Pathfinder Minis: Uncovering The Gems

Strangely, no-one at Paizo bothered to ask me why I was cancelling my Pathfinder Miniatures subscription.  I had a similar experience, years ago, with my former Bank: the teller closed the accounts without bothering to find out what had prompted my decision to leave.  I guess it costs less to find new clients than satisfy current ones.

Having decided (at least for this Pathfinder Mini Set) to purchase individual figures rather than a complete case, I have performed a second review of the Reign of Winter figures and have revised my buy list.

I had originally concluded that 24 of the 44 Reign Of Winter figures were on my "suitability" list.  Since I'm now buying singles rather than a complete set, my absolute must-haves represent a somewhat smaller collection than those on the suitability list.  Here are, in my mind, the real gems of the Reign Of Winter set.

Queen Elvanna, with her Ice staff, crown and raven familiar, is a definite buy.  As is Feiya, below.

 

And if you're going to buy Feiya, you may as well purchase her fox familiar, Daji.  Not the best sculpt, mind you.

 

There are several decent animal sculpts in this set, including the Raven, Falcon and Owl, all shown below.

 



 

 

 

There are many excellent human figures in the Reign Of Winter set  that will make excellent player-character proxies.  You very rarely find interesting and heavily garbed axemen, like Ratibor below, so he is a worthwhile addition.

And here is the Falconer, with a falcon on his shoulder.  I really like the number of animals and animal familiars that have been included in the Reign Of Winter set.

I've seen several Pathfinder players complaining that there are "too many" human female figures in the Pathfinder miniatures range.  Considering how many human male figures have been sculpted in other miniature ranges, you'd think people would be a little more open to redressing prior inequities. 

Greta, Nadya and Nazenha, pictured below are three of those offending female figures.

Monsters are strongly represented in the Reign Of Winter miniatures set, but many are of low utility since they are fairly specific to the Pathfinder universe or are already represented by figures in my current collection.  The Faun is a welcome addition as I don't think I have any Satyrs from other miniature lines.

Of the 44 miniatures in the Reign Of Winter set, I can definitely justify the purchase of the above 12.  Based on past individual figure prices, I'm guessing they will total roughly $80, plus shipping.  I would have normally dropped around $400 for a complete case (Paizo's prices have since dropped and a case will now cost $340 including shipping).