Something that really annoys me about manufacturers

Why does a manufacturer make an artillery piece of some type, anti-tank gun, mortar or anti-aircraft gun and then most of them do NOT make some sort of crew figures operating it along with an ammunition supply for it and in some cases a prime mover…(that would be 4 kits to sell)??? Just think of the diorama possibilities…
And while you are at it, make more infantry figures in combat poses along with command groups from all eras in action, instead of always sitting around or riding???

On the subject of manufacturers’ annoying behaviours (perhaps frustrating is nearer the mark) I was pondering today how on earth singer is them manage to make such obvious errors in their kits.
The new Airfix 1/35 Cromwell has only six wheel bolts per wheel instead of eight - any side view photo shows that this is wrong. I try to imagine the process they go through to get it wrong all the way to the mould being made, and I don’t really see how they do it.

On the subject of static figures, I was also noticing today how smaller scale wargaming figures of the Bolt Action type do look way more exciting than 1/35 figures in particular, even if they do have thosr strange physiques and faces. There do seem to be a lot of the standing staring types in 1/35 with the occasional pointing, but perhaps they are popular, and the exciting poses less so?

what annoy me is when airliner don’t have any stand, even when they’re big

Back in the 70’s and 80’s people complained about only having figures with action poses… now it is the other way around. “You can please some of the people…”

Everyone’s preferences and tastes are different. There are people that want figures and others that never build figures and think it a waste of money when they buy a kit with them. Many companies have released separate figure kits to keep the cost down for those that do not want them. Trumpeter has done a lot of crew kits for their artillery models, so anyone that wants an in action dio can buy both.

Dragon did a Flak 36/37 with figures and a Flak 36/37 without, but also had a separate figure kit of different figures for that…

Tristar did a Flak 38 on its own, a set of figures in action poses to go with it as well as a kit with Waffen SS figures pushing the Flak into place.

Then, why would you need action posed figures and ammunition, if you are going to have the gun being hauled by the tractor? Why do you need the tractor if the gun is going to be in action - unless you have a huge amount of space for the dio… as usually the tractor is moved once it is unloaded so it is a distance away from the gun when it is deployed or in action.

I recently built the AFV Club M40. It had no figures. It would have been nice to have some Korean War era figures in the kit, but they would probably have added WW2 ones anyway… Tamiya’s has figures…

In the end, we all have our particular choices and we just have to accept that we may not get everything we want, every time.

Personally I think it should be a mix of 50/50 action/relaxed poses. And I do think that a gun, its crew, its ammo and its prime mover should be separate kits to give the modeler a choice as to how they want to build/display it. But make no bones about it, gun crews for US and most Soviet/Russian guns are few and far between. The worst is the US guns that have hardly any crews or ammo supplies. The big German guns have very little too (the 17cm and 21cm guns had a bout a 15 man crew each, but at least Trumpy makes ammo for them, but no ammo containers for transport). And what about all the supporting tools and equipment like gunners quadrants, sighting gear and so forth that come with every gun and are probable carried on a prime move with the crew??? I just think we need both action and relaxed figures, not all one or the other.

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