In total there were 1778 responses given to this survey. Considering I was really only hoping to come close to or a little above the number of responses in the last survey, I consider this a huge success.  Where appropriate, I have included the numbers from last years survey in order to compare to the results from this years.  Be aware though that as of yet trending can not be done in most cases as the larger sample set did end up including more hobbyists from certain groups.

Also, due to the manner which percentages were calculated, it is common for whole numbers to not be achievable in terms of working backwards.  There are several reasons for this including rounding, and incomplete data sets.  Some survey responses were incomplete or not applicable - for example several people answered "here" for the What Country are you From? question.

How were you referred to this survey?

The other section included additional forums and websites which ranked below 1% as well as email referrals and non-specific referals (e.g. "a website forum"). Of the sources above, I posted directly to the Forum of Doom, Steve Dean Painting Forums, TMP, TGN, Frothers, Dakka Dakka, CMoN and Reaper. For the most part I tried to avoid posting in locations which were specifically slanted towards a specific genre or game system.

What country are you from?

In addition to the above countries, we have Chile, Japan, Belgium, Greece, Bosnia, Sweden, France, Denmark, New Zealand, Russia, Mexico, Italy, Spain and Switzerland. The other countries though had less than a single percent of the total respondents each.

When we actually look at the numbers from this survey, it might seem at first that there is an inordinate number of respondents from the US versus other countries. However in looking at the actual populations from those countries it isn't all that surprising. Looking at those numbers, the responses from the United States compared to other countries seems a little low or inline with the overall population comparisons.

The bigger issue is the lack of participation from non-English speaking countries. The primary cause of this is fairly straight forward, I speak English as my primary language, I published and promoted the survey on primarily English speaking websites. Right now I am working on a few different options to have the survey translated and published in German, French and Spanish. The software used allows for multiple languages - so in that way, it will be fairly straight forward.

Are you male or female?

In terms of percentages, the number of female respondents dropped for this year from last - however the overall number of female respondents still did go up. While examining the raw data to see if there was a specific cause for this, it seems as though it was simply an issue of more male respondents. From certain sites like Cool Mini or Not, the percentage of females who responded to the survey was higher than the overall average. From other sites like Table Top Gaming News, the number of females who responded were much lower.

Since the actual sources of respondents has changed from last year, I am afraid that no real conclusions can be drawn from this data in terms of trending or other issues. Hopefully as more data can be collected on this topic it will be possible to establish a base line and work from that point.

How old are you?

Overall there were no significant changes from last year to this year in regards to age. We did have several younger respondents that did not participate in last years survey. By comparing the ages from the survey to those that the big companies advertise to, these numbers may seem surprising. However in the grand scheme of things, it isn't all that surprising. Wargaming has been around from decades. Even if only a small percentage of gamers stuck with it from the beginning, they will add up quickly.

What is your current marital status?

Again, no huge changes from this year to last. Most of the respondents are married by the time they enter into the 36 and older category, so with the increase in responses on the bottom end of the age spectrum it accounts for a large portion of the difference in Single responses from this year to last years.

Do you have any children?

This is a new question for the survey, so I do not have data to compare it to from last year. According to the US Census Bureau the percentage of households in the US with children under 18 is around 36%. The percentage among miniature hobbyists is around 42%. This is a little higher, and as my comments from last years survey indicate it does seem that miniature hobbyists are more family oriented than the general population. This doesn't indicate that they are better parents or spouses - but it is an interesting trend that seems to be holding up.

What is the highest level of education you have completed?

Again, trends are holding steady. By comparison to the US averages, miniature hobbyists tend to be better educated than the general population. One of the important aspects of this for the industry as a whole is that higher education will normally translate into higher income - which of course is good for the industry.

Do you collect miniatures for the purpose of displaying them?

Do you collect miniatures for playing wargames?

While there is a change from last years responses to this year, there doesn't seem to be any underlying factor other than the respondents sources. Certain sites provide more wargamers than others, and that seems to be reflected in this years survey.

Do you collect miniatures for use in roleplaying games?

On a scale of 1 to 5, please rate the following attributes in regards to how important they are when selecting miniatures, where 5 is most important and 1 is least important.

A new question for this years survey. With the exception of the sculptor, all of these traits are fairly important to hobbyists. Even sculptors are important, and this can be seen by the success of various companies like Hasslefree or Copplestone.

Do you prefer realistic miniatures or stylized miniatures?

Overall realism versus stylization isn't too important for most hobbyists as long as they do not go overboard with things. The acceptance to the heroic style of miniatures seems to help reinforce this fact as well.

How much space do you have dedicated to miniatures?

Answers of Other ranged from space in the basement to anywhere in the house. There were also several store owners who felt right to show off the advantage of having an entire building dedicated to miniatures and wargames.

How much time per week do you spend playing with or painting miniatures?

How much do you spend in the average month on miniatures?

Do you ever travel to paint your mini's? Game Store Paint Nights for example.

What paints do you currently use?

With as many different types of paint that exist on the market, there are a lot of write in options here. I have gone through that larger section of answers and sorted it out to the following table which represents the most popular paints which were not offered as selections above:

The balance of the write in paints were are made up of various other craft paints (FolkArt, Apple Barrel, Americana), artists paints and other paints which are marketed toward modelers (Revel, Inscribe, Life Color, Gunze). When all the different results were tallied there were over 150 different brands of paint being used.

Do you purchase miniatures that have been painted or use a painting service to have miniatures painted? This does not include prepainted miniatures like Clix or other factory painted miniatures.

There is a significant trend for older hobbyists buying miniatures painted by others over younger hobbyists. Although they still haven't become a dominating force, painting services have become much more popular. As more and more hobbyists use them, it is likely that they will catch on to a wider range of customers as well.

Do you purchase prepainted miniatures?

The answer of Other in this question had basically a single response to it (over 90% of the "Other" responses). They buy prepainted miniatures only when they have to - and then they end up painting them over. It seems as though the response from consumers to prepainted miniatures is currently luke-warm at best. However there is a bit of a Catch-22 for the consumer, if they want to play a game which is only available with prepaints - they have to buy them.

In addition to the repaint the prepaints response, some say they haven't but would consider it if the miniatures looked better or were better quality. Others use prepainted miniatures to get the kids involved in gaming.

Please rate the following miniatures materials in terms of how you like working with them, with 1 being the worst and 5 being the best.

When you compare the results from this question with that of the prepainted miniatures question, some interesting trends show up. People who really liked prepaints also rated the soft plastic higher - even so, very few people like soft plastic. Of those who had a very strong dislike for prepainted plastics, they also have a higher percentage of dislike for the soft plastics. It is quite likely that prepainted plastics would be more popular if they were made using a more rigid plastic or other material.

Resin, although it was ranked as only average in terms of preference there is more to it than may be apparent. During follow up questions with respondents, many who ranked it as #3 only did so because they had never used it. Because of this, about half the #3 comments are likely from people who have never had any experience with it.

Do you currently use an airbrush when painting your miniatures?

What genre do you collect for display?

Responses for the Other option included Pulp, Animals and Horror.

What scales do you prefer to collect for display?

In addition to the above scales, people also wrote in various ship and starship scales.

Do you paint your own miniatures for display?

When you display your miniatures, do you tend to show them alone or in dioramas?

Are you miniatures displayed proudly in common areas or are they hidden away?

What is the main reason you do not display your miniatures in primary living spaces?

Other reasons that people gave for why they do not display miniatures include being embarrassed about collecting miniatures, paint jobs not quite being up to par and simply that they prefer to display them in their art/game room as opposed to in the general living areas.

If you had a better way of displaying your miniatures, would you?

What genre of wargames do you like to play?

Beyond the above large genres of gaming, horror was by far the most popular. There were also responses for sports type games. During the follow up questions, many people placed horror in science fiction or alternate history. Games like Blood Bowl were generally classified into their fluff setting genres.

What historical periods do you play in?

One of the unfortunate situations with historical games is that it is a very large stretch of time that gets broken down into a lot of wars, periods and genres. Nearly 5% of the other responses included English Colonial periods in Africa, India and the Middle East. Following that you have the Seven Years War which came in at around 3% of the responses (this includes related conflicts such as the French Indian War). After that you have generic pirate games which are not specific to a given era with about 2.5%. Rounding out the more popular mentions were the Spanish Civil war. During follow up questions, the Spanish Civil War enthusiasts seem to be divided equally between the two wars (1820s and early 1900s).

In addition to these there are several smaller more specific wars mentioned - many of which I had moved into the broader categories above in order to maintain the accuracy of the survey in relation to other respondents based off from what follow up conversations revealed (for example, the Dark Ages period was posted in others by a few users - however most who gamed Dark Age period games placed it in the Medieval slot).

What scale do you prefer to use for prehistorical miniatures?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

What type of prehistorical games do you prefer to play?

What scale do you prefer to use with Ancients?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

What type of ancient games do you prefer to play?

What scale do you prefer to use for Medieval games?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

What type of medieval games do you prefer to play?

What scale do you prefer to use with Renaissance games?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

What type of renaissance games do you prefer to play?

What scale do you prefer to use for Napoleonic Era games?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

The first question which generated actual "Other" scales. Roughly 3% of the other responses were for 1:1200 scale naval miniatures. Roughly 1.75% were for 1:2400 naval miniatures. The rest were like those above - alerting me to my 28 mm mistake.

What type of Napoleonic games do you prefer to play?

What scale do you prefer to use for American Revolutionary War games?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

What type of American Revolutionary War games do you prefer to play?

What scale do you prefer to use for American Civil War games?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

Nearly 2% of the others responses were for 1:1200 scale miniatures. There were a small handful of respondents that played with 1:600 miniatures.

What type of American Civil War games do you prefer to play?

What scale do you prefer to use for English Civil War games?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

What type of English Civil War games do you prefer to play?

What scale do you prefer for Cowboy Wars (Generic Wild West) games?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

What type of Wild West games do you prefer to play?

What scale do you prefer for WWI games?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

Nearly 5% of the other responses were for 1:144 scale miniatures (aircraft). Around 4% were for 1:6000 scale naval. There were also a few responses for 1:2400 naval miniatures.

What type of WWI games do you prefer to play?

What scale do you prefer for WWII, Pacific Theater games?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

Around 7% of the others were for 1:2400 naval miniatures. Both 1:6000 and 1:1200 had about 1%.

What scale of miniatures do you prefer for WWII, European Theater games?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

For WWII - European Theater games, 1:300 seemed to be a popular scale for aerial combat - having about 2% of the others responses.

What type of WWII games do you prefer to play?

What scale miniatures do you prefer for Cold War era games?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

Roughly 2% of the others responses were for 1:2400 scale naval miniatures.

What type of cold war era games do you prefer to play?

What scale miniatures do you prefer to use for Modern/Near Future games?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

What type of modern era games do you prefer to play?

What scale miniatures do you prefer to use for fantasy games?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

What type of fantasy games do you prefer to play?

Most of the other responses relate back towards the other choices. However dungeon crawls are a bit unique and are worth mentioning. Around 1% considered that a favorite.

What scale do you prefer for Alternative History games?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

What type of alternate history games do you prefer to play?

What alternative history games do you play?

After filtering out the various other responses which fit in other categories, there were two of note left - Weird West style games and Kung Fu theater type games. Neither of those fell into the other categories. There was also some interest in other eras of history including the Renaissance (Da Vinci machines which worked as well as clockwork machines).

What scale do you prefer to use for modern/near future miniatures?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

What type of modern/near future games do you prefer to play?

What science fiction games do you play?

8.36% of the other responses refer to large robot based games. Another 4.95% are targetted towards more "realistic" sci-fi games. The remainder are a bit of a mish mash of space westerns, colonisation and other game styles.

What type of science fiction games do you prefer to play?

For simplicities sake, I have combined the space combat with naval combat. Space combat by itself only occupied 0.87% of the responses and a majority of the follow up questions considered space combat to be a flavor of naval combat.

What scale do you prefer to use for science fiction miniatures?

The great folly of this survey. When entering in the questions for this survey, I ended up repeating a mistake related to the scale question over and over again. The proper division for this should have been 25 Heroic to 32 mm and 32 to 54 mm. The two options were grouped into one option and I didn't notice it until over 100 people had taken the survey. As a result I contacted nearly 300 respondents in regards to this and other scale questions. The results were fairly uniform and roughly 97% used 25 Heroic to 32 mm miniatures for wargames. Around 2% used 40 mm miniatures and the remainder were larger than that.

Where do you most often game?

The handful of other results reference playing where ever they can play.

How many miniatures do you normally game with per side?

What sized game tables do you prefer to play on?

10% of respondents like to use as big of a game table as possible. 5% don't have a preferred size, and use what ever is recomended by the system in question. The remainder used a variety of game tables larger than those listed above with the majority using a 6 foot by 8 foot table.

What games systems do you use?

In addition to the selectable options, write in answers were accepted for this question. The results were as follows:
.45 Adventures (1.36%), 1644 (1.36%), 5150 (1.97%), AT-43 (3.62%), Armies Of Arcana (2.30%), Battlefleet Gothic (1.64%), Battletech (1.97%), Blitzkreig Commander (1.64%), Blood Bowl (1.97%), Brother Against Brother (1.36%), CAV (1.36%), Check Your Six (1.36%), Confrontation (3.62%), Dirtside (1.64%), Disposable Heroes (1.36%), Epic 40K (2.63%), Full Thrust (4.93%), General De Brigade (1.36%), Hordes (2.63%), I Ain't Been Shot Mum (3.62%), Infinaty (3.29%), Johnny Reb (1.36%), Lord Of The Rings (2.96%), Mordheim (2.63%), Necromunda (1.97%), Piquet (2.30%), Rezolution (2.30%), Savage Worlds (1.36%), Song Of Blades And Heroes (1.36%), Stargrunt (1.64%), The Sword And The Flame (3.62%), Wargods Of Aegyptus (1.64%) and finally Warzone (1.36%).

In addition to these systems, the following were also mentioned however they registered with less than 1% of respondents:
AE-WWII, AK47, Battlesystem, Aetherverse, Age Of Eagles, Age Of Reason, Air War 1918, Air War C21, Alien Squad Leader, All Things Zombie, Ambush Alley, Anima Tactics, Arc Of Fire, Armati 2, Astounding Tales, BAR, Battle Of Five Armies, Battlefield Evolution, Battlefront WWII, Battleground WWII, Battlelore, Battlelust, Baybylon 5:A Call To Arms, Beamstrike, Brigade De Armee, British Grenadier, Carnage and Glory, Canvas Eagles, Car Wars, Chain Reaction, Chainmail, Challenger, Chaos In Carpathia, Chapultepec, Charlie Company, Chronopia, CLA, Clan War, Coffin For Seven Brothers, Cog Wars, Cold War Commander, Column, Line And Square, Combat Commander:Europe, Combat Zone, Command And Colors, Command Decision, Cowboy Wars, Crossfire, Extra Terrae Crepusculum, DBM, Dark Age, Days Of Knights, Defiance: Vital Ground, Desperado,
Distant World Battles, Donald Featherstone's System, Dreamscape, Dungeon And Dragons Miniatures, Face Of Battle, Fantastic Worlds, Field Of Battle, Fly Or Die, FNG, Forlorn Hope, Gå På, Gaslight, Gear Krieg, General Quarters, Gorkamorka, Grand Manner, Grande Armee, Great Rail Wars, Great War, Gutshot, Halo Actionclix, Heavy Gear, Hell Dorado, Heroclix, Heroscape, Horrorclix, Imperial Commander, Iron Ivan, Iron Stars, Jagpanzer, Kampfgruppe Commander, Kiss Me Hardy, Le Feu Sacre, Legends Of The Old West, Little Wars, Litzkrieg Commander, Luftwaffe 1946, Metal Storm, Metropolis, Micro Armor, Modern Face Of Battle, Mustafa's Nappy Rules, Mustangs, Napolean's Battles, No Limits, No Quarter, Nuts, Occult Wars, Old Trousers, On Watch, Operation WWII, Panzer Korps Commander, Panzer Minatures Rules, Pax Limpopo, PBI, Polemos - Napoleonic War, Polemos - Great Northern War, Price Of Glory, Rampant Colonialism, Rapid Fire, Red Baron, Renegade Legion, Rippers, Rugged Adventures, Rules Of Engagement, Saganami Island Tactical Simulator, Science vs Pluck, Seekreig, Six Gun Sound, Skank, Spearhead, Star Mogul, Star Trek, Star Wars (West End), Star Wars Miniatures, Starfleet Battles, Starguard, Starship Troopers, Supersystem, Tannhauser, Tooth And Claw, Triumph And Tragedy, TSA Colour Command Series, This Very Ground, Troops, Weapons & Tactics, Urban War, Valor & Steel & Flesh, Void, Volley & Bayonet, Vor: The Maelstrom, Warengine, Warrior Kings and finally Wings Of War.

So anything of note here? Take a look at the top ten from last years and this year. It is possible that a bit of WWII fatigue is setting in, as more and more weird wars games come out. The addition of Apocalypse to the 40K line may have helped to give it a bit of a bump as well. Although DBA dropped in the overall ranking list - the percentage stayed fairly close to the same as last years.

Is there anything else relating to wargames and miniatures that you would like to offer?

A large portion of the comments which were given were targeted towards the survey itself, however there were a few common comments for the industry:

1. Don't abandon unpainted miniatures. Prepaints may be nice for some gamers, however many like to paint as much if not more than the like to game.
2. More industry support for gamers outside of conventions. A magazine would be nice. Many people do not have easy access to game stores, and conventions are fairly limited and can get costly. [Note: there are several magazines already, however many are very focused or do not have very good distribution.]

And a final comment that I think was very well said:

"For all the glorious miniatures and painting skill shown and all the stunning terrain and buildings it is still the camaraderie and leveling of the classes that brings me back again and again to the gaming table. Where else would a high price lawyer, a Madison Street executive, the guy who imports a brand of expensive foreign cars playing with a high school teacher, a warehouseman and a factory worker with no class barriers? I have friends older than most gaming products and remember 25 cent figures but my friends from the beginning are still friends now."

What scale miniatures do you most often use for roleplaying games?

Like a most of the scale questions, this question suffered from an incorrect entry on my part which caused the broad scale category of 25-54 mm. In the follow up questionnaire, I clarified this with the respondents and 98% of them said they use 28-32 mm miniatures for RPGs. The remainder use a mix of larger scales like Clix miniatures and 40 mm miniatures.

What things do you normally represent in miniature for RPGs?

In addition to the selectable options, write in answers were accepted for this question. For the most part, the others options included treasure, furniture and other small scenic bits and pieces.

How many miniatures do you normally use when playing RPGs?

This question showed some of the most dramatic changes from last years responses and the number of roleplayers remained close to the same percentage as last years. It is possible that this reflects a change in the games being played. There was a jump in modern and sci-fi games from last year and this area isn't very well represented in terms of miniatures for roleplaying. Also with the more modern genres of roleplaying games, you normally do not have hordes of goblins and skeletons for players to confront.

What RPGs do you currently use miniatures with?

In addition to the selectable options, write in answers were accepted for this question. The results were the following:
Call of Cthulhu (2.65%), Castles & Crusades (1.32%), CyberPunk 2020(1.32%), Deadlands (1.32%), GURPS (6.62%), Heavy Gear (1.32%), Lord of the Rings (1.32%), Rolemaster (1.99%), RuneQuest (2.65%), Serenity (1.32%), Shadowrun (1.32%), Star Frontiers (1.32%), Star Wars (6.62%), Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (4.64%).

The following games were also mentioned, however they had less than one percent of the vote:
Adventure!, Ars Magica, Astounding Tales!, BESM, Chaos in Carpathia, Chaosium's Basic Roleplaying RPG, Chivalry & Sorcery, ETC, Cthulhutech, Dark Heresy, Earthdawn, FUDGE, Gear Krieg, Harn, Heroquest, Hollow Earth Expidition, Legend of the 5 Rings, MERP, Marvel SAGA, Mech Warrior, Midnight, Mutant Chronicles, Mutants and Masterminds, Nobilis, Paranoia, Ptolus, Rippers, Runebearer, Sovereign Stone, Spacemaster, Star Trek, True 20, Twilight 2000, Witch Hunter.

Do you use terrain or scenery with your miniatures (either for display or gaming).

Do you build all your own scenery or do you purchase it?

What type of terrain items do you tend to purchase most often?

Terrain cloths were the most popular other response. Roads, rivers and other water features rounded out the responses. It is important to note that many of the follow up questions showed that many respondents considered rivers and water features to be part of the Rocks and other natural features category.

Do you buy building materials to make terrain/scenery crafting easier? Example: Pillars, Molds, Tree Armatures.

What types of materials do you find to be most useful?

The other comments mainly referenced specific materials, however there were a number of requests for better tools.

What type of trees do you most often use?

Results for other mostly focused on specific brands of trees versus actual styles of trees. One of the more commonly mentioned brands being Woodland Scenics trees.

On a scale of 1-5, where 1 is the worst and 5 is the best - rate the following materials commonly used for terrain.

Would you like to add any additional information regarding scenics and terrain?

Another essay style question. This didn't receive nearly as much attention as other questions, most people had comments which related directly towards this survey. One thing of note here though, several respondents never buy material specifically for terrain and use found objects and other scrap for making terrain with.

Do you play board games as well?

What type of board games do you most often play?

Probably the most open ended question I have ever asked in a survey. Not surprisingly, strategy games like Axis and Allies and RISK ranked quite highly in the responses here. Nearly two thirds of all respondents included a game like those in their response. Other than those, it was a fair mix of your standard board games. Monopoly took top honors of being mentioned the most of any single game (over 50% stated Monopoly specifically). Many of the games (about 20%) were computer games that migrated to the table top (Age of Empires for example).

Do you play computer games?

What computer games do you currently play?

This question was left largely open ended due to the large number of computer games currently on the market as well as ones which have been sold in recent and not so recent times. With over 1300 responses, most of which have multiple games listed - this is a condensed version of the list:

The general break down of the categories I used does not necessarily correlate with computer game industry standards. Games like Grand Theft Auto are grouped with games like Planescape Torment. The reason for this is that going into a very detailed breakdown isn't too terribly relevant to the survey as a whole.

One of the more interesting aspects of this question is that a large portion of the games mentioned (over 50%) are old games as opposed to newer games with a lot of additional flash. In large part the newer games being played are multiplayer games which offer online play.

Is there anything else that hasn't been covered that you think would be useful to game developers and miniature manufacturers to know. Feel free to mention lines and genres that are not currently covered or are overlooked.

The answers for this section are not easily made into a form which is rateable, however I have worked through the answers (over 370 short essays) and boiled them down to the following points.

• More Modern/Near Future miniatures. They are popular in RPG and skirmish games, but other than military they are unrepresented
• More Post Apocalyptic games with cars in the 28 mm range (Mad Max style).
• More Pulp and Victorian Sci-Fi miniatures.
• More flexible game systems that allow for custom army designing.
• Better layed out websites. Use pictures, both painted and unpainted. If you use painted pictures though, make sure they are painted well.
• More Alternate History (beyond weird war/traditional pulp).
• Don't abandon painters in favor of prepaints. Keep selling unpainted versions.
• More scenery and flavors items. Civilians, refugees, livestock (both alive and dead), battlefield debris... All eras and scales.
• Finish a range when you start it. Many people have half armies because they purchase a new line and it never gets completed.
• More sports related miniatures. Rollerball, Blood Bowl as well as regular games like Soccer and American Football.
• Play test rules more. People get annoyed when they buy a book and then have to print off another several pages of corrections and updates.
• More games which have rules for both campaign level gaming as well as tactical level gaming.
• Mass combat modern/near future rules.
• Choose a scale and stick with it. Some companies have scale variations within a single line of miniatures.
• Larger selection of scenic components and better distribution of those products.
• More ability to buy individual figures as opposed to sets. Often consumers are forced to buy miniatures they don't want in order to get a unit of miniatures they do want.
• More Weird Wars and Pulp Weird Wild West.
• More attention to horses. Many horses are posed in a very static and boring pose (horse artillery being a major offender).
• More attention to converters and the ability to buy parts separately (weapons, heads and other items).
• Easily stored terrain and buildings (collapsible if possible). Paper models are good, but they do not tend to be as durable as other things.

Many of the responses to this question were clarifications to early questions (everything from differing educational systems, to civil unions for marriage). For the purpose of clarity, I have omitted these responses from the summary as they are of little interest to anyone but myself.

Other answers which were left out of the mix were opposing arguments. Some respondents claim that prepainted miniatures and terrain are the future and all others should be abandoned. Others state they will never buy prepaints. Along the same vein are issues related to costs of the hobby. Some say that the price isn't an object and happily pay for the miniatures. Others lament the day of miniatures costing under a dollar each.

Any responses that are directly tied to a specific scale/game system are condensed into broader groups. If you are a manufacturer who would like more information in regards to specific genres, eras or scales you can contact me for that information.

Would you like to be contacted for follow up questions regarding this survey?

The final question of the survey was to allow users to opt in for follow up questions and communication. 60.37% of users elected to provide their contact information for this purpose and I used that information to clarify various issues related to questions in this survey as well as to ask several additional questions which are not directly related to this survey.