Black plastic HQ minis

[lucapaschi]

No, I'll take a photo when I can comparing the different types of minis, pretty sure it will be easy to see it's not homemade stuff, but they'll all show similar casting features.
Black was never used: even Morcar or Ogre minis are blueish, not pitch black like these. So yeah, it's a mystery: I just think they're cool, pricey or not. It also allowed me to have an actual Ogre horde at my disposal (found 11 in total), so that's fine for me!

The only variant I've seen for those expansions is the female barbarian sword (round or pointy edge). The color is pretty consistent through all the boxes I've seen (6/8 barbarians and 4/5 elves), maybe even more so than the EU conuterparts.

Yes, they are all "american" in that sense: while the other minis have EU bases, they most likely come from the same place (so Barbarian&Elf molds), and all those I've seen were based in the US, so they must have been cast there!

[Kurgan]

Yeah. And the Mercenaries/Men-at-Arms and Ogres are Gamesworkshop Citadel miniatures... while the rest (Giant Wolves, Elven Warriors/Archers/Archmage, Polar Warbears, Ice Gremlins, Frozen Horror, Yeti, female Barbarian/Elf) are not... or am I wrong about that?

The black plastic reminds me of the little guns/accessories for Kenner Star Wars figures ('77-'85)... most of them weren't originally cast in black but many bootlegs exist (apparently using the same molds and same type of plastic).

The plastic seems very common, it's the same stuff used in most board game pieces of the period, including the black pieces in common chess or checkers sets.

[Cael Darkhollow]

the black minis are an uncommon but not rare "prototype" plastic color variants from Milton Bradley in North America (and at least Against the Ogre Horde, Wizards of Morcar boxes, possibly others?) several Battlemasters games (also MB and partnered with Citadel and GW) have also turned up with black instead of green or gray figures too. Seems black plastic figure variants are more common in BattleMasters than HeroQuest though.

I own multiple sets of both games and many duplicates of all the expansions so I have seen all kinds of plastic color variants over the years. I have probably a few hundred Milton Bradley game HQ/BM figures total with just a few dozen in black plastic.

some plastic color variants I have seen or own
two different red shades: "candy" semi-translucent red or matte brick red for HeroQuest heroes, HQ mercenaries, and Battlemasters Imperial archers, cannon & crew, and crossbowmen

four green shades or same figures normally green in black: olive drab green, forest green, dark green, "candy" semi-transparent green, and black for HeroQuest goblins, orcs, fimir, and Battlemasters orcs, Goblins and hedges.

Light gray, dark gray, rarely in darker blueish gray and black for HQ Chaos Warriors, HQ mercenaries, and BM Chaos Champion knights and BM Chaos Warriors and Chaos Archers.
I've seen the HQ furniture, BM halberdiers/men-at-arms, Imperial Lord Knights and BM tower in both common light/dark grays but not blue gray or black.

Dark deep brown or chocolate brown for HQ rats and furniture parts.

Black or dark purple for HQ ogres(atoh), Wizards of Morcar figures, BM ogre chieftain, BM Chaos Lord Knights and horses and BM chaos beastmen.

Cream white, ivory white or yellowed white HQ skeletons, mummies and Zombies.

Red, yellow, blue and brown BM knight horses.

HQ mercenaries in brick red, "candy" translucent red, light gray, darker gray and black.

Ogres in dark nearly black blue, light blue, black, dark purple, and brick red.

I have never seen any color variants of the light blue plastic used for the elf quest/Barbarian quest exclusives such as the Frozen Horror, wolves, elf warriors/archers, female elf, ice gremlins, polar war bears or female barbarian; just the ogres (which are the same mold as one of the atoh ogres.)
Both of the Barbarian Quest Packs and both of the elf quest packs I own are all light blue, While the ATOH expansions Ogres I have come in multiple colors.

Very early in the old eBay days of yore I collected multiple HeroQuest and Battlemasters games or expansions for parts as I was disgruntled with the rising cost of GamesWorkshop Warhammer plastic or metal minis, so it was a cheap (back then! $25-50) alternative to build up multiple Warhammer armies because each game (usually missing a few parts) still came with dozens of plastic figures. Much cheaper than the 10 or even just 5 plastic figures per box GamesWorkshop was selling during the same time period. I bought them whenever I had extra money as they were commonly up for sale cheap. No one was piecing out games for individual part sales then at exorbitant prices, incomplete games were just considered unplayable garbage or to Frankenstein a few together to complete a set or replace broken and missing components. I bought MB/GW games on eBay from U.S., Canada, and the UK.
My Orc, Goblin, Empire, Beastmen, Chaos Warrior, Undead, wood elf, dwarf, skaven, and Ogre Kingdom armies all have Milton Bradley HeroQuest or MB Battlemasters figures in them, not to mention Warhammer Quest, Advanced HeroQuest and DarkWorld figures as well to go with the actual Warhammer figures.
I've been collecting for decades always grabbing thrift store or yard sale HQ/BM finds as well as online.

I noticed the plastic color differences right away after I bought more HeroQuest or Battlemasters spare complete sets to go with my cherished originals I have had since I was a teen, or extra incomplete game boxes for conversions to Warhammer.

I suspect the black variant mercenaries are only from Wizards of Morcar sets where they are usually red and come with blue wizards, but sometimes all the figure come in black.
The HeroQuest advanced quest edition mercs are brick red or candy red and the Barbarian Quest Pack mercs are dark gray or light gray.

The early runs of HQ base game and Kellar's Keep seem to only source of occasional uncommon black or dark green HQ goblins, orcs or fimir. While dark green or black BM figures such as orcs, goblibs, chaos warriors and beastmen are much more common.

[Cael Darkhollow]

Europe expansions boxes I have say contents from more than one country. Colour and contents may vary from those illustrated.
(very true)

while the U.S. expansions boxes say color of parts may vary. Ironically the U.S. games are much more consistent in color from set to set than the European games.

Seems like Against the Ogre Horde and Wizards of Morcar have the most European variation, while the base game and Kellar's Keep are the source of the color variants in the U.S.
I've never seen a black gargoyle, or chaos warlock (sorcerer) from the base game, not sure they exist.

the list of black plastic Milton Bradley game figures as far as I know:
black HQ Chaos Warriors
black HQ fimir
black HQ goblins
black HQ orcs
black HQ ogres
black HQ mercenaries
black HQ wizards of Morcar

black BM Chaos Lord Knights (and horses)
black BM Chaos Warriors
black BM Chaos Archers
black BM Chaos Beastmen
black BM Chaos Ogre Champion
black BM Orcs
black BM goblins
black BM goblin wolf riders

really dark purple, dark green, and dark blue figures exist as well and can appear black even in hand (and certainly in photos) only close scrutiny or side by side comparison with a truly black plastic figure can distinguish them easily.

[Kurgan]

I don't have the BM figures, but I've seen enough to know that the sculpts are quite different from the HQ ones (the Ogre and the Imperial soldiers come the closest but have noticeable differences and in the Ogre, a rather large scale difference!).... plus they all have those tabs to insert into group bases with the slot in the bottom.

I've seen pictures of black Gargoyles and Chaos Warriors as well, but again, hard to tell from photos if they're truly black plastic or painted (primed, not everybody uses gray or white for a base coat).

I've seen red versions of Ogre Champions too (mohawk head, axe arm, spike fist... not just basic body).

I've seen the Battlemasters Ogre in dark blue.

The pics of the Wizards of Morcar on the Inn "miniatures" pages look black, but it could be the lightning. Everywhere else they're midnight blue/dark blue (darker than the Ogres).

I've seen a bright blue version of the Frozen Horror miniatures (could be lightning) while on the box and in all other pics they appear as the pastel blue.

The pics look too detailed to be resin 3d prints, but as usual, lightning or paint could be involved in some of them for all I know...

I did get a batch of Chaos Warriors once where one of them was black, but turned out to be just a layer of primer.


These are all going by online photos, mind you. I have some EU undeads that are white, and some black Mercenary scouts, the rest of my figures are all the "standard" colors for NA (dark red heroes, dark green "greenskins," yellowish undead, medium gray specials...) plus one medium red Ogre Warrior from ATOH.


Black can be generic, but I think sometimes it looks really cool, like when I did my Reaper Bones replacements for the expansion characters, I painted the "Wizards of Morcar" alternates in gloss black.

[Cael Darkhollow]

yes the Battlemasters figures are not the same exact sculpts as HeroQuest, but are the same basic style, made by the same companies (Milton Bradley and Games Workshop with Citadel Miniatures), set in the same Warhammer Old World setting. Completely compatible besides the figure bases issue.
Many people use BM figures for homebrew HQ expansions; armored orcs, different goblins and Chaos Warriors, mounted figures, Empire army archers, halberdiers, etc.
The BM Ogre Champion is significantly larger than an HQ ogre, but that is why he's the champ! Fits a similar size range as a 6'5" tall human body builder next to a 5'7" average human. In the Warhammer figures range, the standard ogre troop is no where near as large as their general ogre figure either.

Darkworld boardgames although not made by Milton Bradley or Games Workshop, have nearly identical style figures as well (intentionally copied style or perhaps even same sculptor) that are very HQ compatible as well, but their ogres have muscular torsos instead of potbellied.

I personally have black wizards of Morcar sorcerers and black orcs, fimir and goblins (but not mercenaries) and black ogres as well as dark blue, dark purple, light blue and brick red ogres. I also have some dark green nearly black HQ greenskins from a Kellar's Keep, very different from the standard dark forest green North American HQ greenskin plastic.

I have many more black BM figures that are usually dark purple, gray or green plastic respectively. Black plastic variants are more common in BM it seems.

I find that the "candy" semi translucent green and "candy" red Milton Bradley game figures are the most fragile. most of my broken weapon figures are in that weaker more brittle plastic.

as far as I can tell all the black plastic variants are authentic vintage figures from the 90's. Mine certainly are as I have owned several of them since then (original owner) or purchased them in sets from early 2000's long before knock offs, reprod, etc. hit the market.

So far I have not seen any 3d printer or remolded figures that could fool someone or pass as an original, but it certainly would be possible with today's technology and know-how. Repro toy plastic weapons for He-Man or StarWars for example are identical quality to the originals and very hard to spot.

I would be very curious to see if the original HQ molds exist, and are still production worthy, I would be commissioning orders!

[Kurgan]

Collecting history yo

That is very cool information and I think its really awesome that you have a "Hero Quest canon" Warhammer army (or armies, perhaps).

Can you post some pics of the different variants? I've seen a few pics of "candy" colored figures on etsy but I always assumed they were bootlegs or fan-made creations. The brittleness would explain why they weren't used more.

I almost imaged they were made of that other type of common toy plastic from the era, I'm not sure what it was called, but most toys I had growing up were either the "board game" (or model kit) type plastic that "tinks" when you clank them together or tap with your fingernail... and the other type that has some bend to it that is more like hardened crayon wax (you can scratch it really hard with your nails and create impressions in it or flake off bits but it can survive all kinds of abuse compared to the other type which will get white stress marks and snap if you bend it but resists scratches a lot better). This latter plastic often was done with accessories (weapons and things) or for toys meant for younger kids like dinosaurs or army men. There was another plastic type used for accessories, a kind of hard rubber -- not sure if it was vinyl because it had a totally different feel to the vinyl dinosaur toys (might have been the same plastic used for the limbs of star wars figures), but mostly it was those other two for the toys we had in the 80's. Obviously I'm no chemist or scientist. I've heard terms like polymer resin and PVC thrown around but I couldn't begin to categorize.

Back to your collection... I'm especially interested in the dark purple and other variations of the Ogres and WOM. Those would be cool to see.

Thanks for sharing your experiences and history. However did you find them all and do we know where the other colors come from, if the black were indeed "prototypes" (plastic, as opposed to the metal ones everybody knows about that appeared in early adverts).

The only miniatures I've ever modified along these lines would be some Warhammer fantasy Skaven that I shaved the "bottom tab" off of in order to glue to Zealot miniature bases. I'd hate to mess up a rare figure someone needed to complete their set, even if we do have 3d printing these days (I realize you could just cement a figure into a slotted base even without the tab, though it wouldn't quite be as secure).

Neat solution. I'd love to see a gallery of the variants.

[Kurgan]

The Mercenaries (supposedly from a German "Wizards of Morcar" set on Ebay) I ordered are blood red, different from the NA Heroes and even the red Ogre Warrior.

[lucapaschi]

Got the new weapons lot and took some photos comparing to the Barbarian weapons... it seems to me the detail and subtle lines are too good to be bootlegs/recasts or fake. They even have sprues bits left, so it really seems they came from the MatA sprue as we know it from WoM or the Barbarian set, and were not made one by one.



Anyways, I kept 6 of each and have some left (crossbows, longsword and halberds): so if there's anyone who would like to have some, let me know!

[Kurgan]

Yeah. I compared the blood red Mercs to the black Mercs and they look exactly the same, down to the lines and imperfections, detail, etc. I agree, they seem to be from the same molds in any case.