Salute Saturdays: Ax Faction

Another miniature company with stuff on display at Salute was Ax Faction.

This is their most recent piece, which is called the "Druid's Daughter". Girl riding giant armoured hare? Fair enough...

You will, as I post the various pictures I took, you may start to see a teensy bit of a theme to the models. Not that they are excellently sculpted, or well painted, but the choice of subjects.

In short, all but one of their sculpts include scantily clad women. Most of them with their breasts out. Their website (apart from turning on music every time you change page) claims that they produce "edgy & exquisite 32mm miniatures with brash styling and provocative design". Honestly, its just cheap and a quick way of selling miniatures, dressed up as 'edgy' - which it isn't. Tons of other miniature companies do it as well.

This sculpt shows that they are perfectly capable of making good miniatures without women trying to catch their death of cold. Personally, I don't find their figures offensive or make me feel excluded - but there will be women who do.

I've heard it asked before why more women aren't into the hobby. The answer is partially answered by this sort of thing. The fact that I am not offended is not the issue - and there will be women who aren't as well. That's not the point. What is important (if you care about seeing a better balance of people in the hobby) is to not dismiss someone else's upset or offence because you aren't - that is, essentially, blaming them and not the cause of the problem.

I don't have an easy answer to this - and I'm not sure there is one. But given I was posting the photos, I thought it would be good to mention that it pays to be self aware. Please, just take that moment to be thoughtful of someone else's feelings if they raise an issue. It will help a lot.