We went live from the basement and did the most important serious business possible: talking paint like it’s a sport. The whole idea was “who’s winning the model paint wars?”—what ranges are actually dominating, why people buy what they buy, and how different the answer looks depending on whether you’re a new painter, a veteran, or a store that has more than one half-empty rack on the wall. From the shop perspective, the reality is the market is super competitive, but a lot of it comes down to accessibility, distribution, and what’s sitting in front of you when you’re just starting out. If we’re being honest, Citadel is still the giant because nobody has fully matched what Games Workshop offers the brand-new painter: curated systems, recipes, and a “paint it like the box” path that’s easy to follow. After that, we talked about the real fight—Army Painter being the next big wargaming pick, AK 3rd Gen being an absolute joy to use (especially if you already paint a lot), and Vallejo being the “silver-haired guy in the court” that’s incredibly strong but not very sexy in how it markets. We also talked about Pro Acryl feeling more boutique and still growing, and we called out a real casualty: Scale75, which had great paint but imploded hard due to mismanagement vibes and the Kickstarter death-spiral problem. Bottom line: there’s an equilibrium right now, and the punches are mostly new product categories—then everyone copycats the next year.