My first three rares were all USS Iowas... I bought two (original) starter sets and one booster and they all had the same rare.
I remember going up to the guy behind the counter at Gator Games and complaining that the box said "random" but that in my two starters 8 of the 9 ships were identical.
I am working on basing all my major nation units on Reachers bases. Major units get sisters, and subs/DD/air/MTB get 4 of each class. Taking up 9 tackle boxes and a dozen Plano trays thus far. Easily have a couple hundred Shapeways planes alone.
Most of my collection comes from two guys. My painter bretwhite was selling off his painted Shapeways and WOTC collection, so I snag it for a deal. $300. And a lot of early War at Sea and Task Force pieces from Judge (I forgot part of his username) for like $200.
I don't have every single miniature despite what some people believe. My first fleet carrier with nice little black dent in the front was Akagi.
Erwin Rommel - "Give me American supply lines, British planes, German officers and Canadian troops, and I can take over the world".
My biggest want is a Kaga to pair with my Soryu. Unfortunately I'm unwilling to lay out $75 for a plastic model on Ebay. Guess I will have to mine Goodwill for awhile.
I didn't realize I had a full set and searched for what I thought was a missing unit for over a month. Wikipedia lists the Seafire as a Fleet Command Unit and for obvious reasons I couldn't find one. The search for that actually led me here where I found out about the team decks. I'm still in the process of getting minis for all the team deck cards.
USS Massachusetts was the hardest for me to get. Won it off eBay, then the seller’s account rejected my payment twice (both after I already had the piece on hand)!
The Dutch sub is easily another British T class. The Witte De Witt is either 1 of the 7 sisters or modded to make another DD. She is pretty “standard” looking.
Two of my favorite minis are the two I won from Weeds. The French CV Joffre and the USS Arkansas. First Rare pulls were the Warspite and the Yamato. Hardest to get I think was the original Bismarck. Paid what I thought was stupid money at the time. $19 I think. Got into painting the minis because I couldn't stand looking at some of the really bad paint jobs on a lot of the aircraft.
"Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?"