were weeks behind their Fleet compatriots) and scored a board game, a few days after the recent board game photo-sesh' (of which there is more still in the queue), it's a bit of fun and most of it went to recycling a couple of weeks ago!

Kids game, mechanism is best described as Ludo-variant, with four players trying to 'get round', the hook being four off-board characters trying to stop them. Warner Brothers cartoon characters provide the interest here.

Bugs, Daffy, the Road Runner and Tweaty-Pie (does anyone know why a grown man calling himself baby-talk became the 'biggest' thing on Youtube? End of Civilisation as we know it? Oh, OK, that makes sense!) are in the box to be collected by collectors!

In the style of Phidal's figures and in a softish PVC-substitute, they were worth the quid or so for a damaged box - the trouble with buying this stuff from charity-shops is it's not always all there, even if it says checked, but about nine-out-of-ten are complete, so it's always worth a punt!

So Tweaty's about 30mm and Bugs Bunny is a hare over 45! Eh? I shouldn't be allowed! His eyes need work though; he looks even more demented than usual! Mattel's Looney Tunes 4-Toon Race game - box ticked . . . that's all folk's!

Q is for Question Time - F is for Four Fierce Freebies and other Feathered Fellows

A bit of a follow-up to the previous post because for many years I had this chap . . .

How it nearly looked the other day!

. . . in the same bag as the Hong Kong chromium-coated Crescent chaps we saw the other day, as he looked to be a well finger-worn member of the same clan, but in fact he belonged somewhere else and is actually just marbled in grey and purple with a slightly metallic sheen.

He's actually a Clairet-copy, previously issued (from the manufacture) as a Nestlé premium at some point and copied by Starlux in more than one version. As far as I know both French 'commercial' types are based, rather than the tripod arrangement of this chap, while the Starlux have the left forearm raised (Indian doing 'How', backwoodsman holding an European pipe) and a taller, thiner log-seat, but this chap is a mystery to me.

Also and because I thought he went with those HK 'plated' chaps I'd assumed (never x-assume and all else my very great friend!) he was polystyrene, but I now suspect . . .

. . . that he belongs with these other three? They too had been mis-christened, and were in with the Koho's (also seen here recently) as the bases are similar, but more have turned-up now and all in the same subdued/darker colours, so I think they are separate.

The kneeling guy is a copy of a Linde coffee premium, while I think the running guy is taken from another (to Clairet) French make? I have seven or eight now (already put away!) but only the four poses and the same shades of cooked and uncooked meat! I suspect they are all premiums of some kind, probably French or one of the Low Country's (someone tell TJF that's a geographical reference, not a 'racist' epithet!), and I would love to know more about them?

In the meantime [this was supposed to follow-up on the Crescent post the other day but for a bunch of reasons the best part of three weeks have gone-by!] I have picked up an actual Koho pose (previously show to us here - as Koho - by Theo van der Weerden), but not in Koho's cloth, being clearly marked MIR, French laundry powder (and there's a couple more here).

The green one, which in common with the 'meaty' ones also looks (from the neat, thinnish, ovoid, parallel-sided base) like it could be Koho, also isn't! It's actually one of the old Siku sculpts (issued in various guises and two sizes), but is manufactured in soft plastic, and has more in common with those polyethylene copies/issues of the Lido 'Captain Video' figures we saw here . . . earlier this year? I mention that only as it may prove in the future to have been a clue as to who is/was producing these apparently modem soft plastic copies of old 1950's stuff?

A close-up of the mark, no doubts as to this one's origins, the figure is half-ruined by the mark - slap-bang in the center of his chest!

He is however a better 54mm than the Koho-proper's in my collection being halfway between their 40 and 70mm.

A bitty post, but hopefully of some interest?

T is for Thar' She Blows! (Brucie Bonus)

Not technically a pirate-themed item, but then over here ITLAPD has been and gone, but there's still a few hours of it over the pond, so very much on the cusp of the day; here is a lovely diorama from Brian Berke up there in New York, in which an early nineteenth-century whaler (the Charles W. Morgan - originally from Pyro) get a ship-to-ship message delivered by Captain Nemo of the Nautilus!

No blurb, but Brian said;

"A few months ago we went to see the Charles W. Morgan at the Mystic Seaport Museum in Connecticut before VOVID-19 closed everything down.

The whaling ship is the last of it's type. Whale oil was not needed when oil was discovered in Pennsylvania and the fleet of whalers was mostly sunk by the Union Navy as blockades to southern ports during the Civil War.

That's the background. I recently dug out a plastic kit of the Morgan and here it is on it's maiden voyage. Sadly it was seen by Captain Nemo, that's life! "

he added . . .

"Captain Nemo wasn't a pirate though revenge against authority started many a pirate on that vocation."

The Captain being actually consumed by a hunger for vengeance and hatred of imperialism; the British Empire (a fledgling America in the recent Radio plays!) which is explained further on Wikipedia!

Also - superb photography from Brian there, I thought?

As mentioned the model has had several boxings under three labels, Pyro commissioned the original tool, Life-like got hold of it in a tranche of ex-Pyro tooling in the 1970's (?) and dropped the name, although it was retained on the runners ('sprues')!

While most recently Academy-Minicraft had a shot, although that's a 1980/90's 'recently' I fear, I don't know if Academy still have it, but Minicraft went off to concentrate on hobby tools (I think) some time ago!

And many thanks to Brian for closing 'Pirate Day', as I think the organisers have simplified the title to, this year . . . in order to expand the concept?

C is for Captain Morgan's Cut Throat Crew!

These are current, or at least still available, the card is over 12-years old, which is why I didn't de-card them, nor will I bother with much blurb, as you can see them all, beautifully painted, on the company's website!

As purchased, I can't remember if they were an expensive 'impulse' purchase at a War Gaming show, something cheap under the table at a Toy Soldier show, or came-in with a mixed lot at some point, I may even have paid full at the old Esdevium Games shop in Aldershot, years ago? But they're here now!

That's them; Foundry Miniatures Cut2/CUT012, a nice, slightly chunky whitemetal pirate crew, all I need is a 1:60th ['ish] ship and Cap'n Morgan's your uncle!